Possible new weapon

**antisocialmunky** · 12-23-2009, 15:55

I just heard the standard history channel narrator and almost stopped watching. Then I saw that it was one of the old series that were pretty good.

I didn't see it in the part I watched but I'm assuming you're talking about the Belly Bow - Greek Crossbow? I think only Syracuse used it en'masse though there are a few samples of those and Roman torsion crossbows. However, I don't think it was ever widely adopted.

**Ludens** · 12-23-2009, 16:53

The Gastraphretes? I've heard about it before, but I am not sure how popular it was. AFAIK it was only used in Syracuse, and only for a short time. It was further developed into the ballista and similar siege weapons of EB's Hellenes and Romans, but the bow itself does not appear to have been a major weapon of war.

The team is rather short of modellers and there presumably still is a unit limit, so I think they are not interested in gimmick units. Unles you can show it was used extensively (or at all) in EB's time-frame.

**Hax** · 12-23-2009, 18:46

The Gastraphretes? I've heard about it before, but I am not sure how popular it was. AFAIK it was only used in Syracuse, and only for a short time.

Yes, it was indeed developed by King Dionysios II of Syrakousai to use against the Carthaginian invaders. It certainly existed, but I highly doubt that it would've been widespread nor used in great numbers (except in city defense, perhaps).

**Darius** · 12-24-2009, 05:37

While I love the vast amount of units that EB provides for recruitment, I'd personally prefer if the single province availability type units were kept to a bit more of a minimum. Yea they're usually great, but unless you're willing to go through the logistical nightmare that's necessary to keep your army supplied with reinforcements regularly for them, they usually only get used rarely if ever at all.

**antisocialmunky** · 12-24-2009, 06:12

I don't think the Greeks ever figured out a way to employ those things effectively outside of maybe sieges like its equally unique counter part in the Roman Hand Ballista. Nor do I know of any studies on the effectiveness of the Greek Crossbows.

A extremely OP version of them is present in XGM if you want to play with it.

**Watchman** · 12-29-2009, 13:01

AFAIK the main problem with the 'getes was that it A) was all kinds of heavy, cumbersome and inconvenient to use B) had a pretty ridiculous reloading time even by crossbow standards. Useful enough for siege firefights but thoroughly useless for field engagements, basically.