Got a Real-World Weapon, Armour or Tactics Question? Mk. XXIX

[Saint-Just]

For a time though it was in other direction - instead of underwater mines being called mines anti-fortification shells on land (sort of semi-armor-pierecing shell which penetrates deep into the ground or concrete and then explodes) were called torpedo shells.

[Lvl 2 Expert]

Two people quibbling with me from opposite sides of the "swords are better" argument, I think perhaps I got something nearly right.

I'm rereading this, and I still don't get what you meant by this in this context. People are helpfully pointing out several ways your argument doesn't make complete sense, so you must be right?

The weird part is that Martin and me were basically pointing out the same way in which it doesn't make sense: being expensive can't be the only reason swords were popular. There has to be at least some other reason. You quote us both on saying that. That's not its own opposite. So I'm afraid I don't really understand what you mean.

[snowblizz]

I believe "torpedo" comes from the "torpedo fish", which was a fish that gave off an electric shock. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Common_torpedo

As a shallow water fish, sometimes people swimming would brush up against them, fishermen would bring them up in their nets, even people walking along the beach might step on one, all receiving an unexpected shock. So the word was understandably applied to what now is called a "water mine", then was ported to the land based version (i.e. a land torpedo). Then when the "self-propelled torpedo" was developed, that took over the term "torpedo" and the older trap like devices became mines.

Ha! I recently saw/heard this use of torpedo and I couldn't parse it at all. I knew they couldn't be talking about what I thought they were.

[Incanur]

As far as smallswords go, I used to underestimate them but have come around to respecting the weapon as the pinnacle of sidearm efficiency. I still consider the smallsword inferior to the outrageously large & heavy sidearms worn in Renaissance Europe, from long rapiers to "short swords" with 37-40in blades & full basket hilts to hand-&-a-half swords with complex hilts, but those get diminishing returns on their greater weight & length & thus a lower efficiency in that sense. A good smallsword gives surprising odds in an unarmored one-on-one fight at very low weight & moderate length. A person wearing a smallsword is getting a lot of martial potential in a minimal package. Many period sources, from Donald McBane (https://stoccata.org/about/styles/scottish-smallsword/) on, raved about the smallsword. I read these claims critically, but it's hard to say smallswords were that bad when various experienced fencers gave them the advantage over heavier cut-&-thrust swords of similar length. Period opinions varied (https://martialartsnewyork.org/2018/05/01/an-early-american-fencing-controversy-the-broadsword-versus-the-smallsword-in-boston-1808/), but based on that record & modern sparring (https://youtu.be/i15NJRo57Ko), I suspect a reasonably robust smallsword can hold its own against broadsword or sabre with about the same reach. The lack of cutting ability seems bad in theory, as skillful & powerful cuts are the most reliable way to immediate stop an unarmored opponent, but in practice such cuts are difficult to pull off against competent fencers & thrusting alone seems to have been sufficient for one-on-one unarmored dueling. A fencer who lands a thrust can withdraw & defend themself while the wounded opponent bleeds out, or they can close & grapple.

I'm still not a big fan of the smallsword or anything, but I have to give the weapon its due & I appreciate how learning about the smallsword has made further recognize the importance of nimbleness.

[Martin Greywolf]

Ah. So often the exact method used to collapse the walls isn't clear in the records. That makes sense. From what I can find the terms -- "sap" and "sapper" -- in English, evolved around 1600. So the terms may be anachronistic anyway? However, some modern definitions define a "sapper" as someone who digs mines -- which is where my complaint comes from. In the 19th century combat engineers were usually divided by specialization: sappers, miners, and pontoniers. By the 20th century many countries had just started calling all their combat engineers "sappers" -- which probably further confuses the issue (especially if the terms are being used anachronistically). But historically there was a distinction.

We are once again in the pedantry country for this, I think.

If we're talking about discussing this in modern English, well, most people hear sapper and they imagine someone who digs as part of military operation, and don't go further than that. So, for colloquial use, there's not much point in making a distinction. For a more sophisticated debate, there is a good cause to be made for making a distinction between sappers and miners - but there's also a good cause against it, even sappers will dig some shallow tunnels, and miners will have to dig trenches, if only to start digging out the mine.

Now, if we're talking about sappers in organized military where a unit had the official designation of sappers, then the distinction we have to make is what that specific army had as part of sapper's duties at that time - which, as fusilier said, is digging trenches most of the time, for most countries.

But not only is English not the language most of earlier history is written in, the meaning of words can shift as well, especially in translation. The easiest words to see this with are those that English loaned from other languages, the example I choose being the hussar. Because hussar means pirate. It got there from Roman corsaro, then to greek khosarios and then to Balkan gusar/husar, which got twisted into a name for any brigand, rather than just the one on sea, and from there to Hungarian huszar (which at the time meant light border cavalryman that used very brigand-like tactics against Ottomans) and English hussar (which managed to shift from light cavalry to heavy shock cavalry over time there).

So, your average medieval chronicle is going to use a latin word, and since there is no formal military structure, that latin word will be descriptive and mean something like "the guy who digs" or "guy who digs a mine (mine as in the one for gold etc)". The former could be pretty much anyone, digging anything, the latter is probably there because when you have to dig a lot of things, you go to the people who, in peacetime, have the profession of miner and get them to do the digging. But what they dig is still up in the air, unless the source specifies with latin word for trench or tunnel - because you could well have a sentence that says "diggers dug under the wall", and that could mean pretty much anything.

And the final nail in the coffin are translations. Because while the actual source text may say "diggers dug under the wall", a translation that everyone uses and was made by one British guy in 1800s translated that bit of text into "wall was sapped", and the original nuance (or rather lack of thereof) was lost.

[fusilier]

We are once again in the pedantry country for this, I think.

If we're talking about discussing this in modern English, well, most people hear sapper and they imagine someone who digs as part of military operation, and don't go further than that. So, for colloquial use, there's not much point in making a distinction. For a more sophisticated debate, there is a good cause to be made for making a distinction between sappers and miners - but there's also a good cause against it, even sappers will dig some shallow tunnels, and miners will have to dig trenches, if only to start digging out the mine.

Now, if we're talking about sappers in organized military where a unit had the official designation of sappers, then the distinction we have to make is what that specific army had as part of sapper's duties at that time - which, as fusilier said, is digging trenches most of the time, for most countries.

But not only is English not the language most of earlier history is written in, the meaning of words can shift as well, especially in translation. The easiest words to see this with are those that English loaned from other languages, the example I choose being the hussar. Because hussar means pirate. It got there from Roman corsaro, then to greek khosarios and then to Balkan gusar/husar, which got twisted into a name for any brigand, rather than just the one on sea, and from there to Hungarian huszar (which at the time meant light border cavalryman that used very brigand-like tactics against Ottomans) and English hussar (which managed to shift from light cavalry to heavy shock cavalry over time there).

So, your average medieval chronicle is going to use a latin word, and since there is no formal military structure, that latin word will be descriptive and mean something like "the guy who digs" or "guy who digs a mine (mine as in the one for gold etc)". The former could be pretty much anyone, digging anything, the latter is probably there because when you have to dig a lot of things, you go to the people who, in peacetime, have the profession of miner and get them to do the digging. But what they dig is still up in the air, unless the source specifies with latin word for trench or tunnel - because you could well have a sentence that says "diggers dug under the wall", and that could mean pretty much anything.

And the final nail in the coffin are translations. Because while the actual source text may say "diggers dug under the wall", a translation that everyone uses and was made by one British guy in 1800s translated that bit of text into "wall was sapped", and the original nuance (or rather lack of thereof) was lost.

Given that the etymology of "sap" and "sapper" ultimately derives from a latin word "sappa" which refers to the tools used to dig (spade, mattock), I can envision a historian noting the similarity between the words, and translating to "sapper" when, as you noted the word is probably better translated as "digger." Speculation, of course, but seems likely.

[Mike_G]

"Sapper" has continued into modern usage for a lot of combat engineer units. So, as usual in English, words evolve and meanings shift.

[fusilier]

"Sapper" has continued into modern usage for a lot of combat engineer units. So, as usual in English, words evolve and meanings shift.

Yup. But sap and sapping still have their "technical" definitions.

Just in case things aren't muddled enough, in the 19th century it became common in many armies to designate one man per company as a "sapeur-pionnier" (French term). This person was usually equipped with a large felling axe, and they would be deployed to clear obstacles or cut trails through forests, etc. (Typically the several sapper-pioneers from a battalion would be combined into a squad). In American practice the term was usually shortened to "pioneer" (during the American Civil War for instance) -- but in other nations it may be shortened to just "sapper." Providing yet another definition of the term "sapper". :-)

Thanks everybody for the digression!

[Pauly]

As far as smallswords go, I used to underestimate them but have come around to respecting the weapon as the pinnacle of sidearm efficiency.
[snip]
.

Another factor in favor of small sword over rapier and dagger or backsword and buckler in a civilian setting is that is less offensive socially.

Carrying a rapier and dagger or backsword and buckler is carrying a weapon set that has military capacity and carries with it the connotation that it is intended for offensive use. The English word ‘swashbuckler’ derives from someone noisily (swash) using a shield (buckler) and was originally perjorative.

Small swords being smaller, and with much less conspicuous hills make them more socially acceptable. Certainly not the weapon of choice for a ruffian trying to intimidate an ale house in the dockyard slums.

[Brother Oni]

Another factor in favor of small sword over rapier and dagger or backsword and buckler in a civilian setting is that is less offensive socially.

Carrying a rapier and dagger or backsword and buckler is carrying a weapon set that has military capacity and carries with it the connotation that it is intended for offensive use. The English word ‘swashbuckler’ derives from someone noisily (swash) using a shield (buckler) and was originally perjorative.

Small swords being smaller, and with much less conspicuous hills make them more socially acceptable. Certainly not the weapon of choice for a ruffian trying to intimidate an ale house in the dockyard slums.

Conversely, it also makes them more acceptable to wear in polite company. In the UK, there's still a standing law that a sitting member of Parliament cannot enter Parliament in armour (Statute forbidding Bearing of Armour 1313 (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Statute_forbidding_Bearing_of_Armour)), but they can still be armed, since wearing a sword was the mark of a gentleman (and up until the 18th-19th Century, basically necessary for self defence purposes).

[Berenger]

Are there any sources on how viking ship crews divided loot among themselves? Would there be a single large pool of loot with shares of equal or different size for the captain, the ship owner, "officers" (?) and common crewmen? Would everything go to the captain to be distributed according to need, merit or social standing of the participants? I guess that 'everyone keeps exactly the stuff he personally found and carried away' would be highly impractical and prone to promoting strife amongst the raiders.

[Vykryl]

Didn't see anything in a quick web search unfortunately. In the book The Long Ships, during one voyage it mentions the party's leader, helmsman, and a few others (probably chieftains of the party's three ships) getting triple shares of the booty. Another voyage of the story mentions helmsman share being greater than that of the rest of the crew, but not the same as the chieftains on the voyage.

[Pauly]

Are there any sources on how viking ship crews divided loot among themselves? Would there be a single large pool of loot with shares of equal or different size for the captain, the ship owner, "officers" (?) and common crewmen? Would everything go to the captain to be distributed according to need, merit or social standing of the participants? I guess that 'everyone keeps exactly the stuff he personally found and carried away' would be highly impractical and prone to promoting strife amongst the raiders.

I read about it a long time ago, some things that stick in my mind.
Some ships were built by a village and then manned by some of the men from the village. In that case every household in the village got a share and then the surviving crew would get additional shares. Captain and navigator got extra shares although I can't recall the proportions. You could recruit renowned warriors by offering them an additional share.

Other ships were owned by an individual and crewed by warriors he recruited. In which case shares were divvied up more like a pirate ship with your rank on the ship deciding how many shares you got.

You also had ships built and crewed by order of kings. These weren’t strictly speaking vikings as vikings were for profit raiders. I can’t recall if they had a formal system for distributing loot.

Shares of loot were distributed ‘after costs’. So if your voyage got 200 gold pieces, but it cost you 100 gold to buy materials and supplies then the share of loot comes from the 100 profit, not the 200 income.

As a general rule of thumb with pirates from the Golden Age of Piracy is that at most the captain would receive triple an ordinary sailor’s share, and a double share was the most common split.

[Vinyadan]

Yup. But sap and sapping still have their "technical" definitions.

Just in case things aren't muddled enough, in the 19th century it became common in many armies to designate one man per company as a "sapeur-pionnier" (French term). This person was usually equipped with a large felling axe, and they would be deployed to clear obstacles or cut trails through forests, etc. (Typically the several sapper-pioneers from a battalion would be combined into a squad). In American practice the term was usually shortened to "pioneer" (during the American Civil War for instance) -- but in other nations it may be shortened to just "sapper." Providing yet another definition of the term "sapper". :-)

Thanks everybody for the digression!

Another fun fact: a pionnier was originally an infantryman (literally, a footman: pes (Lat. for foot) > pedo (late Lat. for footman) > Fr. pion > Fr. pionnier), but, somehow, already in the middle ages the name got the additional meaning of someone who excavates the ground.

It's got something to do with chess pawns: Lat. pedonem > It. pedone, Fr. pion, En. pawn, Pt. peão, Gr. pioni, Sp. péon, Dutch Pion, Turkish piyon, Polish pion... I find it interesting that the Turks got the name from the French form, as the game is supposed to have originated in Asia. Then again, they are fairly late comers in Anatolia and Thrace, and the game probably had already dispersed to Europe when they got there. Still, they got the name of the Bishop from Arabic, and that of the Queen from Persian or Arabic...

[AllHailthed4]

Long time reader, first time poster.

Our table is starting a new game in a couple weeks. My character is a military-trained sniper who will be palling around with an eclectic group of spies/criminals/Lovecraft investigators. The specific era is a little wibbly-wobbly, but generally the setting incorporates elements of the 1920's-50's.

From a mechanical standpoint, the character will mostly be providing battlefield control in combat (I'm under no delusion that 5e's mechnics will allow me to one-shot a shoggoth). However, I would like to incoporate some real world tactics into my roleplay and combat decisions. To that end, I'm wondering if the experts on this thread have any suggested reading on the topic? I'm particularily interested in the role a sniper should play on a team, general combat tactics, and countersniper tactics (in case the baddies decide to recruit one too).

[Mike_G]

Long time reader, first time poster.

Our table is starting a new game in a couple weeks. My character is a military-trained sniper who will be palling around with an eclectic group of spies/criminals/Lovecraft investigators. The specific era is a little wibbly-wobbly, but generally the setting incorporates elements of the 1920's-50's.

From a mechanical standpoint, the character will mostly be providing battlefield control in combat (I'm under no delusion that 5e's mechnics will allow me to one-shot a shoggoth). However, I would like to incoporate some real world tactics into my roleplay and combat decisions. To that end, I'm wondering if the experts on this thread have any suggested reading on the topic? I'm particularily interested in the role a sniper should play on a team, general combat tactics, and countersniper tactics (in case the baddies decide to recruit one too).

A Rifleman Went to War (https://www.amazon.com/Rifleman-Went-War-Herbert-McBride-ebook/dp/B014SRU58C/) by Herbert McBride is a great autobiography of one of the men who pioneered sniping in WWI which would be appropriate for your era.

Or if you just want a manual, it's hard to beat the Marine Corps Scout Sniper Manual (https://www.amazon.com/Marine-Corps-Sniper-Training-Manual/dp/0879470941)

[Pauly]

Long time reader, first time poster.

Our table is starting a new game in a couple weeks. My character is a military-trained sniper who will be palling around with an eclectic group of spies/criminals/Lovecraft investigators. The specific era is a little wibbly-wobbly, but generally the setting incorporates elements of the 1920's-50's.

From a mechanical standpoint, the character will mostly be providing battlefield control in combat (I'm under no delusion that 5e's mechnics will allow me to one-shot a shoggoth). However, I would like to incoporate some real world tactics into my roleplay and combat decisions. To that end, I'm wondering if the experts on this thread have any suggested reading on the topic? I'm particularily interested in the role a sniper should play on a team, general combat tactics, and countersniper tactics (in case the baddies decide to recruit one too).

“Enemy at the Gates” by William Craig has some fery good sections on Soviet sniping and encompasses a biography of Vasily Zaytzev who was the most famous Soviet sniper of WW2. The movie on the other hand bears little resemblance to true history, especially the personality/character of the snipers. There is a lot in the book about the seige of Stalingrad which you can skip over.

Another book I’d recommend is”Man Eaters of Kumaon” by Jim Corbett. While this book is about hunting man eating tigers, and differs from sniping in that he stalked the tigers to much closer distances than those snipers engage at, it’s a very good source on how to observe nature and to make logical deductions on how to find your prey.

Most Hollywood films would have you believe marksmanship and weapons handling are the prime requisites for sniping. In reality the mental side of being able to kill in cold blood and patience along with ability to observe nature are more important.

Some Field Manuals from the era that may be of use
US Scouting manual from 1944
https://archive.org/details/FM21-75

USMC Sniping Manual from 1981 (a little past your timeframe but most of it should still br relavent
https://archive.org/details/milmanual-fmfm-1-3b-sniping-u.s.-marine-corps/page/n1/mode/2up

British Sniping and Fieldcraft manual from 1942
https://www.compasslibrary.com/products/fieldcraft-sniping-and-intelligence-1942

Australian Army Sniper Manual.
http://afd-gaming.com/training/manuals/public/Public_Sniper_Manual.pdf

[Tobtor]

Are there any sources on how viking ship crews divided loot among themselves? Would there be a single large pool of loot with shares of equal or different size for the captain, the ship owner, "officers" (?) and common crewmen? Would everything go to the captain to be distributed according to need, merit or social standing of the participants? I guess that 'everyone keeps exactly the stuff he personally found and carried away' would be highly impractical and prone to promoting strife amongst the raiders.

The most accurate thing to say is: we do not know.

The other answers in this thread is likely good interpretations, but not based directly on sources. I assume the book "The Long Ships" is the one by Frans G. Bengtsson, which is a historical novel. And while the author does knows alot, and I is pretty accurate as fiction goes, it is not a source.

To make a guess/estimate we can look at three groups of sources.

1. Contemporary or near Contemporary sources from outside Scandinavia (aka Frankish, German and Anglo Saxon chronicles, as well as a very few Arab texts). Unfortunately they do not delve into any details about internal organisation. We can only learn that loot was divided among the participants.

2. Law texts. These are typical later (the earliest text are from the period 1100-1250). And they only describe the more organised country wide mobilisation called "leding". I know the danish ones best so I will take my description from that, but also the works of Rikke Malmros who did two books on late viking age and early military organisation ("Vikingernes syn på militær og samfund. Belyst gennem skjaldenes fyrstedigtning" and "Bønder og leding i valdemartidens Danmark" - unfortunately I do not think the are translated into English?

Anyway: it system is built around the village/area and each have to provide 1 ship and crew, who needs to bring their own weapons (shield and spear), they also need to equip the steersman (the one who steers the ship, but is also the captain on land) with a mail-armour. That is: the village needs to fund the ship and armour in the first place, by paying the steersman - likely some of the earliest taxation. They do get a share of loot bu it is very uncertain how much.

The system is described for text about the 12th century, but seem older. Rikke Malmros suggest (and at least some other scholars agree) that it have its roots in the 10th century reforms and more centralised government (during the reign of Harold Bluetooth and Swein Forkbeard in Denmark). Thus late Viking age.

However, more private "raids" are not covered.

3. Iceland sagas and poems. They are written in the 12-14th century, and how accurately they portray the actual Viking ages is debated. I believe they (at least some of the early ones) is pretty good. BUT Iceland is a special case, and might not represent for instance Swedish way of organise it.

Anyway: I have read all the existing sagas (some of them multiple times). First of: some vikings where "full time" Vikings, eg. pirates. But most of the time "going viking", it is a part time job. This can have two forms: A. Something done by young men. B. seasonal/periodic raids organised by an "chieftain"

A.
Young men where expected to go out in the world before settling. They need to gain wealth, reputation and connections. Sort of going to university, but with much more sailing and plundering and trading.
How to start: If your father was wealthy they could equip a ship for you (and your brothers). If your father was not as rich but still wealthy, he could buy a "a part" in a ship. How this worked is not described in details. If he a normal farmer, he could buy "a seat" in a ship. Sometimes it is a seat in a ship of a local chieftain's ship, but there is many Sagas of buying a seat in Norwegian and even Danish ships for Icelanders.

Some ships where mainly doing raiding some mainly trading, but even a ship mainly focusing on trading could supplement with raiding if need be. Any raiding-crew also conducted trading, as whatever plunder you got was not likely exactly what you wanted/needed, so you would go to trading centres an an sell/trade the loot.

Some of the sons of chieftains joined a king/earl to be "their man" and conduct their work. There are tales of putting down revolt but also missions to collect taxes of the Sami-tribes or tributes from distant earls. Most are working for the Norwegian King (as the closest king), but there are examples of Icelanders joining Danish and Swedish kings as well, and even Norse kings in England as well as at least one example of joining a Anglo-Saxon king.

Some also worked as Scalds for kings, this could be done even if you did not have your own ship, but was a way to move up in the world.

Others seem to work completely freelance.

The end goal was to go home and settle, using whatever loot you got to get a place in society. Going out was a way to secure you place in society or even rise on the social ladder. Most seem to been away 3-8 years, though some stayed longer and some settled other countries, and some just like being a Viking so much that they went at it full time. Especially younger sons might be tempted to gain their fortune somewhere elsewhere (all sones inherited, but at least in soem Sagas the older son got the farm, the younger the ship, the last the swords and some wealth/money and so on).

B. seasonal/periodic raids organised by an "chieftain"
Some of the more important people, presumably the ones already owning a ship, organised seasonal or periodic raids or other trips (including trading, joining a king in wars etc). Good thing there where young men around who needed to join a crew (see A above). This seem to be they way most people imagine it, but it does seem to be somewhat rare, unless the chieftain had sons who needed to gain a reputation and acquire new wealth.

So; about loot: if you have a "share" in a ship and you or your father have organised the trip, you likely get a larger share, whiles others get to divide the rest at equal shares. Note however that as some of them seem to have paid to get a seat, and thus some of the cost of the expedition was already covered. How much? We have no clue, as we do not know how much they paid and how much it cost to organise.

Hope it helps.

[Khedrac]

Long time reader, first time poster.

Our table is starting a new game in a couple weeks. My character is a military-trained sniper who will be palling around with an eclectic group of spies/criminals/Lovecraft investigators. The specific era is a little wibbly-wobbly, but generally the setting incorporates elements of the 1920's-50's.

From a mechanical standpoint, the character will mostly be providing battlefield control in combat (I'm under no delusion that 5e's mechnics will allow me to one-shot a shoggoth). However, I would like to incoporate some real world tactics into my roleplay and combat decisions. To that end, I'm wondering if the experts on this thread have any suggested reading on the topic? I'm particularily interested in the role a sniper should play on a team, general combat tactics, and countersniper tactics (in case the baddies decide to recruit one too).

Before you do anything else, have a chat with your DM about your intentions. The chances are good that they will know about as much as you do about how snipers work, or, once you have read some of the suggestions, less than you do. At this point trying to apply some of the theory you have learned will just make things worse!

If you and the DM agree about what sort of thing your character is trained in and what it can do (with humans) then the DM won't mind you spouting more technical information (which adds useful colour if you are able to keep it brief) and you will know that the DM has a fair idea of what you are trying to do and is applying the circumstances fairly (i.e. if it doesn't work on these opponents there's probably a good reason other than the DM didn't understand what you were trying to achieve).
Also, if you and the DM agree on what you are trying to do, it doesn't matter if the methods ascribed to your character are completely wrong in real life - they are what works (normally) in the game world.

[Pauly]

Before you do anything else, have a chat with your DM about your intentions. The chances are good that they will know about as much as you do about how snipers work, or, once you have read some of the suggestions, less than you do. At this point trying to apply some of the theory you have learned will just make things worse!

If you and the DM agree abot what sort of thing your character is trained in and what it can do (with humans) then the DM won't mind you spouting more technical information (which adds useful colour if you are able to keep it brief) and you will know that the DM has a fair idea of what you are trying to do and is applying the circumstances fairly (i.e. if it doesn't work on these opponents there's probably a good reason other than the DM didn't understand what you were trying to achieve).
Also, if you and the DM agree on what you are trying to do, it doesn't matter if the methods ascribed to your character are completely wrong in real life - they are what works (normally) in the game world.

Having read this, Might I suggest considering to change your character to “Dangerous Game Hunter” rather than “military sniper”?

Sniping involves a lot of technical issues and involves hiding and waiting and taking a shot at 200~300m with a military rifle. Dangerous game hunting involves stalking a target to 5 or 10 meters and then using a much more powerful ‘stopping’ rifle.
Also socially big game hunters are generally drawn from the upper middle class whereas the typical sniper is more commonly drawn from the backswood peasant class.

From a RPG perspective a dangerous game hunter might be a better fit on the tactical battlefield and in social situations.

[snowblizz]

Having read this, Might I suggest considering to change your character to “Dangerous Game Hunter” rather than “military sniper”?

Sniping involves a lot of technical issues and involves hiding and waiting and taking a shot at 200~300m with a military rifle. Dangerous game hunting involves stalking a target to 5 or 10 meters and then using a much more powerful ‘stopping’ rifle.
Also socially big game hunters are generally drawn from the upper middle class whereas the typical sniper is more commonly drawn from the backswood peasant class.

From a RPG perspective a dangerous game hunter might be a better fit on the tactical battlefield and in social situations.

The two are not necessarily separate categories though. Simo Häyhä, the most famous sniper on youtube (at least fees like it sometimes), learnt his craft as a hunter. Which is quite common really.
For a less technical sniper, I would go for the squad marksman. That is the guy in a squad that was good at marksmanship, but not extensively trained as a sniper team member. Would usually get a marksman oriented rifle (if such exists), sometimes an older bolt-action, or an assault rifle with a scope all depending a bit on time and place.

Obviously it's less than trivial to combined these. The character starts out as someone who was a hunter in civilian life and as a natural marksman was designated to that position in a squad without necessarily going through sniperschool.

[Martin Greywolf]

However, I would like to incoporate some real world tactics into my roleplay and combat decisions. To that end, I'm wondering if the experts on this thread have any suggested reading on the topic? I'm particularily interested in the role a sniper should play on a team, general combat tactics, and countersniper tactics (in case the baddies decide to recruit one too).

