Castles in a D&D/Fantasy setting

Tony Vargas · Jul 5, 2018

Derren said:
Shoot them down with what?

(This is on the aerial troops held to the same standard of realism

A hot air balloon? Made of cloth? Almost anything sharp and/or on fire. And it's a big target, with plenty of time to shoot at it as it slowly drifts towards you.

And the "super AAA" does not need to destroy a wall, just to kill anyone standing on it. When it is accurate enough to combat high flying threats then it is also accurate enough to do that.

(This is on the alternative, where the castle side gets to largely ignore the laws of physics, too

Flying threats have no cover, while the defenders of the wall do, until said threats are right overhead, so it really puts thing back closer to the castle status quo, the castle commands an area (LOS, now), and the attackers, even if flying have to weather that before they can respond as effectively in kind.

Either way works. The problem is fantasy assumptions on only one side.

Derren · Jul 5, 2018

Tony Vargas said:
(This is on the aerial troops held to the same standard of realism A hot air balloon? Made of cloth? Almost anything sharp and/or on fire. And it's a big target, with plenty of time to shoot at it as it slowly drifts towards you.
(This is on the alternative, where the castle side gets to largely ignore the laws of physics, too Flying threats have no cover, while the defenders of the wall do, until said threats are right overhead, so it really puts thing back closer to the castle status quo, the castle commands an area (LOS, now), and the attackers, even if flying have to weather that before they can respond as effectively in kind.

Either way works. The problem is fantasy assumptions on only one side.

Again, with what? No pre-gunpowder weapon would have the range to hit anything but the most low flying balloon.
And anything that can hit a horse sized flying object at high altitude can also hit someone standing on a wall which has much less mobility or is even completely stationary.

Tony Vargas · Jul 5, 2018

Derren said:
Again, with what? No pre-gunpowder weapon would have the range to hit anything but the most low flying balloon.

And a balloon is going to have to be flying very low to have any chance of the small payload it drops landing anywhere near the target. (Because that's the physics-cuts-both-ways example.)

And anything that can hit a horse sized flying object at high altitude can also hit someone standing on a wall which has much less mobility or is even completely stationary.

Completely stationary behind an arrow slit, for instance, or behind a merlon until it step out to shoot, and then back again. Unless your supergun sees through and shoots through stone...
...which I guess isn't out of the question. Of course, neither would be stone 'warded' to stop it. ::shrug::

Derren · Jul 5, 2018

Tony Vargas said:
And a balloon is going to have to be flying very low to have any chance of the small payload it drops landing anywhere near the target. (Because that's the physics-cuts-both-ways example.)

Completely stationary behind an arrow slit, for instance, or behind a merlon until it step out to shoot, and then back again. Unless your supergun sees through and shoots through stone...
...which I guess isn't out of the question. Of course, neither would be stone 'warded' to stop it. ::shrug::

A castle is a lot larger than a balloon. Hitting somewhere inside it is easy even from a few hundered meters height.
And a single archer hiding behind a merlon is hardly a threat. First you shoot the ones manning their supergun. Once that is cleared you shoot anyone stepping out to shoot back. They could of course completely abandon the walls to hide from the enemies supergun, but then the enemy has basically won.
And

Tony Vargas · Jul 5, 2018

Derren said:
A castle is a lot larger than a balloon. Hitting somewhere inside it is easy even from a few hundered meters height.

And dropping things on a windy day is a lot less accurate than shooting arrows. And the castle has no weight limit on how much ammo it can carry. A hot air balloon made with medieval technology, if it could even get off the ground, would have a trivial payload, probably the most dangerous thing it could do is set itself on fire and fall onto the enemy. Seriously, lighter-than-air-craft couldn't be used offensively until the development of the dirigible.

And a single archer hiding behind a merlon is hardly a threat. First you shoot the ones manning their supergun. Once that is cleared you shoot anyone stepping out to shoot back.

The super-gun could be enchanted arrows or something, anyway, so yeah, he could be. You're still firing from exposed positions at enemies who have excellent cover - part of the point of fortifications in the first place.

Derren · Jul 5, 2018

Tony Vargas said:
And dropping things on a windy day is a lot less accurate than shooting arrows. And the castle has no weight limit on how much ammo it can carry. A hot air balloon made with medieval technology, if it could even get off the ground, would have a trivial payload, probably the most dangerous thing it could do is set itself on fire and fall onto the enemy. Seriously, lighter-than-air-craft couldn't be used offensively until the development of the dirigible.

The super-gun could be enchanted arrows or something, anyway, so yeah, he could be. You're still firing from exposed positions at enemies who have excellent cover - part of the point of fortifications in the first place.

Shooting arrows on a windy day is equally inaccurate.
And some years ago there was a promotion on the Nasca lines where people build and flew a balloon made with native american technology which is far below what medieval societies could achieve, and it flew suprisingly well. And especially when you have access to chemical weapons like the, in D&D readily available, alchemist fire you do not need a lot of payload. And even if not and you could only drop a few kg of stones, arrows, etc. with each pass as the enemy can't retaliate it doesn't matter. Normally sieges could take months if not years. So needing weeks of bombing is still a improvement.

And gues what, a gun behind cover has a very narrow firing arc. So you have an artillery duel of who can first destroy the supergun of the other. After that the battle is decided. Either the besieger can then leisurly kill off anyone who shows his face or the defender can kill off any attacker long before they come into range.
Field battles also look very differently as everyone would try to field this gun because of its huge advantage over everyone else.

Tony Vargas · Jul 6, 2018

Derren said:
Shooting arrows on a windy day is equally inaccurate.
And some years ago there was a promotion on the Nasca lines where people build and flew a balloon made with native american technology which is far below what medieval societies could achieve, and it flew suprisingly well

All it had to do was go straight up and provide an observation platform, which is how balloons actually were used in warfare, for observation.
It's not carrying it's own fuel, so it's flight time & altitude adjustments (to find wind going the right direction) are very limited. Value as an offensive weapon, like you're positing, nil.

And gues what, a gun behind cover has a very narrow firing arc. So you have an artillery duel of who can first destroy the supergun of the other. After that the battle is decided.

It's not like that's an issue that hadn't long been taken into account in castle designs.
In essence, though, you're back to no clear advantage, now that you're not assuming fantasy physics on one side, and RL on the other. It'll depend on the details of the fantasy world. Is there a Black Arrow for every Smaug, that kinda thing.

Derren · Jul 8, 2018

Tony Vargas said:
All it had to do was go straight up and provide an observation platform, which is how balloons actually were used in warfare, for observation.
It's not carrying it's own fuel, so it's flight time & altitude adjustments (to find wind going the right direction) are very limited. Value as an offensive weapon, like you're positing, nil.

It's not like that's an issue that hadn't long been taken into account in castle designs.
In essence, though, you're back to no clear advantage, now that you're not assuming fantasy physics on one side, and RL on the other. It'll depend on the details of the fantasy world. Is there a Black Arrow for every Smaug, that kinda thing.

Now you are just talking nonsense.
No, the existence of long range artillery has not been taken into account when building castles.

And no, balloons would have a plenty of offensive uses, both for bombing when the conditions are right or as a stationary archery platform which would make any wall defense useless. And again, the castle would have no way to to defend themselves against them as nothing in that era can shoot very high.

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