Warhorse, don't forget Archery!

Combat system
#1

I love archery and I hope the game has a lot of archery included! A few days ago I saw some updates on combat stuff and saw you shooting some arrows to an enemy. It didn’t look so nice to be honest (yes the game is under development I know). So what I want to do with the lines bellow is stress the need for a quality archery system.

Back those days swords where expensive and a lot of people used bows. They where cheap to make, pretty easy to use (not master) and could be used to hunt or attack others from distance. Most thieves used bows as they lived in the forests where the bows where the best weapon around.

Also castles did have some militia (soldiers fighting with swords etc) but their main defence was archers. I remember visiting a castle in Wales a few months ago, a little guide there said that a typical castle garrison would be consisted of 20-40 men from which 10-30 at least would be archers.

So my main concern is
to what extend will archery be included in the game
& if there will be a variety of bows or just the typical bow/longbow?

What do you guys think, should warhorse put effort to make a decent archery system? (will it worth it?)

A few images of some bows…
http://www.darkknightarmoury.com/images/Category/medium/37.png

and a crossbow …

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Archery like the world hasn't seen in hundreds of years
Enactment of Medieval Archery in the game
#2

You could have posted that here: Different arrow types

No need for a new thread imo. :wink:

Wales and England relied much more on archery at that time than any other force on the European mainland. And longbows weren’t used much outside of Britain since most people just lacked the skill and training dealing with them. Eastern European archers (like Hungarian) often used smaller and curved bows like the ones used by Turks and Ottomans (and they even lacked the skill to use them properly…). Very simple bows were used for defense in castle and city sieges of course. But in most times they were used by rather untrained regular soldiers who normally fighted with melee weapons (apart from the regular guard of a bigger city or bigger castle which was only a small part of an actual army).
Besides that crossbowmen were a regular part of an army at that time. Most of them were hired mercenaries (“Genoese crossbowmen”) though and not local contrymen.

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#3

No
warbows where not cheap to make since the wood was imported from southern Europe.
It took 10 years to train a good archer.
Militia units did not commonly use bows. (out side of UK) but pole arms or crossbows. or even firearms. (when we get past 1400)

You are right that en english garrison would likely have 66% archers… but for everyone ones crossbows would be the standard.

Yes the French where fond of hiring “genoese” crossbow men, because they where considered the best.
But anyone can learn to shoot a cross bow rather quickly.

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#4

Swords weren’t THAT expensive.

#5

Depends on the quality of the sword… :wink:

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#6

Interesting… I was not knowledgeable on the topic.

#7

Well, according to David Nicolle French knights had both archers and crossbowmen in their household. The Count of Nevers had 4.8% archers and 8.8% crossbowmen in his hôtel in 1396… :wink:

And Sigsimund’s own army, the Hungarians, also used the bow quite often. Mounted archers (light cavalry) were one of the regular parts of the Hungarian troops and their numbers were expanded by Sigismund himself in both 1395 and 1397…

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#8

Wood was not imported lol. Making a bow (not a perfect one) is rather cheap as the raw material was everywhere and it could be made faster than a sword etc. You are right about the other stuff you wrote, crossbows where common and easy to use. But making crossbows was very expensive, I would compare the cost of a crossbow to that of a lame sword since it was far more complicated than most medieval weapons and required knowledgeable craftsmen to make them. But anyway, I hope we’ll be able to have some fun in battles with archery and not just repeat the same thing over and over.

PS: Why I like archery so much is that you can carry a longbow with you and kill enemies from distance and the hole process of firing arrows excites me!

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#9

Imagine a battle in kingdom come with the archers firing arrows on you and you have to cover yourself with a shield while hearing the terrifying sound of the arrows hitting people around you. Simply amazing experience!

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#10

Yeah, and now imagine the same situation while attacking the enemy on horseback… :wink:

#11

LoL I guess you’ll just have to attack very fast or dismount. Nonetheless this was the reality of that time.

#12

Sure, if what you need is a bow for hunting.

But a warbow is simply not just a bow.

The wood used for the “english” warbows was imported because there simply was not yew in England in the needed quantities. This import was common by late 13th century.

English ship was legally required to bring yew on each trip to help supply the needed yew.

Even when you find local yew it need to dry for 1-2 years. Then you needed to make it over some time.

