Upgrade your account to a Community Supporter account and remove most of the site ads.

Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="TheAuldGrump" data-source="post: 2279718" data-attributes="member: 6957">And the large, slow, soft bullet of a Renaissance firearm really wasn't that great at penetrating armor.For my campaign I treat masterworked solid metal armors (Plate, breastplate, and a few variants) as granting full protection against firearms, all others grant half. Chainmail grants half, but increases the damage by one point as the rings are driven into the flesh of the target. Awl point arrows and crossbow bolts are treated the same way as bullets.*EDIT* Masterworked armors are called 'proofed' in the campaign, they have a lead splotched ding from where the armourer fired a pistol at it from 20 feet to show that it can stop a bullet.One factor against firearms is that if they are not cleaned after every shot they can become fouled, and malfunction. The Brown Bess did so about one out of sixteen shots in battlefield conditions. Maintained between shots that would drop to just about zero. (I have fired a Brown Bess more than any other type of gun. Simple and reliable, I have seen one that saw more than a hundred years of service - first in the British Army, then in the British Navy, then in the Spanish navy, then in Mexico... When it went to the British Navy they shortened the barrel and flared the muzzle, reloading on a ship has its difficulties.)Malfunctions include hangfires (potentialy dangerous to the user), smoke shots (the bullet does not leave the barrel, and must be removed in order to reload the weapon) and weld shots (gas escaping around the bullet and wadding welds the soft lead bullet to the inside of the barrel). Guns blowing up in the user's hands was extremely rare. Cannons that aren't allowed enough cool down time on the other hand...And yes, matchlock and later the snapaunce and flintlock were cheaper than a good crossbow. A wheel lock on the other hand could be very expensive.The Auld Grump</blockquote>

Verification