Need Bronze age help
How historically accurate are you trying to be? Why the Bronze Age specifically?
Some general thoughts about the Bronze Age:
- Dominant weapons are spear and bow. Long-bladed swords don't exist; swords are basically big daggers and used as sidearms only.
- The best armor is scale. Full plate will not be invented for 3,000 years.
- No books--these were not invented till the time of Rome. Papyrus scrolls and clay tablets are the order of the day.
- Metal is expensive. Deposits of copper and tin (the components of bronze) are not nearly as common as iron. Moreover, unless you happen to have a copper mine right next to a tin mine, you have to ship the copper to the tin or the tin to the copper before you can make bronze.
- If you want a "magic metal," an equivalent to mithral/adamantine, I suggest meteoritic iron. People were making things out of iron meteorites long, long before they figured out how to smelt terrestrial iron. The stuff is both insanely rare and lends itself to stories of mystical or divine origin.
- Depending on the period, warhorses may or may not be available. Cavalry was invented around the middle of the Bronze Age. Before that, it was chariots or walk.
- Each major city is likely to have its own patron god.
well the reason that I am doing it is that I am trying to have an equipment list per tech level. I've got most of the tech levels worked out but I messed up on the Bronze Age and I have to do it again. I am trying to set up my game system so that a GM can run historical games/ fantasy games/time travel games/etc. in my system. They could also have an alien planet at the Bronze Age. The starting point however is Earth's Bronze Age. I am trying to have a weapon list and a basic equipment list in a period appropriate monetary system. Then I will work up some character archetypes and maybe some mythological creatures for it. I'm going to come back and work on suggested campaigns later.
Check out my web site for more stuff on the system!
Check out my web site for more stuff on the system!
It's worth noting that Homer's Greeks (Achaeans, to be more correct) are Bronze Age. The classical Greeks are iron age.
Anyway, a lot of equipment would be around, though not all in the same place.
Weapons:
Spear, short spear, long spear, pike, javelin, darts.
Dagger, Short sword, kopesh, broadsword.
Hand axe, battle axe, (Chinese) dagger-axe
Mace, two-handed mace
Halberd (Chinese long dagger-axe), glaive (central asian).
Bow, Composite bow
Sling
Lasso
Bola
Armour:
Leather
Hide
Scale
Breastplate
Chariots are the main military conveyance; a few people ride horses, but they're messengers. Riding horses is undignified.
GURPS Low Tech would have a lot of equipment, and there's a couple of other historical sourcebooks for the period. Green Ronin put out two bronze age books for D20, Testament (old testament) and Trojan War (Homer), and Hamunapatra for ancient Egypt. Mongoose did OGL Ancients, which isn't just bronze age. Palladium have a number of books covering historical weapons and armour, including one on Egypt.
More to the point, at least in the early Bronze Age, horses had not yet been bred strong enough to carry the weight of armor. War horses are every bit as much a technology as iron smelting.
Ed_Laprade
Adventurer
One thing to remember about early iron age weapons is that they weren't as good as their bronze equivalents. Mostly they were cheaper. At least, once the techniques to smelt the ore became commonly known.
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