Sure you can make one a lot faster, but it will not be as strong. And a week bow loose a lot of range and ability to deal with armor. A week bow simply have no value as a military weapon.

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#13

I’m astonished that you think that English warbows or longbows were the only bow used at that time. Effective or not, weaker and less sophisticated bows were used by way less trained archers… :wink:

The main military values of “normal” bows at that time was to demoralize the enemy, killing horses and wounding less armoured soldiers. Most of that was even true for English longbowmen and their usual tactic of arrow showers in open battle. So I wouldn’t say that a weak bow didn’t have any value as military weapon after all. But you’re absolutely right that most archers weren’t really precise. They were no snipers, killing a man with a single arrow in cold blood…(speaking about NON-English archers of the time)

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#14

Of course if the enemy has plate armor it is pretty useless but the vast majority of the soldiers at that time didn’t have such armor. Bows are deadly even if they’re not so strong. A strong war bow would need 120kg force to draw it back and 30kg to hold it in it’s position, that makes up for a massive amount of strength which is deadly, but even with less power, bows where deadly and could kill anyone that doesn’t have plate armor. Horses can be killed easily with a few shots and it is perfect for large armies. A normal archer could fire up to 10-16 arrows in a single minute, multiply that with (lets say) 40 archers and you have 400-640 arrows hitting the enemy in a minute. I thing bows are underestimated. @LordCrash

#15

The big limiting factor on military operations was logistics.
An untrained peasant need food and water just like a professional crossbow man.
That is why hiring professional soldiers was done for offensive operation. Raising militias remove you peasants from their fields… not a good idea. And your nobles only had to serve for x days a year.
By the mid 14th century the English armies in France was professional soldiers that was paid for their service. (even the nobles)

A consequence is that most soldiers was actually equipped with some sort of helmet and body armor.
And a well equipped and trained crossbowman is many times more effective than a untrained peasant.

It is simply better to have 500 well trained and equipped soldiers, than many more untrained peasants.

The ordinary peasant in mainland Europe didn’t own a bow. He had no need for it. and why should he use the money on getting a bow and on the arrows? And why use the time on training?

And most noble didn’t want their peasants to learn how to kill noble…

What made the English armies effective. And special was the fact that they could raise 1000s of archers.
No other power could do so.

Why this culture of longbows lovers happened is any ones guess.

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#16

Why do you always talk about English archers??? This is about a game set in Bohemia and there was hardly any influence by English military tactics in the area at that time…

In armies on the European mainland (especially France and German countries) peasants usually didn’t fight unless they had to fight for their lives right where they live. And yes, they didn’t use bows but they neither use any other sophisticated war weapons or armours…

European armies at 1400 were usually composed by a “house army” of the respective noblemen (a standing army staying in the service of their leaders and protecting their lives and belongings) which was usually very well trained and mercenaries hired for money for specific campaigns. These mercenaries were of course also very well trained soldiers in every possible form of weaponry possible, good archers included. The main power of European mainland armies at the time were no question mounted men-on-arms, in the tradition of French chivalry. But every serious army used infantry and a good (but rather small) part of this army consisted of archers and crossbowmen usually used to cover the flanks of the regular infantry (later often light cavalry/mounted archers) and for skirmishing before the actual attack of the melee soldiers started.

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#17

Well anyway, I think if bow stuff is included in battles it will be awesome. By the way I am half Welsh so that’s probably why I love archery so much. They were the ones that invented longbows soo… :stuck_out_tongue:

#18

the English was the only one to use archers in large scale. (when we are talking west Europe powers. the Burgundians later simply hired english archers… )
That is why Iam talking about the English.

When we are talking armies in the middle of Europe, the Crossbow was the mostly used range weapon… and by the end of the 15th century firearms was just as much or even more than crossbows. (find the topic about early firearms for that)

–
Yes I think bows, both weaker hunting bows and proper warbows should be in the game. But I do hope that crossbows will be the standard range weapon in the game.

#19

We want over this in another thread. You can’t really discuss longbow archers in wars without referring to the English.

#20

Well you can discuss archery in general without talking about English archers. That is indeed possible. :wink:

But I agree with Thomas that at least 50% of the range weapon fighters should be crossbowmen, maybe even 2/3 of them. I think that should be a quite realistic rate for them for the time in Bohemia.

Following my French example an army of 100 soldiers would consist of about 10 crossbowmen and 5 archers.

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