Some stuff on stuff

[Brandon Stubbs]

I loved this post. Thanks. I'm especialy enoying the web site on the Bow
and other weapon desciptions. They seem to confirm my suspicions that
Archers could be used alot more dangerously in this game. With the
possibilty of around 24 shots in a minute (5 tactical turns). My main
concern with Archery is that no one I know likes to play the archer cause
he doesn't get much glory and experience.

>||1) I can't seem to find anything about reload times for normal bows
>||(non-crossbows) in the books. Where is it?

In a kind of related question. Can someone clarify what phase means in the
reload times of a the crossbows. Does it take 8 tactical turns(8x12
seconds) or 8 phases(8x3 seconds)? In Book 2, section 1.581 does this mean
4 shots per tactical turn?

>A trained archer could shoot 12 arrows a minute, but some
>sources say that the most skilled archers could fire twice this number.
>The arrow could wound at 250 yards, kill at 100 yards and penetrate armor
>at 60 yards.
>
>12/minute = 1/5 seconds ~= 1/2 phases
>8/minute = 1/7+ seconds ~= 1/2 phases
>
>The above text DOES account for the best of the best firing at double rate
>(1/phase), but from my own archery experience when going for speed you
>sacrifice accuracy.  The high rate was probably ONLY for arrow storms,
>where you are simply lofting mass numbers to rain down on an area of
>targets.
>
>My personal best, in timed shoots on the argery range at 30 seconds, is 5-6
>arrows.  I am not that great in skill, so most of mine that hit the target
>are pretty far off the center.  The best SCA archers I saw in timed shot
>made good hits out of 7-8 arrows, which is closer to the 3/4 rate that
>Brandon indicated in his followup.  But that is for the best of the best
>level archers.  EL?  Pretty high.

To make up for multiple shots being fired and the accuracy decreasing you
would have the EL be evenly divided by the number of attacks. If there is a
remainder then that is put on any of the attacks archer choses.

>Could these same SCA archers pull it off in war, with all the death and
>confusion around them?  Probably not.  But for a person trained in it I
>think we can safely extrapolate.

Only stationary archers could pull multiple attacks. A moving archer would
have too many other things he'd have to concetrate on.
Also in the history of the bow, it said that the Chinese made a shorter bow
that could fire faster than a long bow. To explain this the non-magical,
non elven bow would subtract it's wsb from number of multiple attacks
possible, because of the resistance of the bow it self. All this based on
the Bow mulitple attack.

When I mentioned these options to some of my players they completely agreed
that this would motivate them in using the bow more.