Balancing Flintlocks, Blunderbusses, and Muskets

[nakedonmyfoldin]

I'm considering integrating some firearms into my fantasy setting. The weapons and ammo will not be readily available in most shops, but I still don't want the firearms to become too powerful. How would you stat these weapons? What would you apply to them to balance them with other ranged weapons like a bow?

negative attack bonus since they will not be perfectly rifled like today's guns?
longer reload times?
shorter effective range?
expensive/hard to find ammo?

thanks guys!

[Snowbluff]

Don't over-think it and do not use the PF rules. Just make them weapons. Bows and Crossbows are still more effective for many years after the introduction of firearms.

[nakedonmyfoldin]

I've seen that long reload time is frequently used. should they also be treated as exotic weapons? Only a single society of gnomes and dwarves will have these weapons in my campaign. How long should the range increment be?

[Snowbluff]

Exotic weapons? I wouldn't go that far. With reload times, they are not worth taking the feat to use them. Simple might be too easy to use, so maybe martial? Then again, bows are supposed to be harder to use...

I'll get back to you on the range.

[Diachronos]

Don't over-think it and do not use the PF rules. Just make them weapons. Bows and Crossbows are still more effective for many years after the introduction of firearms.

What exactly is wrong with the Pathfinder rules for guns, if you don't mind me asking? I think they balance things out rather nicely, even with their Early firearms being rather inefficient compared to a bow or other ranged weapon.

[Raphite1]

What exactly is wrong with the Pathfinder rules for guns, if you don't mind me asking? I think they balance things out rather nicely, even with their Early firearms being rather inefficient compared to a bow or other ranged weapon.

I was wondering this, too. If the OP wants guns to be more common, then he can just adjust downward the high price of ammunition in PF, and maybe soften the "chance of breaking" stuff. Otherwise it seems to be a fine base to build on, even if the Gunslinger class itself isn't exactly amazing.

[Snowbluff]

What exactly is wrong with the Pathfinder rules for guns, if you don't mind me asking? I think they balance things out rather nicely, even with their Early firearms being rather inefficient compared to a bow or other ranged weapon.

Oh... where does one even start?

1) Exotic weapons/restricted use.
2) Exorbitantly expensive.
3) Touch AC rule is nonsensical.
4) Misfire rules are nonsensical, and conflict with Grod's Law.
5) Setting silliness (suddenly guns exist on Golarion, and they add robots, not constructs, later).
6) Useless unless subject to abuse.
7) Low compatibility (as in the game isn't designed with them in mind).

Honestly, if you would fix 2, 3, and 4, they'd be alright. IN that sense, I thank you for bringing it up. This is very helpful to the discussion. As such, I will remind you that 3.5 does have firearm rules in the DMG, and PF is of no use as precedent.

Grod's Law is what you should pay attention to, since you seem to think making it annoying to use suggests balance.

[nakedonmyfoldin]

For the purpose of my campaign, i would like these weapons to be very rare, and thus pretty expensive. Since people in this setting are unaccustomed to the huge recoil and imprecision of unrifled barrels, i think i will stick with making firearm proficiency a feat (exotic weapon status). As far as touch-based attack vs. regular ranged attack vs something else entirely, i am still very much undecided. Stats i've considered for the guns are as follows:

Pistol (basic flintlock): 1d10 dmg, 20 ft, x4 crit, piercing/bludgeoning damage. 2 round reload time
Blunderbuss (early shotgonne): 4d4 dmg, 10 ft, x2 crit, piercing/bludgeoning damage, 3 round reload time.
Musket : 1d12 dmg, 40 ft, x4 crit, piercing/bludgeoning damage, 3 round reload time.

I don't want firearms to be extremely overpowered, obviously, but i think they provide players with an interesting choice. The emergence of the firearms in the campaign is more important as a hook than an actual equipment, but i know some players will want to use them.

ex) before the ogre closes the distance, pow, blunderbuss to the face. Cuts his health in half, makes the rest of the fight with your melee weapon easier.

[nakedonmyfoldin]

on the topic of misfire, i'm not a huge fan of the pathfinder rule, but i do think a misfire should be consdered, especially seeing as these weapons are very primitive firearms. Maybe a natural 1 indicates a misfire? You take some fire damage equal to half of the damage roll and the weapon is considered broken?

[Diachronos]

Oh... where does one even start?

1) Exotic weapons/restricted use.
2) Exorbitantly expensive.
3) Touch AC rule is nonsensical.
4) Misfire rules are nonsensical, and conflict with Grod's Law.
5) Setting silliness (suddenly guns exist on Golarion, and they add robots, not constructs, later).
6) Useless unless subject to abuse.
7) Low compatibility (as in the game isn't designed with them in mind).

