Longbows are no good

**Kobal2fr** · 12-08-2006, 23:34

Originally Posted by Carl

My biggest reason for being a touch disbelieving of the test mentioned is the fact that the English DID use Longbows extensively prior to gunpowder, and apparently won often, yet the enemy would often have been wearing plate, so it has to have been useful against it or they would have switched to crossbows.

Of course it's usefull against plate, but not the way you think. It did break through mail, but it never did "punch right through" plate, bodkin or no bodkin.

The crossbow had supplanted the bow in the first place because it surpassed it in practicality (easier to use, can be carried loaded) and most importantly range (except in the specific case of the longbow), even though it lost in firing rate. But when you can outshoot the enemy, and/or carry a pavise, speed doesn't really matter. Range is what it was all about, not killing power.

The advantage the longbow had over the crossbow wasn't in killing power either, but in sheer volume of fire. If you fire 10 arrows per minute, even if most of them are wasted you're statistically bound to hit something vulnerable overtime, like armor joints, helmet slits, horses and so on. Spray and pray, if you will.

The reason the English stuck to their longbows for so long was simply because *they* had men available who had trained enough in bowyery and who could handle bows huge enough that their range was roughly equal to that of the crossbow (a little more, a little less, it doesn't really matter), while firing faster. The other nations did not, nor did they care to train their folk for years and years when two weeks and a crossbow was good 'nuff.

But in any case, the reason why longbows garnered such fame for their efficacity in battle doesn't have anything to do with the weapon's qualities.
It is because the English pioneered the tactical use of missile troops as the battle winning, "kill" units.

The other western kingdoms considered missiles mainly as harrying tools (force the enemy to move), and siege tools (keep the enemy away from the walls, be he sieger or siegee). The knights were the "kill unit", both out of social structure and past experience. But the English had realized in their battles against the Scots that knights could be beaten by "clever rabble", in contradiction to prevalent assumption, and had the ingeniosity to turn to their own missile rabble as their main strength, in much bigger numbers than their enemies did.

It's not really that English longbowmen were superior to French crossbowmen : there were more of them, and they were used in a completely different tactical role.

Going back to the longbow vs crossbow debate itself, I think things are modelled accurately in the game :

- terrain and situation aside, crossbows will beat regular archers because they can get a couple solid volleys in before the archers can even get in range, and if you micromanage your Xbows, archers won't even have a chance to fire. But longbows will destroy un-pavised crossbows through their rate of fire.

- Longbows are better than crossbows, pavise or not, at killing things in a timely fashion. Crossbows will kill just as many soldiers as longbows in the end, but it will take them much, much more time - kill about as many with each volley, much slower volleys. More volleys shot in a "tired" state too. XBows are perhaps firing a little bit too fast, I'll grant you that. And then again, that's iffy.

- And pavise win archer duels because that what pavises were about in the first place. Ride those jokers down, see how they like them apples.

**TheFluff** · 12-09-2006, 00:36

Correct me if im wrong, but isent the reason why "use fire" is avalible to arches and xbows is to make them more versitile and able to kill armor and conserve ammo for archery duels and seiges and fighting armoed/pavise units?

**PaulTa** · 12-09-2006, 00:48

I think what made the longbow a significant part of how we see medieval english armies today is not necessarily the quality of the bow, but the quantity. Archery training was as common as fast food in medieval england, and sunday was even a day dedicated to nothing but longbow training?

Side note- On the ringmail, the rings worked really well at stopping a slashing sword attack, but the rings were prone to not necessarily break apart, but part when something pierced instead of slashed. So against a sword cut, the ringmail was effective, but against a bodkin arrow? Not at all.

I think the solution for the English is to increase ROF for longbows. If you take it in a historical sense, a large portion of the english population were trained as opposed to able. In a game mechanics sense, the English are the retarded cousins of the French, who have everything the english have and then a whole bunch more (like an effective crossbow unit, better cannon selection, better cavalry, and better spear infantry, a good pike unit, and Scot's guards which are retinue longbowmen with armor plating... Not to mention horse archers.)