Unfortunately for all of us, DnD is notoriously bad at that sort of thing, it has its own set of simulationist rules that largely override what would happen in real life (whether or not shoggoths would be involved).

The best thing I can think of to do is to base your gameplan on manipulating concealement and cover - turning over tables (it gets you a concealment, even against a machinegun), leaning from behind corners, using the hell out of prone condition, that sort of thing. For tactics against enemies, destroy their cover (alchemical fire, maybe? many tables let fire destroy objects far faster than it would) and... that's about it. DnD doesn't really model covering fire, unless there is some rule about making ranged AoOs I'm unaware of.

Just... talk to your DM about this first, I've seen some DMs get incredibly salty at players for using cover rules.

[SleepyShadow]

Before you do anything else, have a chat with your DM about your intentions. The chances are good that they will know about as much as you do about how snipers work, or, once you have read some of the suggestions, less than you do. At this point trying to apply some of the theory you have learned will just make things worse!

If you and the DM agree about what sort of thing your character is trained in and what it can do (with humans) then the DM won't mind you spouting more technical information (which adds useful colour if you are able to keep it brief) and you will know that the DM has a fair idea of what you are trying to do and is applying the circumstances fairly (i.e. if it doesn't work on these opponents there's probably a good reason other than the DM didn't understand what you were trying to achieve).
Also, if you and the DM agree on what you are trying to do, it doesn't matter if the methods ascribed to your character are completely wrong in real life - they are what works (normally) in the game world.

Hi, I'm the GM in question. Have no fear, I know quite a bit on the subject of sniping, and on the military in general. I'm not worried about D4 knowing more than I do on the subject.


Unfortunately for all of us, DnD is notoriously bad at that sort of thing, it has its own set of simulationist rules that largely override what would happen in real life (whether or not shoggoths would be involved).

The best thing I can think of to do is to base your gameplan on manipulating concealement and cover - turning over tables (it gets you a concealment, even against a machinegun), leaning from behind corners, using the hell out of prone condition, that sort of thing. For tactics against enemies, destroy their cover (alchemical fire, maybe? many tables let fire destroy objects far faster than it would) and... that's about it. DnD doesn't really model covering fire, unless there is some rule about making ranged AoOs I'm unaware of.

Just... talk to your DM about this first, I've seen some DMs get incredibly salty at players for using cover rules.

I don't have a problem with cover/concealment, especially since the enemy will be using it as well. On the subject of covering fire, D20 Modern has decent rules for it which I'm adapting for the game.

[Vinyadan]

Young men where expected to go out in the world before settling. They need to gain wealth, reputation and connections. Sort of going to university, but with much more sailing and plundering and trading.
How to start: If your father was wealthy they could equip a ship for you (and your brothers). If your father was not as rich but still wealthy, he could buy a "a part" in a ship. How this worked is not described in details. If he a normal farmer, he could buy "a seat" in a ship. Sometimes it is a seat in a ship of a local chieftain's ship, but there is many Sagas of buying a seat in Norwegian and even Danish ships for Icelanders.

Some ships where mainly doing raiding some mainly trading, but even a ship mainly focusing on trading could supplement with raiding if need be. Any raiding-crew also conducted trading, as whatever plunder you got was not likely exactly what you wanted/needed, so you would go to trading centres an an sell/trade the loot.

Some of the sons of chieftains joined a king/earl to be "their man" and conduct their work. There are tales of putting down revolt but also missions to collect taxes of the Sami-tribes or tributes from distant earls. Most are working for the Norwegian King (as the closest king), but there are examples of Icelanders joining Danish and Swedish kings as well, and even Norse kings in England as well as at least one example of joining a Anglo-Saxon king.

Some also worked as Scalds for kings, this could be done even if you did not have your own ship, but was a way to move up in the world.

Others seem to work completely freelance.

The end goal was to go home and settle, using whatever loot you got to get a place in society. Going out was a way to secure you place in society or even rise on the social ladder. Most seem to been away 3-8 years, though some stayed longer and some settled other countries, and some just like being a Viking so much that they went at it full time. Especially younger sons might be tempted to gain their fortune somewhere elsewhere (all sones inherited, but at least in soem Sagas the older son got the farm, the younger the ship, the last the swords and some wealth/money and so on).



Would serving the Eastern Roman Emperor factor in as one of these options?

[AllHailthed4]

A Rifleman Went to War (https://www.amazon.com/Rifleman-Went-War-Herbert-McBride-ebook/dp/B014SRU58C/) by Herbert McBride is a great autobiography of one of the men who pioneered sniping in WWI which would be appropriate for your era.

Or if you just want a manual, it's hard to beat the Marine Corps Scout Sniper Manual (https://www.amazon.com/Marine-Corps-Sniper-Training-Manual/dp/0879470941)


“Enemy at the Gates” by William Craig has some fery good sections on Soviet sniping and encompasses a biography of Vasily Zaytzev who was the most famous Soviet sniper of WW2. The movie on the other hand bears little resemblance to true history, especially the personality/character of the snipers. There is a lot in the book about the seige of Stalingrad which you can skip over.

Another book I’d recommend is”Man Eaters of Kumaon” by Jim Corbett. While this book is about hunting man eating tigers, and differs from sniping in that he stalked the tigers to much closer distances than those snipers engage at, it’s a very good source on how to observe nature and to make logical deductions on how to find your prey.

Most Hollywood films would have you believe marksmanship and weapons handling are the prime requisites for sniping. In reality the mental side of being able to kill in cold blood and patience along with ability to observe nature are more important.

Some Field Manuals from the era that may be of use
US Scouting manual from 1944
https://archive.org/details/FM21-75

USMC Sniping Manual from 1981 (a little past your timeframe but most of it should still br relavent
https://archive.org/details/milmanual-fmfm-1-3b-sniping-u.s.-marine-corps/page/n1/mode/2up

British Sniping and Fieldcraft manual from 1942
https://www.compasslibrary.com/products/fieldcraft-sniping-and-intelligence-1942

Australian Army Sniper Manual.
http://afd-gaming.com/training/manuals/public/Public_Sniper_Manual.pdf

I'll definitely give these a look! I don't suppose there are any manuals from the Eastern Bloc (that have been translated)?


Having read this, Might I suggest considering to change your character to “Dangerous Game Hunter” rather than “military sniper”?

Sniping involves a lot of technical issues and involves hiding and waiting and taking a shot at 200~300m with a military rifle. Dangerous game hunting involves stalking a target to 5 or 10 meters and then using a much more powerful ‘stopping’ rifle.
Also socially big game hunters are generally drawn from the upper middle class whereas the typical sniper is more commonly drawn from the backswood peasant class.

From a RPG perspective a dangerous game hunter might be a better fit on the tactical battlefield and in social situations.

The character is a backwoods peasant, lol. The party has plenty of charismatic faces, so I figured I'd introduce a little earthy common sense.


The two are not necessarily separate categories though. Simo Häyhä, the most famous sniper on youtube (at least fees like it sometimes), learnt his craft as a hunter. Which is quite common really.
For a less technical sniper, I would go for the squad marksman. That is the guy in a squad that was good at marksmanship, but not extensively trained as a sniper team member. Would usually get a marksman oriented rifle (if such exists), sometimes an older bolt-action, or an assault rifle with a scope all depending a bit on time and place.

Obviously it's less than trivial to combined these. The character starts out as someone who was a hunter in civilian life and as a natural marksman was designated to that position in a squad without necessarily going through sniperschool.

Simo Haya was definitely an inspiration, along with Lyudmilla Pavlichenko :smallsmile:

The squad marksman idea might be good as a starting point. It's definitely in line with the character's backstory, and gives them plenty of room to grow as the campaign progresses.


Unfortunately for all of us, DnD is notoriously bad at that sort of thing, it has its own set of simulationist rules that largely override what would happen in real life (whether or not shoggoths would be involved).

The best thing I can think of to do is to base your gameplan on manipulating concealement and cover - turning over tables (it gets you a concealment, even against a machinegun), leaning from behind corners, using the hell out of prone condition, that sort of thing. For tactics against enemies, destroy their cover (alchemical fire, maybe? many tables let fire destroy objects far faster than it would) and... that's about it. DnD doesn't really model covering fire, unless there is some rule about making ranged AoOs I'm unaware of.

That's very true. To clarify, I plan to use what I learn as a background from which to draw inspiration rather than rigid manual. If a combat scenario gives me time to set up a concealed position, then I'll take the opportunity to show off a bit. If not, then that's what a sidearm and hitpoints are for :smallwink:

I will definitely use your suggestions about creating cover and using the prone condition, and may invest in some alchemical fire (or use radio contact to direct the wizard's fireballs?)

Thanks for the help!

[Berenger]

Thanks for the answers regarding vikings. :smallsmile:

I'm asking because I'm going to GM a viking RPG, so while I'm generally interested in historical facts, educated guesses are good enough for my purposes when there are no applicable sources.

[Tobtor]

Would serving the Eastern Roman Emperor factor in as one of these options?

Yes. This would be the "Some of the sons of chieftains joined a king/earl to be "their man"", category. The emperor just being a very powerfull "king". Harald Hardrada was serving the Bysantine emperor, and at least to his mind this was that sort of arrengement. When he left he used the earned loot to get power back home (he gave half the loot to his brother King Magnus to be appointed co-King of Norway).

[Pauly]

I'll definitely give these a look! I don't suppose there are any manuals from the Eastern Bloc (that have been translated)?

The character is a backwoods peasant, lol. The party has plenty of charismatic faces, so I figured I'd introduce a little earthy common sense.

Simo Haya was definitely an inspiration, along with Lyudmilla Pavlichenko :smallsmile:

The squad marksman idea might be good as a starting point. It's definitely in line with the character's backstory, and gives them plenty of room to grow as the campaign progresses.

That's very true. To clarify, I plan to use what I learn as a background from which to draw inspiration rather than rigid manual. If a combat scenario gives me time to set up a concealed position, then I'll take the opportunity to show off a bit. If not, then that's what a sidearm and hitpoints are for :smallwink:

Thanks for the help!

I’m unaware of any Eastern bloc sniping manuals that have been translated, but I think you’d have better luck in a shooting/sniping forum than here. However as I understand it there is little difference in the technical sniping side of the training, although deployment may have been different between East and West.
“Enemy at the Gates” does cover Lyudmilla Pavlichenko, but more as a side character to Zaytzev.

A very informative youtube video on Simo Hayha https://youtu.be/3XzmCQUPyTM

This other channel has a lot of videos about rifles from the era and sniping tactics, and is run by a (claimed) modern sniper. I haven’t found anything he said or claims to be egregiously wrong and his shooting appears to be consistent with what he says his training is so I’m inclined to believe his claims. This video in particular has a really good breakdown of the limits of sniping in your target era.
https://youtu.be/YqK6CMqGuMs

Edit to add.
As for counter-sniping there are 2 things.
Firstly on a battlefield there are a whole lot of eyeballs observing a whole lot of areas from a whole lot of directions. Most snipers were spotted by a random dude on the other side who happened to be looking at the right place at the right time, hence the practice of relocating after one or two shots from a position.
Secondly in the rare instance of sniper duels fieldcraft was king. Being able to hide better than the other guy and being able to observe better than the other guy usually determined the matter. The other less common way was to induce the other sniper into making a shot and thus revealing his position, either by providing a suitably realistic dummy target (helmet on a stick) or through a volunteer providing a live target. This second method depended on having a good idea as to the enemy sniper’s position. Marksmanship almost never came into it because both shooters were already at a very high level.

As for roleplaying, I think that Clint Eastwood’s character in Gran Torino is a very good representation of the mentality of most snipers* I have read about . Yeah? I’ll blow a hole in your face and then go in the house... and sleep like a baby. You can count on that. We used to stack ****s like you five feet high in Korea... use ya for sandbags. . They don’t talk much not because they are shy or anti-social, but more because they don’t see the point of small talk. They tend to be see problem -> fix problem people, not inclined to discuss what everybody else thinks or seek validation of their plans from others.
* I know his character isn’t meant to be a sniper, but it is more consistent with how real snipers thought and acted than say Jude Law’s character in “Enemy at the Gates”.

[Martin Greywolf]

I’m unaware of any Eastern bloc sniping manuals that have been translated, but I think you’d have better luck in a shooting/sniping forum than here. However as I understand it there is little difference in the technical sniping side of the training, although deployment may have been different between East and West.
“Enemy at the Gates” does cover Lyudmilla Pavlichenko, but more as a side character to Zaytzev.

Unless you find those translated manuals, assume everything about Eastern Front is not true. We really, really can't go into why this is because of forum rules, so that's where I'll end my advice.

[NRSASD]

So I’m thinking of running a short campaign set in the French Revolution, circa 1780-ish. What kinds of weapons would a particularly ambitious band of revolutionaries plausibly have access to if they looted a royal armory?

Here’s what I have so far. Let me know what other broad classes of weapons should exist/what categories should be subdivided because significant differences exist. I’m aiming for verisimilitude, not strict accuracy (I would prefer to use “assault rifle” rather than “M-16”; I want generic classes of weapon rather than specific models.)

Guns: Musket, rifle, pistol, blunderbuss
Swords: Sabre, rapier, small sword (like artillery-crew utility blades)
Polearms: improvised, halberd, pike
Daggers: knife, dagger, (fencing dagger?)
Other melee: axe, club, great axe, great club
Explosives: grenade, incendiary cocktail

As always, thanks for your help in advance!

[Lvl 2 Expert]

I'll see what I can come up with.


Guns: Musket, rifle, pistol, blunderbuss
You could split pistol in a smaller and more covert infantry/dueling type of pistol and a larger cavalry type of pistol, sometimes with more of a blunderbuss style barrel for reloading on horseback. Although I'm honestly not sure if those were still a thing by this time. Also possibly too detailed.

Swords: Sabre, rapier, small sword (like artillery-crew utility blades)
The small sword I know was a lighter version of the rapier, used as a civilian and fencing weapon, although I'm sure that if you found they were used by artillery crews that's the case. Maybe, if you're looking in the utility blade direction, add some cutlass/machete like blade too. There's probably a more period appropriate French word for it, but the cheap durable weapon of commoners, adventurers and sailors alike, basically.

Polearms: improvised, halberd, pike
Go as nuts here as you like. There were a lot of polearms. Although category wise the important one to keep separated is probably the pike. They were a big deal. As a cross between this category and the sword you could consider some sort of a greatsword/zweihander.

Daggers: knife, dagger, (fencing dagger?)
A main gauche/trident dagger/sword breaker/left hand dagger would be a kind of cool addition if you can make it distinct. More for fencing than for military use though. Common alternatives as a left hand weapon are a buckler and a cape. Although this general style of fencing was rapidly being replaced with the modern one handed style.

Other melee: axe, club, great axe, great club
Explosives: grenade, incendiary cocktail
Actually, the most important addition I can do is probably this: just from a military point of view we're pretty solidly inside the age of the gun here. I know I just said pikes were a big deal, but that mostly kind of ended 100 years before this point. Most infantrymen would have a musket or some other form of gun with a bayonet, and as a backup probably often a rapier, or maybe a messer or something. Maybe a smallsword plus a pistol for an officer. For cavalry there's pistols, sabers and lances (which made a return ones bayonets had replaced pikes).

[Pauly]

So I’m thinking of running a short campaign set in the French Revolution, circa 1780-ish. What kinds of weapons would a particularly ambitious band of revolutionaries plausibly have access to if they looted a royal armory?

Here’s what I have so far. Let me know what other broad classes of weapons should exist/what categories should be subdivided because significant differences exist. I’m aiming for verisimilitude, not strict accuracy (I would prefer to use “assault rifle” rather than “M-16”; I want generic classes of weapon rather than specific models.)

Guns: Musket, rifle, pistol, blunderbuss
Swords: Sabre, rapier, small sword (like artillery-crew utility blades)
Polearms: improvised, halberd, pike
Daggers: knife, dagger, (fencing dagger?)
Other melee: axe, club, great axe, great club
Explosives: grenade, incendiary cocktail

As always, thanks for your help in advance!

Just to clarify they are looting a French arsenal, not any other country’s?
.

[NRSASD]

Just to clarify they are looting a French arsenal, not any other country’s?
.

Correct. They’re going to be heroes of the revolution, so urban citizens who got their hands on an arsenal. As far as training/proficiency goes, some of them might be NCO deserters. French colonials would be allowed, but otherwise everyone will be French.

@Level2 Expert- having done a bit more digging, I’m going to replace rapier with epee (the classy French small sword), and small swords with short swords to cover the whole gamut of artillery swords, swords bayonets, and militarized machetes.

Regarding pikes, I know they’re very out of date given the era from a battlefield perspective, but I’m pretty sure they were still a pretty common weapon for revolutionaries when they couldn’t find a gun. Something long and sharp is always useful in these circumstances. Did the French royal forces use polearms for crowd control in this era?

Regarding lances, you’re right, those should totally exist. I’m not sure if the players will ever find a horse though… I’m not expecting the players to leave the urban area.

[Gnoman]

If looting a government arsenal, there's a real chance they'd have some oddball guns available. Karkhoff repeaters saw very limited adoption, for example, but most countries bought at least a few of them for trials. I can't find any evidence that the French used the Giradoni Air Rifle, but the time period fits and it wouldn't be impossible to justify.

[Saint-Just]

Do you mean "royal" as in something that king's family and guests use or just more appropriate way to say "government"? If the second then the army arsenals shouldn't really have rifles - they definitely weren't a mass-issued weapon at that time.

Also you definitely wouldn't find "incendiary cocktails" pre-packaged. I am under impression that liquid incendiaries in general became widespread only later, in that period it was mostly rockets and shells, not infantry weapons.

[Vinyadan]

About polearms, there are some images of the King's Guard holding them: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swiss_Guards the one on the left is an officer however, so it could have had a non-fighting function. Also, that's an image from 30 years before the Revolution. In representations of fights between the king's forces and the revolutionaries, the pikes are generally held by the sans-culottes, because it was one of their symbols. It was so important, that it started popping up in topography (stuff like "Place des Piques"), and even as person name (a child was given the name "Marat-Couthon-Pique"), so it could have been a matter of emphasis, but pikes were certainly seen as antiquated in the king's military, and hadn't been used in the field for something like a century.

The guards closest to the king, the gardes de la manche (those who "touched his sleeve" because of how close they were to him) also are represented with a polearm in reconstructions of their dress in revolutionary times https://www.authentic-costumes.com/product-page/garde-de-la-manche-du-roy https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Garde_ecossais_Louis_XVI_Patas06120.jpg Of course, there was a ceremonial function, but they were supposed to act if things went wrong, and were drawn from the soldiers of the Scottish Guard, not from the rather unskilled nobles of the Life Guards.

I didn't find much about how policing was dealt with in those times, however (I saw that there is a book (https://fr.shopping.rakuten.com/offer/buy/72197833/La-Police-Parisienne-Sous-Louis-Xvi-La-Police-Parisienne-Sous-Louis-Xvi-Livre.html) about it, but I haven't read it). From the images, a policeman (a member of the marèchaussée) carried a stick, a gun, and a sword, and often was mounted.

I also couldn't find what would probably have been the best answer: an inventory of some weapon depot in the days of Louis XVI. On a more general level, the looting of the Hospital of the Invalids got 3,000 rifles and a few cannons (or, according the 1842 Britannica, "upwards of 30,000 stands of arms and 20 pieces of cannon"; I don't know why there are such massive discrepancies between sources), and the Bastille contained large quantities of powder; cannons were also taken from both the Hotel de Ville and the Bastille. J. Humbert, one of the attackers of the Bastille, recorded that, before he got there, he was given a rifle at the Invalides and powder at the Hotel de Ville, but no shot, and he had to buy some small nails to load his gun; before these places were taken, he and other citizens patrolled their districts armed only with swords, because the districts had no firearms. They also looted the shops of armorers and cutlers (a representation (https://www.parismuseescollections.paris.fr/fr/musee-carnavalet/oeuvres/appel-aux-armes-et-pillage-des-boutiques-des-arquebusiers-par-les-0#infos-principales)).

There is a funny thing (and related to odd pieces), Humbert describes some previously dismantled small cannons being used against the Bastille, one of them with silver inlays. This one has been identified with a Siamese cannon gifted to Louis XIV by the King of Siam in 1684. https://royalartillerymuseum.com/news/object-of-the-month-february It was held in the palace currently known as Hotel de la Marine and considered forniture, until it was looted and put to use again. During the same event, the crowd got some parade swords and pikes, which I guess are the ones on which two heads were paraded after the Bastille was taken, unless they came from soldiers who helped conduct the assault (the man then in charge of the building deliberately led the people directly to the weapon hall, to keep them away from the really valuable stuff like the jewels, which were stolen a few years later).

Another funny detail, the keys of the Bastille had a great symbolic meaning, so they were paraded around after the victory: people forgot that they were necessary to free the prisoners, so their cell doors had to be smashed open.

Contemporary sources also describe the carriages of aristocrats being searched before the attack and finding weapons in them; this would have been part of some conspiracy, which involved hoarding both weapons and grain to increase its price during an already bad year. I don't know how reliable this is (hearsay...), but it could be interesting for a game.

[Mr Beer]

They might get some armour: cuirass were still used by cavalry and I guess some simple helmets.

Also barrels of gunpowder, slow match and small cannon - or large cannon if you want.

EDIT

Looks like this musket was a standard French infantry weapon: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charleville_musket

And this link seems to be a primer on the kind of artillery the French would have used at the time: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gribeauval_system

[AdAstra]

Depending on how much granularity you want, it may be good to separate out hatchets, particularly more utility-oriented ones, and larger axes. Similarly, carbines/musketoons might be a useful subdivision of muskets.

There might be some hand mortars,capable of firing the hand grenades of the time, but they were not a very popular weapon (if they misfired, you still had a lit grenade in the gun). But bad ideas are fine to have sometimes.

In terms of artillery the heroes are likely to be able to use personally, Coehorn mortars, swivel guns, and wall pieces are reasonable options for the period. They're relatively portable as artillery goes, the wall piece especially being essentially a giant musket, though one you'd want to brace thoroughly before firing. If the players have any wagons they should be able to transport them without much difficulty, and it gives them some extra firepower to break out should they need it.

[fusilier]

So I'm thinking of running a short campaign set in the French Revolution, circa 1780-ish. What kinds of weapons would a particularly ambitious band of revolutionaries plausibly have access to if they looted a royal armory?

Here's what I have so far. Let me know what other broad classes of weapons should exist/what categories should be subdivided because significant differences exist. I'm aiming for verisimilitude, not strict accuracy (I would prefer to use “assault rifle” rather than M-16”; I want generic classes of weapon rather than specific models.)


Guns: Musket, rifle, pistol, blunderbuss

Musket (and bayonet!) of course. The French don't seem to have adopted any military rifles during this period, instead preferring smoothbore muskets for their light infantry. A Dragoon musket (a shorter version of the standard musket) was used for a while.

Military blunderbusses existed, but I think they were more of a naval item. You might want to consider a carbine/musketoon instead, both cavalry and sappers carried them.


Swords: Sabre, rapier, small sword (like artillery-crew utility blades)

having done a bit more digging, IÂ’m going to replace rapier with epee (the classy French small sword), and small swords with short swords to cover the whole gamut of artillery swords, swords bayonets, and militarized machetes.

For short sword, what you are looking for is a "sabre-briquet", a short, curved sword with a fairly wide blade. The British might call something similar a "hanger." Intended for foot troops (infantry and foot artillery), they were usually simple, NCOs and elite units would carry them. The later "artillery short sword" wasn't adopted until 1816.


Polearms: improvised, halberd, pike
In the 18th century halberds were carried by Sergeants, and partisans (spontoons?) were sometimes carried by junior officers. It's basically a spear or half-pike. I think this practice may have already fallen out of fashion by the time of the revolution, but I suspect a bunch of them were in arsenals in either case.


Daggers: knife, dagger, (fencing dagger?)
Not sure how many of these would have been common in an arsenal (maybe some ancient plug bayonets were still lying around), but knives and daggers were usually a personal purchase item, and not hard to find. Socket bayonets should be in abundance, of course.


Other melee: axe, club, great axe, great club
Felling axes (for pioneers), and hatchets for various work I think were common in military stores. Artillery trail-spikes make good improvised clubs. And the various other artillery implements (rammer, sponges, worm), are effectively staff weapons.


Explosives: grenade, incendiary cocktail
Grenades yes. They are often made from small artillery shells. Not sure about incendiary cocktails -- a good artillery store might have the stuff needed for making something like a carcass (a kind of flare like projectile), but it would be the materials to make one, rather than have it made it up ahead of time and stored.

Perhaps rockets? I don't know much about the history of French military rockets, I believe they fielded some later in the Napoleonic wars.

[Pauly]

British and Austro-Hunfarians are my bag in thus period. I have a bit if a smattering about the French though.

Pre-revolutionary officers were expected to pay for and provide their personal side arms, so officer’s pistols, spadroons (military small swords), cavalry sabers and so on would not be found in the arsenal,

The French never adopted a rifle. The loss of rate of fire was held to be a bigger drawback than benefit of accuracy. The Girondi air rifle was a state secret of the Austro-Hungarians and there is zero chance of the French having acquired any.

Carbines (short muskets) were used by the dragoons, pioneers and artillery. Possibly different patterns for each service.
Speaking of pioneers they carried felling axes and puck axes and so on, which were 100% tools and 0% weapons.

Cavalry swords were basically curved sabers for the light cavalry and long straight sabers for the heavy cavalry. The heavy cavalry full cuirass and helmet would also be found in the arsenals. Cavalry also carried cavalry pistols which weren’t as finely made as the officer’s weapons. I can’t recall if pre-revolutionary France had lance equipped regiments, but they did have lances by 1800.

NCOs were issued with a cutlass type sword, often called a hanger in British sources. Half pikes and halberds were issued to junior officers and senior NCOs, but my reading is that they were a parade duty item only in this era.

[ShurikVch]

Have two questions for which I have some problems to find answers:

Before the iron (steel) armor, armor material was bronze. OK. But - what kinds of armor were made of it?
Before the gunpowder artillery - what was the armament of warships? Were they armed at all? Where I can read/watch about it?

[Catullus64]

Have two questions for which I have some problems to find answers:

Before the iron (steel) armor, armor material was bronze. OK. But - what kinds of armor were made of it?