Honestly, if you would fix 2, 3, and 4, they'd be alright. IN that sense, I thank you for bringing it up. This is very helpful to the discussion. As such, I will remind you that 3.5 does have firearm rules in the DMG, and PF is of no use as precedent.

Grod's Law is what you should pay attention to, since you seem to think making it annoying to use suggests balance.
Some of these are actually justified, at least in certain settings:
#1 is largely dependent on how widespread firearm usage is in the setting, and Pathfinder does have variant rulings that can make firearms into Martial weapons. In terms of the OP's situation: Martial weapons are widespread enough that anybody with decent combat training would at least have some idea of how it's used, while Exotic weapons are things that are rare outside of certain combat schools or cultures. If firearms are something that are exclusive to a fraction of dwarf and gnome society, there's no way they're going to be widespread enough for them to be a martial weapon.
#2 is a little tougher, but still setting-dependent. Making the black powder takes time and components, and if knowledge of its creation is limited to a select group it's going to be harder to get the necessary things to make the guns and ammunition.
#3 is realistic in my opinion, because firearms fired from a close enough range will punch right through most light and medium armors. You still have to be pretty much within PBS-range to benefit from it with an early firearm, so it's not like you're going to be effortlessly sniping all of the high-AC monsters from a long distance.
#4 is also realistic with early firearms given the method of reloading. Even something as simple as adding the gunpowder can go wrong by having too much or too little: At best it doesn't go off and you have to pretty much reload the thing, at worst it's going to freaking explode in your hand.

#5-#7.... Okay, I've got nothing for these ones

[nakedonmyfoldin]

Things I would still like people to weigh in on:
Misfire, I figured a natural 1 would be ok, but is a 5% misfire too much? Or should I work itlike a critical, roll 1 then roll above 10 to avoid misfire? What damage is incurred? Is the weapon broken?
Ranged touch or regular ranged attack, I'm leaning towards ranged touch but armor has some bearing. Maybe 1/2 the ac from armor is applied?
Thanks for the help, any other comments or concerns with what I've listed previously is also appreciated

[Diachronos]

Things I would still like people to weigh in on:
Misfire, I figured a natural 1 would be ok, but is a 5% misfire too much? Or should I work itlike a critical, roll 1 then roll above 10 to avoid misfire? What damage is incurred? Is the weapon broken?
Ranged touch or regular ranged attack, I'm leaning towards ranged touch but armor has some bearing. Maybe 1/2 the ac from armor is applied?
Thanks for the help, any other comments or concerns with what I've listed previously is also appreciated

My recommendation would be to either use PF's rules for early firearms (hits touch AC of targets within the first range increment, regular AC of anything outside that) or specialized ammunition for piercing armor.

[The Insanity]

What edition?
Well, regardless, I would just use PF firearm rules. No need to reinvent the wheel.

[Snowbluff]

Some of these are actually justified, at least in certain settings:
#1 is largely dependent on how widespread firearm usage is in the setting, and Pathfinder does have variant rulings that can make firearms into Martial weapons. In terms of the OP's situation: Martial weapons are widespread enough that anybody with decent combat training would at least have some idea of how it's used, while Exotic weapons are things that are rare outside of certain combat schools or cultures. If firearms are something that are exclusive to a fraction of dwarf and gnome society, there's no way they're going to be widespread enough for them to be a martial weapon.
#2 is a little tougher, but still setting-dependent. Making the black powder takes time and components, and if knowledge of its creation is limited to a select group it's going to be harder to get the necessary things to make the guns and ammunition.
#3 is realistic in my opinion, because firearms fired from a close enough range will punch right through most light and medium armors. You still have to be pretty much within PBS-range to benefit from it with an early firearm, so it's not like you're going to be effortlessly sniping all of the high-AC monsters from a long distance.
#4 is also realistic with early firearms given the method of reloading. Even something as simple as adding the gunpowder can go wrong by having too much or too little: At best it doesn't go off and you have to pretty much reload the thing, at worst it's going to freaking explode in your hand.

#5-#7.... Okay, I've got nothing for these ones
1) Early firearms is the default, ergo we assume the default.
2) See above.
3) It's not. Magical armor is much stronger than mundane materials. Not to mention no damage is done to the armor. By the same thinking, crossbows should be doing the same. Your thinking lacks verisimilitude and is self-contradictory because it's borrowed from the flawed reasoning of the devs.
4) Bowstrings can snap, hafts can crack. We don't use fumble rules for everything else.
5-7) You had nothing for anything else, it didn't stop you there. #6 is a strong meta-game concept. If you're not ready to answer that one, you should look into it. The same is true for the touch attacks on a meta perspective.

What edition?
Well, regardless, I would just use PF firearm rules. No need to reinvent the wheel.
PF reinvented the wheel into a convenient square shape. 3.5 had gun rules, and they are much better by the virtue of nothing was done with them. :smallsigh:

[Anlashok]

My starting point for guns was always crossbows: Fix crossbows and give them a new paint job and you have guns.