If English bowmen had a higher rate of fire, then an english army that was primarily made up of bowmen (which seems historically accurate) would give a french army a run for their money. This is what england needs in my opinion.

**Kobal2fr** · 12-09-2006, 02:14

Originally Posted by SMZ

I'd call that the worst type of mishap. Once again, just like you can protect powder from getting wet, oil your sword and sand your armor... if you had a composite bow in a damp area - you could prevent it from falling apart, as long as you took care of it. If they knew how to make the things, and had the materials, they would've.

Like Kraxis said, it's not just rain - it's atmosphere. The glues behaved differently in colder and damper climates just by *being there*. The problem is not really the thing falling apart overtime, but one piece of the complex composite "machine" not behaving correctly, changing physical properties which were essential to its working properly.
Rust you can whitle away, it's still hard steel underneath. If a steel sword melted in the desert heat, you'd have a decent analogy there.

lol... being killed with something does not translate into knowing how to make it. The U.S. had fun blowing up Afghanistan with the aid of "smart bombs".... why doesn't Afghanistan just build it's own?

The Magyars/Hungarians weren't killing Italians/Germans/French were they ? Nor were western cultures always at war with cultures which used composite bows either - prior to the Fourth Crusade they had good relations with Byzantium for example. The Venetians traded a fair bit with Eastern people too, and so on...

Besides, that example is just plain silly. When you kill a Hun, his bow doesn't explode does it ? And it's not exactly a product of cutting edge rocket science either. Over-time, everybody around the med started to copy Roman tech found on dead Romans, everybody learnt stuff from the foes they fought, why would composite bows be any different ?
Composite tech has litteraly been around since the dawn of times. It's absurd to think it was any kind of big, closely kept secret...

**dopp** · 12-09-2006, 02:34

3mm on the helmet, 2mm breastplate and 1mm everywhere else doesn't sound awful, in fact it's a little thin. You are maximising the armor on the surfaces that receive the incoming fire, which is really sensible and similar to how tank (and battleship) armor is distributed today. In fact, replica battle armor is often 1mm thicker on average, and tourney armor is unbelievably thick at around 4-5mm. Armor like that would weigh around 40-60lbs, considerably less than what a modern paratrooper would carry into battle. Furthermore, penetration alone is not a true gauge of a weapon's effectiveness. Even though the thinner breastplate was pierced a fair number of times (about 50%), the arrow did not penetrate deeply enough to cause a lethal or even disabling strike.

Placing a 3mm steel plate bought from a hardware shop and shooting stuff at it at 90-degree angles doesn't really test the bow's power. Your angle of impact is perfect and the flat plate does not offer the glancing surface that true armor would provide, which increases the effective thickness of the armor manifold.

The bow used was a replica based on weapons recovered from the Mary Rose, fired by some bloke borrowed from the Yeomanry and thus a little bit more skillful than the average college professor with his 30lb hunting bow. I do not recall the exact poundage, but I think it was 90lb-110lbs. A respectable test weapon, considering that there is some debate over the poundage of the Mary Rose bows and how representative they were of English longbows. Your 150-160lbs is a little generous, since most estimates range from 90 to 160lbs. This fascination with the uber longbowman who was able to draw 200lb bows sounds to be yet another manifestation of the "those were real men" attitude. Despite being a professional mercenary soldier (which in those days usually meant he was a criminal or a never-do-well, hardly the sort of material to produce uniformly elite soldiers) suffering from malnutrition and inadequate healthcare, the longbowman is still regularly depicted as handling bows too powerful for champion Olympic shooters, rigorously selected, well-fed and honed to athletic perfection, to even draw, and scoring hits on individual targets at three times the range.

**Gaius Terentius Varro** · 12-09-2006, 02:46

I actually wonder if pavise's shield bonus is applied differently from other unitsl (front/left hand side) while they are engaging in melee or just standing around and laughing at incoming arrows.

**Barry Fitzgerald** · 12-09-2006, 02:54

If you dig into the history books on longbows/crossbows...it is clear that there is some inbalance in the game.