To cite a more well-documented example of bronze defensive armaments, take a look at Greek hoplites. Since they were citizen-soldiers whose kit had to be provided out of their own property, I think that the places which they prioritized armoring in bronze are revealing. Generally, if nothing else on the body is armored in bronze, the head will be. The shield usually also has a thin facing of bronze. Wealthier hoplites would go in for either bronze reinforcements to their primarily textile body armor, or the fully bronze cuirass. Bronze greaves were not unheard of, since the lower legs are one of the body parts least protected by the shield.

Bronze scale armor has also been found; I'm not aware of any examples of bronze mail.

[Thane of Fife]

Have two questions for which I have some problems to find answers:

Before the gunpowder artillery - what was the armament of warships? Were they armed at all? Where I can read/watch about it?


The Eastern Roman Empire was famous for using flamethrowers on their ships (see Greek Fire), but I believe the most common forms of fighting done from ships would have been arrow fire, boarding, and (on some ships) rams.

The idea of a forecastle or aftercastle on a ship comes from this period, with the "castle" providing a strong defensive position from which to repel boarders and which would provide a high vantage point to shoot from.

[fusilier]

Have two questions for which I have some problems to find answers:
. . .
Before the gunpowder artillery - what was the armament of warships? Were they armed at all? Where I can read/watch about it?


Underwater rams were used in the classical period, but fell out of favor in the middle ages. Boarding was the main way of fighting another ship. Grappling hooks were common to lash the ships together for a boarding fight. Rocks and javelins would be thrown from the fighting tops (like a crow's nest). Other than that most fighting would be with the expected personal weapons: swords, spears, bows, crossbows, etc. Some heavy weapons were used, like large crew served crossbows, but they don't seem to have been intended for destroying the enemy ship at range.

Oh, and fire! Fire could be dangerous though if the ships were grappled and couldn't be freed. Famously, at the battle of Zonchio (1499), when two Venetian sailing ships had fought an inconclusive boarding action with the Ottoman flagship, the Venetians turned to using fire. But it turned against them and all three ships burned and sank.

Note: "arming" a ship, often included putting soldiers on it for fighting, and not, necessarily, fitting it with heavy weapons.

I haven't read many works that focus on the pre-gunpowder era. If you can find a copy of John F. Guilmartin's Galleons and Galleys, I would take a look at it. While focused on the development of gunpowder weapons at sea, it covers the transition from pre-gunpowder to gunpowder, and gives a good introduction to the late pre-gunpowder form of naval combat. A fairly easy read, and well illustrated.

[Mechalich]

Before the iron (steel) armor, armor material was bronze. OK. But - what kinds of armor were made of it?

So this is a bit tricky. There has been relatively little metal armor uncovered from the Bronze Age. A few examples, such as the Dendra panoply (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dendra_panoply) exist, but they are rare, and it is difficult if not impossible to tell if artistic depictions imply metal versus textile armors (especially with scale/lamellar). Most of the examples of bronze armor we actually possess, whether its Greek Hoplite cuirasses, Chinese lamellar coats, or Roman scale armor are from the Iron Age and existed alongside armor made of iron, often exactly the same pieces. For example, there are iron hoplite cuirasses as well as bronze ones.

[Satinavian]

Have two questions for which I have some problems to find answers:
Before the iron (steel) armor, armor material was bronze. OK. But - what kinds of armor were made of it?
The really important benefit iron brought to the table was being way cheaper and available in larger quantities.

Among other things that means that before iron, it was less the case that bronce was used for armor in place of iron and more that metal armor as such was far more rare/prestigious and people generally used the bronce for weapons only and other materials for armor.
It also means that even when people made bronce armor pieces, they often were unique and there is little in widespread bronce armor styles and types. Bronce scale armor might have existed to some extend, mostly because it is easy to get there from the non-metal version by just changing the material of the scales.

[Gnoman]

The most concrete description I've seen of bronze armor in the literature is the equipment assigned to Goliath.


A champion named Goliath, who was from Gath, came out of the Philistine camp. His height was six cubits and a span. He had a bronze helmet on his head and wore a coat of scale armor of bronze weighing five thousand shekels; on his legs he wore bronze greaves, and a bronze javelin was slung on his back. His spear shaft was like a weaver’s rod, and its iron point weighed six hundred shekels

[Martin Greywolf]

For bronze age Homeric armor, see this article (https://koryvantesstudies.org/studies-in-english-language/page215-2/). It's pretty well-supported, cites sources and so on. I'm not sure I agree with horned helmet as non-ceremonial piece, but then and again, sengoku jidai kabuto are a thing that exists, so...

[Spamotron]

Have two questions for which I have some problems to find answers:

Before the iron (steel) armor, armor material was bronze. OK. But - what kinds of armor were made of it?
Before the gunpowder artillery - what was the armament of warships? Were they armed at all? Where I can read/watch about it?


The most thorough layman's overview of ancient naval artillery I know of is this interview (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rtZhQQM02Ww&t) on Drachinfel's channel. Drach basically pioneered naval history on YouTube and he vets his sources and guests quite well.

[Pauly]

As for bronze armor, the usual caveats about when/where apply. Also important is that this is the start of metal armor making and design in human history, so techniques and designs had to be developed from scratch.

The earliest bronze armors seem to have been bronze plates curved to fit around the body, like a very crude lorica segmentata. Whatever protection it gave would have come to cost of serious impairment to mobility.
Later scale armor seems to have been the preferred method utilizing bronze in armor.
Greaves to protect the shins appear to have been common, and bracers to protect the forearms are known to exist.
Finally the bronze cuirass was developed, although these appear to have been contemporaneous with the iron age.
From what I have read there was no bronze mail, or at the very least no widespread adoption of mail.

Regarding ship armament. Again the usual caveats about when/where apply.
Rams were important in galley warfare, although they weren’t universally adopted across time and space.
Marines were the most common “armament” carried. Along with the marines came various methods to aid boarding and fighting. The Romans developed the corvus boarding ramp. It was common for ships to be lashed together to provide stable fighting platforms, and some naval battles were more like land battles on floating platforms.
Archers were carried, and were considered as separate and different category to marines. Archers being unarmored and not expected to contribute much in hand to hand fighting where marines were seen as boarding experts.
Artillery such as ballistae (aka bolt throwers) could be carried. It is important to note these were considered long range anti-personnel devices, not anti-ship devices. There are some suggestions catapults could have been used, but considering range and accuracy makes me think this is more wishful thinking than anything else. Finally on rare occasions trebuchets were fitted for sieges. This was rare and definitely not for fighting other ships.
The use of fire as a weapon was a huge problem, because all ships were highly flammable and you didn’t want that fire to get loose on your own ships. The Byzantines developed Greek fire, which is something of a mystery to this day, but appears to have been an early flamethrower. Gunpowder grenades were developed and in the naval context were an incendiary device, if nit a particularly effective one. Fire ships were a tried and tested method, their use was predominantly against ships moored together in harbor.

[Myth27]

How thick was the metal of a plate of a very heavy armor of a late medieval knight ?

[Pauly]

How thick was the metal of a plate of a very heavy armor of a late medieval knight ?

Thickness wasn’t uniform, the low stress areas were made thinner and high stress areas made thicker.
Generally speaking 1.5mm to 2mm thick was the usual thickness of large plates, but there is be a lot of variation to thicker or thinner than that. You also have to remember that the full harness included mail and an arming doublet (or equivalent) underneath the plates.

Here is a link to a site that sells historical pieces of armor with thickness measurements.
https://european-armour.com/allenIndex.html

[Martin Greywolf]

How thick was the metal of a plate of a very heavy armor of a late medieval knight ?


Thickness wasn’t uniform, the low stress areas were made thinner and high stress areas made thicker.
Generally speaking 1.5mm to 2mm thick was the usual thickness of large plates, but there is be a lot of variation to thicker or thinner than that. You also have to remember that the full harness included mail and an arming doublet (or equivalent) underneath the plates.

Here is a link to a site that sells historical pieces of armor with thickness measurements.
https://european-armour.com/allenIndex.html

Depends on what you mean by "very heavy armor". Pauly is spot on in all things, but his numbers are those of field plate, i.e. armor you took with yourself to war. There were many specialized tournament armors, and their weight was significantly higher. The ballpark for field plate is 20-25 kg, tournament armor was usually around 40 kg mark, jousting armor was around 60 kg. That gets you 1-2 mm peak thickness for field, 1.5-2.5 for foot tourney and 2-3 mm for jousting.

https://live.staticflickr.com/3657/3472368834_081c0906fe_z.jpg
Note that this one is vaguely shaped like the 30 kg tourney plate, has a giant crotch cutout, is missing gloves and is still almost double the weight

https://royalarmouries.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/03/foot-combat-armour-1520.jpg
https://royalarmouries.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/03/foot-combat-armour-1520-1.jpg

https://collections.royalarmouries.org/media/emumedia/324/800/large_DI_2010_1334.jpg

https://collectionapi.metmuseum.org/api/collection/v1/iiif/23936/61629/main-image

So... take your pick which one counts as "very heavy".

[Catullus64]

I have a somewhat strange question regarding the weight of weapons, particularly shields. It's not too difficult to go online and find numerical ranges for the weight of objects like this, but I often find these numbers to be not very helpful, for two reasons:

1) I'm bad with mentally associating numerical weights with everyday objects.
2) Even an accurate weight doesn't tell the whole story about a weapon's handling; shape and distribution of weight make a big difference in how two objects of similar weight will handle.

Has anyone been fortunate enough to handle good replicas of different historical shields? I'd be very interested to know the difference in handling between, say, a Greek aspis and a kite-shaped knightly shield (both strapped to the arm), or between a Roman scutum and an Anglo-Saxon shield (both gripped in the center), and how those traits might be reflective of their differing usages.

[Vinyadan]

I have a somewhat strange question regarding the weight of weapons, particularly shields. It's not too difficult to go online and find numerical ranges for the weight of objects like this, but I often find these numbers to be not very helpful, for two reasons:

1) I'm bad with mentally associating numerical weights with everyday objects.
2) Even an accurate weight doesn't tell the whole story about a weapon's handling; shape and distribution of weight make a big difference in how two objects of similar weight will handle.

Has anyone been fortunate enough to handle good replicas of different historical shields? I'd be very interested to know the difference in handling between, say, a Greek aspis and a kite-shaped knightly shield (both strapped to the arm), or between a Roman scutum and an Anglo-Saxon shield (both gripped in the center), and how those traits might be reflective of their differing usages.

I have not, but I have some frequently heard information. The hoplon/aspis was used in formation and only about half of it covered the bearer, the other half covered the man on his side. Which side, that's a different matter (I have seen depictions of shields on the right or the left). The hoplon had an arm-ring (porpax) close to the centre and a thread to the side (antilabe) to hold with your hand, and sometimes the ring is even depicted closer to the side with the thread. Another often read observation on it is that it partially rested its weight on the shoulder of the bearer.

So I'd expect it to feel and be handled in a rather different way than many other shields.

[Palanan]

I have a question that’s a little broader than specific weapons or armor, but figured this would be a good place to ask.

Can anyone recommend a book which includes a detailed survey of how Roman provinces were governed? I’m interested in how the provincial administrations functioned, whether and how much provincial settlements were able to govern themselves, and how the provinces interacted with Rome and Romanized Italy.

I’m open to sources which go into any aspect of this, whether classical authors or modern scholarship. I’m aware there’s a lot of geography and centuries of governance involved here, so I’m open to anything which touches on even modest portions of this.

[Vinyadan]

I have a question that’s a little broader than specific weapons or armor, but figured this would be a good place to ask.

Can anyone recommend a book which includes a detailed survey of how Roman provinces were governed? I’m interested in how the provincial administrations functioned, whether and how much provincial settlements were able to govern themselves, and how the provinces interacted with Rome and Romanized Italy.

I’m open to sources which go into any aspect of this, whether classical authors or modern scholarship. I’m aware there’s a lot of geography and centuries of governance involved here, so I’m open to anything which touches on even modest portions of this.

Depending on which languages you speak, you can try with the bibliography from this article: https://www.treccani.it/enciclopedia/le-province-europee-dell-impero-romano-introduzione_%28Il-Mondo-dell%27Archeologia%29/

[Martin Greywolf]

Has anyone been fortunate enough to handle good replicas of different historical shields? I'd be very interested to know the difference in handling between, say, a Greek aspis and a kite-shaped knightly shield (both strapped to the arm), or between a Roman scutum and an Anglo-Saxon shield (both gripped in the center), and how those traits might be reflective of their differing usages.

This is another of the how long is a piece of string questions. It cannot be answered, except maybe in a very, very long book.

To make some attempt at it... well. Your first mistake is assuming there is such a thing as aspis that handles a certain way. There isn't. Sure, there is a type of shield called aspis, definet by its shape, but two different examples of aspis will handle very differently, have different thickness and so on, and this is for a fairly rigidly defined shield. Something like a kite shield has a few hundred variations, some can be handled easily, some are essentially tower shields etc.

Weight alone is easy - you start at half a kilo (for some wicker shields) and go up to ten (heavy kite shields and roman scutums).

Very generally, you have two categories of shields, passive and active. Passive shields are so big and heavy you hold them in front of you and fight around them - Roman scutum, kite shields, large pavaises and the like. These are surprisingly easy to use, because you don't move them around much and frequently let them rest on the ground, but it is still a big, heavy object and marching with them is... an experience.

The active shields, you have to move around - bucklers, targes, rotellas and so on. They are small and light enough to do that, but at the higher end of weight range (~5 kg)... Let me put it like this, fighting sword and heater shield, provided you use that heater shield properly and don't let it rest against your body, is the second most physically demanding melee weapon combo. The first is using spear in two hands and a shield.

And then there are the really small shields that really shouldn't be counted as such, your bucklers and small targes. They don't protect against projectiles and aren't expected to stop a pole weapon - they are more like a parrying dagger in many respects, rather than a shield.

[Yora]

How long would it have taken in the 1910s for troop ships to carry soldiers from New Zealand to Turkey?

[Vinyadan]

How long would it have taken in the 1910s for troop ships to carry soldiers from New Zealand to Turkey?

Seven weeks to reach Egypt. You can check how long it took them from Egypt to Turkey.

https://ww100.govt.nz/masseys-tourists-new-zealands-expeditionary-force-in-egypt

[Yora]

That is significantly longer than I expected. Fast ocean liners between Europe and North America could make 1000 km per day. At that speed, going from Sidney to Cairo wpuld be possible in 15 days. Seven weeks is three times as much.

I also found a report of a convoy from Los Angeles to Hawaii in 1944, which took 12 days for the 4000 km. Which matches the ~350km per day from the example above.

I think this makes for an interesting data point for plausible travel times between planets for space empires. If it made sense to call in troops from a small colony of juat 1 million (thpugh traveling together with the more numerous Australian troops) who might arrive in 10 weeks, then you can plausibly put small but well equiped colony planets really far out into space.

[Pauly]

That is significantly longer than I expected. Fast ocean liners between Europe and North America could make 1000 km per day. At that speed, going from Sidney to Cairo wpuld be possible in 15 days. Seven weeks is three times as much.

I also found a report of a convoy from Los Angeles to Hawaii in 1944, which took 12 days for the 4000 km. Which matches the ~350km per day from the example above.

I think this makes for an interesting data point for plausible travel times between planets for space empires. If it made sense to call in troops from a small colony of juat 1 million (thpugh traveling together with the more numerous Australian troops) who might arrive in 10 weeks, then you can plausibly put small but well equiped colony planets really far out into space.

The troop ships were in convoys, because of raiders like the SMS Emden, which restricted their speed to the slowest ship in the convoy. Generally this was around 7 knots in WW1. Even after the Emden was sunk there was always fear of Q-ships or the possibility of other raiders being sent.

Fast ocean liners were used as troop transports in the North Atlantic, but they were sent unescorted and relied on their speed to keep out of trouble.

Also the convoys consisted of coal burning ships which needed more frequent refueling than oil burning ships and the refueling took much longer.

[fusilier]

That is significantly longer than I expected. Fast ocean liners between Europe and North America could make 1000 km per day. At that speed, going from Sidney to Cairo wpuld be possible in 15 days. Seven weeks is three times as much.

I also found a report of a convoy from Los Angeles to Hawaii in 1944, which took 12 days for the 4000 km. Which matches the ~350km per day from the example above.

I think this makes for an interesting data point for plausible travel times between planets for space empires. If it made sense to call in troops from a small colony of juat 1 million (thpugh traveling together with the more numerous Australian troops) who might arrive in 10 weeks, then you can plausibly put small but well equiped colony planets really far out into space.

They didn't always travel in convoys. Also, they may have made a lot of stops on the way which would have slowed them down. While not giving much in the way of times, this webpage gets in details of how the WW1 troopships from Australia operated. Although most of the information is about ships heading to Britain.

https://anzacportal.dva.gov.au/wars-and-missions/ww1/military-organisation/transport

[Martin Greywolf]

Also keep in mind that the ship speed may not be the bottleneck that is slowing the whole thing down. If there aren't enough guns to send with the troops, if there is some sort of political agreement that needs to be hashed out, if the place the troops are heading for (or any stops along the way) is short on water/food/coal... It's why you tend to see admirals travel around extremely quickly compared to soldiers - they hitch a ride with whatever ship leaves the soonest, and *are* actually travelling more or less at ship speed. Ordinary troops, on the other hand, well, you better hope that the port you get stuck at for two weeks because of supply issues is Mallorca rather than Murmansk.

[Palanan]

Originally Posted by Palanan
I have a question that’s a little broader than specific weapons or armor, but figured this would be a good place to ask.

Can anyone recommend a book which includes a detailed survey of how Roman provinces were governed? I’m interested in how the provincial administrations functioned, whether and how much provincial settlements were able to govern themselves, and how the provinces interacted with Rome and Romanized Italy.

I’m open to sources which go into any aspect of this, whether classical authors or modern scholarship. I’m aware there’s a lot of geography and centuries of governance involved here, so I’m open to anything which touches on even modest portions of this.


Originally Posted by Vinyadan
Depending on which languages you speak, you can try with the bibliography from this article….

I’ve been meaning to follow up on this. I appreciate the linked article, but most of the bibliography seems to be focused on ancient architecture and urban design—which is very interesting, but not what I was going for.

Any other suggestions on books describing how the Roman provinces were governed, and how that interacted with the governance of individual settlements within those provinces?

[Gnoman]

That is significantly longer than I expected. Fast ocean liners between Europe and North America could make 1000 km per day. At that speed, going from Sidney to Cairo wpuld be possible in 15 days. Seven weeks is three times as much.

I also found a report of a convoy from Los Angeles to Hawaii in 1944, which took 12 days for the 4000 km. Which matches the ~350km per day from the example above.


Traveling 1000km a day requires a sustained speed of 22 knots. 350km a day is 8 knots.

Getting speed on a ship is not a trivial task, and increases are not linear. The Olympic-class ocean liners (Titanic being the most famous of these), massed 52000 tons, made 23 knots, and carried 6000 troops during wartime service - somewhere around 10 tons per passenger. SS Justicia, a different converted liner, massed 32000 tons, made 18 knots, and was able to carry 4000 troops - 8 tons per passenger. USS Henry R. Mallory, (one of the ships used to transport the American Expeditionary Force) on the other hand, massed 11000 tons, moved at only 15 knots, and carried 2200 troops - 5 tons per passenger. Perhaps a more telling example is the Edward Luckenbach, a pure cargo design (albeit much more modern than the rest, having been launched in 1916 with the latest and greatest engine tech) grossing 8000 tons at 15 knots, carrying up to 2200 troops - 4 tons per passenger.

Or, in other words, you could get seven Edward Luckenbach with the tonange of an Olympic, while an Olympic carries less than three times as many troops. This is partially because the latter is geared more toward luxury, but a larger part is that they have to spend a ginormous amount of their mass on generating the enormous amount of power they need to generate that speed.

Note that these are flank speeds - what the ship can do if it is going all-out. Note also that Titanic was considered an extremely fast ship and was going for a crossing-time record on her maiden voyage. That level of speed is not an expected standard - running steam boilers at maximum pressure for long periods of time tended to make them explode. Fuel consumption also goes way, way up. For extended voyages, you aren't going flat-out.


The other issue is that ships in wartime don't often sail in a straight line. They zig-zag so that a raider or U-boat has a harder time intercepting them from a given sighting - a straight projection of their course won't lead you to them. That adds a lot of travel time.

Really, 350km a day is awful generous and would have required either excessive risk of interception or putting heavy strain on the engines.

[Yora]

My interest was really mostly about what amounts of transit times people accepted historically to maintain stable links to the government, not so much ship speeds.
Shipping the ANZAC troops to Turkey was the longest distance I can think of for movement of combat troops in the middle of a war.

[Gnoman]

Fair. I was mostly trying to demonstrate why the times were what they were, and why the listed example was a fairly fast crossing.

[Mechalich]

My interest was really mostly about what amounts of transit times people accepted historically to maintain stable links to the government, not so much ship speeds.
Shipping the ANZAC troops to Turkey was the longest distance I can think of for movement of combat troops in the middle of a war.

The amount of time could be quite long. Many of the large European colonial empires were spread out enough that, should something like a major rebellion occur, it would take years for a response to occur. A useful non-political example, is the case of the Mutiny on the Bounty (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mutiny_on_the_Bounty#Retribution). The Bounty departed England in Dec 23 1787; the mutiny occurred on Apr 28, 1789; some of the mutineers settled on Tahiti and were apprehended in Mar 1791 by the HMS Pandora; those mutineers were returned to England, court martialed, and hanged in Oct 1792. This case demonstrates that even over a seemingly minor matter the empire was able to maintain control at a distance of many months communication and travel.

[Palanan]

Originally Posted by Yora
My interest was really mostly about what amounts of transit times people accepted historically to maintain stable links to the government….

You might look at some of C.J. Cherryh’s Alliance/Union novels, which feature trade routes among nearby stars which take months or years to travel via FTL. She’s meticulously mapped out the ramifications to governments, colonies, and stations over a number of books, and how governments maintain or don’t maintain control over those timescales is one of her underlying themes.

[Martin Greywolf]

You might look at some of C.J. Cherryh’s Alliance/Union novels, which feature trade routes among nearby stars which take months or years to travel via FTL. She’s meticulously mapped out the ramifications to governments, colonies, and stations over a number of books, and how governments maintain or don’t maintain control over those timescales is one of her underlying themes.

We had that thing in real life, we called it pre-industrial era. Looking at pretty much any large state before steam power and telegram were a thing will give you a good idea, whether it is how Roman empire dealt with region borders and its postal systems, how Mongols handled this (and their postals system), China and it's don't make me come over there tributary system, and probably the best for research if you aren't willing to go looking for obscure dissertations, British Empire with its colonies, always at least months away from London.

The gist of it is that you don't really transport troops - you have various colonial forces on the spot, and only large conflicts force you to dip into core of your army, which does take months to get to where the trouble is, relying on the colonial forces to hold on until then.

Looking at WW1 in this context is not a good idea, no one was expecting a conflict of that size to happen, and everyone had zero experience with logistics of it. A better place to go would be WW2 and take a couple of knots of speed away from ships, by then, people more or less knew what the hell they were doing.

[NRSASD]

I’m running a 1830’s France game, and I suddenly have a character with a FN Model 1910. How does that compare to a flintlock pistol? Specifically, I’m talking about accuracy, range, and impact on the target. I’m trying to figure out how to rule how much “damage” it does, and while I have stats for the flintlock, I don’t know enough to compare.

If this is relevant, it is Gavrilo Princep’s FN Model 1910.

[halfeye]

I’m running a 1830’s France game, and I suddenly have a character with a FN Model 1910. How does that compare to a flintlock pistol? Specifically, I’m talking about accuracy, range, and impact on the target. I’m trying to figure out how to rule how much “damage” it does, and while I have stats for the flintlock, I don’t know enough to compare.

If this is relevant, it is Gavrilo Princep’s FN Model 1910.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FN_Model_1910

That's ridiculous. The clue is in the name.

The damage on a hit might be slightly down, but the rate of fire would be up from five minutes to reload a single shot to firing a magazine (six shots) as fast as the trigger can be pulled, the ease of use would be better and the accuracy at short to medium ranges might improve considerably.

On the other hand, where is the player getting cartridges from? They shouldn't be available at that time, nobody makes them because they don't know how, and there are no guns to fire them.

[Gnoman]

I’m running a 1830’s France game, and I suddenly have a character with a FN Model 1910. How does that compare to a flintlock pistol? Specifically, I’m talking about accuracy, range, and impact on the target. I’m trying to figure out how to rule how much “damage” it does, and while I have stats for the flintlock, I don’t know enough to compare.

If this is relevant, it is Gavrilo Princep’s FN Model 1910.

I'm going to assume this is some sort of time-travel or dimension-hopping thing, because -as halfeye alludes to- the FN 1910 was invented 80 years after your time period.


That said, comparing the two isn't that difficult.


The specific 1910 you're using is chambered in .380 ACP. This round is small and weak enough that the usual comparisons between black powder and smokeless don't matter that much - the round is light, but not faster than you'd get with black powder. Compared to the sort of big-bore pistol you'd see in that period, half damage is probably Good Enough! if you're going very abstract. For a more detailed comparison, the easiest thing to do would be to check the derived stats used in GURPS.

There, you have a typical military-grade flintlock pistol at 2D6 with the Large Piercing damage type (1.5x multiplier to damage that gets past Damage Reduction), and the .380 at 2d6-1 with a Piercing damage type (no modifier to damage). Which makes them almost identical at punching through armor (.380 is not a fast round and thus lacks a lot of the advantages you normally see in modern guns), with the more modern weapon doing about 2/3s the damage. This works if whatever system you're using is a bit less abstract.


That said, every other factor favors the M1910. The flintlock is a single shot, extremely large (there were very few small pistols in that era, and most were along the size of a Desert Eagle or similar), has rudimentary sights, and takes a long time to reload. You might be able to outdo the two shots a minute that a period longarm would do, but not by that much.

Meanwhile, the 1910 is very small (which not only makes concealment easier, but makes it much handier to use, and thus more accurate), has better sights, carries six rounds, and reloads so much faster that the difference in fire rate is effectively incomparable. In the time it takes to fire the flintlock twice, you can probably have fired as many magazines as you can carry.

Replacing the ammunition, however, would be effectively impossible. Even if you have a mold to make replacement bullets, and save all your casings, neither nitro propellants or percussion primers exist in 1830. Unless you have a supply link back to wherever you got the pistol from, you have all the ammo you started with and that's it.

