Why do Crossbows Suck?

[Kraydak]

Except all the historical documents which said it did.

There are lots of historical documents saying that to raise military archers you need to hire people and put them in a training camp for 2+ years just working on their archery? I certainly have never heard of even one such.

 

[Cleon]

As a side note: Some tests were done with "poisoned arrows". Arrow heads were made with grooves to retain a liquid poison via capillary action, then fired.

The speed of passage through the air pretty much scattered the venom in flight. Unless you were firing point blank, it meant nothing.

Arrow heads could be specially prepared well in advance, but they had to have grooves and hollows for poison, and then they'd have to be covered in wax, to protect it. Nobody ever did the "Dip and shoot" thing we see people do in games.

The tribes in Africa and South America (and Southeast Asia for all I know) that traditionally poisoned their arrows were more stone age, and didn't use arrow heads at all. Their arrows had sharpened wooden tips that they'd bake dry near a fire, to harden them. Once dried they'd soak the wood in the poison, and it would be absorbed.

If someone wanted to poison an arrow they would surely use a poison with high enough viscosity to stay on the business end of the arrowhead. Something treacly or resinous.

If they used a runny liquid of course it'd flow off. For that matter, an assassin who wanted to poison a blade wouldn't need something a good deal thicker than water to do it.

 

[Cleon]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2zGnxeSbb3g

Althoough that bow certainly has not a very high draw strength (30 lb), much lower than bows actually used in a war.

I've already seen that video. It's an inherently less accurate way to fire a bow, as I argued in the earlier post.

A 30 pound draw is likely enough to deal with an unarmoured opponent, but it'll be pretty useless against anyone in armour.

Actually, if that's 30 pounds at a normal draw it'd be less powerful with the part-draw trick he's using, so the arrows would do even less damage.

'Course in a real fight a speed archer could always poison their arrows. I've read that Chinese repeating crossbows (chu-ko-nu) were often used with envenomed bolts, partially because they were so low-powered the missile itself didn't do much damage.

 

[Nagol]

There are lots of historical documents saying that to raise military archers you need to hire people and put them in a training camp for 2+ years just working on their archery? I certainly have never heard of even one such.

England had laws on the books demanding all (non-aristocratic) men aged 60 or less would own a bow and practice archery weekly. That's a lot of hours of training.

 

[Ryujin]

For what it's worth, there is basically bugger-all evidence that it takes years to train military archers. Archery isn't inherently all that difficult, and people can build up muscle quite rapidly. On the other hand, pre-modern states couldn't afford large bodies of standing troops, so to have a pool of archers you needed to convince your yeoman class that keeping in shape to shoot high draw-weight bows is fun. Which is a pretty hard sell. Alternatively, your military elite could be primarily archers (Japan, say), of course, but in Europe that wasn't the case.

In England there were actually laws, from at least the 1500s onward, that required all males to own both bow and arrows, and required mandatory practice. In the early 1500s the requirement was for all males aged 7 through 60. If you train everyone then you're bound to end up with quite a few who excel, and who are obviously physically developed to do the job.

 

[Kraydak]

In England there were actually laws, from at least the 1500s onward, that required all males to own both bow and arrows, and required mandatory practice. In the early 1500s the requirement was for all males aged 7 through 60. If you train everyone then you're bound to end up with quite a few who excel, and who are obviously physically developed to do the job.

Throughout Europe, there were laws requiring people (well, at least respectable people with money who could be more-or-less trusted to want to uphold the status-quo) to possess arms and armor (according to status and wealth) and to practice with them. England's laws were completely normal. The laws had absolutely nothing to do with bows (or other weapons) being particularly hard to learn, and everything to do with states being too poor to maintain standing armies of any size: if you can't afford to hire people, equip them, and them hide them away in training camps for a few months, then you need to be able to recruit more-or-less competent, already geared people. Regardless of what weapons they are going to be using.

 

[Ryujin]

Throughout Europe, there were laws requiring people (well, at least respectable people with money who could be more-or-less trusted to want to uphold the status-quo) to possess arms and armor (according to status and wealth) and to practice with them. England's laws were completely normal. The laws had absolutely nothing to do with bows (or other weapons) being particularly hard to learn, and everything to do with states being too poor to maintain standing armies of any size: if you can't afford to hire people, equip them, and them hide them away in training camps for a few months, then you need to be able to recruit more-or-less competent, already geared people. Regardless of what weapons they are going to be using.

Of course it isn't difficult to learn basic archery skills. In fact a couple of days worth of work would make for a reasonably accurate archer. It's not the skill involved that's at issue, however. As my own recent re-entry into archery reminds me it takes work to build the muscles that you use in archery. Where pulling my own 45 pound longbow was once no more difficult than stretching an elastic band, it now takes far more effort. My 50 pound Mongol style horsebow takes even more significant effort.

Now Medieval folk weren't exactly superhuman, despite some rather oddly held beliefs by some. Building and maintaining the muscle required to draw a 80+ pound (frequently up to 130 pound) longbow takes constant work. From that point of view the bow is 'particularly hard.'

 

[MoonSong]

Of course it isn't difficult to learn basic archery skills. In fact a couple of days worth of work would make for a reasonably accurate archer. It's not the skill involved that's at issue, however. As my own recent re-entry into archery reminds me it takes work to build the muscles that you use in archery. Where pulling my own 45 pound longbow was once no more difficult than stretching an elastic band, it now takes far more effort. My 50 pound Mongol style horsebow takes even more significant effort.

Now Medieval folk weren't exactly superhuman, despite some rather oddly held beliefs by some. Building and maintaining the muscle required to draw a 80+ pound (frequently up to 130 pound) longbow takes constant work. From that point of view the bow is 'particularly hard.'

Also don't forget that muscle development not only requires the right kind of training. Nowadays it is fairly easier because we hav cheap access to protein and corn derived food, but in the middle ages that wasn't so easy, peasants lacked the nutrition to quickly develop muscle tissue, and keeping that muscle in working condition also requires training and nutrition. In such conditions the right genetic make up is also an advantage. That is why rising an army of archers was as expensive and time consuming.

 

[Hussar]

But was it though? Expensive I mean. I recall reading that one of the primary reasons the English had so many archers at Agincourt was because archers were about the cheapest soldiers you could field.

 

[Ryujin]

Also don't forget that muscle development not only requires the right kind of training. Nowadays it is fairly easier because we hav cheap access to protein and corn derived food, but in the middle ages that wasn't so easy, peasants lacked the nutrition to quickly develop muscle tissue, and keeping that muscle in working condition also requires training and nutrition. In such conditions the right genetic make up is also an advantage. That is why rising an army of archers was as expensive and time consuming.

An excellent point.

But was it though? Expensive I mean. I recall reading that one of the primary reasons the English had so many archers at Agincourt was because archers were about the cheapest soldiers you could field.

Cheap is relative. Most of those archers would likely have been spearmen, if the training regimen hadn't existed. The English had bowmen because they foresaw the need for bowmen.