I think PF gun rules are more workable than snowbluff gives them credit for, but 1, 2, 4 and 6 are important points.

Though 1 is only really an issue because weapon proficiency categories don't have clearly defined meanings. Logically one would think that special training (i.e. a feat) would be necessary for more complex weapons, so guns should be simple and slings should probably be martial or exotic... but more often then not it's simply a matter of how rare the weapon is instead. But sometimes it can be one or the other so it's unclear.

Grod's Law is the right term for 2 and 4. Both of them are relatively stupid and relatively easy to overcome, making them ultimately trivial concerns if you're optimizing for them.. but if you aren't they end up being obnoxious mechanics that simply make the player's experience a little more miserable for no gain.

6 is icing on the cake. "A guy with a gun" simply doesn't cut it in Pathfinder. I can't just take EWP(Revolver) and Rapid reload and call myself a competent character, which goes to the next point.

1, 2 and 6 sort of combine together to form the largest problem, which is that guns are more of a Gunslinger class feature disguised as an item than anything else. Because only gunslingers (and certain archetypes) get the free proficiency to deal with 1 or the cheap crafting to deal with 2 or the mechanics to take advantage of 6.

[The Insanity]

Only a single society of gnomes and dwarves will have these weapons in my campaign.
BTW. You stole my campaign idea!

[Marlowe]

Gunpowder small arms, until the mid 19th century or so, are not that great an advance over the likes of bows and crossbows. Most nations with strong traditions of archery kept using bows into the gunpowder period, and the older weapons disappeared more because of the relative ease of training a musketeer compared to training a bowman than any great military reason.

So, no need for exotic weapon prof. Simple is fine. You can be a musketeer in five minutes.

One thing that I've not seen people think about much is the Smoke. Even a couple of shots using black powder generates enough thick, acrid white smoke to seriously cut down visibility in a small area. Also, the noise could be a serious scare for mounts and animal companions.

[nakedonmyfoldin]

Alright, I can appreciate PF for hits: touch in first range increment, regular attack outside of the effective range.
Misfire I believe is a necessary thing to consider. Bowstrings break, but bows don't involve small explosions in your hands. Soldiers died from misfires with early firearms.
As far as proficiency, I may split the difference and call guns Martial.

I like the consideration of noise and smoke too, these are things that should be considered, especially indoors in small spaces. I may just wing these situations though, if someone is firing many shots in a short period (couple of loaded guns fired in succession), i'll add some smoke. Noise can require some ride checks, or perhaps (in the case of the blunderbuss and musket) deafen or partially deafen the wielder/nearby allies.

[TheIronGolem]

I like the consideration of noise and smoke too, these are things that should be considered, especially indoors in small spaces. I may just wing these situations though, if someone is firing many shots in a short period (couple of loaded guns fired in succession), i'll add some smoke. Noise can require some ride checks, or perhaps (in the case of the blunderbuss and musket) deafen or partially deafen the wielder/nearby allies.

Ask yourself if this will really make it more fun to play a gun-using character, or just more annoying.

[Snowbluff]

Alright, I can appreciate PF for hits: touch in first range increment, regular attack outside of the effective range.
Misfire I believe is a necessary thing to consider. Bowstrings break, but bows don't involve small explosions in your hands. Soldiers died from misfires with early firearms.
As far as proficiency, I may split the difference and call guns Martial.


They wouldn't even puncture era armor some of the time. :l

Bowstrings breaking would render the weapon inoperable. It's the only part about misfires people really care about.

[nakedonmyfoldin]

The characters probably won't be optimizing for firearms. This is still a fantasy setting in which bows and melee weapons will reign supreme. The discovery of firearms (or the main faction's realization that firearms have been developed in the subterranean labs of the dwarves + gnomes) does not occur immediately. I will give them opportunities to optimize for firearms once they have been discovered, but honestly, I believe that these weapons will just serve a neat new flavor of weapon that will force the players to adapt a new combat style. Maybe a few select gnomes are true gunslingers, but the role of these weapons is closer to "oh no, the weapons they have now are decent, but if they keep developing them, they could very well turn the tide of war".

[VoxRationis]

My starting point for guns was always crossbows: Fix crossbows and give them a new paint job and you have guns.

I think PF gun rules are more workable than snowbluff gives them credit for, but 1, 2, 4 and 6 are important points.

Though 1 is only really an issue because weapon proficiency categories don't have clearly defined meanings. Logically one would think that special training (i.e. a feat) would be necessary for more complex weapons, so guns should be simple and slings should probably be martial or exotic... but more often then not it's simply a matter of how rare the weapon is instead. But sometimes it can be one or the other so it's unclear.

Grod's Law is the right term for 2 and 4. Both of them are relatively stupid and relatively easy to overcome, making them ultimately trivial concerns if you're optimizing for them.. but if you aren't they end up being obnoxious mechanics that simply make the player's experience a little more miserable for no gain.