[NRSASD]

Thank you! And yeah, dimension hopping is a thing. More specifically, a player wished for "a pistol to kill royalty" and that seemed like too good a fit not to pass up.

[Martin Greywolf]

You might be able to outdo the two shots a minute that a period longarm would do, but not by that much.

I don't think so. Long arms being larger often makes them easier to reload, not harder. You can let your musket rest on the ground and most of the motions you need to make are nice and large. A pistol is a small, fiddly thing that you have to brace against weird things, best reloaded at a table.


Even if you have a mold to make replacement bullets, and save all your casings, neither nitro propellants or percussion primers exist in 1830.

Percussion primers are just about becoming a thing (invention is 1807-1820-ish, depending on what you count as percussion), but the real problem is gunpowder. Unless you have some sort of smokeless powder, it will make your gun jam within about 50-100 rounds. That's with modern black powder mixes, whatever gunpowder you have in your world may be worse in the fouling department and make it jam sooner.

To solve this jamming problem, you'd have to take the whole gun apart and thoroughly clean it, which takes time and requires konwledge (or a lot of figuring out) on how to do it, or you won't be able to put that gun back together.

[Gnoman]

I don't think so. Long arms being larger often makes them easier to reload, not harder. You can let your musket rest on the ground and most of the motions you need to make are nice and large. A pistol is a small, fiddly thing that you have to brace against weird things, best reloaded at a table.


I'm not really familiar with pistol drill of the period, about all I know is that it was possible but cumbersome to reload on horseback (such as in a caracole).



Percussion primers are just about becoming a thing (invention is 1807-1820-ish, depending on what you count as percussion), but the real problem is gunpowder. Unless you have some sort of smokeless powder, it will make your gun jam within about 50-100 rounds. That's with modern black powder mixes, whatever gunpowder you have in your world may be worse in the fouling department and make it jam sooner.

To solve this jamming problem, you'd have to take the whole gun apart and thoroughly clean it, which takes time and requires konwledge (or a lot of figuring out) on how to do it, or you won't be able to put that gun back together.
[/quote]

Black powder will also have severe issues in a package that small - without compressed powder (not introduced until the late 1880s) the amount of BP you can fit in a .380 case is going to be extremely anemic.

Meanwhile a primer isn't just a percussion cap shoved into the base of the cartridge. The formulation's different, which changes the way it reacts. In any case, it took until the 1840s for caps to really start becoming common - ten years earlier they were an expensive and dangerous novelty.

[Catullus64]

I'm developing a fictional culture, and want to lavish plenty of detail on their material possessions. In particular, I want to portray a how a violent culture on the knife's edge of subsistence still chooses to invest resources and effort into beauty and artistry. While I'm not exclusively concerned with weapons, that is the focus of this thread. So I thought I'd come here to learn something. Tell me about what you consider some of the most beautifully decorated historical weapons and armor; tell me interesting examples from history or archaeology of how fighters decorated and beautified themselves, or how they otherwise personalized their tools of war. Pretty much any pre-industrial culture is a welcome source of ideas, even if my own fictional one will end up being more narrow in its influence.

[Pauly]

I'm developing a fictional culture, and want to lavish plenty of detail on their material possessions. In particular, I want to portray a how a violent culture on the knife's edge of subsistence still chooses to invest resources and effort into beauty and artistry. While I'm not exclusively concerned with weapons, that is the focus of this thread. So I thought I'd come here to learn something. Tell me about what you consider some of the most beautifully decorated historical weapons and armor; tell me interesting examples from history or archaeology of how fighters decorated and beautified themselves, or how they otherwise personalized their tools of war. Pretty much any pre-industrial culture is a welcome source of ideas, even if my own fictional one will end up being more narrow in its influence.

In any culture the rich dudes had the beautiful richly decorated weapons. Just for clarification are you talking about regular soldiers/tribesmen with highly ornamented weapons?

[Martin Greywolf]

In particular, I want to portray a how a violent culture on the knife's edge of subsistence still chooses to invest resources and effort into beauty and artistry.

Usually, it doesn't. If you are on the edge of starvation, one of three things is liable to happen in the next 5 years: your people move to somewhere nicer, the situation drastically improves, or some of the many possible disasters strikes and finally wipes you out.

Second thing I take issue is violent cultures as such. If you take a good look at any cultures that were claimed to be violent, you will find that there was little difference between them and most of their contemporaries. This goes for vikings, Roman empire, assorted nomadic tribes and several others we aren't allowed to discuss here - hell, even modern culture, the least violent one there ever was, maintains massive armed forces. There aren't any non-violent cultures either, since those tend to get absorbed into the violent ones pretty much immediately, and the level of violence tends to be kept at a nice, sustainable level.

This is pretty important for you, because no culture will have "violence" as its trait, even if it is militant, or warrior-like, or have raiders as an established part of it, there will be more to it, and that informs your material culture quite a lot. A raiding culture, like vikings or nomads, will value items from far away lands, since they show that you are good at their preferred method of warfare. A militant state approximating Romans will put more value on state trophies earned in war. An individualistic warrior-oriented culture (e.g. knights, Landsknechts) will demand its warriors to put a significant chunk of their income into sprucing up their equipment and making it stand out.

It will also determine what is depicted on the decorations, nomads will try to mimic far away styles, Romans will be more focused on showing officers commanding armies in great victories, knights will be more into depictions of individual feats of prowess. This won't affect all of these (there are scenes of kings commanding armies in illuminations of chronicles), but they will dictate what the majority of them shows.


Pretty much any pre-industrial culture is a welcome source of ideas, even if my own fictional one will end up being more narrow in its influence.

I mean... google "<culture descriptor or name> decorated weapons" and you will find what you want, especially for high status pieces.

In general, you will see four principal means of decoration: paint, plating, covering and carving.

Paint is clear enough, slap some paint on it, maybe put some pictures on instead of simple patterns. What the paint uses as its base will determine how long it lasts, and how water resistant it is, but we have solid evidence of this being done pretty much as long as there was paint. As an added bonus, it protects the item from rust.

https://manuscriptminiatures.com/image/24600/1000https://manuscriptminiatures.com/image/8289/1000https://manuscriptminiatures.com/image/7854/1000
https://scontent.fbts3-1.fna.fbcdn.net/v/t39.30808-6/285252305_459053329556600_7444809920279680841_n.jp g?_nc_cat=101&ccb=1-7&_nc_sid=0debeb&_nc_ohc=MWqlOmm6j4IAX_YQDTa&_nc_ht=scontent.fbts3-1.fna&oh=00_AT__AQZx7wDr90TmlKr8lGpBCqtUKdnOjTtx2dwGmk7E Qg&oe=62CC1AFF

Plating is the same as paint, but with metal! Methods of attaching this vary, but the idea is to put some other metal on your steel weapon and the more expensive the metal, the more rich you are. You can start with iron on steel for slight contrast and end up with gold damascening. As an added bonus, it protects the item from rust. (well, some of it does)

https://www.fableblades.com/Photos/Hrafn/Hrafn%20(11).JPG
https://i.imgur.com/jjPsUAT.jpg
https://cdn.rockislandauction.com/dev_cdn/55/3549.jpg

Covering is using some sort of fabric-like material and gluing or otherwise attaching it on the object in question.This is a nice middle ground in expenditure between painting armor and plating armor with gold, so you are pretty likely to see a lot of it. Unfortunately, it being the armor of the working knight also means there are very little examples of it left, and ti isn't popular enough to spawn many replicas. You're likely to see it done with leather (because leather is cool, apparently), historically, linen and velvet were the most common. As an added bonus, it protects the item from rust.

http://nadler.us/armour/brigandine/brig_craig1_1.jpg
https://i.ebayimg.com/images/g/NIcAAOSw-1Zcat48/s-l400.jpg
https://i.pinimg.com/736x/09/48/56/094856750539360d480cc5be1a70988a--greece-velvet.jpg

Carving is, well, carving some pattern into the weapon of your choice, and while this can be done with steel, it is popular with wood - especially since you can do this while on capaign to stave off boredom. Shaping the object itself is a subcategory, and since that counts (in my head, at least), putting in bits of metal to put gems into also does. As an added bonus, it protects the item from ru... wait, no, it doesn't. For once.

https://www.thefirearmblog.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2014/12/Screen-shot-2014-12-17-at-12.17.36-AM.png

https://www.fableblades.com/Photos/Hrafn/Hrafn%20(5).JPG
https://armstreet.com/catalogue/small/halberd-decorative-stainless-head-knight-of-fortune-1.jpg
http://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/2080/1501/products/DSCN5793_600x.JPG?v=1559744307
https://i.pinimg.com/originals/7b/bb/c7/7bbbc713c5440ad5372f078e33e048b8.jpg

[Gnoman]

The other thing is that "beauty" is often a secondary effect. A lot of "decorations" on hunting weapons from animistic cultures, for example, are intended to draw the spirit of the depicted animal. On more martial weapons, you might see invocations to the goddess of victory, or inscriptions exhorting the blood god, or curses on particular foes. Perhaps the most obvious example of this is the practice of writing insults on ammunition - which has been seen on everything from ancient Greek sling bullets to ballistic missiles in Europe today.

You could also look at the way modern soldiers have decorated their vehicles for inspiration - WWII aircraft nose art, fierce features on tanks, etc. Not to mention more traditional examples like figureheads on ships or painted crests. Some of that is from boredom, others from an attempt to maintain morale, build unit cohesion, anthropomorphication of the vehicle (there's a reason so many cultures call ships "she" or "he" instead of "it"), defiance at the foe, etc.

Propaganda is also a common source, even if it isn't explicitly recognizable as such. Depictions of great deeds, heroic last stands, the perfidy of the foe, and other such events are incredibly common in art and literature. The works of Homer are a pretty good literary example of that.

[fusilier]

I don't think so. Long arms being larger often makes them easier to reload, not harder. You can let your musket rest on the ground and most of the motions you need to make are nice and large. A pistol is a small, fiddly thing that you have to brace against weird things, best reloaded at a table.

My personal experience would indicate that they do reload a little easier than a musket. That said, I'm more familiar with military pistols, which have locks that are similar in size, and robustness, to a musket's lock (a civilian example, especially something small like a Philadelphia Deringer, I could see being very fiddly to reload on the go). I think it's important to understand that the situations that they were used in (very close range), meant they were typically fired just once in a combat. Usually there wasn't going to be time to reload it, if that first shot wasn't sufficient.

A military pistol (compared to a musket) is short, light, and easily held firmly by the barrel/forestock. The short barrel means less time spent ramming, less time spent drawing/returning the rammer. Also it's more trivial to go from the muzzle to the lock for loading and priming. The steps are all the same, and the speed ups are all kind of marginal in my opinion, but it is a little faster. If it needs to be braced to drive home the ball, it's short enough it can be braced against the body, without making ramming awkward. But I'm not sure how common it would be to need to brace it. If mounted, very easy to reload while seated in the saddle. (With the caveat that moving makes reloading any weapon difficult while mounted, although certainly not impossible).

But in practice, it's just not going to happen very often that it needs to be reloaded in the heat of combat. And many sources note that careful loading usually leads to a better, more reliable shot than hurried reloading. I suspect few people would have practiced reloading a pistol quickly, compared to the repeated musket drills.

[fusilier]

I’m running a 1830’s France game, and I suddenly have a character with a FN Model 1910. How does that compare to a flintlock pistol? Specifically, I’m talking about accuracy, range, and impact on the target. I’m trying to figure out how to rule how much “damage” it does, and while I have stats for the flintlock, I don’t know enough to compare.

If this is relevant, it is Gavrilo Princep’s FN Model 1910.

So the time frame is about the time the earliest metallic cartridges were being developed, the pinfire cartridge. So the basic technological development has occurred, although smokeless powder, which makes automatic weapons more practical is still some ways away.

Other repeating weapons (proto-revolvers and pepperboxes) exist at that time too (although they are pretty new).

I think Gnoman answered this question pretty well already -- GURPS is great for these types of situations. A flintlock will do more damage per shot, but the FN 1910 will be able to fire more shots. Depending upon which system you are using, you may have to abstract out the effect.

[Raunchel]

If you're looking for decorated weapons and the like without showing wealth (which is to say, expensive ornaments), you could have a lot of personally done things. Things like wood carvings on shafts, bone handles, their clothes being embroidered in other (cheap) colours, and other such things that a normal person can do in the long evenings. That way, you can also show these things as part of personal pride and the like.

[halfeye]

I’m running a 1830’s France game, and I suddenly have a character with a FN Model 1910. How does that compare to a flintlock pistol? Specifically, I’m talking about accuracy, range, and impact on the target. I’m trying to figure out how to rule how much “damage” it does, and while I have stats for the flintlock, I don’t know enough to compare.

If this is relevant, it is Gavrilo Princep’s FN Model 1910.


Thank you! And yeah, dimension hopping is a thing. More specifically, a player wished for "a pistol to kill royalty" and that seemed like too good a fit not to pass up.

Well, it's nothing like a pistol, but this seems to be more the period:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Infernal_machine_(weapon)

[Pauly]

Thank you! And yeah, dimension hopping is a thing. More specifically, a player wished for "a pistol to kill royalty" and that seemed like too good a fit not to pass up.

How about a Girandoni system air pistol?
https://www.rockislandauction.com/detail/75/3311/girandoni-system-multishot-air-pistol-by-contriner-of-vienna

Period accurate, little bit weird and mostly silent. I’m not sure on the exact lethality of the pistols but the Girandoni air rifles were lethal out to maybe 150 meters, which isn’t as lethal as black powder rifles, as Baker Rifles were known to be lethal out to 500 meters.

[fusilier]

How about a Girandoni system air pistol?
https://www.rockislandauction.com/detail/75/3311/girandoni-system-multishot-air-pistol-by-contriner-of-vienna

Period accurate, little bit weird and mostly silent. I’m not sure on the exact lethality of the pistols but the Girandoni air rifles were lethal out to maybe 150 meters, which isn’t as lethal as black powder rifles, as Baker Rifles were known to be lethal out to 500 meters.

Oooh. I did not realize there was a pistol version of the Girandoni. Very cool!

[Pauly]

Oooh. I did not realize there was a pistol version of the Girandoni. Very cool!

Not many were made and all the examples I have found have elaborate engraving and decorations. I think it’s reasonable to assume thet were weapons for the very rich.
I’m pretty sure the bullet was pretty anaemic compared to regular gunpowder pistols.

[Martin Greywolf]

I’m pretty sure the bullet was pretty anaemic compared to regular gunpowder pistols.

At ten grams at 150 m/s, let's consult Fragment hazard criteria on that...

It has about 50/50 odds of penetrating soft tissue (abdomen, limbs), or cracking a bone. This is against unarmored target, so... yeah, pretty anemic for a firearm.

[Martin Greywolf]

Fellow weapon nerds, in a recent video (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bkAifwVOAME), Matt Easton made the claim that pollaxe was regulated by sumptuary laws, i.e. if you weren't a knight/nobleman/whatever you weren't allowed to have one.

This is the first time I've heard of this - do any of you either have a source for this, or have heard the same thing? I've asked the same thing in the comments of that video, but there was no response yet.

Note that I mean sumptuary laws specifically. Weapons were regulated in cities, restricting carry to nobles only or no one at all, and loot on the battlefield was pretty much always handed over to the brass to be redistributed later. Also, it's not a good idea to grab a weapon specifically optimized for armor on armor combat with you if you don't have armor yourself, but that means poorer soldiers wouldn't use pollaxe by choice, rather than being prohibited by law from using it.

[snowblizz]

Fellow weapon nerds, in a recent video (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bkAifwVOAME), Matt Easton made the claim that pollaxe was regulated by sumptuary laws, i.e. if you weren't a knight/nobleman/whatever you weren't allowed to have one.

This is the first time I've heard of this - do any of you either have a source for this, or have heard the same thing? I've asked the same thing in the comments of that video, but there was no response yet.

Note that I mean sumptuary laws specifically. Weapons were regulated in cities, restricting carry to nobles only or no one at all, and loot on the battlefield was pretty much always handed over to the brass to be redistributed later. Also, it's not a good idea to grab a weapon specifically optimized for armor on armor combat with you if you don't have armor yourself, but that means poorer soldiers wouldn't use pollaxe by choice, rather than being prohibited by law from using it.

Never seen such a thing noted before.

[Pauly]

Fellow weapon nerds, in a recent video (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bkAifwVOAME), Matt Easton made the claim that pollaxe was regulated by sumptuary laws, i.e. if you weren't a knight/nobleman/whatever you weren't allowed to have one.

This is the first time I've heard of this - do any of you either have a source for this, or have heard the same thing? I've asked the same thing in the comments of that video, but there was no response yet.

Note that I mean sumptuary laws specifically. Weapons were regulated in cities, restricting carry to nobles only or no one at all, and loot on the battlefield was pretty much always handed over to the brass to be redistributed later. Also, it's not a good idea to grab a weapon specifically optimized for armor on armor combat with you if you don't have armor yourself, but that means poorer soldiers wouldn't use pollaxe by choice, rather than being prohibited by law from using it.

Poleaxes were used, at least in later times, as a tool to kill cattle by butchers. Hence why we have the phrase “fell as if he had been poleaxed” which is sometimes shortened to just “poleaxed” in English. NB in use as a butcher’s tool the accepted spelling is “poleaxe” where the medieval weapon can be spelled “pollaxe” or “poleaxe”.

I really can’t see an item regulated by sumptuary laws, and thus prohibited to the working classes, evolving into a worker's tool.

[Gnoman]

I asked some people who have a good bit of archive access, and they failed to find any mention of sumptuary laws on this subject. Local level restrictions about lending them to other people "except in support of the mayor and the good people of the town", but that fairy refutes the notion of them being a high-class weapon.

More to the point, there are a lot of references to the exact scenario referenced, though not with poleaxes. Several references to peasants slowly scavenging complete sets of armor and weapons to become higher-status men at arms.

[Martin Greywolf]

I have stumbled on a neat thing that may interest you, a very early accounting record of a firearms inspection of a city - the claim is that this one is the oldest one of its kind, and it may well be actually true.

The record is about an inspection of firearms used on the walls of city of Bratislava (aka Presporok, aka Pressburg, aka Posszony, aka...) in 1443. Bratislava is in modern Slovakia, and was and still is on the banks of Danube and was for most of its time a border city - the exception being during the existence of Austria-Hungary.

What this record doesn't mention: anything that doesn't use a gunpowder e.g. melee weapons and crossbows (we'll get to those later), fireamrs in private hands, firearms in hands of city watch that wasn't assigned to the wall (there were at least 4 fortresses outside of the city walls), so the total amount of weapons would have been much higher. Still, it gives us a good lower margin.

Final thing to note is population of Bratislava, it was howering somewhere in 5 000 - 10 000 range, fairly small for French standards, pretty big for eastern Europe.

Now, the actual numbers: 125 barrels (not necessarily total firearms), a lot of gunpowder, 870 arrows (it just says arrows - were they for bows, crossbows or ballistae? we don't know), 3 incendiary arrows, 13 copper cannonballs, 52 lead cannonballs, 22 pounds of lead balls (i.e. for shotgun loads for cannons or for individual handguns)


62 hookguns and handguns
45 artillery pieces (tarasnica[1], howitzer, mortar, large cannon for stone cannonballs)
18 others, two of which were multi-barrell organ guns, with the possibility that they were counting by the barrel and these 18 are, in fact, just two 9-barrell organ guns


For a breakdown of how many where where:


Otter gate - 19 handguns, 8 cannons
Enemy of Hungarians Tower - 12 firearms
Saint Michael's Gate - 1 hanguns on gate proper, with 4 hanguns and 3 cannons on its barbican[2]


Total arms can be sort of extrapolated from Hussite wars wagon crews - these were flexible by their nature, bud Dudik gives us some average numbers. A warwagon had 2 handgunners, 6 crossbowmen and 10 melee fighters. Assuming the same distribution for walls - and what are war wagons if not wars on wheels - we get total numbers for Bratislava's permanent defensive forces as:


47 - 63 gunnery crews, (141 to 315 people, when accounting for a crew fo 3 to 5 per cannon), with enough ammunition to shoot each of them... once? really?
62 handgunners
186 crossbowmen (4.6 arrows per crossbowman, 0.02 incendiary arrows per crossbowman), which is a wealth of ammunition compared to artillery
310 melee infantry


For a total of 558 soldiers plus artillery crews, which gets us to 699 - 873 men. For a city of, let's split the difference and call it 7 500 people.

What does this tell us?

A full tenth of city's total population, so every fifth male, was in the militia. This isn't that surprising, cities having a very martially-oriented public life is well documented, but this gives us some perspective - pretty much everyone would have a relative in the city's defensive forces, if not the actual patrolling militia proper.

The ammunition stores are extremely low. The city would have to rely on either 1) hearing of enemy army approaching and stocking up, or 2) requisitioning ammunition from local fletchers and powdermakers. This also means that any surprise attack, hard as it would be to achieve, would be incredibly effective. Nota that this is a comparatively very defensively successful city, it was rarely taken in a siege.

Surprise inspections were a done thing in year of our lord 1443, don't hesitate to hit your players with one.
https://bratislavskykraj.sk/wp-content/uploads/2020/04/mnm-1024x733.png
This one is fairly useful, the city walls didn't move from ~1200 to this point in time, the only difference is slightly more towers on said walls.
I do have better maps, but all of them are in physical books, and I am far too lazy to scan them

A - St. Martin's Church (Cathedral at the time of drawing of map, church in 1443), two towers above it, next to plot 24, is the Enemy of Hungarians tower
L - St Michael's gate
K - Otter gate

Danube is below the bottom edge of the map.

[1] there is no proper translation for this one, French word is Fauconneau, it is a stationary gun for direct fire into people with a long barrell, kinda like an oversized musket
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/1/10/Tarasnice.jpg
https://www.mediastorehouse.com/p/473/portuguese-swivel-gun-17th-century-5882810.jpg.webp
[2] The defensive setup was: inside city -> Gate proper -> drawbridge over moat -> barbican (i.e. a small courtyard ringed by walls) -> barbican gate -> drawbridge over moat -> outside of city

[Gnoman]

Is this buried in some archive, or is it available online? I know people who would be very interested in reading this source.

[Martin Greywolf]

Is this buried in some archive, or is it available online? I know people who would be very interested in reading this source.

Okay, so, here is what you do. Prepare yourself mentally to do this in Slovak or German, because English versions of the relevant sites don't exist.

Next step is, go to this site (https://www.crarc.findbuch.net/php/main.php#414d422d412f585849562e31x268). Click on the magnifying glass on top, write 1443 to the search bar, press enter. THe results are on the left, you want to click on the tiny icons of magnifying glass next to "AMB Archiv mesta Bratislavy", becasue intuitive UI design is for losers.

That will get you to three Kammerbuch (accounting books) results from year 1443 for Bratislava. It is at this point I can no longer help you, because I can't actually read them. Well, I kinda can, but it is painfully slow and those things are 200 pages a piece. The entry you'd be looking for is from 2. august 1443, so probably in the middle book - medieval Bratislava had fiscal years that started in IIRC may.

If that fails, you'll need to contact Doc. PhDr. Vladimír Segeš, PhD. from Slovakia (you'll know you have the right guy if he has a ton of titles next to his name) - I think he still works for our Institute of Military History, their webpage (https://www.vhu.sk/) even has, wonder of wonders, an english translation. Ask about the source of survey from his book "Kriminalita a justícia v stredovekom Prešporku" (Criminality and justice in medieval Bratislava), page 88, "Dávne delá a pušky" (Old cannons and handguns).

[Pauly]

I have
The ammunition stores are extremely low. The city would have to rely on either 1) hearing of enemy army approaching and stocking up, or 2) requisitioning ammunition from local fletchers and powdermakers. This also means that any surprise attack, hard as it would be to achieve, would be incredibly effective. Nota that this is a comparatively very defensively successful city, it was rarely taken in a siege.
y

Not so surprising. Ammunition was very expensive relatively speaking. I don’t have my references with me but I remember reading that at the time of the Spanish Armada some British captains became stupendously wealthy because the value of the powder captured was worth more than the value of the ship carrying it.

[Gnoman]

The people I wanted the source for say the same thing. Large stocks of ammunition were laid in only when siege was expected.

[Grim Portent]

Can anyone reccommend a source for the armaments and tactics preferred in Eastern Europe in the late 1400s? Specifically interested in Hungary, Romania (Wallachia and Transylvania primarily) and the Ottoman Empire.

[Pauly]

Can anyone reccommend a source for the armaments and tactics preferred in Eastern Europe in the late 1400s? Specifically interested in Hungary, Romania (Wallachia and Transylvania primarily) and the Ottoman Empire.

Have you tried the Osprey catalogue? I’m sure they’ll have some books that suit.

They’re nor super in-depth but give a good overview and often have very interesting bibliographies for further research.

[Telok]

13 copper cannonballs

This is the first I've heard if copper cannonballs. Alas I can't have time to do decent searches and quick ones aren't turning up anything decent. Is there somewhere with more/better info on the use & reasoning behind using copper for cannonballs?

[Gnoman]

Stone takes a lot of work to shape, iron thakes a lot of work (in the form of heat) to cast. Copper melts quite easily, is reasonably common, and is thus rather cost-effective in that narrow time period.

[PhoenixPhyre]

Stone takes a lot of work to shape, iron thakes a lot of work (in the form of heat) to cast. Copper melts quite easily, is reasonably common, and is thus rather cost-effective in that narrow time period.

Similarly, this is why we use lead bullets (usually jacketed in copper to retain their shape). So in some sense, we still fire copper "cannon balls". It's just the copper is an outer shell around an even easier-to-work, easier-to-deform (which is useful in rifled applications) lead core. Except depleted uranium ones...that's a whole different "ball" game. Pun intended.

[Pauly]

This is the first I've heard if copper cannonballs. Alas I can't have time to do decent searches and quick ones aren't turning up anything decent. Is there somewhere with more/better info on the use & reasoning behind using copper for cannonballs?

My assumption was that they were for firestarting. Copper is an excellent conductor and it would transfer heat from the cannonball to a wooden target faster than an iron or lead ball.

I have nothing other than my assumption to back this up.

[halfeye]

My assumption was that they were for firestarting. Copper is an excellent conductor and it would transfer heat from the cannonball to a wooden target faster than an iron or lead ball.

I have nothing other than my assumption to back this up.

It was a long, long time ago, but if I remember correctly, copper is an excellent conductor, but it has a very low thermal capacity.

