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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Bilharzia" data-source="post: 7919398" data-attributes="member: 6970322">I'm sorry but most of your assumptions and conclusions are wrong. It's clear that crossbows are much slower and clumsier to use than bows, although with a goat's foot lever you are down to "only" twice as slow as a longbow (windlass is more powerful but much slower). I also agree that the power of crossbows came to equal and then exceed longbows, but much of what you have said does not agree with physics, mechanics or history.You claim, comparing with crossbows "a similar power selfbow, it can be fired every 15 seconds or more even by novices who never held a bow before. " this is not true, unless you are talking about very light draw target bows, which it doesn't seem like you are because you say "Versus formations, which was the default situation, accuracy is far less important than rate of fire." No one is going to field armies of novices against troop formations, which is why archers were trained from childhood to use powerful longbows."Further, a competent archer can pull, knock, draw, and release as one swift action, taking under 3 seconds. " I think this is a bit optimistic, although not far off, I would say more like 5 seconds. I noticed you didn't include "aim" as part of that procedure, I know you say accuracy wasn't important but I question this, even for massed troops it's important especially as ranges become shorter and correspondingly your shot is more powerful at short distances and because of this aiming and accuracy becomes more significant.An average person can be trained to use a crossbow, even a windlass, in a day, and that's being pessimistic - of course more training will improve your speed and accuracy. An average person will not be able to use a 200lb longbow in a day, it's not difficult, it's impossible. A longbow with a draw weight to be worth anything in a battle takes years to learn to use and to develop the right kind of strength, the two go hand in hand. It baffles me that you are ignoring this."Takes months to years of drill to be reloaded effectively in battle. Those 1000# draw windlass set crossbows need plenty of practice to be able to do it effectively, especially under fire."Sure, and exactly the same proviso applies to bows. All the circumstances, dangers, chaos and tension of a battle applies to any weapon you are using, the same applies to bows and crossbows."For footmen, the crossbow was NOT a more accurate nor easier weapon to learn. "Crossbows are easier to learn and more accurate. These two are related, from what I can tell you are ignoring the strength required to use a bow of sufficient power, despite using a 200lb longbow as an example, which is at the top end of what is likely to be in use - a bow like that would take years to develop the strength and ability to use. To draw and loose the arrow accurately of a bow like that is extremely difficult, and this is what makes aiming difficult - it is much, much easier to aim with a low draw weight bow because your body is not under that enormous tension drawing the bow. In comparison a crossbow can be aimed and loosed at ease, it can be held, aimed and tracked for very long periods without any tension, even used lying down. This makes aiming and accuracy so much easier because you don't need any where near the strength to keep the crossbow steady, you need some strength to hold it and release the bolt but there's no comparison to a longbow or any other war bow.You are right about power being a factor with crossbows being favoured although wrong about comparing the draw weights, they are extremely misleading. Similar draw-weight crossbows are significantly less powerful than longbows because they are less efficient, this is why they needed enormous draw weights - and mechanisms like stirrups, goat's foot, windlass, cranequins, to match and then out-match the power of longbows.</blockquote>

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