6 is icing on the cake. "A guy with a gun" simply doesn't cut it in Pathfinder. I can't just take EWP(Revolver) and Rapid reload and call myself a competent character, which goes to the next point.

1, 2 and 6 sort of combine together to form the largest problem, which is that guns are more of a Gunslinger class feature disguised as an item than anything else. Because only gunslingers (and certain archetypes) get the free proficiency to deal with 1 or the cheap crafting to deal with 2 or the mechanics to take advantage of 6.

What do you mean, "fix" crossbows? What needs to be fixed about them? Their insanely short reload time? If you want crossbows to be a competitive PC weapon in the hands of skilled users, you're looking for the wrong weapon. Crossbows are for peasants (and Genoese mercenaries). The same applies for guns.

In any case, early-period guns are annoying to use. Reloading them is extremely finicky (and long), they have a nasty tendency to misfire, and all the aiming skill in the world won't help the fact that the aerodynamic performance of the projectile is erratic, making accuracy capped (my personal suggestion for mechanics to use for firearms to distinguish them from other weapons).

[Curbstomp]

Why don't you just take the 3.5 DMG firearms rules? They are pretty straight-forward. I've used them in a low-magic pirate campaign as well as in a low-magic Thirty-Year's War campaign. They balanced well with the regular weapons.

[Raven777]

Alright, I can appreciate PF for hits: touch in first range increment, regular attack outside of the effective range.
Misfire I believe is a necessary thing to consider. Bowstrings break, but bows don't involve small explosions in your hands. Soldiers died from misfires with early firearms.
As far as proficiency, I may split the difference and call guns Martial.

Please, don't do that. You are confusing obnoxious and balance. I played a Gunslinger. Misfires do nothing to stop a gun's damage and accuracy, which are the actual things that need balancing. It merely makes guns a liability in combat. Until the entire wretched thing is made irrelevant by mid levels anyway through class features or enchantments.

What you want is to limit guns to 1d6/pistols 1d8/muskets damage, have them be Exotic Weapons to represent their rarity, and make them crit 20/x4 as their perk for being Exotic. None of the other crap. They reload as a free action, they do not misfire. What I'm saying is, skip the early firearms and go straight to the Spencer (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spencer_repeating_rifle).

[VoxRationis]

Why? Why throw 19th century technology into a Late Medieval or Renaissance game system? Because you want to play John Wayne? Play Deadlands, or any number of other systems. Frankly, if you can get repeating rifles in the setting, people are going to latch on to them like a male angler fish to his mate. Expecting the armor and swords of the PHB to still be in play when repeating rifles are available is unreasonable unless your campaign is centered around colonialism and culture clash.

Also, why would you have repeating rifles do damage comparable to bows? As I understand, a rifle bullet is much more likely to deal major damage to someone than an arrow.

[Psyren]

I actually agree with Snowbluff on this one, firearms are pretty silly in PF. The touch AC rule in particular is odd - it means that I could be within one range increment of something whose carapace is so thick that it gets +500 natural armor, and I get to ignore all of that with my battered 1d6 starter pistol like it's not even there. With every shot.

I like that they have stats for a wide variety of guns and I like the scattershot rules, but there's a lot of other problems with the system ultimately.

[VoxRationis]

You could have a "penetration" stat that allows them to ignore a certain amount of armor, or all armor under a certain threshold.

[Anlashok]

What do you mean, "fix" crossbows? What needs to be fixed about them?
The fact that they aren't very good? That seems obvious.


If you want crossbows to be a competitive PC weapon in the hands of skilled users, you're looking for the wrong weapon.
And this is a pretty weak counterargument, but typical I suppose.


Why? Why throw 19th century technology into a Late Medieval or Renaissance game system? Because you want to play John Wayne? Play Deadlands, or any number of other systems.
And you do it again.

Seriously what's the point of coming into a thread and declaring everyone is a bad person and doing it wrong by having different expectations from their game? I really don't get it.

[Psyren]

You could have a "penetration" stat that allows them to ignore a certain amount of armor, or all armor under a certain threshold.

Indeed, that would be the best way to handle it. It would also keep them from having to throw in clunky language like "this touch attack doesn't count as a touch attack for the purposes of Deadly Aim" etc.

[squiggit]

Penetration would be a pretty nice stat. Ignore X AC up to the maximum of their armor/natural armor. It might look a bit cumbersome to some people though, and if you want to do it right stuff like strength based penetration for longbows starts to get a bit awkward.

[Milo v3]

Why? Why throw 19th century technology into a Late Medieval or Renaissance game system?