[Pauly]

It was a long, long time ago, but if I remember correctly, copper is an excellent conductor, but it has a very low thermal capacity.

I use copper saucepans at work. The great thing about using copper is heat goes on, heat goes off very quickly, which makes it great for things like delicate sauces and fish. Cast iron holds heat which makes wonderful for grilling meat, but its a bitch to bring it up to temperature or change temperature.

[Telok]

Stone takes a lot of work to shape, iron thakes a lot of work (in the form of heat) to cast. Copper melts quite easily, is reasonably common, and is thus rather cost-effective in that narrow time period.

My only issue with that is I don't think lead has every been significantly rarer or more expensive. This sort of thing is where I really love references. My own guesses would involve the balls having different flight or barrel wear characteristics, but they're just guesses.

[Martin Greywolf]

The people I wanted the source for say the same thing. Large stocks of ammunition were laid in only when siege was expected.

Well, yeah, but I was still surprised by how low the stores actually were, I was expecting something like 5-10 shots per cannon, not one. Especially since it's the ginpowder that is a pain to store, not the shot.


Can anyone reccommend a source for the armaments and tactics preferred in Eastern Europe in the late 1400s? Specifically interested in Hungary, Romania (Wallachia and Transylvania primarily) and the Ottoman Empire.

In English... pretty much Osprey. Also look up works on Sigismund, he was emperor of HRE, but also a King of Hungary, and one of the main players in Hussite wars. It would be better if you found a work on his main Hungarian man, Ctibor of Beckov, but only significant work on him I know of is a 400 page monster of a book in Slovak. Frankly, anything Hussites used got widely adopted, because they empirically proved how effective it was - so reading up on those wars will get you places.

Ottomans... I'm afraid you're on your own reading specific papers (https://www.academia.edu/19826125/Military_Engineering_in_the_Ottoman_Empire_The_Ori ginal_Version) and trying to get a picture of what they did. Probably the best thing to do is look at specific battles and get sense from those - Nicopolis, Belgrade, Nove Zamky/Ujvar, Mohacs...


My assumption was that they were for firestarting. Copper is an excellent conductor and it would transfer heat from the cannonball to a wooden target faster than an iron or lead ball.

I have nothing other than my assumption to back this up.


It was a long, long time ago, but if I remember correctly, copper is an excellent conductor, but it has a very low thermal capacity.


My only issue with that is I don't think lead has every been significantly rarer or more expensive. This sort of thing is where I really love references. My own guesses would involve the balls having different flight or barrel wear characteristics, but they're just guesses.

First possible reason, they were indeed incendiaries - Bratislava of the time sat ~50 meters off the banks of Danube (or sometimes in the middle of Danube come flooding season)
and it was besieged by ships several times in its history. As for sources, this paper (https://deremilitari.org/wp-content/uploads/1999/11/Walton_TudorArtillery.pdf) has a direct reference to copper cannon balls being explicitly incendiary on page 223.

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/f/f1/K%C3%A9pes_kr%C3%B3nika_-_61.oldal_-_III._Henrik_cs%C3%A1sz%C3%A1r_haj%C3%B3inak_puszt ul%C3%A1sa_Pozsonyn%C3%A1l.jpg/400px-K%C3%A9pes_kr%C3%B3nika_-_61.oldal_-_III._Henrik_cs%C3%A1sz%C3%A1r_haj%C3%B3inak_puszt ul%C3%A1sa_Pozsonyn%C3%A1l.jpg
This is Henry III after some people from Bratislava swam up to his ships at anchor and drilled holes in them
Pucture is from Chronica Picta, written 300 years after this supposedly happened, so take it with a grain of salt
THe structure on the illumination is Bratislava castle, the town is just to the right of it
the castle and the city were, very atypically, two independent administrative/government structures

Second possibility? The one really hard to catch? It's surplus copper. Bratislava lies on one of several trade routes from Banska Bystrica, a mining city that was a major source of copper for half of Europe, some 150 km away. It's not impossible that these copper balls were made at a time when buying copper became a lot cheaper for reasons of surplus.

[Pauly]

Well,
First possible reason, they were indeed incendiaries - Bratislava of the time sat ~50 meters off the banks of Danube (or sometimes in the middle of Danube come flooding season)
and it was besieged by ships several times in its history. As for sources, this paper (https://deremilitari.org/wp-content/uploads/1999/11/Walton_TudorArtillery.pdf) has a direct reference to copper cannon balls being explicitly incendiary on page 223.
.

Again I have nothing to support this apart from supposition.

In the time of Nelson shot furnaces in fortifications took ~30 minutes to heat an iron ball to temperature. Given the time frame it’s reasonable to assume furnaces from 250 years earlier were both smaller and less efficient. A copper ball would be much much faster to bring to heat and thus be better suited to sustained fire than iron ball.

[fusilier]

This is the first I've heard if copper cannonballs. Alas I can't have time to do decent searches and quick ones aren't turning up anything decent. Is there somewhere with more/better info on the use & reasoning behind using copper for cannonballs?

Reports from the Mexican-American War (and Texas Revolution) reference the Mexican artillery using copper cannonballs, and sometimes copper musket balls. The assumption seems to be that Mexico had lots of copper, and used it when supplies of other metals were hard to come by.

[Mike_G]

Again I have nothing to support this apart from supposition.

In the time of Nelson shot furnaces in fortifications took ~30 minutes to heat an iron ball to temperature. Given the time frame it’s reasonable to assume furnaces from 250 years earlier were both smaller and less efficient. A copper ball would be much much faster to bring to heat and thus be better suited to sustained fire than iron ball.

I have a related question.

When firing "red hot shot" how did they keep the hot projectile from igniting the powder when loading? Was there just enough wadding between them or was a hot cannonball toll cool to ignite powder or what?

[Gnoman]

The wadding was damp, IIRC. The shot was very much hot enough to ignite powder.

[Pauly]

I have a related question.

When firing "red hot shot" how did they keep the hot projectile from igniting the powder when loading? Was there just enough wadding between them or was a hot cannonball toll cool to ignite powder or what?

The ball was heated to cherry red ~800-900 degrees C.

Thorough swabbing was the first step.
Then load the powder charge in bags and regular wadding, being very careful not to leave any powder in the barrel
The ball was carried from the furnace tomthe gun in a cracle.
Ball is loaded with wet wadding front and back in addition to the regular wadding.
Then the gunner fired as quickly as possible.

The idea was to have as little time as possible between the ball leaving the furnace and the shot being fired.

If the shot required the barrel being angled downwards some additional steps were done to fight gravity.

[Martin Greywolf]

The Tudor copper shot mentioned in article I linked wasn't meant for heated shot use, it was filled with "fireworks". If I had to guess, it was done because copper is easier to cast and work into a hollow sphere, but I don't exactly have any translations of period gunnery manuals on hand, so...

The Mexican copper balls are allegedly made because of copper surplus. I really don't know enough about that late of a history to tell whether that's true or one of the historian's theories.

Bratislava's copper balls... who knows. As you may have notice, the inspection didn't really thoroughly list every variation - no mention of ball weight or diameter for one - so there could well be several variations of copper shot in that category.

[Martin Greywolf]

Can anyone reccommend a source for the armaments and tactics preferred in Eastern Europe in the late 1400s? Specifically interested in Hungary, Romania (Wallachia and Transylvania primarily) and the Ottoman Empire.

Okay, so, this arrived into my mailbox just now. I haven't read it, and it will be some time before I can get to it, so I can't say how good or accurate it is. Use with caution. (https://www.academia.edu/211636/_Ottoman_Warfare_1453_1826_?email_work_card=title)

[Telok]

This sort of isn't a real world stuff question, but it sort of could be and I can't really figure a better place to ask.

I converted a 10 meter long monster from a fantasy game to a space opera game after coming up with the absurd idea of using them as a "boarding party" in space navy combat. I even managed to write a little program for how many people shooting for how long it would take to kill a big monster, so I could find out what sort of "space navy boarding combat party" the monster is equal to. That all works out OK, in the game system math at least.

Thing is, I can't really account for the environment. The ship crews are basically normal soldiers with normal RL like battle rifles and normal RL like morale & intellect & stuff. The ships are functionally WWII to late 1980s battleships & aircraft carriers (I found deckplans online and use them for maps). The monster... is capable of tearing a hole big enough to fit through, in any bulkhead, in about 45 seconds. It is, however, basically a giant rabid animal. Although it is immune to a bunch of stuff, so vaccuum or poison gas won't kill it and it'll wreck it's way out if a meltdown nuke reactor before the heat and rads kill it.

All in all and without accounting for the "in a ship" environment, over 15 minutes it will kill about 150 people (and it can move fast enough to make that happen). If 50 soldiers at a time can full-auto pretty much the whole time it they have about a 2% chance of killing it every 15 minutes. If 250 soldiers can full-auto it they have about a 10% chance to kill it every 15 min. Crews range from 150 to 1500 (yes its a death sentence for a small ship, that's fine).

My queston then is; how would the fight being in the confines of a ship change things? Would such ships commonly have personal carry anti-vehicle weapons around? Would the crew of, say the USS Iowa, do domething like luring it to a powder magazine under a turret and blowing it? Would the crew of a carrier be willing to fire a helicopter rocket pod indoors in the... hangers?

[Martin Greywolf]

Would such ships commonly have personal carry anti-vehicle weapons around?

Not really, their anti-vehicle weapons are the primary or secondary guns. The most you'd see is a handful of mortars. You didn't have a lot of personal firearms on these sorts of ship in the first place, and most of them were in armories and not carried around by sailors, at most you'd see some people guarding classified stuff with pistols.

That said, this is the case because weapons like these weren't needed. If there was a reason for them...


Would the crew of, say the USS Iowa, do domething like luring it to a powder magazine under a turret and blowing it?

GAH! No!

Seriously, words can't describe how bad an idea it is. A magazine explosion will sink the ship in minutes - if it is a secondary magazine, a primary magazine going off is pretty much a guarantee of loss of ship with damn near all hands. Magazines on these ships had a system where they could be flooded by seawater if a fire was going in their direction, but a direct hit would still blow the entire ship up. Just ask HMS Hood.


Would the crew of a carrier be willing to fire a helicopter rocket pod indoors in the... hangers?

You'll get a fire at the very least that way, and if it hits a fuel line (a necessary thing on an aircraft carrier)... No. No one would be willing to do it.

What a critter like this would do?

On a water ship, a breach like this is likely to get seawater to boilers. Once that happens, you loose a hefty chunk of the ship's interior (hot boilers + cold water = explosion) and a lot of power to a ship. It's about as bad as being hit by a torpedo, if not worse. With space and vacuum, you have massive atmospheric breach that spreads further and further, loss of power... It's much more of a problem than you think it is, and it pretty much doesn't matter how many people this monster kills.

What's worse is that the ship isn't designed to resist explosives from the inside, so any weapon that is capable of hurting it is not usable.

The best option? Look at real life WW2 era torpedo protection. Have an outer hull that the monster tears through and then a hollow space, followed by actual armor. Once your monster is in there, you can maybe use some sort of bait or something, to keep it there for long enough to employ those high power weapons - hopefully, your inner-main armor can shrug off a rocket that kills the critter.

If it actually gets inside, you either need to kill it really quickly, or abandon ship. Also, if this sort of an attack is a thing, forget about assault rifles, you'll need machineguns and anti-materiel rifles. Something like early WW2 era Lahti AT rifle with a non-explosive projectile could work fairly well.

[Telok]

GAH! No!

Seriously, words can't describe how bad an idea it is.

Thats why I asked. Thank you.

Hmm. Its space opera so air loss to boarding parties is handwaved. It only matters on a few ship critical hits. I guess there's already a self-sealing double hull set up then. So from the crew's pov its: "crunch" -> prep for boarding party -> surprise 30 foot hell-world monster in your face.

Now, nobody in their right mind would go to the hell-world and try to farm the bloody thing, this will be a complete surprise. But thinking, there is personal armor in the APC/light tank range and would be commonly used in military boarding actions (piracy probably not but I'm assuming civvie ships don't matter here). That means some anti-armor weapons will be on hand.

I'll try running the numbers again with the assumption that the regulars shave off the hit point buffer & regeneration, then the heavy weapons at... 1/10? 1/20? will do the breaking through the "won't die" special abilities. Probably the lower end heavy weapons without big explosion radii.

[tyckspoon]

If the space-navy in question is aware these creatures are a threat, they're going to need to change doctrine and equipment to deal with them, and may go to the extreme of changing their ship design entirely if they expect to fight them in multiple conflicts. Normal personal weaponry isn't going to cut it with those estimated times to kill, not least because there won't be anywhere in the ship big enough for 50-plus crew to even focus fire on a single target (aside from possibly the main deck, and if they see the creature coming there they should be trying to bring it down with ship's weaponry.) If they don't have bigger guns to apply to the problem, either the ship is a loss because the monster unstoppably rampages until (too much crew is dead/it rips enough holes in the hull/it hits a critical ship system) or it's a loss because somebody decides to suicide the ship rather than let the creature eat them and possibly launch into another ship to do the same.

So your crew needs something with a lot more punch available to them, and you have to be willing to suffer further damage to the ship's structure in employing it unless you are able to come up with some kind of weapon system that deals massively disproportionate damage to the creature compared to the ship structure. If the creature is resistant mostly by bulk and doesn't have ship-plating grade natural armor, for example, you might be able to use something like high-caliber lower-velocity expanding bullet rounds that will do a lot of flesh damage but not very much risk of punching through structural elements of the ship.

If the crew doesn't have that kind of weapon option, feasible reactions I can think of basically come down to A: Dramatically self-destructing the ship (exploding ship's ordinance, power core meltdown, etc) or B: Abandon ship, evacuate all reasonable crew, and have another ship hit the thing with its own main or secondary armaments.

[halfeye]

I converted a 10 meter long monster from a fantasy game to a space opera game after coming up with the absurd idea of using them as a "boarding party" in space navy combat. I even managed to write a little program for how many people shooting for how long it would take to kill a big monster, so I could find out what sort of "space navy boarding combat party" the monster is equal to. That all works out OK, in the game system math at least.

...

The monster... is capable of tearing a hole big enough to fit through, in any bulkhead, in about 45 seconds.

...

My queston then is; how would the fight being in the confines of a ship change things? Would such ships commonly have personal carry anti-vehicle weapons around? Would the crew of, say the USS Iowa, do domething like luring it to a powder magazine under a turret and blowing it? Would the crew of a carrier be willing to fire a helicopter rocket pod indoors in the... hangers?

How did this monster become this strong? A 33.3 ft long monster is not huge, it's about the size of a T. Rex, twice the size of an elephant, and people hunted those.

Steel bulkheads on military ships are sometimes armoured, you wouldn't get through that without oxy-acetylene gear or something equivalent.

[Lemmy]

How long could leaf-shaped blade be and still perform reasonably well (compared to other blades of similar length, but of more conventional shapes)?

I was thinking of making a certain race of my setting use leaf-shaped blades, but all I could find like that were short swords. Could there be a change to their design that kept the general shape but made it more optimal for longer blades (70+ cm), assuming manufacturing them isn't an issue?

Thanks in advance for any and all replies.

[Rynjin]

How long could leaf-shaped blade be and still perform reasonably well (compared to other blades of similar length, but of more conventional shapes)?

I was thinking of making a certain race of my setting use leaf-shaped blades, but all I could find like that were short swords. Could there be a change to their design that kept the general shape but made it more optimal for longer blades (70+ cm), assuming manufacturing them isn't an issue?

Thanks in advance for any and all replies.

The point of a leaf shape is to add more mass to the right areas (near the tip) to maximize cutting power on a shorter blade. It's the same reason why a machete has a more bulbous tip as compared to the relatively slim bladed portion near the handle.

Longer blades already have more mass, so don't need their balance thrown off by making the blade more top-heavy. Instead, tapering results in better balance and the ability to thrust, which is important.

I'd say your best bet for a longer leaf-shaped blade would be a polearm, not a sword. You could get away with a wide "leafed" guandao type weapon I think.

Edit: I found a video of someone testing a bastard sword (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JecnZK0ko78) with a leaf shape, from a fantasy blade manufacturer.

It kinda works, but as you can see from the video it has some issues. All of the cutting power is concentrated on the "leafed" portion, with the taper being largely vestigial and the back end of the blade lacking enough mass to properly cut.

Which...basically just makes the sword a weird shaped axe but without the advantages of an axe.

That said, in a fantasy setting the relative impracticality doesn't matter so much as "is this conceivably plausible", and the answer appears to be yes. Though I still think a polearm works better.

[Telok]

How did this monster become this strong? A 33.3 ft long monster is not huge, it's about the size of a T. Rex, twice the size of an elephant, and people hunted those.

Steel bulkheads on military ships are sometimes armoured, you wouldn't get through that without oxy-acetylene gear or something equivalent.

My mistake. Went back & checked numbers. Monster takes 2-3 minutes to hole an interior bulkhead. About 6 minutes to gnaw through the exterior armor of the smaller ships, up to 12-15 getting into battleships.

Did I mention its a bit silly high end space opera?

[Mr Beer]

If 50 soldiers at a time can full-auto pretty much the whole time it they have about a 2% chance of killing it every 15 minutes. If 250 soldiers can full-auto it they have about a 10% chance to kill it every 15 min.

So this is like 1000s of rounds per soldier hitting it? If this thing can soak 10s of Ks of rifle rounds, it's functionally immune to such an attack, like it's a main battle tank or something. What is the mechanism of the kill exactly? If we know what takes it down when hosed with rifle fire, that informs the type of weapon one should use to reliably kill.

I agree with others that say if this thing is a known threat, they will have specific counter measures on board, like special weapons or armoured kill rooms that it can be lured into and then electrocuted, fried or crushed to death remotely.

[GeoffWatson]

Thats why I asked. Thank you.

Hmm. Its space opera so air loss to boarding parties is handwaved. It only matters on a few ship critical hits. I guess there's already a self-sealing double hull set up then. So from the crew's pov its: "crunch" -> prep for boarding party -> surprise 30 foot hell-world monster in your face.

Now, nobody in their right mind would go to the hell-world and try to farm the bloody thing, this will be a complete surprise.

If it's a surprise, they're doomed.
It's not going to sit still for the hours needed for full-autofire to kill it, and anything stronger risks destroying important ship components.
The misses from full-auto will probably do serious damage to the ship interior anyway (armouring everything would take nearly-useless weight which you don't want on a spaceship).

Abandon ship - call in the Super Space Marines, and hope they kill it before their missed shots destroy anything important.

[Martin Greywolf]

How long could leaf-shaped blade be and still perform reasonably well (compared to other blades of similar length, but of more conventional shapes)?

I was thinking of making a certain race of my setting use leaf-shaped blades, but all I could find like that were short swords. Could there be a change to their design that kept the general shape but made it more optimal for longer blades (70+ cm), assuming manufacturing them isn't an issue?

Thanks in advance for any and all replies.

I agree with others who have said a longer sword with the xiphos-style leaf shape would be a very bad idea, but that's where we can... extrapolate.

Let's assume that the leaf shape is, for some reason, deeply cultural for these folks, and they want a functional blade about the length of a bastard sword that calls back to it. That? Now that is very possible.

What you need to do is take the same steel ingot you make a sword out of and reshape it differently, same total mass and mass distribution, different shape. Make the first part of the blade thicker in cross-section and narrower, make the leafy bit flatter and wider. And you're very much in luck, because something like this has been done historically.

http://myarmoury.com/images/pb/bb4f7a47ced763902b51487c2d0f08db.jpg

The handle on that on is 20cm long, and they were used from ~1300, based on pictorial evidence. It was most likely a case of "hey, we're using sabers because we consider ourselves Attila's descendants but longswords are becoming a thing, let's make a longsword sabre".

For your leaf shaped blade, you'll want to do something similar, make the curves gentler and the overall look of the blade more slender. You'll end up with a perfectly functional sword that will be a tad better in cutting while being a bit worse at precision thrusts.

Also make sure that you can still grab the wide leaf part to half-sword it and that the point itself is slender and thick enough to go through mail, that is pretty important for a sword that wants to compete with standard longsword in the age of plate armor.


If the space-navy in question is aware these creatures are a threat, they're going to need to change doctrine and equipment to deal with them[...]

If we're changing doctrine, then there will be no boarding, just have the equivalent of fighter patrols take the critter out.

I mean, if this wasn't a space opera thing, then we'd have to ask ourselves how was this space navy so incompetent in sensor tech that something the size of a bus managed to sneak up on them. I mean, late WW2 radar could detect single-seat fighters and post-war can see missiles, never mind something this big, and that's in atmosphere with all sorts of interference.


My mistake. Went back & checked numbers. Monster takes 2-3 minutes to hole an interior bulkhead. About 6 minutes to gnaw through the exterior armor of the smaller ships, up to 12-15 getting into battleships.

Did I mention its a bit silly high end space opera?

If you want it to be a boarding fight, and players are content not to ask pesky questions like "where is our fighter screen", "why don't we electrify the outer hull" or "why don't we use our secondaries to blast it apart before it gets close"...

Actually, if they are asking the pesky questions, I'd advise you to give this thing some sort of phasing, stealth or teleport ability that can get it at least over several hundred kilometers without being detected or hit. Possibly put it on a long cooldown while the sacks of phlebotinum goop replenish, making it essentially a space ambush predator.

Okay, that aside for boarding itself. This weaker version is much more stoppable. The biggest issue, once it gets inside the ship proper, is to not use weapons that will wreck your ship as well, so no high-power cannons and rockets. If we ignore ricochets, machineguns and AM rifles will work fairly well, especially if you cut what is more or less and arrow slit in your bulkheads and fire through that while the critter munches.

Another weapon that would work pretty well is manually-triggered shaped charge petards. Use a grenade launcher or robot/drone or some such to attach those to the critter, and trigger those that stuck well remotely.

https://www.mediastorehouse.com.au/t/617/normal-method-applying-petard-explosive-device-9786081.jpg

[Telok]

If it's a surprise, they're doomed.
It's not going to sit still for the hours needed for full-autofire to kill it, and anything stronger risks destroying important ship components.
The misses from full-auto will probably do serious damage to the ship interior anyway (armouring everything would take nearly-useless weight which you don't want on a spaceship).

Abandon ship - call in the Super Space Marines, and hope they kill it before their missed shots destroy anything important.

Well, checked with other heavier weapons, did sims of blasting through barriers, recalculated kill rates.

And dang it. Found an error in the crit check in the sim. Redoing some percentages.

Any ways, the actual space combat boarding system is fine. Works. Not worried about PCs, they'll drop out of the 10 to 15 min per turn space combat to hero the monster to death at 5-6 rounds per minute. This whole thing is because the previous campaign started some doom clocks. One of those involves a powerful & insane person trying to bring art & culture to the galaxy. To that end they piracy up to a small fleet, farm a hell-world for giant monsters, stuff the monsters (stunned/restrained) into modified boarding shuttles, then shoot the shuttles at other ships like they were torpedoes.

As its a doom clock the PCs may be half way across the galaxy when stuff happens and I'd like to figure npc ship survival & news stories. More "by the numbers" than just some ass pulling bs. I've had that bite DMs where the "epic city destroyer" monsters could be two round ganked by a party that knows their damage output is less than 30ish archers. Much sarcasm ensued. And, its possible, I guess, for the PCs to try to ignore this if one does hit their ship, meaning I do need the body count & collateral damage rates.

Speaking of collateral damage, checking the math, the lighter weapons and stray rounds aren't a danger to bulkheads (although stuff in the rooms is trashed by missed shots but big monster is easy to hit). The anti-armor stuff is 40%-80% likely to damage interior bulkheads (small holes, spalling), actual anti-vehicle man-portable rockets at 95%, but still takes about 20-50 hits to put a hole big enough for a person to duck through.

[Pauly]

In the Viet Nam war allied soldiers came across man eating tigers, rogue elephants and salt water crocodiles. The basic military approach was to ‘leave them the hell alone and bring in specialist hunters if they caused too much trouble”.

It isn’t just a matter of having the tech and the people. It’s
- having the right gun (a dangerous game rifle or equivalent)
- knowing the habits of the critter
- knowing the critter’s vulnerable spots.
- being able to stalk the critter
- having the nerve to take a well aimed close range shot, not randomly shooting rounds into the general vicinity of the critter.
Militaries have a long history of being incredibly unsuccessful in critter hunts. Examples include the Beast of Gevudan and the French army, the man eating tigress of Champawat and the Nepalese army, the great emu war and the Australian Army, Gustav and the Burundi army.

For a navy I’d echo the ‘abandon ship and call for reinforcements’ as the most viable way for a navy to deal with such a critter if it successfully gets on board a ship.

[Telok]

Ok. I've worked stuff out to the point where I'm happy with it. Thanks all.

It turns out that hunting/sniper rifles, and even more so laser sniper rifles, are pretty much the best bet for anything past the most basic troops. After that its the anti-armor weapons (ap grenades, ap rockets, short range plasma blasters). Even with enough good weapons the monsters will still kill 200 to 500 regular troops, half that in veterans with heavy armor, and half again elites in power armor. But I have my numbers and they work on both the narrative & mechanical levels now.

One issue I hit was that the system in use is set up so once a critter runs out of hit points/plot points it gets into critical damage, which is what does the actual killing with bleeding, KO, stuns, dismemberment, eviceration, etc. There are abilities creatures can have to mitigate or be immune to some of this stuff (eg: robots don't bleed or suffer fatigue), or there's one tag that says "ignore critical hits that wouldn't outright kill the creature unless <spacial conditions>". Playing with the simulator that ultra no-crit tag makes it super hard to kill the monster if it has otherwise lore appropriate stats. Without that tag, but with all the other immunities turned on, ten regular soldiers with gyrojet pistols they aren't proficient in can kill the monster in about 5 rounds. It got better as I upped the monster's stats but to make it sufficently resistant in order to get even closr to the correct narrative results would take boosting its stats to insane levels.

Obviously I could hand wave & butt pull or just make up a new monster ability. But that affects playability. If every big monster has unique & totally different defense abilities then players have no rules consistency or planning ability aside from "do big damage" (boring). If the monster is under statted relative to the narrative effects players get nasty cognitive dissonance when they mow it down using less damage abilities than a couple squads of mook npcs. If its over statted the players basically can't engage with it, having to give up & abandon ship every time it shows up or it's super tough but has weenie nerf claws that can't do the required damage to be a real threat.