The main advantage of the longbow was it's fast rate of fire..and range. Remember we are firing at massed units...showering arrows on an enemy with fast rate of fire will work..and did work. With regards plate armour...well not all plate is equal..apart from that there are areas not covered with plate..so a longbow whilst less effective than the crossbow...would do damage..in numbers. Agincourt proved this.

It is also incorrect to suggest that the English abandoned the crossbow 100%...they did not. Due to the heavy norman influence in warfare...in this period it is most certain that both units were fielded...in numbers..though with a preference for the trained longbowmen, after the welsh invasion (pembroke etc)

The plus for the crossbow is sheer power..able to penetrate armour..even good quality plate..with the disadvantage of a much slower rate of fire...and less range than the longbow.

Back to the game...well longbows rate of fire doesnt reflect what was reality..by some margin...some suggest that a rate of fire from 15-20 volleys a minute..is reasonable. Remember these were highly trained soldiers...specific skills in bowmanship.

A normal crossbow rate of fire would be 3/4 volleys a minute...with teams for reloading (as used by Richard the Lionheart) ROF could be double that...but still outclassed by the longbow.

Damage wise the crossbow is champ..
Range ROF wise Longbow has the edge

Some balancing needs to be done here...

**cassiusdio** · 12-09-2006, 02:56

Knights may have been well protected, protected to such an extent that being killed by an arrow was more down to the archers luck than a certainty. What is often overlooked is that the majority of soldiers were not knights, and were not protected to the same degree.

A feudal Levy dictated that a knight answer a call to battle and bring along a certain number of men at arms. these soldiers were maintained at his expense and were always availiable. since a suit of good quality plate armour was very expensive, he would equip his men either with older armour, or with armour of a lesser quality.

so in battle, a unit of 'knights' on foot or horseback, would have been made up of a number of well armoured knights, and their more numerous, and not so well armoured men at arms. Arrows were far more likely to kill the men at arms than the knights, which is why so many knights were captured by the english, the men at arms generally had arrows sticking out of them.

as to the claim that longbows are no good IG. well i feel i must disagree, i am of the oppinion that one should maximise your strengths, and the english ability to field longbows is one of them, so instead of having a fairly conventional 3-4 units of them, i take 10-12. in that quantity they are quite, quite lethal, certainly lethal enough that my fairly outnumbered heavy infantry can adequately deal with any enemy that get through, and they have the added advantage that you can make your battle line fairly horse proof

regards

**Gaius Terentius Varro** · 12-09-2006, 03:09

Wouldn't the trajectory play a role here?

**Barry Fitzgerald** · 12-09-2006, 03:14

Nah longbows are not good in the game...reasons being..

Range is not long enough
Rate of fire is too slow (not at all like they were)
No. of arrows/ammo is too low...least 50+ is needed (for al bowmen)

Even taking into account the problems in the game..and of course less effective against plate armour..(compare to crossbows)..

Simply put you were getting shots in and much more of them...well before the enemy can wield his crossbows normal archers to bear on your forces. That is why...and the only reason why they worked so well.

Not to suggest crossbows are useless...far from it...you simply need to engage faster..and if we look at why crossbowmen became armoured..well the reason is above.

Needs fixing

**CBR** · 12-09-2006, 04:04

The main advantage of a composite bow is that the use of tendons and bone means you can have a lighter bow compared to a selfbow of equal draw weight. It also means a shorter bow which is easier to use on horse back.

A lighter bow means an arrow will be sent off at a higher velocity, as it represents a higher proportion of the combined arrow/bow limbs/string weight that are all moving forward when letting it loose.

Fast arrows are great for horse archers shooting at other horse archers racing back and forth at shorter ranges. The faster the arrow the easier it is to hit a moving target.

But overall a self bow and a composite bow is near identical when it comes to potiential power: a 100 pound composite drawn to the ear would be the same a 100 pound longbow also drawn to the ear. The longbowman would just need a heavier arrow to get the same power: say 70 grams compared to 40 grams for the compostite bow.