A Late Medieval system with robots, plasma grenades, cloning vats, cybernetics, and Stalin. I think 19th century tech should be fine :smalltongue:

[Yahzi]

The problem with guns is not guns. As others have said, it was a long time before a musket was better than a crossbow; armies only used muskets because they were incredibly easy to use, both in learning time and in operation (you try loading a crossbow 20 times in an hour - it's exhausting!). The recoil isn't an issue, either - crossbows have plenty of recoil.

The problem with guns is cannons. The fact that your common soldiers are running around with expensive, noisy crossbows isn't going to change anything. The fact that your common soldiers can load up a bombard and take out dragons is going to change everything.

The problem with gunpowder is that it scales: you can only make a crossbow so big before your materials stop letting you pile on force multipliers. But cannons? Just make 'em thicker and toss in more powder.


Pumhart von Steyr (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pumhart_von_Steyr): an 80 cm stone ball weighing 690 kg to a distance of roughly 600 m
What kind of damage do you think that would do?

IRL people didn't make a lot of really big guns because they weren't worth the bother. But in D&D you have giant monsters and heroes who can take dozens of arrows before they fall. Normally they rule the battlefield; with cannons, they just become targets. It will make a very Renessaince feel, in that individual heroes won't actually be as important as logistics.

[TheIronGolem]

The problem with guns is cannons. The fact that your common soldiers are running around with expensive, noisy crossbows isn't going to change anything. The fact that your common soldiers can load up a bombard and take out dragons is going to change everything.

The problem with gunpowder is that it scales: you can only make a crossbow so big before your materials stop letting you pile on force multipliers. But cannons? Just make 'em thicker and toss in more powder.


When you're the DM, gunpowder only scales if you want it to. If you want guns in your game but not cannons, you can easily handwave it with something like "in this world, gunpowder becomes too unstable in large quantities to make anything bigger than X practical", where X is the biggest kind of gunpowder weapon you want your setting to have. It's not realistic, but nothing about D&D is.

[VoxRationis]

The fact that they aren't very good? That seems obvious.

Crossbows in D&D are far, far better than they have any right to be. They reload at a rate easily manipulated to be competitive with bows, repeating crossbows have just as much punch as their winched counterparts, and they have a more effective range than bows, at all times. They have already been "fixed," by your definition of what is "fixing" them, since AD&D, where they took realistically longer to reload.
That they are used primarily (in my experience) by low-level wizards makes sense; crossbows are there so people can have a bow without knowing how to use one. They are where they need to be, perhaps better.


And this is a pretty weak counterargument, but typical I suppose.

Typical of what? Of me? Of people who recognize that weapons have inherent kinds of limitations?



And you do it again.

Seriously what's the point of coming into a thread and declaring everyone is a bad person and doing it wrong by having different expectations from their game? I really don't get it.

I'm hardly calling everyone a "bad person"; I'm disputing your assumptions and weighing in on a topic in a public forum according to a considered opinion I have about the topic.

[VoxRationis]

When you're the DM, gunpowder only scales if you want it to. If you want guns in your game but not cannons, you can easily handwave it with something like "in this world, gunpowder becomes too unstable in large quantities to make anything bigger than X practical", where X is the biggest kind of gunpowder weapon you want your setting to have. It's not realistic, but nothing about D&D is.

Actually, bombards were generally impractical for a number of good reasons that go beyond "there aren't any super-large monsters to shoot at in real life." Your DM could refer to materials limitations, weight and logistics, large misfire chances, or the fact that even a Dex 8 ogre can move out of the way of a bombard's aim before it can be aimed or fired properly. Heck, even an ooze could probably do it, if it could recognize the threat.

[Anlashok]

Crossbows in D&D are far, far better than they have any right to be
This is what I mean. They don't "have any right" to be effective weapons? That's just silly. If dnd were any sort of simulationist game you might have a point.


Typical of what? Of me? Of people who recognize that weapons have inherent kinds of limitations?
Typical of you. The nature of the game simply doesn't support the position and it smacks as simply attempting to masquerade preference as something grander


I'm hardly calling everyone a "bad person"; I'm disputing your assumptions and weighing in on a topic in a public forum according to a considered opinion I have about the topic.
Disputing and disagreeing is fine. It's this implication that people who have different taste than yours are inherently wrong, ignorant or malicious that's ridiculous. It's not merely "I don't like crossbow based characters" it's "crossbows don't deserve to be good". It's not just "I don't like guns in my high fantasy" it's "You shouldn't want guns in your high fantasy either and you're wrong for including them!". It's not just "I don't like evil parties" it's "I'm going to go gloat about an evil aligned character dying in another game while contributing nothing to the discourse".

It's just silly.

[Spiryt]

What do you mean, "fix" crossbows? What needs to be fixed about them? Their insanely short reload time? If you want crossbows to be a competitive PC weapon in the hands of skilled users, you're looking for the wrong weapon. Crossbows are for peasants (and Genoese mercenaries). The same applies for guns.