Again, thanks for the help. And now I know they won't try something like the powder magazine idea.

[KineticDiplomat]

To ask the obvious question, since its in the RW thread: WHY is it crit resistant per se?

It sounds like "crits" reflect mechanisms of injury.

Basically, while a bullet punching a hole in you is never a good thing, it is actually a host of other things that make a projectile wound a really bad day. Usually they have to do with some variety of kinetic energy transfer, expansion, fragmentation, yaw, or tumbling effects...the exact manner isn't terribly relevant here. The point is when for some reason the bullet just zips through without that mechanism acting you get the ice pick effect where all you've really made is a smallish hole. The US/NATO 5.56mm round had some controversy about this, leading to a new tranche of engineering the round...

So, why doesn't your creature let mechanisms of injury actually perform? It's not just a groggy bleh, it has game fun: once you can point out the science of why it takes so much killing, then you can have players figure out the answer. Ask the Australians about the Emu war and why full metal jacket rifle rounds were not a great answer for killing puffy birds with thick coats of feathers, tiny and few critical organs, etc., and where they went in response

[GeoffWatson]

Speaking of collateral damage, checking the math, the lighter weapons and stray rounds aren't a danger to bulkheads (although stuff in the rooms is trashed by missed shots but big monster is easy to hit). The anti-armor stuff is 40%-80% likely to damage interior bulkheads (small holes, spalling), actual anti-vehicle man-portable rockets at 95%, but still takes about 20-50 hits to put a hole big enough for a person to duck through.

There would be a lot more vulnerable stuff than bulkheads - pipes, electronics, wiring, supplies, fuel, crew, etc.

[Telok]

There would be a lot more vulnerable stuff than bulkheads - pipes, electronics, wiring, supplies, fuel, crew, etc.

Yes! And that's great. Fits my gaming mantra of "no empty rooms" perfectly. Never ever give the players a fight somewhere they can treat like an empty room. That's how you get dull boffer larp static hp-to-zero "fights". Blow up the scenery! Exploding barrels & computers! Illogical steam pipes! Bottomless pits! Giant trash compactors! No empty rooms!

[Pauly]

To ask the obvious question, since its in the RW thread: WHY is it crit resistant per se?

It sounds like "crits" reflect mechanisms of injury.

Basically, while a bullet punching a hole in you is never a good thing, it is actually a host of other things that make a projectile wound a really bad day. Usually they have to do with some variety of kinetic energy transfer, expansion, fragmentation, yaw, or tumbling effects...the exact manner isn't terribly relevant here. The point is when for some reason the bullet just zips through without that mechanism acting you get the ice pick effect where all you've really made is a smallish hole. The US/NATO 5.56mm round had some controversy about this, leading to a new tranche of engineering the round...

So, why doesn't your creature let mechanisms of injury actually perform? It's not just a groggy bleh, it has game fun: once you can point out the science of why it takes so much killing, then you can have players figure out the answer. Ask the Australians about the Emu war and why full metal jacket rifle rounds were not a great answer for killing puffy birds with thick coats of feathers, tiny and few critical organs, etc., and where they went in response

To build on this a little. Animals like tigers, who nature expects to fight for their meals, are much more resistant to injury and heal faster than humans. Animals like crocodiles and elephants are resistant to injury due to thick hides. In both cases successful hunting requires knowing where the few vulnerable spots are, and this knowledge is far more important than the weapon being used.

In gaming terms this would mean making a successful lore check to being able to get access to critical hits. You could also apply needing to be at close range or for the critter to be immobilized/asleep due to the small size if the critical hit area.

[Telok]

To ask the obvious question, since its in the RW thread: WHY is it crit resistant per se?

It sounds like "crits" reflect mechanisms of injury.

Basically, while a bullet punching a hole in you is never a good thing,

The critter is... yeah, pretty much a T.Rex crossed with a ankylosaur, up muscled, and with the typical ultra-soft sf regeneration. The simulations helped tweak the stats. Anti-armor weapons worked well, but the surprise was how well the sniper rifle type weapons worked. So it looks all right I think.

[Pauly]

The critter is... yeah, pretty much a T.Rex crossed with a ankylosaur, up muscled, and with the typical ultra-soft sf regeneration. The simulations helped tweak the stats. Anti-armor weapons worked well, but the surprise was how well the sniper rifle type weapons worked. So it looks all right I think.

The reason why IRL sniper type rifles weren’t the go to for killing dangerous game is that the travel time between trigger pull and bullet impact made a serious difference in whether you got the crit or just poked a hole in the critter. You had to get close, like 10 meters or closer kind of close, to get the guaranteed one hit one kill shots.

In close quarters there shouldn’t be any effective difference between a sub MOA target rifle and a mass produced service rifle. The benefit of the sniper rifle is ability to hit small things at long range, and in ship board engagements you won’t get the range to justify the benefit.

[halfeye]

The reason why IRL sniper type rifles weren’t the go to for killing dangerous game is that the travel time between trigger pull and bullet impact made a serious difference in whether you got the crit or just poked a hole in the critter. You had to get close, like 10 meters or closer kind of close, to get the guaranteed one hit one kill shots.

In close quarters there shouldn’t be any effective difference between a sub MOA target rifle and a mass produced service rifle. The benefit of the sniper rifle is ability to hit small things at long range, and in ship board engagements you won’t get the range to justify the benefit.

The modern 0.5 inch sniper's rifles are easily elephant killers, and would mess up a tiger no problems at full range even on a not particularly ideal hit. They are so powerful they are outside the Geneva convention.

[Gnoman]

The modern 0.5 inch sniper's rifles are easily elephant killers, and would mess up a tiger no problems at full range even on a not particularly ideal hit. They are so powerful they are outside the Geneva convention.

.50 BMG rifles aren't dedicated sniper weapons - they're intended for use against light vehicles, light fortifications, and other hard point targets. They work just fine as an anti-personnel weapon (all claims that international convention or policy prohibit this are myth), but are not an ideal weapon. They offer little advantage over a more conventional rifle in that role except range (rarely relevant), are much more effort to tote around, and have a much stronger visual signature.

[Pauly]

The modern 0.5 inch sniper's rifles are easily elephant killers, and would mess up a tiger no problems at full range even on a not particularly ideal hit. They are so powerful they are outside the Geneva convention.

Good luck carrying a Barrett or equivalent into the jungle and moving into a position where the tiger is. Tiger’s aren’t well known for standing about in open fields with long lines of sight.

Besides a 5.56 is just as potent an elephant killer, assuming you have an actual sniper handling the rifle, for all but the most extreme ranges.

[Gnoman]

Besides a 5.56 is just as potent an elephant killer, assuming you have an actual sniper handling the rifle, for all but the most extreme ranges.

No, it is not. Taking down a large animal requires a great deal of penetration that 5.56 simply does not have. More importantly, taking down a large animal quickly and humanely requires a great deal of energy transfer that 5.56 simply does not have. There's a reason that "elephant gun" or "big game stopping rifle" is an entire classification of weapon.

[Vinyadan]

No, it is not. Taking down a large animal requires a great deal of penetration that 5.56 simply does not have. More importantly, taking down a large animal quickly and humanely requires a great deal of energy transfer that 5.56 simply does not have. There's a reason that "elephant gun" or "big game stopping rifle" is an entire classification of weapon.

Would cavitation make up for that?

[Gnoman]

That's one of the mechanisms of energy transfer, but it doesn't do you much good if it happens shallowly. Intermediate rounds like 5.56 can be marginal for reaching vitals on larger deer (if shot frontally), let alone big game. Full-rifle rounds can reach the vitals on big game if you hit it right, but they'll spend so much energy getting there that the kill is probably going to be slow. That's pretty relevant to this question, because the proposed megabeast has regeneration - so even a vitals shot won't kill it if it isn't done fast.

[Martin Greywolf]

Okay, hunting animals with military gear.

Killing humanely

We do not care about this. It's not what the question is about.

Calibers are meaningless

If someone categorically states something like "5.56 is not good for hunting", you know that they don't know what they are talking about. There is a massive range of ammunition with very different properties that are 1) all the same caliber and 2) able to be used in the same rifle. 5.56 specifically is perfectly legal for use in a lot of countries (USA varies by state), and there are specialized deer loads for it.

Even more importantly, penetration is not dictated by caliber in the slightest, saying that "5.56 does not have enough penetration" is categorically wrong. Penetration within reasonable range (not, like, ten meters into solid steel) depends on bullet velocity and bullet not fragmenting. And with modern bullets, most of them are designed specifically to fragment. If you have a bullet that was meant to fragment inside a human chest and you shoot a bear, it doesn't matter if it was a .50 cal (and yes, there are some weird 50 ammo types that do this) or 5.56, it's not gonna do that much damage.

Stopping power

This is the ability to neutralize (not necessarily kill) a thing in as few shots as you can. It matters a great deal in civilian hunting, because of humane killing considerations, and in situations where you need to drop something within a second (e.g. self defense, hostages being involved etc).

Here's the thing, it doesn't matter much if you have fully automatic weapons and nothing to stop you from just hosing the animal. A hunter will not want to take a machinegun or an assault rifle and dump two hundred rounds into a tiger, a squad of soldiers will not care. The animal will look like a bunch of bloody shreds by the time they stop, but it's not like they want to eat it.

So, unless the animal can manage to either not give them enough time to do that (e.g. by being an ambush predator, like tigers are), the animal is dead if the soldiers can aim properly. Which is why you always see animals evading death in places where they are hard to see (jungle, muddy water), and usually with less that stellar armed forces going after them.

Anti-materiel rifles

They aren't really needed on Earth animals. Sure, they will work, but why waste your time on faffing about with them when you can get a fireteam to dump a few magazines into the unfortunate elephant.

Beast of Gevaudan

It's been some time since I've looked into it seriously, but the most reasonable theory I've heard about it is that it was several wolves, not just one beast. Combine that with mass hysteria, and you're sending you soldiers to tramp around in the woods looking for demons every time someone sees a large dog.

Emu war

Look, I like this meme as much as the next guy, but if you use this as an example, at least go read about it.

First round was a bunch of soldiers trying to get cute with herding emus into ambushes, which may well have worked if the machinegun didn't jam. They then tried to mount the MG on a truck, and the ride was so rough the gunner couldn't even start shooting, let alone hit something. Note that they still did kill ~200 emus for 2500 rounds fired.

Once people started to use braincells, there were about a thousand emu kills for 10 000 rounds, with another 2500 emus estimated to die from wounds, one emu killed per three bullets. For comparison, WW2 saw some 50 billion rounds fired, if they were as efficient at killing people as they were emus, they would kill all the people alive today twice over.

So no, the emus didn't win the Emu war.

But hey, don't take my word for it

Because there was one incident from Vietnam war of tiger vs soldiers that is from a reliable source that I dug up.

https://i.imgur.com/uGQcXN1.jpg

So, six soldiers on a recon patrol, ambushed by a tiger at night while they were sleeping, one of them was literally in tiger's jaws and couldn't defend himself because he was asleep moments prior. The tiger still died and only managed to hurt a soldier who was asleep.

Military hunting parties

[warning, dead animals are discussed and show in the links, nothing graphic, but still]

Are organized when they (https://www.premiumtimesng.com/news/more-news/187953-soldiers-kill-notorious-hippopotamus-in-gombe-dam.html) have (https://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/11/world/americas/11hippo.html) to be (https://www.nairaland.com/7243458/nigerian-army-celebrates-capture-huge), usually to precision-kill a single troublesome animal, and for that job, the soldiers tend to pick DMRs.

[Inevitability]

To what extend can pre-metallurgy equipment stack up to medieval-era iron and steel?


If I have a group of savage humanoids, somewhat bigger and stronger than humans, armed with stone bludgeons and simple knives/spearheads/arrowheads made out of flint and bone, would they be able to stand up to a ramshackle village militia (unarmored, weapons are repurposed iron tools like pitchforks and kitchen knives)?

What about a better-equipped militia (boiled leather armor, with messer-like blades, iron-tipped spears, and longbows)?

What about a squad of soldiers in chainmail, armed with 'normal' swords?

If the savage humanoids have horses and the humans do not, does that change anything?

[tyckspoon]

To what extend can pre-metallurgy equipment stack up to medieval-era iron and steel?


If I have a group of savage humanoids, somewhat bigger and stronger than humans, armed with stone bludgeons and simple knives/spearheads/arrowheads made out of flint and bone, would they be able to stand up to a ramshackle village militia (unarmored, weapons are repurposed iron tools like pitchforks and kitchen knives)?

What about a better-equipped militia (boiled leather armor, with messer-like blades, iron-tipped spears, and longbows)?

What about a squad of soldiers in chainmail, armed with 'normal' swords?

If the savage humanoids have horses and the humans do not, does that change anything?

If armor is not in play, having bad iron weapons is not an advantage over stone. Flesh is not significantly easier to damage with metal than stone. That will come down to which side is better organized, usually; if the militia actually practices as a militia they should be able to repel a less-organized attacker. If it's just 'somebody rang the alarm bell, show up with whatever you have nearby' and they don't drill or practice combat with whatever their options are, they'll probably get pretty badly mauled in one-on-one fights with enemies that are much better suited to doing that.

Once armor starts showing up the advantage swings heavily to the militia, and once you're looking at metal armor the primitive weaponry is effectively not a threat any more. You will still see injuries and the occasional deaths, of course, because combat is combat and stuff happens, but I do not believe there is any real chance that the side wearing chainmail actually loses to the side without in a direct engagement.

Horses would offer a mobility advantage, but without a number of other technological innovations it's actually quite hard to fight effectively from horseback, so actual combat would still be as dismounted foot; mounts would probably see the humanoids adopting a hit-and-run raiding style where they try use the horses to strike at areas the organized defence cannot easily cover, grab whatever they can easily move/have their horses carry, then remount and vacate once an an organized response shows up.

[Pauly]

To what extend can pre-metallurgy equipment stack up to medieval-era iron and steel?


If I have a group of savage humanoids, somewhat bigger and stronger than humans, armed with stone bludgeons and simple knives/spearheads/arrowheads made out of flint and bone, would they be able to stand up to a ramshackle village militia (unarmored, weapons are repurposed iron tools like pitchforks and kitchen knives)?

What about a better-equipped militia (boiled leather armor, with messer-like blades, iron-tipped spears, and longbows)?

What about a squad of soldiers in chainmail, armed with 'normal' swords?

If the savage humanoids have horses and the humans do not, does that change anything?

Ask Hernan Cortez

[Gnoman]

To what extend can pre-metallurgy equipment stack up to medieval-era iron and steel?


If I have a group of savage humanoids, somewhat bigger and stronger than humans, armed with stone bludgeons and simple knives/spearheads/arrowheads made out of flint and bone, would they be able to stand up to a ramshackle village militia (unarmored, weapons are repurposed iron tools like pitchforks and kitchen knives)?

What about a better-equipped militia (boiled leather armor, with messer-like blades, iron-tipped spears, and longbows)?

What about a squad of soldiers in chainmail, armed with 'normal' swords?

If the savage humanoids have horses and the humans do not, does that change anything?

Absent armor (note that the Spanish Conquistadors often went without armor against the Aztecs and others, due to the heat of local conditions), the primary disadvantage of stone and bone weapons is availability. Stone and bone that's suitable for weaponmaking is of limited quantity, and stone takes a great deal of time to work into shape. Metal is metal in general, and is faster to work in a comparable piece. Once armor comes into play, things change significantly - any armor at all greatly hinders the functionality of a stone or bone weapon, and it is physically impossible to penetrate metal armor with one - the weapon will break at a much lower level of force than you would need to force the armor out of shape. So, to compare your three scenarios:

1. Unarmored militia

The militia's use of metal won't aid them all that much. The enemy weapons will kill them just fine, and rapidly improvised weapons made of a better material are probably worse than purpose-built weapons made of an inferior one. Depending on what you mean by "monstrous humanoid", they're likely to be at a great disadvantage simply because the guys using stone and bone weapons against them are probably going to be stronger and tougher than they are. This is pretty clear cut that the edge goes to the monsters.

2. Armored militia with real weapons.

Here, the militia has a real edge in equipment. Leather armor is not immune to the crude weapons, but it is highly resistant. Meanwhile, their weapons are straight up better than the primitive ones being used against them, which makes a big difference. Countering this, the monstrous humanoids are probably more experienced in fighting, and are probably strong and tough enough to offset the edge in equipment. I'd call this an even match.

3. Real armored soldiers

This is simple and straightforward. Their armor will be effectively invulnerable to the primitive weapons barring extreme bad luck, they have better weapons, and are probably trained for fighting. In a straight-up fight, the soldiers will win. The only way for the monstrous humanoids to defeat this enemy would be to use harassment and ambush tactics to pick off vulnerable solders that are out of armor, or to use traps that don't care about armor such as pits and deadfalls.

[Martin Greywolf]

To what extend can pre-metallurgy equipment stack up to medieval-era iron and steel?

I don't feel like writing several books... :smallwink:



If I have a group of savage humanoids, somewhat bigger and stronger than humans, armed with stone bludgeons and simple knives/spearheads/arrowheads made out of flint and bone, would they be able to stand up to a ramshackle village militia (unarmored, weapons are repurposed iron tools like pitchforks and kitchen knives)?

This is a lot more specific.

Since we have no armor in play, which in itself can be odd (more on that later), only thing that matters is reach of your attacks. Since both sides have access to sharpened sticks, the weaponry is pretty much equal no matter what it is made of. George Silver states outright that in a fight of rapier and staff, staff wins, and he was referring to unsharpened staff to boot.

I have to object to the term "savage humanoids" - not necessarily on PC grounds, but rather on grounds of it doesn't tell us anything about this other group. Are they hunter-gatherers, primitive farmers, do they have martial culture? All of those things matter.

Still, village farmers would be just about the least suitable people to fight short of office workers, so our savages do have the edge here.



What about a better-equipped militia (boiled leather armor, with messer-like blades, iron-tipped spears, and longbows)?

You will not find it in a village. You are unlikely to find any sort of militia in a village, but one with armor and solid weapons isn't a thing - the Hussites had significant trouble arming their hastily assembled commoners, to a point where they invented several new, easy to manufacture weapons. Maybe if this is a frontier town or some such, but that needs to be specified - we can potentially be talking about something like the Ranger towns of Hungary, where a small tribe got a village in exchange for their military service of scouting and guarding the border.

http://husitstvi.cz/wp-content/uploads/jednotky-vyzbroj-vystroj07.jpg
http://www.lutel.cz/obrazky/11016.jpg
These dussacks became incredibly famous by appearing in Lichtenauer tradition treatises, but keep in mind they were a last-ditch sidearm for the hussites, the polearms above were much often used

What's more, boiled leather armor isn't a cheap thing. It was used only rarely, and usually by higher income folks, your armor for people on a budget is gambeson. If you are really on a budget, there are records (from Hussite wars) of smolnice, which I'd translate as tarmor (tar+armor), which are bits of straw soaked in tar strapped over yourself, combined with rope helmets (take a rope and curl it over a ball/head, then sew it together).

Iron-tipped spear doesn't really give you any advantage against unarmored people over a sharp stick other than durability and messers are a terrible idea (unless you have shields, but those were not specified), so the only advantage is the longbow.

Here's the thing, a 60 lbs bow will send an arrow straight through a deer, anything heavier than that is an overkill against armor, so you don't really need longbows. A simple hunting self bow that a teenager can use (~40-50 lbs) will cause wounds that are pretty much as lethal as the ones from a 160 lbs longbow against unarmored humanoid.

So in this case, the villagers have advantage of some armor, and that's pretty much it. I'd still bet on the savages.



What about a squad of soldiers in chainmail, armed with 'normal' swords?

Well, a dedicated two-handed thrust with a spear you put your weight behind may get through a good mail shirt, but it will definitely knock the wind out of you - with more people on the field, ot means one spearman will knock the wond out of you and the other will use that to stab your face.

Thing is, if the swords are all the soldiers have, they will be javelined to death even before that happens, but an actual combined arms force will have the advantage.



If the savage humanoids have horses and the humans do not, does that change anything?

Not a single thing, because this is essentially a siege. Only things this will affect is what happens before and after the fight.

What you forgot

There are factors in play that matter a lot more than weapon quality.

The most important one is morale, how willing are the savages to press the attack? How determined are the villagers to hold? What is at stake?

Morale aside, if the savages are attacking a village and the village knows that this might happen, it will fortify itself. Stone walls are not happening and even proper pallisades may be out of reach, but a sturdy wooden fence will go a long way.

https://scontent.fbts3-1.fna.fbcdn.net/v/t31.18172-8/321720_302763146426602_949804166_o.jpg?_nc_cat=106&ccb=1-7&_nc_sid=cdbe9c&_nc_ohc=061vkHrMpG0AX8a1iRi&_nc_ht=scontent.fbts3-1.fna&oh=00_AT9vA6mUUcwkVV42vpFWESmneVlF3lbhKt5DsjfTvhsV 5Q&oe=6362A256

https://www.dobrevylety.sk/gallery/bc06f96eeacc84b94d6a95f1d2eb1bb0.jpg
It took us two days to build the tower, and half of that was putting the roof on

While the plank walls can't stop a battering ram, they can stop you from kicking them down, especially if someone is stabbing you from above - unfortunately, I can't find any photos of that particular event

These sorts of fortifications are a hell of a force multiplier, and will give the villagers the win here - unless the attackers use incendiaries on the very likely straw roofs. They you have a fight that will be as much about putting out fires as it is about fighting.

Villagers may have some skilled slingers among them, as could the savages.

Finally the savages. They have armor. Even if they managed to loot nothing usable by them, even stone age cultures had some sort of armor - several layers of whatever clothing they had on hand, be it linen or hide, sometimes reinforced with wood and bone. They won't wear this for hunting (it's either useless for rabbits or doesn't work for bears), but if they set out on a raid, they will have at least some people being their heavy infantry.

https://qph.cf2.quoracdn.net/main-qimg-8f39f2d35b48c8726bf22292e4d707ec-pjlq

http://4.bp.blogspot.com/--7VcQIva1T4/T3OgpIHwfwI/AAAAAAAAAl0/9yfCE9oojfg/s1600/sibir_30.jpg

https://images.metmuseum.org/CRDImages/aa/original/DP113379.jpg

https://www.firstpeople.us/american-indian/people/pt/nakoaktok-warrior.jpg

In absence of organized large scale military response on behalf of the villagers, what you have on hand is a siege with more or less equal fighting potential man-to-man. The conventional rule of thumb is that the attackers need a 5 to 1 numerical advantage to successfully storm the fort.

[Vinyadan]

Martin, how did you make sure the structures were stable? How deep down in the terrain do they go? Did you have a method to choose what to place in the hole with the beam?

[Martin Greywolf]

Martin, how did you make sure the structures were stable? How deep down in the terrain do they go? Did you have a method to choose what to place in the hole with the
beam?

Bear in mind it's been almost a decade.


Martin, how did you make sure the structures were stable?

Hustle.

More seriously, you don't need a lot for these structures, use heavy tree logs for the frame, put them into holes and secure them in place with rocks. As long as the structure isn't too airy, its own weight will stabilize it. The important bit is to use some sort of treatment for the wood to prevent it from rotting - historically, you'd use tar, beeswax or oil, we probably used some sort of commercial paint-on thing, but I honestly can't remember - it's the black "paint" at the bottom meter and a half of the pillar.

http://galahad.sk/img_loader.php?img=wfwqma4MDMZFOMwIOYJ9mbplmckq3a9 dmchW2a9NxLuq2byjmegEmY2FGdOlVMWAJMvMXfnFxbjlSYqjX fsF2fvUmbyVGdu92a
http://galahad.sk/img_loader.php?img=wfwqma1ADMZFOMwIOYJ9mbplmckq3a9 dmchW2a9NxLuq2byjmegEmY2FGdOlVMWAJMvMXfnFxbjlSYqjX fsF2fvUmbyVGdu92a
And yeah, we cheated on the roof, because annually replacing straw is not fun

You may well question our methodology, but the thing is still standing a decade later, so...

https://www.welcometobratislava.eu/wp-content/uploads/2019/05/10-1.jpg


How deep down in the terrain do they go?

As you could see from the photo of building it, about knee deep for 2 stories for the big building, IIRC the tower is 1.5x to twice as deep because it is taller and lighter, but I wasn't there for building of that one.


Did you have a method to choose what to place in the hole with the beam?

The arcane method of "different sizes of rocks that are readily available".

http://galahad.sk/img_loader.php?img=wfwqmayiDMZFOMwIOYJ9mbplmckq3a9 dmchW2a9NxLuq2byjmegEmY2FGdOlVMWAJMvMXfnFxbjlSYqjX fsF2fvUmbyVGdu92a
http://galahad.sk/img_loader.php?img=wfwqma5UDMZFOMwIOYJ9mbplmckq3a9 dmchW2a9NxLuq2byjmegEmY2FGdOlVMWAJMvMXfnFxbjlSYqjX fsF2fvUmbyVGdu92a

We only had to cheat with one pillar, because we hit a spring from the side, we poured concrete into that one.

Important note

If you live in an area with hurricanes or earthquakes, building like this will get you or someone else killed.

[Thane of Fife]

Not a single thing, because this is essentially a siege. Only things this will affect is what happens before and after the fight.

What you forgot

There are factors in play that matter a lot more than weapon quality.

The most important one is morale, how willing are the savages to press the attack? How determined are the villagers to hold? What is at stake?

Morale aside, if the savages are attacking a village and the village knows that this might happen, it will fortify itself. Stone walls are not happening and even proper pallisades may be out of reach, but a sturdy wooden fence will go a long way.

Why do you think this is the most likely turn of events? Raiding - for cattle, brides, slaves, etc. - is probably the most ubiquitous form of warfare in history, and I have never heard anything that suggests that raids typically devolved into sieges.

[Mike_G]

Why do you think this is the most likely turn of events? Raiding - for cattle, brides, slaves, etc. - is probably the most ubiquitous form of warfare in history, and I have never heard anything that suggests that raids typically devolved into sieges.

Fortifications for even small villages are really common. In the case of a raid, if people had enough warning to get into the fort/tower/blockhouse/whatever, then the raiders had to decide to just leave, take the place by assault or conduct a siege. So yeah, it did happen a lot.

Successful raids usually caught the defenders by surprise and either took the village or grabbed what they wanted and escaped. Often, a raid destroyed a village or carried off loot or prisoners but many of the people survived if they holed up in a stronghold. They may have a lot of rebuilding to do after, but it's better than being dead.