The lighter arrow would have better max range because of its higher velocity but also have lesser power at that range (lighter arrow means worse ballistic coefficient) and long range shooting in general doesnt do much anyway.

IIRC some Italian city states had composite bows in their navies in late 15th century, of course along with arquebus and crossbows. The construction was certainly not a secret to European countries as they afterall used composite crossbows. But as a weapon for the masses there was not much point in having composite bows as they were more expensive and didnt give any significant advantages for a foot archer.

Originally Posted by SMZ

You don't need special physics. Normal ones will suffice.

When shooting at max range you need an angle of about 45 degrees. When the missile has reached halfway(actually bit more than that) it has reached its maximum height and will start falling down. It doesnt do that because it has expended all its energy, but because gravitational acceleration has picked up enough speed to counter the missile's upward speed. When it finally reaches its target only a small part of its velocity has come from gravity.

Arrows might be more slender than a bolt but there are few more elements to consider. Sectional density (total mass/frontal area) is important. The shape and fletchings produces drag too. A crossbow bolt is AFAIK considered to have a better ballistic coefficient than arrows but I think they are still very close to each other.

The heavier crossbows had a higher max range than longbows anyway: tests with a 150 pound longbow using a 86 gram heavy bodkin arrow gave a max range of about 250-260 yards. A 1200 pound crossbow with a bolt of similar weight had a range of about 450 yards. Another crossbow of perhaps 800 pounds had a max range of 380 yards. A more ordinary crossbow, using belt and hook to load, would perhaps be 3-400 pounds and I guess a range of 250-300 yards yards would not be too far off. Lighter flight arrows from that longbow would of course produce better max ranges of 350-400 yards but the lighter they are the less energy(penetration) they have

CBR

**Grifman** · 12-09-2006, 06:33

Originally Posted by dopp

While longbowmen were mostly experienced soldiers, crossbowmen also boasted elite mercenary bands. Why would they be any worse? If the crossbow was easier to learn to fire, they might even be better. There would certainly be more of them. Mastery of a more difficult weapon does not automatically make you a better warrior than those who master easier weapons. It would depend on the potential effectiveness of the weapons in question. If your chosen weapon is merely on par or inferior to easier weapons, you might even be a bit of a retard to have wasted all your time on it...

The problem is that history is against your analysis. English longbowmen consistently shot up the mercenary xbowmen hired by the French. The longbow had a higher rate of fire that the xbowmen just could not match.

**Grifman** · 12-09-2006, 06:41

Originally Posted by Mega Dux Bob

As for being the uber weapon of doom the later battles in the 100 years war make it very clear that if the longbowmen couldn't set their stakes they were meat on the table for the French mounted men-at-arms. At one battle (Vernuil, I think) the French had hired Italian mercenaries in the latest plate armor and the longbow was absolutely useless against it. That is retinue longbows verses gothic knights in game terms.

According to wiki the only thing the Italian knights charged was the English baggage train. Not much of a contest there, I think. From what I've read, the French were only able to defeat the English bowmen if they could get at them while they were unprepared - they did defeat them in a couple of battles when they caught them wrongfooted. But if they were set up and staked out, the French usually failed.

**dopp** · 12-09-2006, 07:52

Basic tactics would say that ANY force in a strong defensive formation, set up and staked out, would have an advantage, all things being equal. It only proves that the English were able to get the French to attack them more often, not that the English archers were especially invincible. They may well have been, but their success in fixed positions alone does not prove it.