And knights. And their retinues. And commune militias. And hunters.


crossbows are there so people can have a bow without knowing how to use one.

In pretty much whole Europe in later medieval, and renaissance period, crossbow was actually 'upgrade' so anyone who had money and training was using crossbow.

England was kind of anomaly with it's bow culture.

So this statement doesn't really hold water.

[squiggit]

Actually, bombards were generally impractical for a number of good reasons that go beyond "there aren't any super-large monsters to shoot at in real life." Your DM could refer to materials limitations, weight and logistics, large misfire chances, or the fact that even a Dex 8 ogre can move out of the way of a bombard's aim before it can be aimed or fired properly. Heck, even an ooze could probably do it, if it could recognize the threat.

This. I can only really see it in that position were you constantly fighting gargantuan and colossal creatures (I think PF even has an archetype about shooting cannons at dragons). Or well, their normal historical uses obviously.


They wouldn't even puncture era armor some of the time. :l

To be fair, what era of weaponry we're looking at isnt entirely clear, since pathfinder firearms cover 200 years or more of technology, even discounting tech guide/numeria stuff.

Still silly that it doesn't discriminate between low quality scale and ancient impenetrable armor forged in the fires of hell though for sure.

[VoxRationis]

Yeah, I'm not sure how you're supposed to shoot a creature that moves at 200 feet/move action with a weapon that stands a decent chance of missing a house for the first couple of shots. Careful timing, I guess.

The use of bows vs. crossbows in different locations is due to a number of different factors; lower population in medieval England, greater prevalence of yew, and societal differences between England and her rivals in France and Spain. However, the superiority of the longbow in rate of fire but logistical inferiority in terms of training required is true regardless of those factors. Perhaps it was oversimplification to call it simply a peasant weapon, but it is a weapon far better-suited for use by conscripted peasants than a bow, at the cost of a certain degree of effectiveness. In any case, that a crossbow, by virtue of its low rate of fire, is an extremely limited weapon for use by a single person (e.g. an adventurer) is true—crossbows in military use were deployed en masse and crossbow use for hunting or home defense is practical because of a low number of expected targets and a high amount of lethality for the first shot—neither of which is true in an adventuring context.

I'm not going to answer an argument that both attempts to say that I'm objectively wrong about my preferences and pleads for me to respect that everyone has different but equally valid preferences in the same post.

[Spiryt]

The use of bows vs. crossbows in different locations is due to a number of different factors; lower population in medieval England, greater prevalence of yew, and societal differences between England and her rivals in France and Spain.

Quite contrary - yew is not prevalent in England.

And yew that actually could be found in England before it got extinct was of rather low quality.

Yew growing in cold, rainy, lowland places in England was worse for making bows than that growing in warm, dry and high altitude one.

That's why Spanish yew, for example, was very priced.

Up to such means, for example:


The Statute of Westminster of 1472 decreed that four yew bow staves had to be imported with every ton of merchandise unloading in any English harbour.



. Perhaps it was oversimplification to call it simply a peasant weapon, but it is a weapon far better-suited for use by conscripted peasants than a bow, at the cost of a certain degree of effectiveness. In any case, that a crossbow, by virtue of its low rate of fire, is an extremely limited weapon for use by a single person (e.g. an adventurer) is true—crossbows in military use were deployed en masse and crossbow use for hunting or home defense is practical because of a low number of expected targets and a high amount of lethality for the first shot—neither of which is true in an adventuring context.

But it was actually completely backwards - longbow was extremely peasant weapon.

Yeomen, so free, relatively well situated peasants, were legally obliged to practice with bows, every weekend, at least.

So feudal structure of England could have wide reservoir of peasant, somehow capable shooters.

'Conscripted' peasants is obviously anachronistic concept in regards to medieval Europe, but those yeomen were pretty close to that.

And longbows were just as, if not more used ' en masse'. Crossbows were generally regarded as more desirable in sieges, for example.

To cut it short, crossbow is just as fun weapon for 'adventurer' if different than bow.

Thus I agree that 3.5 D&D does absolutely foul job in giving player a choice.

I saw decent homebrew solutions in giving crossbow similar bonuses as 'composite' bows, only multiplied 1.5 or 2 times Two Handed Weapon style.

In exchange for lower amount of shots that's already present in reloading action being required.

Early firearms introduced in gameplay, could use something similar, only without Str score, as irrelevant, of course.


The recoil isn't an issue, either - crossbows have plenty of recoil.

Crossbows don't have recoil...

More powerful one can have, I guess, decoil :smallbiggrin: - energy that's not used to propel bolts creates pull force yanking the crossbow out of shooters hand indeed.

[Anlashok]

I'm not going to answer an argument that both attempts to say that I'm objectively wrong about my preferences and pleads for me to respect that everyone has different but equally valid preferences in the same post.
So, naturally. You do it yet again.