[gbaji]

I think it's important to remember that unless a village is somewhere really really far from potential raiders, it's almost always going to have at least some sort of wall somewhere around at least some of the buildings, and at least one building somewhat designated as the "fallback/defense" position that specifically has strong walls and is usually taller than the surrounding buildings as well. That will give the defenders an advantage.

Are the people in the village aware of even the potential for being attacked? They should have something available to at least slow down attackers and to hide behind. Even in the absence of a direct serious concern about raiding, villages tended to have walls/fences if for no other reason than to keep domesticated animals *in* and wild animals *out*. Even a somewhat open fence can act as a decent defensive position if both sides are fighting with basically sharp sticks. The guy who's trying to get across it is at a disadvantage to the guy already on the other side who's just standing there defending. Always.

And, as a couple of people pointed out, where do ranged weapons come in? Even in relatively primitive weapon scenarios, the advantage of range has always been significant. Simple bows, slings, or just thrown rocks, can be major factors in a fight like this and are extremely easy to make and should be readily available to both sides. And yeah, once again the advantage goes to the defenders (even moreso IMO).

The obvious counter to the defenders advantages would be the attackers having some element of surprise on their side. The fight will be significantly different if they are detected outside the wall/fenceline/whatever, versus if they get inside before an alarm is sounded and the locals come out to see what's going on. That will also dramatically change how you may want to run the encounter as well. Is it a desperate scramble to man the walls and hold off an overwhelming number? Or is it a smaller number but they're already running around inside the village square, lighting things on fire, killing anyone who gets near, and grabbing and running off with anything of value.

Oh. And I suppose the most important thing: What is the actual objective of the attackers? Is this a raiding party? Are they trying to just kill their enemies? Capture specific people? Rescue someone of theirs who is held captive? Steal something specific? What they're trying to accomplish is going to completely change how they attack and what they do during the attack. Just saying "I want a fight that goes like this" may work, but without a motivation for the attackers it's going to be less "OMG! They're trying to destroy the omicron power source!" and "they're just enemies for us to kill, cause they're there and attacking our side, and we're here to attack them". Latter is less satisfying (and frankly wont make much sense).

[Satinavian]

And, as a couple of people pointed out, where do ranged weapons come in? Even in relatively primitive weapon scenarios, the advantage of range has always been significant. Simple bows, slings, or just thrown rocks, can be major factors in a fight like this and are extremely easy to make and should be readily available to both sides. And yeah, once again the advantage goes to the defenders (even moreso IMO).Improvised ranged weapons without training are pretty much abysmal, even if you have metal. We should assume that the attackers do have shields as was extremely common even in metal deprived tribal warfare.
And while the attackers might have them, whether they play a big role depends on their strategy.

Also no, useful bows and useful arrows in relevant numbers are not that trivial and fast to make. You should count those only from the "militia has proper weapons" stage onward. Slings are simple but would need practice.


And don't overestimate the effective range of primitive ranged weapons. It is shorter than one might think, especcially with subpar equippment and without training. Certain feats of legendary elite troops of the past were the praiseworthy exception, not the norm.

[VonKaiserstein]

To what extend can pre-metallurgy equipment stack up to medieval-era iron and steel?


If I have a group of savage humanoids, somewhat bigger and stronger than humans, armed with stone bludgeons and simple knives/spearheads/arrowheads made out of flint and bone, would they be able to stand up to a ramshackle village militia (unarmored, weapons are repurposed iron tools like pitchforks and kitchen knives)?

What about a better-equipped militia (boiled leather armor, with messer-like blades, iron-tipped spears, and longbows)?

What about a squad of soldiers in chainmail, armed with 'normal' swords?

If the savage humanoids have horses and the humans do not, does that change anything?

The sources are quite biased, as they're being told by the technologically advanced civilization, but look up Indian massacres as historical examples. A common pattern is that a group of preindustrials seems to win against industrial militia regularly, even when they're equipped with firearms. Against soldiers, much less so.

Though the tales emphasize the treachery and subterfuge of the Native Americans, the https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indian_massacre_of_1622 Indian Massacre of 1662 shows militia being able to just fall back to strongpoints, while the preindustrial society destroyed massive amounts of infrastructure, leading to starvation.

Mostly when soldiers get involved it goes exactly the other way- Native American tribal militia did no better than their colonial counterparts when soldiers attacked their villages.

That's a great period of time to research for your question, because you have many incidents of non metallurgical societies fighting both trained soldiers, and untrained pioneer/militia.

The only examples I can think of of effective militia are those who have so much training that they'd more reasonably be considered soldiers than militia. As previously mentioned in this thread, the Hussites were peasants before being rigorously trained by Jan Zizka. The Swiss pikemen during the Canton wars set the precedent for Switzerlands train everyone, so there is no civilian population to conquer approach. Essentially, there milita was ex-military, and had been trained to a soldier level.

[Thane of Fife]

Fortifications for even small villages are really common. In the case of a raid, if people had enough warning to get into the fort/tower/blockhouse/whatever, then the raiders had to decide to just leave, take the place by assault or conduct a siege. So yeah, it did happen a lot.

Successful raids usually caught the defenders by surprise and either took the village or grabbed what they wanted and escaped. Often, a raid destroyed a village or carried off loot or prisoners but many of the people survived if they holed up in a stronghold. They may have a lot of rebuilding to do after, but it's better than being dead.

I have no doubt that it did happen, only that it was the most common result. There have probably been many raids in history, perhaps even the majority, that have occurred because some guys in one village got drunk and decided to go raid the neighbors, steal some stuff, and run before serious resistance is organized. There have no doubt been other raids where the vikings sail in and everyone runs for the fortified house and/or the woods. I could not tell you what the historical ratio is of one to the other, but I would tend to guess that it was not overwhelmingly slanted towards the latter.

[halfeye]

I have no doubt that it did happen, only that it was the most common result. There have probably been many raids in history, perhaps even the majority, that have occurred because some guys in one village got drunk and decided to go raid the neighbors, steal some stuff, and run before serious resistance is organized.

Really? That's a heck of a way to start a vendeta. If there is an ongoing feud that it's a part of, maybe, but a lot of people don't like living like that. Neighbours are neighbours usually.


There have no doubt been other raids where the vikings sail in and everyone runs for the fortified house and/or the woods. I could not tell you what the historical ratio is of one to the other, but I would tend to guess that it was not overwhelmingly slanted towards the latter.

Nobody liked the Vikings, even in Sweden they died out.

[Grim Portent]

Really? That's a heck of a way to start a vendeta. If there is an ongoing feud that it's a part of, maybe, but a lot of people don't like living like that. Neighbours are neighbours usually.

It feels pretty plausible to me, plenty of towns and villages hated their nearest neighbours to the point of long term low level violence that occasionally broke out into actual conflict. Feuds start somewhere after all, and are often attributed to someone drunk or young and stupid stealing something, kidnapping someone or killing someone. Sometimes all three.

Pretty sure a lot of the clan based conflicts up here in Scotland boiled down to someone's great-great-uncle stealing some cows*, eloping with someone else's daughter without permission, or getting drunk and stabbing someone, and 'justice' never being satisfied afterwards.


*Serious business, that. Cows are valuable to a pre-industrial society, and well worth killing over.

[halfeye]

It feels pretty plausible to me, plenty of towns and villages hated their nearest neighbours to the point of long term low level violence that occasionally broke out into actual conflict. Feuds start somewhere after all, and are often attributed to someone drunk or young and stupid stealing something, kidnapping someone or killing someone. Sometimes all three.

Pretty sure a lot of the clan based conflicts up here in Scotland boiled down to someone's great-great-uncle stealing some cows*, eloping with someone else's daughter without permission, or getting drunk and stabbing someone, and 'justice' never being satisfied afterwards.


*Serious business, that. Cows are valuable to a pre-industrial society, and well worth killing over.
If there's already a feud running, it might work that way, but around here there are iron age forts on some of the hilltops, and you probably didn't go messing with them over a drunken revel. There were still feuds in the previous century, but I think in real life most people prefer to steer clear of them. They may be fun in a game, but there's little real risk in that.

[Pauly]

It feels pretty plausible to me, plenty of towns and villages hated their nearest neighbours to the point of long term low level violence that occasionally broke out into actual conflict. Feuds start somewhere after all, and are often attributed to someone drunk or young and stupid stealing something, kidnapping someone or killing someone. Sometimes all three.

Pretty sure a lot of the clan based conflicts up here in Scotland boiled down to someone's great-great-uncle stealing some cows*, eloping with someone else's daughter without permission, or getting drunk and stabbing someone, and 'justice' never being satisfied afterwards.


*Serious business, that. Cows are valuable to a pre-industrial society, and well worth killing over.

Raiding was a serious business, not undertaken by drunken yahoos. The Steel Bonnets by George Macdonald Fraser is a great read about the Anglo-Scottish border reivers, which I highly recommend.
The existence of a non defensible border that prevented a central authority from exerting control was a key feature of why the raiding lasted so long in the area.

[Grim Portent]

Proper viking style raiding was serious business, but opportunistic theft or brawls that are also called raids didn't have to be well thought out or even planned in advance to work. Outlying homesteads, farms and pastures were not hard to ransack before anyone could rally a response, and made up a pretty big chunk of inter-village/town conflicts. It's also not unheard of for a guest to turn into an enemy because of a spur of the moment change in situation.

A raid could be something as simple as beating the snot out of (or stabbing) a shepherd and legging it with some sheep that were out to pasture after all, it's not all razing villages to the ground and running off with sacks of silver. A few drunk idiots were fully capable of that sort of thing.

[HeadlessMermaid]

A raid could be something as simple as beating the snot out of (or stabbing) a shepherd and legging it with some sheep that were out to pasture after all, it's not all razing villages to the ground and running off with sacks of silver. A few drunk idiots were fully capable of that sort of thing.
I wouldn't describe that as raiding, I would describe it as rustling. Very common (within AND without blood feuds), and almost obligatory if we're talking about semi-nomadic shepherds as opposed to settled farmers. Razing villages and running off with the loot also happened, but at that point we got brigandage (or war; when soldiers "forage" in enemy territory, their actions are indistinguishable from banditry).

Bandits are a favourite topic of mine and I've looked it up in many different contexts and places and eras. And I gotta say, village 1 randomly attacking nearby village 2 is NOT a normal thing.

[Thane of Fife]

I wouldn't describe that as raiding, I would describe it as rustling.

If you look up the Wikipedia page on cattle raiding, it describes rustling as being the North American (especially cowboy) term for cattle raiding.

Certainly, when I described some people getting drunk and going on a raid, I was imagining something more along the lines of "Let's go steal/break some stuff" then "Let's go kill everyone and burn their village down."

[HeadlessMermaid]

If you look up the Wikipedia page on cattle raiding, it describes rustling as being the North American (especially cowboy) term for cattle raiding.
Huh. Well thanks for that TIL moment, I didn't know that. English is not my native language and I often lose track of American/British English differences. That said, I used the term "rustling" because I've read it in a bunch of papers and books that talk about animal theft in decidedly not North American contexts (the Mediterranean, the antiquity, the Ottomans etc), and it doesn't have to be cattle specifically, it's often sheep. I mean, I didn't make it up. :)

tl,dr; That was just a terminology mixup, no real disagreements here.

[Martin Greywolf]

Raiding

If this is a raid, then there won't be a siege, your grace. Or a fight.

The raid has a simple objective: hit the soft targets, loot everything you can and then retreat before any resistance is organized. If this is a fortified frontier village and it gets raided, then the raiders will chase off the people outside of it, abscond with the cattle and whatever there is out there, take one look at the fortified village and leave. This is the modus operandi of: vikings, mongols, other nomads, pre-Shaka Zulu Zulu warfare, ...

The point of it is not to get into a pitched battle, so unless the militia manages to ambush them, which is another very different fight, they won't see that much fighting.

Basically, a raid is a specific type of engagement, and since it wasn't specified in the opening question, I just ignored it, like so many other possibilities. Especially since this is a TTRPG forum and fighting back against a raid isn't very interesting in most TTRPGs - it's 99% scouting and prevention.

How common are fortifications

Anything from every village has them to practically non-existent. It depends on how the people perceive safety, if there are enemies nearby, if they have common cultural background... Wihtout knowing more about the context this fight takes place in, it's impossible to tell.

This gets really specific is you don't want to make assumptions, so I'll focus on area where I've read enough on the topic: 1250s Hungary. The details will vary greatly.

There is an... event of sorts that flipped the script in this period, that being the Mongol invasion, so you have pre-Mongol situation and post-Mongol situation. Pre-Mongol, villages have wicker fences and that's about it, it is only towns and larger that have most often earthworks fortifications. On the Panonian plain, those earthworks are a dug ditch material from which was used to raise a small hill, on top of which you have wooden pallisades - sometimes wood-packed dirt - wood, often just one row of wood.

https://expeditions.fieldmuseum.org/sites/default/files/styles/media-article-image/public/null/hunargian-AE5.jpg?itok=uSqfm3NK

https://dailynewshungary.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/07/Kunhalom-Great-Plain-2.jpg

The actual small villages were expected to use those towns/large villages (there was no formal distinction between the two) to hide if there was trouble.

On more hilly terrain, you saw less fortifications. As weird as it sounds, there was a sound logic behind that: if the enemy comes, bury your valuables, grab what you need and run for the hills. You still have some places in hills above those villages that have local names that suggest this was how they were used. The idea was that the enemy force wouldn't have the time or the inclination to chase you around the forests and you can go back down once they leave.

https://nanicmama.sme.sk/sites/nanicmama.sk/files/demanovska_dolina_10.jpg

This worked fairly well if there was a brief nomad raid, and if the attack was from the people of the same culture (Germans, Italians, Poles), people sometimes didn't even bother to run if the attacker had a decent reputation, they just buried their stuff to pretend they were poorer than they really were. This was frequent enough that there are references to this in some writings, usually in the form of "a paesant is a deceitful creature, shake them down good because they hid their stuff".

Then the Mongols came. They raided the country for two years non-stop, were organized enough to defeat earthworks and the only things that stopped them were very rough hills and Danube. Once Danube froze, only hills helped, but the villages still got raided and burned down, and since farmers were hiding, no one was making food. The population went from 3 million to 2.

The response to this was significant, but perhaps not in the way you think. Villages remained unfortified, and the fortifications of towns changed. Royal charters were made and the number of cities and towns with stone walls increased tenfold at least. The most significant response, however, was the lift of moratorium on building of stone castles - you had to have an explicit royal permission which was rarely given before, now those stone castles started to crop up everywhere.

And those refuge places in the hills were now used as good locations for castles a lot of the time.

The ordinary villages defended themselves by the means of lookout towers, that gave you enough time to seek that refuge with enough of your stuff. The consistent occupation for a prolonged time Mongol-style would still starve you, but it was much, much harder to do when maybe a hundred stone castles became about a thousand.

https://i.ytimg.com/vi/H8-gMx5WqvM/maxresdefault.jpg
This is a klopacka, a "knocking tower", from which the change of a miner's shift was announced by knocking. You can hear it here (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KL2W9LuYZEg), it was done this way to make it clearly distinct from church bells.

https://encrypted-tbn0.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcQ7W7N9uHLcCAvyY-m50oZsb1zXF7s6afAVS-bke_qN2hjBp-9a6K4ZRC7fYIuEYmnBujY&usqp=CAU

In conclusion, Hungary went as far as village fortifications went, from "we aren't in enough danger to use these" straight to "if we try to hold something we can actually reasonably make we're dead anyway, so we won't bother". There's a lot more nuance here rather than danger==walls, no danger==no walls.

What the USA frontier tactical reasoning looked like as far as fortified villages went... I could take a guess, but I haven't done enough research to say anything with confidence.

[Grim Portent]

Huh. Well thanks for that TIL moment, I didn't know that. English is not my native language and I often lose track of American/British English differences. That said, I used the term "rustling" because I've read it in a bunch of papers and books that talk about animal theft in decidedly not North American contexts (the Mediterranean, the antiquity, the Ottomans etc), and it doesn't have to be cattle specifically, it's often sheep. I mean, I didn't make it up. :)

tl,dr; That was just a terminology mixup, no real disagreements here.

In a medieval context raids/raiding cover a surprisingly broad set of things. Border skirmishes, banditry, murder, kidnapping, nighttime assaults in general (Vlad the Impaler was known to have led several nighttime raids against Ottoman military camps for example.) Basically all clan vs clan violence in the Scottish Highlands was done through the medium of raids, with a few proper battles being the exception.

These being violent affairs meant that one raid was usually responded to with another raid, which could then bounce back and forth for generations and cover all manner of skirmishes, thefts, murders and so on. It's basically informal warfare when you get down to the basics, and common to tribal/clan based societies across a lot of the world.

It could get pretty nasty up here. Or North of here technically, me being a lowlander. A few raids were launched with the specific purpose of genocide, the goal being to murder an entire clan in their beds in a nighttime assault. Actual raze the place to the ground and stab the babies sort of stuff.

[Saint-Just]

The modern 0.5 inch sniper's rifles are easily elephant killers, and would mess up a tiger no problems at full range even on a not particularly ideal hit. They are so powerful they are outside the Geneva convention.

Unless you are joking "so powerful they are outside the Geneva conventions" is a myth. There is no limitation on power/caliber of anti-personnel weapons, and while there has been some controversy about usage of explosive ammunition against humans I think most if not all RoE allowed it even if sometimes writers felt the need to jump through the weird hoops to justify it.

[halfeye]

Unless you are joking "so powerful they are outside the Geneva conventions" is a myth. There is no limitation on power/caliber of anti-personnel weapons, and while there has been some controversy about usage of explosive ammunition against humans I think most if not all RoE allowed it even if sometimes writers felt the need to jump through the weird hoops to justify it.
It's a myth I heard in the context of an alleged sniper auto-biography saying "we weren't allowed to shoot them, so we shot the wall and killed them with the shrapnel". Maybe it is a myth. *shrugs*

[Pauly]

Unless you are joking "so powerful they are outside the Geneva conventions" is a myth. There is no limitation on power/caliber of anti-personnel weapons, and while there has been some controversy about usage of explosive ammunition against humans I think most if not all RoE allowed it even if sometimes writers felt the need to jump through the weird hoops to justify it.

Besides the Geneva Convention(s) are about how to treat combatants, POWs, non-combatants and generally how to wage war humanely.

The Hague Convention(s) are about regulating weapons of war.

If a weapon is so terrible as to be banned, most recently blinding lasers, then it will be banned under the Hague convention.

Biologial and chemical weapons are banned under the Geneca Protocol, not the Geneva Concention.

Any time someone says “[a particular conventional weapon] is banned under the Geneva Convention” it’s usually a pretty good clue they don’t know what they’re talking about, or quoting someone who didn’t know what they were talking about.

[Gnoman]

It's a myth I heard in the context of an alleged sniper auto-biography saying "we weren't allowed to shoot them, so we shot the wall and killed them with the shrapnel". Maybe it is a myth. *shrugs*

It is, but it is one that originated within the military itself - I've heard more than a few veterans relating it as a tale told in basic training.


The most likely origin is the M8C Spotting Rifle that is integrated into the M40 Recoilless Rifle. This is a .50 caliber weapon that is specially loaded with a very bright tracer. Said tracer is carefully rigged to have identical ballistics to the 106mm round, and to be highly visible. This is so you can fire off that, see where it hits, and very quickly fire the main round and run away. When this weapon was in service, soldiers issued it were instructed in very strict terms to never, ever try using the spotting rifle as an antipersonnel weapon - not for any concerns about treaty or convention, but because a very bright slow-moving projectile from a single-shot rifle is not a very good weapon for hitting people, and it gives away the position of the guy with the heavy weapon - not a problem for the intended use, because there's no hiding a recolless rifle firing anyway, but bad if your squad is up against another squad. Over time "the rules say never use this specific .50 caliber weapon against personnel" turned into "the rules say never use any .50 caliber weapon against personnel". Everything you hear about "shoot them in the belt buckle, because that's equipment and not a person" or "shoot the wall" or whatever is bunk.

[Martin Greywolf]

Everything you hear about "shoot them in the belt buckle, because that's equipment and not a person" or "shoot the wall" or whatever is bunk.

Especially because lawyers writing these agreements aren't towering morons. A cursory read of any of these treaties reveals that the weapons that are banned are banned "for use in war" (Geneva Protocol has it in its official name), because all parties are well aware what kind of loophole abuse would result if something was banned for use "against people".

If a country breaks a prohibition, though, then we see all kinds of sophistry to make it better in public perception (as opposed to legally), but we're skirting dangerously close to forum rules as is, so that's where I'll leave it.

[Lvl 2 Expert]

Beast of Gevaudan

It's been some time since I've looked into it seriously, but the most reasonable theory I've heard about it is that it was several wolves, not just one beast. Combine that with mass hysteria, and you're sending you soldiers to tramp around in the woods looking for demons every time someone sees a large dog.

I personally like the idea that there were dog/wolf hybrids (or just plain feral dogs) involved. Something large. Maybe a mastiff producing a full litter with a wolf. The offspring is big and strong and scary (maybe a bit of "hybrid vigor" bringing the size up even a bit further), not as instinctually scared of humans as regular wolves yet as fully grown adults not too well equipped to hunt the regular fast prey animals.

I do agree though that the more reasonable we can make the explanation the more likely it is to be true, wolves plus mass hysteria is a combination for which the ingredients were definitely there. With the amount of wolves and the amount of cases of mass hysteria it should have happened at least a few times in history, so why wouldn't this be one of them?

[Sapphire Guard]

You know how mills can explode from all the dust in the air if someone strikes a spark in the wrong place? Does that still apply if they're derelict, abandoned with all the equipment and stores intact?

Like, an operational mill is abandoned mid workday, years later monsters occupy it, is there still an explosion risk if a party tries to clear out the monsters, assuming they stir up enough dust, or would it be too damp by then?

Thanks.

[Martin Greywolf]

You know how mills can explode from all the dust in the air if someone strikes a spark in the wrong place? Does that still apply if they're derelict, abandoned with all the equipment and stores intact?

Like, an operational mill is abandoned mid workday, years later monsters occupy it, is there still an explosion risk if a party tries to clear out the monsters, assuming they stir up enough dust, or would it be too damp by then?

Thanks.

This is what is called, IIRC, a fuel-air explosive, and works with anything that can burn. You take your burny substance, reduce it to a powder and spread it in the air, and once it reaches the right mix, it burns very, very quickly, i.e. it explodes. There's a whole headache with how big the grains need to be of what material to be optimal, but we don't really need to touch that here.

The important bit is that the flour needs to be spread around in the air, and that will dictate if your derelict mill explodes. If it is in a damp place and was left alone for a few days, all the flour is now dried or slightly moist paste. If it was in a desert or otherwise kept dry, however... it still will not explode, because all the flour is on the ground. However, were some ill-advised (N)PCs to disturb it and distribute it into the air again...

Boom.

[Lapak]

This is what is called, IIRC, a fuel-air explosive, and works with anything that can burn. You take your burny substance, reduce it to a powder and spread it in the air, and once it reaches the right mix, it burns very, very quickly, i.e. it explodes. There's a whole headache with how big the grains need to be of what material to be optimal, but we don't really need to touch that here.

The important bit is that the flour needs to be spread around in the air, and that will dictate if your derelict mill explodes. If it is in a damp place and was left alone for a few days, all the flour is now dried or slightly moist paste. If it was in a desert or otherwise kept dry, however... it still will not explode, because all the flour is on the ground. However, were some ill-advised (N)PCs to disturb it and distribute it into the air again...

Boom.
You'd need not just dry but actively preserved somehow. An abandoned building full of edible flour will be infested by bugs, rodents, etc. promptly. 'Years later' there won't be much left unless the flour was being magically protected or something.

[halfeye]

You know how mills can explode from all the dust in the air if someone strikes a spark in the wrong place? Does that still apply if they're derelict, abandoned with all the equipment and stores intact?

Like, an operational mill is abandoned mid workday, years later monsters occupy it, is there still an explosion risk if a party tries to clear out the monsters, assuming they stir up enough dust, or would it be too damp by then?

Thanks.

Stirring up enough dust would be a problem, it's not enough to have just a bit. It also has to be burnable, sand wouldn't do, no matter how fine.

[Pauly]

This is what is called, IIRC, a fuel-air explosive, and works with anything that can burn. You take your burny substance, reduce it to a powder and spread it in the air, and once it reaches the right mix, it burns very, very quickly, i.e. it explodes. There's a whole headache with how big the grains need to be of what material to be optimal, but we don't really need to touch that here.

The important bit is that the flour needs to be spread around in the air, and that will dictate if your derelict mill explodes. If it is in a damp place and was left alone for a few days, all the flour is now dried or slightly moist paste. If it was in a desert or otherwise kept dry, however... it still will not explode, because all the flour is on the ground. However, were some ill-advised (N)PCs to disturb it and distribute it into the air again...

Boom.

For the boom to happen (a) the flour needs to be very fine and (b) well circulated in the air and (c) there needs to be a source of ignition.

Leaving aside the issues of damp, rot and rodents as already discussed, the finest and lightest flour will be the first to be blown away by the wind. So unless the mill is somehow hermetically sealed there isn’t going to be fuel for the boom.
However if the mill is hermetically sealed the flour will be sitting safely on the floor. Just walking through isn’t going to stir up enough flour and have it circulate enough in the air for it to go boom. Mills go boom because there is a large amount of flour being circulated in the air by heavy machinery. Bakeries don’t go boom even though they probably have more flour per cubic foot than a mill because the flour isn’t being circulated through the air by heavy machinery. You can’t get a boom just by throwing a ack of flour into the air.
Ignition source is the easiest problem to resolve.

[Martin Greywolf]

You can’t get a boom just by throwing a ack of flour into the air.

A closed sack? Probably no.

But it's not as hard (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E_UcktErOy0) as you make it sound (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0nwRxFYG17Y). An overturned sack that spills it onto a lit lamp from one floor up will give you a decent fireball.

[D&D_Fan]

You know how mills can explode from all the dust in the air if someone strikes a spark in the wrong place? Does that still apply if they're derelict, abandoned with all the equipment and stores intact?

Like, an operational mill is abandoned mid workday, years later monsters occupy it, is there still an explosion risk if a party tries to clear out the monsters, assuming they stir up enough dust, or would it be too damp by then?

Thanks.