The problem is that history is against your analysis as well, since there are only a handful of battles where the English shot up crossbowmen. Crecy, where the Genoese had left their pavises behind and got run over halfway by impatient knights, is the only notable example, and not a very good one at that. At other battles, such as Agincourt, the crossbowmen never got to fire at all. It was the English being on the defensive that gave them the advantage in those battles. The crossbowmen were thrown forward hastily to "prepare" the way for a cavalry or infantry attack with a few brief volleys of bolts, found themselves fighting an archery duel for which they were unprepared (having left their pavises behind), and run over or pushed aside by the "real" fighting men who wanted to get on with things. Things would have been more even if both sides had come intending to fight an archery duel. Yes, I know that crossbows fire slower than longbows, even with separate loaders. That's why you pay someone to carry a big wooden board in front of you or wear it on your back. It doesn't matter how fast the other guy can fire or how accurately (shoot really, you can only 'fire' a gun) if he only hits your shield. Unless you believe that bodkins pierce thick pavises too?

Actually, I wouldn't be surprised if longbowmen also used pavises too when facing enemy archers. In their case it would be held by someone else and raised to cover them when the enemy volley arrived (you can see it coming). The OP's issue was that pavise crossbowmen are protected against longbowmen but not vice versa, which is why longbows are at a disadvantage in archery duels. But making them more uber as a means of overcoming just one type of unit unbalances them against everyone else. Maybe the English need to bring Pavise Crossbowmen too to "tank" the hits while the rest of the longbows DPS. After all, the pavise in M2TW is not completely immune to arrow fire like it should have been IRL.

**SMZ** · 12-09-2006, 08:17

But as a weapon for the masses there was not much point in having composite bows as they were more expensive and didnt give any significant advantages for a foot archer.

Considering you just listed greater range, faster rate of fire as well as lighter and less cumbersome weapon... it seems rather odd to conclude by saying that there were no significant advantages.

A 9 foot spear may be "only" 1 foot longer than an 8 foot spear... but to the two guys trying to poke one another with them, I'm pretty sure they'll consider that difference a little more important than an item of academic debate.

**CaptainSolo** · 12-09-2006, 09:46

I dont buy most of the opinions of the forum about the impotence of the Longbow.If it were true then the French armies must have been truly inept if on home soil with numerical advantage they couldnt,for the most part,defeat the primarily longbow dominated armies of the English during the early period of the hundred years war.
The simple fact is the longbow was a battle winning weapon for the English and one that changed the face of the traditional medieval battlefield forever.No longer were armoured knights the kings of the battlefield.

If the Longbow was as overated as some suggest then why:

Were they so sought after as mercenaries?

Why were the French prepared to cede one third of their territory to the English rather than face them in a large scale battle such as Crecy?

Why did the French King alter his tactics at the battle of Mauron and fight dismounted in three large colums?

Why did the numerically stronger French army allow the English to march with sight of Paris without engaging them? Wise it has to be said but much to the disgust of it's inhabitants.

Why did the French king allow hundreds of his people to starve to death,inside and out of the city,at the siege of Calais despite having marched to relieve them? Presumably they could have just waded in and slaughtered the overated and impotent longbowmen drawn up out side the city.

The list goes on and on and i havent even mentioned the psychological effects of being under a storm of arrows.I didn't think that would bother them as they would have all being wearing the highest quality platemail that everyone seems to think was so commonplace on the medieval battlefield at that time.

As for Agincourt,saying that adverse weather conditions,muddy fields etc etc etc were the sole reasons for the defeat is a bit like the French saying they lost at Waterloo because Napoleon had piles...No wait,hang on a sec,they did say that !!

Back on topic.....The fact that even regular crossbowmen can compete with quality longbowmen in game shows me that some balancing needs to be done.I'm all for nerfing the longbow in favour of game balance but please don't confuse that with reality.

**CaptainSolo** · 12-09-2006, 10:49

Originally Posted by Kobal2fr

The crossbow had supplanted the bow in the first place because it surpassed it in practicality (easier to use, can be carried loaded) and most importantly range (except in the specific case of the longbow), even though it lost in firing rate. But when you can outshoot the enemy, and/or carry a pavise, speed doesn't really matter. Range is what it was all about, not killing power.

Firearms supplanted the longbow and other ranged weapons due to practicality but it dosent mean they were better weapons.The British Baker rifle used in the Peninsular war outranged the musket.The Musket had more killing power due to their numbers and volley fire when in optimun range.Killing power is what it's about at the end of the day.