Read it again. The only thing I'm calling objectively wrong is the ridiculous "if it's not my way it's bad" attitude. If you honestly consider that a necessary enough requirement that asking you to stop it is a personal affront there's a whole host of other problems we need to deal with then.

[VoxRationis]

But it was actually completely backwards - longbow was extremely peasant weapon.

Yeomen, so free, relatively well situated peasants, were legally obliged to practice with bows, every weekend, at least.

So feudal structure of England could have wide reservoir of peasant, somehow capable shooters.

'Conscripted' peasants is obviously anachronistic concept in regards to medieval Europe, but those yeomen were pretty close to that.

And longbows were just as, if not more used ' en masse'. Crossbows were generally regarded as more desirable in sieges, for example.

To cut it short, crossbow is just as fun weapon for 'adventurer' if different than bow.


1) "Yeoman" is different from "peasant". While both commoners, one is a serf and the other is not.

2) In this context, a peasant weapon is a weapon appropriate for use by a commoner who has spent their time farming rather than training to fight. I'm sorry if I did not make that explicitly clear. The actual social status of the weapon's wielder is irrelevant to the factors of 'required training' and 'individual effectiveness'. As it stands, the fact that the yeomen needed to train continually with the weapon for their adult lives puts the longbow outside of that definition, as regardless of their peacetime professions, they spent significant time training.

3) All sub-artillery weapons in warfare are used en masse; the question is 'does it retain combat usefulness outside of that context?' What I was pointing out with that particular argument was that the crossbow becomes rather weak if an individual using one needs to fire a second shot, while a regular bow is just as useful as it was before (the issue then becomes range relative to charging distance, which is applicable to both weapons equally).

[VoxRationis]

So, naturally. You do it yet again.

Read it again. The only thing I'm calling objectively wrong is the ridiculous "if it's not my way it's bad" attitude. If you honestly consider that a necessary enough requirement that asking you to stop it is a personal affront there's a whole host of other problems we need to deal with then.

Actually, I was referring to where you said that my preferences regarding realism were wrong.
Ahem:



The nature of the game simply doesn't support [that weapon should have inherent kinds of limitations] and it smacks as simply attempting to masquerade preference as something grander

[The Insanity]

Sorry, but I don't see where he said that your preference is wrong.

[TheIronGolem]

Seconded, anyone who read it that way did so because they specifically wanted to.

[nakedonmyfoldin]

I think I've found a pretty happy place for the guns in my campaigns, thanks to the contributors. Sorry if I mistakenly incited "syntax war".

[Raven777]

Also, why would you have repeating rifles do damage comparable to bows? As I understand, a rifle bullet is much more likely to deal major damage to someone than an arrow.

Because the easiest way to balance firearms is just to make them bows with a different paint coat? If you want additional mechanics to account for penetration or rate of fire, that's OK too. I call that a difference in intent. I set out to get firearms in the hands of those who want them on their character for flavor reasons with as less of a hassle as possible. By sticking close to existing parameters, I ensure the least amount of ripples through game balance, which I find is most important. Call that the lazy way.

You, on the other hand, might also want to make firearms a good simulation of the real thing. Both intents are fine, but yours demands more tweaks not just for the guns themselves, but also the other systems they'll interact with, as demonstrated by PF's touch attacking firearms allowing gun users to rip through monsters balanced around the targeting abilities of basically everyone else.

[Oko and Qailee]

Don't over-think it and do not use the PF rules. Just make them weapons. Bows and Crossbows are still more effective for many years after the introduction of firearms.

To expand on this:
the first fire arms had poorer range at lower accuracy than bows (especially longbows), they didn't penetrate plate as well as people imagine, and they took a long time to reload. The image of bows also taking a long time to be drawn and fired is also false as archers could fire an arrow/second by keeping arrows in the same hand that does the drawing of the bow.

Even when they first appeared in military use, guns were worse than bows. Yet they still replaced the british long bow well before they out performed them, because of one reason.

Training. Guns took nearly no training relative to bows. It's much easier to give someone a gun and train them to fire it than to train them to use a bow.


So taking all this, how do we expand it to D&D?

Well it depends "how recent are guns?"

Brand new: Simple weapon, 1d8 dmg, 40ft range increment, ranged touch roll applies on armors lighter than medium, move action reload

Renaissance: pistol: Martial weapon, 1d8, 40ft, ranged touch roll on armors lighter than heavy.

Later than that: As above, but always ranged touch.

Though for all of the above a case can be made for shields obstructing bullets.

Keep in mind this is just me tossing ideas around. So the balance is probably terrible.

[Larkas]

I like the crossbow parallel. This is what I'd consider myself:

Flintlock Pistol - 1d4, x3, 20ft., 50 gp, simple weapon, reload as move action.
Blunderbuss - 1d8, x3, 40ft., 75 gp, simple weapon, reload as move action.
Musket - 1d10, x3, 60ft., 100 gp, simple weapon, reload as full action.
Bullets, firearms (10) - 1 gp.*
Black powder - 1sp/shot.

If you think misfire chances will add anything to your game, make it happen on a roll of 1, confirmed by an unmodified d20 roll below 11. The weapon deals critical damage to the wielder and is considered unusable before proper cleaning/maintenance. However, by taking EWP: Chosen Firearm, the misfire chance is eliminated and the critical increases to x4.

If you need to justify why these guns aren't more widespread, make black powder hard to produce and/or store (I think this was the case in the real world), which translates into an increased price (5sp/shot, must be kept dry at all times). Just make sure your fluff/crunch isn't getting in the way of fun.

I don't think touch attacks even make sense in the context of firearms. Paizo said elsewhere that armor bonus is an abstraction (i.e.: armor doesn't actually make the attack miss the target, but rather deflects the attack slightly so that the hit doesn't cause damage), and that touch attacks get to ignore armor because they don't need to injure the target to connect. I mean, it could make some sense for guns to bypass some armor DR in an "armor as damage reduction" game, but only then.

* I'd make these higher quality bullets be usable with and increase the damage die of any sling: lead bullets+slings were absurdly effective damage-wise in ancient warfare.

[Yahzi]

I think a less annoying critical failure would simply be the gun failing to fire and needing priming again (which was far more common than actual explosions). But then, why not just fold that into the miss chance in the first place?

It is true that bombards are hard to aim, among other problems, but it is also true that they were single-handedly responsible for killing the largest creature in medieval Europe - the castle. They were made as big and and as accurate as they needed to be to bring down the super-powered super-sized monster on the medieval battlefield. Before the bombard, a castle was an overwhelming advantage. You would plan your line of march around them. After the bombard, mere castles (as opposed to fortresses) were tactical considerations, not strategic ones.

I submit that scalable gunpowder would have the same impact on D&D: monsters (which tend to be big) would surrender their utter dominance of the battlefield. A dragon pre-gunpowder puts a Protection from Arrows up and can pretty much strafe your 0th level army with impunity. It fears only the ballistae, which isn't going to kill it with one lucky shot.

Post gun-powder, even getting close enough to breath flame on the troops could kill your dragon, if it accidentally set off an ammo store.

I think that's a pretty big change in the feel of the game. Especially if you just got your first dragon mount. :smallbiggrin:

[Milo v3]

I submit that scalable gunpowder would have the same impact on D&D: monsters (which tend to be big) would surrender their utter dominance of the battlefield. A dragon pre-gunpowder puts a Protection from Arrows up and can pretty much strafe your 0th level army with impunity. It fears only the ballistae, which isn't going to kill it with one lucky shot.
Wouldn't protection from arrows work on bullets just as well as it does on bolts and arrows? Meaning they'd still only fear the siege weapon.

[Yahzi]

Wouldn't protection from arrows work on bullets just as well as it does on bolts and arrows? Meaning they'd still only fear the siege weapon.
Well, ya, that was my point from up above. Muskets aren't terribly important;they're just crossbows. The problem is that cannons scale effectively as big as you need them to be. It's like handing wands of fireballs to first level wizards; all of sudden even mooks without last names can kill your dragon.

[Spiryt]

1) "Yeoman" is different from "peasant". While both commoners, one is a serf and the other is not.


Eh, it's not different.

Yeomen were peasants that owned their own land. Plain and simple.

Being 'serf' or not is pretty irrelevant here not to mention that yeoman in fact usually had plenty of servitude duties indeed, serving in army was one of them...



2) In this context, a peasant weapon is a weapon appropriate for use by a commoner who has spent their time farming rather than training to fight. I'm sorry if I did not make that explicitly clear. The actual social status of the weapon's wielder is irrelevant to the factors of 'required training' and 'individual effectiveness'. As it stands, the fact that the yeomen needed to train continually with the weapon for their adult lives puts the longbow outside of that definition, as regardless of their peacetime professions, they spent significant time training.

The yeomen spent their lives farming indeed.

And you seem to believe that crossbow shooters would not spend their lives training, which is completely wrong.

In fact in hundreds of major towns all over Europe wealthy enough townfolk/burgers had pretty much exactly the same duties like yeomen:

- learn shooting in their freetime, AT LEAST once a week.

Knights and other professional soldiers, would by definition train a lot, often from early age.



3) All sub-artillery weapons in warfare are used en masse; the question is 'does it retain combat usefulness outside of that context?' What I was pointing out with that particular argument was that the crossbow becomes rather weak if an individual using one needs to fire a second shot, while a regular bow is just as useful as it was before (the issue then becomes range relative to charging distance, which is applicable to both weapons equally).

If crossbow user needs another shot he spans a bow and fires another shot.