Flour explodes in what's called a 'dust explosion' and it's because of fine, combustible particles floating in the air. In an oxygen medium, of course. For example, if air and flour get into a lightbulb, when activated, it will explode. Do not purposely do this ever. Another example? Thermobaric weapons.

So if there is enough flour in the air, and the air is oxygen, then lighting a torch, creating any friction, sparks, electrical discharge, all of that would be a very bad idea for the party. I don't think the flour would go bad in the right environment though. If in a cool, dark place, it could last a solid year. Say the monster stir up a bunch of flour, and fire is started, I say go ahead. Burn the place up. You're the DM, it will be cool.

But other people have pointed out that wind rodents* might ruin the flour. I say, monsters need to eat too. What if the monsters begin operating the mill again, albeit with less safety precaution. That gives a reason for fresh, fine flour to be in the air.

*I meant 'wind and rodents' but imagining a rat made out of wind is funnier.

[Mr Beer]

If the flour is intact, the next step is to stir it up. I suggest an air elemental...in fact if you have an elementalist, air followed by fire should guarantee ignition.

[Xervous]

Some cursory reading suggests that a small detonation of airborne flour particles leads to a combination of a shockwave and a slower curtain of flame. The shockwave stirs up flour on the floor (apparently a layer as thin as a piece of paper is enough) and the flame ignites the secondary explosion. Chain reactions are a possibility to consider.

[Pauly]

A closed sack? Probably no.

But it's not as hard (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E_UcktErOy0) as you make it sound (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0nwRxFYG17Y). An overturned sack that spills it onto a lit lamp from one floor up will give you a decent fireball.

There’s a reason why bakeries are allowed to exist in shopping malls and crowded dense inner city streets.

[PhoenixPhyre]

Somewhat random and apropos of nothing--

Is there as wide a variety of weapon carrying harnesses (not sheaths, but how you attach sheaths etc to your person) as there is of swords? I assume the fastening for a wooden sheath (like katanas, which traditionally(?) have a place for cordage to attach) was different than a leather sheath that might fasten to/be part of a leather belt? Maybe?

And what about non-sword weapons? I assume that polearms were just carried or stuck on a cart if available; hard(er?) to strap a pike or halberd to your back than a sword to your side, which is why swords were "sidearms". What about poleaxes, war axes, maces, etc? Thrown spears? Did those have any kind of "quiver"?

I'm mostly interested in getting a sense of aesthetics and practicalities.

[Martin Greywolf]

Is there as wide a variety of weapon carrying harnesses (not sheaths, but how you attach sheaths etc to your person) as there is of swords? I assume the fastening for a wooden sheath (like katanas, which traditionally(?) have a place for cordage to attach) was different than a leather sheath that might fasten to/be part of a leather belt? Maybe?


There is quite a range of them, but slightly less so that those for swords - if a given region uses a given system, then it will likely be used on all the swords in it, while the differentiation between the sword types often gets... pointlessly nitpicky from practical standpoint.

Standard sword belts you know about, with varieties that have swords point behind you or straight down as well as several systems of how precisely the scabbard is attached to it, but there are also:

https://mcishop.azureedge.net/mciassets/w_5_0078354_pirates-baldric_550.png
https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/55ac289ce4b00075640a70e2/1661912706514-AY2E2VVMHOZT20RT969N/PXL_20220730_181642573.jpeg?format=1000w
https://dagfari.net/img/cms/z%20mobilu/a.jpg
https://encrypted-tbn0.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcRgGacKgv1W2jlgQ-nxzG5Qwvjnrg1sVHX5ZQ&usqp=CAU
You put it on the shoulder as is, I couldn't find actual photo of it being worn.

There are likely others I'm not aware of, and all of them have slight variations.



And what about non-sword weapons? I assume that polearms were just carried or stuck on a cart if available; hard(er?) to strap a pike or halberd to your back than a sword to your side, which is why swords were "sidearms".

You had some systems to make them easier to carry on horseback, at least.

http://www.geocities.ws/rik_fox/husaria/hussar81.jpg

That said, the most common lance carrier is called "squire". :smallbiggrin:


What about poleaxes

Is a polearm and was treated as such, no carrying device.


war axes, maces, etc?

Well axes first. They are sharp, so you want to either cover the edge with a bit of leather, or make sure you are only wearing it on your hip/saddle when in armor and in a way where it can't snag and cut apart your clothes. Maces and one handed warhammers are far easier to wear.

That said, you can either straight up tuck them behind your belt, or there is a neat system I'm using which is two interlocked iron rings - one goes into your belt, the second one is for sliding the shaft of your weapon through. Unfortunately, I can't find any pictures of it, and there's only so much time I want to give it.

Or, you had a belt clip on the weapon itself, which was more rare.

http://pics.myarmoury.com/view.html?battleaxes01.jpg

[Incanur]

In a recent video (https://youtu.be/dSQNnNY8JN0), Matt Easton claims that the pike is "awful" for single combat. Period sources directly contest this notion.

I'm curious if y'all are aware of any additional historical texts that address the pike (in the broad sense, any long spear) in single combat.

Antonio Manciolino recommended (https://artmilitary.wordpress.com/2011/10/19/hello-world/) the 12-14+ft lancia (https://grauenwolf.wordpress.com/2014/02/02/equipment-for-bolognese-fencing/) over the 8ft(ish) spiedo:

"Longer weapons are to be preferred to shorter ones: therefore, the spear is to be preferred to the spiedo, holding it against the latter not by the butt (dangerous because of the weapon’s length) but at mid-haft and with good advantage. Similarly, it is better to take a partisan rather than a two-handed sword."

A longer pike-type weapon would presumably be worse than Manciolino's lancia, but probably not dramatically so.

For unarmored single combat, George Silver (http://www.pbm.com/~lindahl/paradoxes.html) gave the advantage to lighter 8-9ft hafted weapons like his short staff over anything longer but still gave pikes & other long staff weapons odds over anything shorter (including the halberd & sword & target).

Pikes also saw widespread use fighting in loose formation in 16th-century European warfare; extraordinary pikers often defended the shot (arquebusiers, etc.) & in that role might have to face multiple foes in melee combat with some room to move around. In 16th-century China, soldiers likewise used pikes in small teams as well as in large formations. Qi Jiguang seems to have thought (https://youtu.be/uJrRCuzziTc) that a soldier armed with sword & shield was at a disadvantage against the long spear & needed to throw a javelin to create an opportunity to rush in. None of this evidence from fencing manuals as well as military treatises makes much sense if pikes were awful in single combat.

People are only beginning to spar with pike simulators against other weapons, & the existing simulators may not sufficiently match historical pikes. As with other staff weapons, full-force sparring with pikes is difficult to do safely. Without robust evidence from accurate modern sparring by people experienced with historical techniques, dismissing period sources strikes me as very reckless & misguided.

Historical sources often clash with our common-sense preconceptions.

[Gnoman]

I talked to somebody who's a serious reenactor that does a lot of pike sparring, and his response is


a pike on its own is verry difficult--when i've been against someone on my own there are a few options as i see it: drop it and grab your sword; keep backing up; or half-hand it with the butt on the ground and you choking up on it right behind the head


where they really shine is in combination with any other arm

[Pauly]

The only period illustrations I am aware of that show pikes being used in one on one situations are in dueling manuals. I have read many accounts of single combatant sword fights, or fights involving polearms, but I cannot recall any account involving at least one party having a pike. Which suggests that pikes weren’t used very much in one on one fights

Some of that may be be to do with the pike being a weapon of war, not something you carry around with you on a day to day basis to see off bandits, or muggers in a dark alley.

Some of it may be down to the pike being a low status weapon, not a weapon carried by the significant and interesting classes who have the coin to pay for fancy paintings or books.

Another issue is that pikes need to be made of thicker wood than spears, which means their weight goes up faster than just the length, making them less wieldy than spears. So longer pikes can be in the 5 to 6kg range, where shorter pole-arms are in the 2 to 3kg range, spears being lighter still. So maybe a shorter pike/long spear may be useful in a duel but the longest pikes not so much.

[Martin Greywolf]

In a recent video (https://youtu.be/dSQNnNY8JN0), Matt Easton claims that the pike is "awful" for single combat. Period sources directly contest this notion.

Not even slightly. Whenever anyone says something like "period sources" say this or that on a topic this large, it means there wasn't enough research done. What historic sources are we even talking about? Fencing treatises are the best for this topic, but few of them even mention pikes, and for things like chronicles or strategical treatises, context is important - they could very well mean that the pike is the best for formation fighting only.

Even with all that said, there are sources that pre-date pikes. If we're using the word pike in the sense of the modern definitions, e.g. the weapon used for pike-and-shot warfare, you can put their origins at about Burgundian wars era of 1470s, and manuscript illuminations support this. Before this time, you see lances/long spears that top out at about twice the height of the user, usually a bit less, after this date you get well over that.

https://manuscriptminiatures.com/image/21437/1000
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/d0/Bad-war.jpg

That means that pike is over 4 meters/13 feet long at the least, and is usually at something like 6 meters/19 feet. Any treatise or source before this point cannot talk about pikes by definition, unless it happens to be one of the few sources from area where pikes were used earlier (e.g. Swiss cantons) - well, unless you define pike as anything longer than 3 meters, but then we're talking about a category of weapons as varied in how you can use them as single-edged sword. A 3-meter spear, you can use with one hand, a 5 meter pike, not so much.



Antonio Manciolino recommended (https://artmilitary.wordpress.com/2011/10/19/hello-world/) the 12-14+ft lancia (https://grauenwolf.wordpress.com/2014/02/02/equipment-for-bolognese-fencing/) over the 8ft(ish) spiedo:

When Manciolino uses the word pike, he isn't necessarily talking about the same as pike as the one in modern sense (which is how Matt Easton used the word). This is not the first time it happened, we have the same problem with the rapier terminology, where many period sources use the word rapier to describe a weapon that is an arming sword, sometimes without any additional bits on the crossguard.

https://wiktenauer.com/images/thumb/2/22/Mair_side_sword_18.jpg/1280px-Mair_side_sword_18.jpg
https://wiktenauer.com/images/thumb/f/f4/Mair_side_sword_16.jpg/400px-Mair_side_sword_16.jpg


Now, let's examine what Opera Nova says.



"Longer weapons are to be preferred to shorter ones: therefore, the spear is to be preferred to the spiedo, holding it against the latter not by the butt (dangerous because of the weapon’s length) but at mid-haft and with good advantage. Similarly, it is better to take a partisan rather than a two-handed sword."

First thing that should jump out here is that this is a very general advice. Longer weapon is better weapon in general, that is true enough.

Second thing is that the pike is on the short side, and wouldn't be considered pike by many modern classifications. But let's dig deeper.

Because Manciolino actually agrees with Matt Easton - even his short pike is an awful weapon to use in one on one combat, and you need to take steps to make it shorter.

But the real nail in the coffin? Tom Leoni's translation is straight up wrong. Because I looked up the relevant passage in Opera Nova in Italian and it says:


L’arme piu longhe sono d’antiporre a le piu corte, & percio la Lancia è piu tosto da sceglier che’l spiedo tenendola contra il spiedo non nel pedale per il periglio de la sua longhezza, ma nel mezzo con qualche uantaggio. Et medesimamente la partigiana piu tosto si deue torre che la spada de due mani.

A much more precise Swanger translation:


The longer weapons are opposed to the shorter ones, and therefore the lance is sooner chosen than the spiedo, holding it against the spiedo not by the base owing to the peril of its length, but in the middle with such advantage. And similarly the partisan is taken sooner than the two handed sword.

Opera Nova isn't even talking about pikes in this section! It's just general "longer is better" advice, and gives you a tip on how to handle a weapon that is arguably too long.


For unarmored single combat, George Silver (http://www.pbm.com/~lindahl/paradoxes.html) gave the advantage to lighter 8-9ft hafted weapons like his short staff over anything longer but still gave pikes & other long staff weapons odds over anything shorter (including the halberd & sword & target).

Silver directly contradicts experience of everyone else, and it is hardly the first time - see his entire "rapiers are terrible dueling weapons" thing.


Pikes also saw widespread use fighting in loose formation in 16th-century European warfare; extraordinary pikers often defended the shot (arquebusiers, etc.) & in that role might have to face multiple foes in melee combat with some room to move around. In 16th-century China, soldiers likewise used pikes in small teams as well as in large formations. Qi Jiguang seems to have thought (https://youtu.be/uJrRCuzziTc) that a soldier armed with sword & shield was at a disadvantage against the long spear & needed to throw a javelin to create an opportunity to rush in. None of this evidence from fencing manuals as well as military treatises makes much sense if pikes were awful in single combat.

Well, yeah, that's what pike is specifically designed to do - work well in formation. There was never any doubt about that particular bit.



People are only beginning to spar with pike simulators against other weapons, & the existing simulators may not sufficiently match historical pikes. As with other staff weapons, full-force sparring with pikes is difficult to do safely. Without robust evidence from accurate modern sparring by people experienced with historical techniques, dismissing period sources strikes me as very reckless & misguided.

Historical sources often clash with our common-sense preconceptions.

The whole "it would work with real weapons" argument has been used again and again, and has been found lacking again and again. People like Matt Easton do have the necessary experience with period techniques to be able to tell pretty damn well whether something didn't work because simulators were used, or because of how the weapon is. If anything, sparring polearms are easier to use than their real counterparts on account of having to be much lighter, so pikes should be better at fighting in simulations, not worse.

As for how the historical sources clash with this, they don't. I've gone through all of the ones on Wiktenauer, and the ones that even talk about pikes are:

Schermkunst - a Dutch treatise, has a single pike vs pike play with instructions and no commentary other than that.

Andre Paurenfeyndt - tells you that staff techniques form the basis of many others, including pikes (zuberstangen), then talks about staff vs staff, the longest staff in pictures is about 3 meters

Meyer - has the long staff and actually a pretty lengthy section on it, but only does pike on pike as far as I can tell. He also directly contradicts Opera Nova advice and holds the pike at the end.

Manciolino - already discussed him.

Mair - has a pike section, but only one mixed play and no comment on advantages of it. He does, however, show a few techniques with pike held in the middle.

di Grassi - actually has a full chapter on polearms, and does talk about the pikes at length, there is even a translation on Wiktenauer. He pretty much agrees with Matt Easton, saying it sucks and you need to train super hard to do it:


Therefore among renowned knights and great Lords this weapon is highly esteemed, because it is as well void of deceit, as also, for that in well handling thereof, there is required great strength of body, accompanied with great value and deep judgment: for there is required in the use thereof a most subtle delicate knowledge and consideration of times, and motions, and a ready resolution to strike.

Colombani - says he knows how to fight with it, proceeds to not tell us how

[Incanur]

The only period illustrations I am aware of that show pikes being used in one on one situations are in dueling manuals. I have read many accounts of single combatant sword fights, or fights involving polearms, but I cannot recall any account involving at least one party having a pike.

Benvenuto Cellini's autobiography includes a number of small-scale encounters with pikes. In one case, he fought alone on foot with a "good pike" against a foe wielding a "lance." (There were others nearby on both sides but they held back out of fear.) Cellini described being "otherwise well armed" at the time, so I assume he was wearing some form of armor. (Mail appears elsewhere in the text.) The person he fought may also have been wearing armor, because Cellini wrote that he would have run his target through if the man had not fallen backward.

The text also describes arming relatively small numbers of guards or henchmen with pikes at various points. & there's at least one other fight involving a weapon called in pike in one version. However, translations do vary; one says the people opposed to Cellini in the above encounter had "pikes" while he had a "spear." Unfortunately, I haven't been able to find a copy of the original to see what words are used.

Jean Chandler (https://www.google.com/books/edition/Acta_Periodica_Duellatorum_vol_3/kKNhDwAAQBAJ) does analyze three examples from Cellini's autobiography as involving pikes, relating them to how George Silver thought pikes & similar long staff weapons were pretty good for single combat in the open.


Some of that may be be to do with the pike being a weapon of war, not something you carry around with you on a day to day basis to see off bandits, or muggers in a dark alley.

William Harrison's description of England says that people sometimes traveled outdoors with 13-14ft pikes on their shoulders, prompting riders to wear pistols.


Some of it may be down to the pike being a low status weapon, not a weapon carried by the significant and interesting classes who have the coin to pay for fancy paintings or books.

This is not the case. Nobles & even kings fought with pikes in the 16th century. James IV of Scotland was in the front ranks at Flodden Field 1513 & perished there. I don't know for sure that he was wielding a pike, but he probably was. In any case, military manuals from the later 16th century stress how the pike was an honorable weapon fit for the best men.


Another issue is that pikes need to be made of thicker wood than spears, which means their weight goes up faster than just the length, making them less wieldy than spears. So longer pikes can be in the 5 to 6kg range, where shorter pole-arms are in the 2 to 3kg range, spears being lighter still. So maybe a shorter pike/long spear may be useful in a duel but the longest pikes not so much.

The weight does seem like an issue. However, pikes probably weren't more than 4.5kg. Sancho de Londoño gave a detailed dimensions of the kind of pike he recommended, & it would weigh about 3.88kg (http://www.esgrimaantigua.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=5026&hilit=Londo%C3%B1o&start=60) from the wood alone. & he described it as a rather long & heavy pike soldiers might complain about, so some pikes were presumably lighter. Very similarly, Cheng Zong You wrote that a 16.8ft pike for martial use would weigh 9.1lbs, but that somewhat shorter (& presumably lighter) pikes were also fine.

[Incanur]

Because Manciolino actually agrees with Matt Easton - even his short pike is an awful weapon to use in one on one combat, and you need to take steps to make it shorter.

Manciolino recommended choosing the longer lancia over the shorter spiedo: that means he thought it was a better weapon (presumably in the context of an unarmored duel in the open). There's no way to square that with the notion that he thought the lancia was a terrible weapon. He elaborated on the technique later on:


But if you had the lancia and was attacked by someone who had the partigiana, ronca or spiedo or other weapon, you will take the lancia in the middle and it will be enough to satisfy you that you have an arms length of lancia of advantage and more than the enemyÂ’s weapon length and so youÂ’ll be sure that if you wanted to fight with all your lancia length against a short weapon he more easily could parry it and run you over

This passage also indicates that the lancia was quite long, as it still has an arm's length or more of reach advantage over other staff weapon while held in the middle. Modifying one's technique based on the opponent's weapon is basic martial arts & doesn't mean the weapon in question is bad or disadvantage. Jospeh Swetnam similarly recommended different techniques for using the staff (with a spike, so basically a spear) against the rapier & dagger versus against another staff. But he thought the staff had the advantage.


Well, yeah, that's what pike is specifically designed to do - work well in formation. There was never any doubt about that particular bit.

You consider a team of five or ten soldiers to be in formation? Or soldiers explicitly not keeping ranks while defending the shot to be in formation?


Meyer - has the long staff and actually a pretty lengthy section on it, but only does pike on pike as far as I can tell. He also directly contradicts Opera Nova advice and holds the pike at the end.

Manciolino doesn't mention holding the lancia at the end when fighting against another lancia that I see, only when facing a shorter weapon. Also, Meyer did mention holding the pike in the middle for earnest combat the field, at least according to the Jeffrey L. Forgeng translation.


di Grassi - actually has a full chapter on polearms, and does talk about the pikes at length, there is even a translation on Wiktenauer. He pretty much agrees with Matt Easton, saying it sucks and you need to train super hard to do it:

Di Grassi didn't say anything about how the pike compares with other weapons, except that it has a powerful thrust (because circles) & it's honorable like the sword alone because of being void of deceit. The comments about how it takes strength, skill, & dexterity to use well presumably refer to pike against pike, which he is what di Grassi covered. This does not imply that he thought it was disadvantaged against other weapons.

This reminds of di Grassi's magnificent articulation of how fencing sucks in general: "And there want not also men in our time, who to the intent they be not wearied, beare [the round target] leaning on their thigh as though that in this exercise (in which only trauaile and paines are auaileable,) a man should onelie care for rest and quietnesse."

Regarding Silver, it's misguided to interpret his system as so different from others. I recommend separating his bluster from his precise claims & instructions. The "short sword" he presented as superior to the rapier had a blade firmly within what people imagine as rapier length today (37-40 inches) & he instructed using it rather like a rapier when facing a long rapier. His written hierarchy of weapons technically gives a 48+in rapier odds over a 36in sword. (This may not have been his intention.) Other historical & contemporary fencers also favor single-handed sword blades shorter than the 43-46+in ones Silver criticized.

Critically, what Silver spilled ink arguing for gives us a window into what he thought would be controversial at the time. He went on & on about rapier vs. short sword, & justified his preference for buckler over dagger, etc. He apparently didn't believe many readers would take issue with the idea that long staves & pikes have the odds over shorter weapons like halberds. In fact, in felt it necessary to argue that staff weapons of his perfect length of 8-9ft have the advantage over long staves & pikes. This implies that some of his contemporaries believe these longer staff weapons had the advantage.

Regarding historical manuals that address the pike, Luis Pacheco de Narváez's final work has a long section on how the single sword (rapier) can defeat the pike or any other staff weapon. I'm still trying to make sense of it, but he engages with what various other fencing masters wrote, such as di Grassi.

If the pike really is an "awful" weapon for single combat & so different from other staff weapons, it's curious that Pacheco would have a long section on rapier against pike & that he would lump together techniques against the pike & other staff weapons.

[fusilier]

One of my sources has a quote from the late 1500s or early 1600s that goes something like -- the Spanish still skirmish with halberds because they haven't yet learned how to skirmish with pikes (like the Dutch). Now skirmishing isn't one-on-one, although it could, possibly, devolve into a collection of one-on-one fights. Further the claim isn't that the pike is better than the halberd, but that you can skirmish with it. But if pikemen could effectively skirmish then they could switch from large formations in close order, to smaller numbers defending skirmishers, which would be more efficient than having some set of soldiers armed with halberds just to protect skirmishers.

If anybody cares I'll try to look up the actual quote, I'm pretty sure I know which source has it, I just don't have the time to dig through it at the moment.

[Gnoman]

Some of it may be down to the pike being a low status weapon, not a weapon carried by the significant and interesting classes who have the coin to pay for fancy paintings or books.


What little I know of the heyday of the pike suggests that this is absolutely not the case. Pikemen were so key to success that they tended to be upper-echelon troops. They had nearly the highest status and pay among mercenary bands (artillery and the heaviest of cavalry outpaced them, largely due to the immense cost of the equipment), and formed the most valuable core of the growing national armies. The Spanish Tercios in particular dominated on the strength of their pikemen, until the bayonet (which allowed each musketeer to be his own pikeman, even if they were much worse at the role) and improved firearm design allowed linear musket tactics to replace them.

We do have copious accounts of mercenaries, including from pike units, fighting duels and bar fights and other forms of single combat. They used knives and swords.

[Vinyadan]

About rapiers, the name comes from espada ropera, "robe sword" (in English probably more correctly "dress sword"). The Spanish name then referred to a function more than a shape, and I wouldn't be too surprised if this had happened in other languages that adopted it (plus the matter of translation of illustrated texts).

Then again, this is the usual deal, academic use of a historical name for the purpose of classification by shape will generally end up leaving it with a far more restrictive meaning than it had in historical sources.


Benvenuto Cellini's autobiography includes a number of small-scale encounters with pikes. In one case, he fought alone on foot with a "good pike" against a foe wielding a "lance." (There were others nearby on both sides but they held back out of fear.) Cellini described being "otherwise well armed" at the time, so I assume he was wearing some form of armor. (Mail appears elsewhere in the text.) The person he fought may also have been wearing armor, because Cellini wrote that he would have run his target through if the man had not fallen backward.

The text also describes arming relatively small numbers of guards or henchmen with pikes at various points. & there's at least one other fight involving a weapon called in pike in one version. However, translations do vary; one says the people opposed to Cellini in the above encounter had "pikes" while he had a "spear." Unfortunately, I haven't been able to find a copy of the original to see what words are used.

http://www.letteraturaitaliana.net/pdf/Volume_5/t115.pdf The original text

[Vinyadan]

I took a look at the text. Cellini in general is pretty hard to understand. Italian has an interesting history, spending its first few centuries as an art language that mostly imitated XIII-XIV century Florentine. Cellini however used a XVI century Florentine, except when he tried to imitate greater authors. As far as literature is concerned, his grammar and forms are very unusual, but he was simply using the language of the common folk, which changes very quickly and leaves very few traces in "official" literature. He actually explains that he dictated the Life as a pastime while working; a boy from his workshop wrote it down, and the work remained unpublished for centuries after it was complete.

Now, as for the terms: Cellini uses a "giannettone", which, according to the old dictionaries, was a large "giannetta". The giannetta was a thrown polearm. A Florentine contemporary to Cellini actually writes about someone who threw a giannettone through a young man's chest.
I am uncertain as to what happens in this scene. Cellini is on a boat, a man on the shore comes forward to attack him, Cellini strikes at him but the other man survives because he falls to the ground. Cellini then spares the man as he lies helpless.
There are two main things that are left open: does Cellini throw his weapon, or not? The verb he uses can mean both (throw a rock, strike with a sword). After the man had fallen, Cellini was still holding a weapon and he still had the enemy at reach, so maybe he didn't throw the giannettone and used it as a spear, but it's also possible that he did throw it and he had a sword with him.
The other question is the meaning of the fall. The man might have been armored and fell as he was pushed by the polearm, which hints to it not being thrown, or he could have been missed by the giannettone, thrown or otherwise, because he randomly fell by stumbling or slipping (he was close to the water). I find this option more likely.
Unsurprisingly, giannettone, being a bigger spear than normal, was used by Aretino to refer to his penis.
There are some museum items catalogued as "giannettone": http://www.archiviodellacomunicazione.it/Sicap/OpereArte/581749/?WEB=MuseiVE If I read correctly, the pole is 220 cm long. Some other reaches 260 cm.

The other men wield "dua pezzi di arme in asta". Those are about as undetermined as it gets: they are two polearms, and, unless there was some "arma in asta" by antonomasia in the times of Cellini, I think it's impossible to have a specific answer.

The text is at the link I posted earlier, pp. 157-159.

[HeadlessMermaid]

There are some museum items catalogued as "giannettone": http://www.archiviodellacomunicazione.it/Sicap/OpereArte/581749/?WEB=MuseiVE
Oooh, since you shared that link, a language question. I like researching knives and daggers, and the words I know to look for in Italian sources/museums are daga, pugnale, coltello, and the more specific sfondagiaco, stiletto. And folding knives/clasp knives are usually called coltelli a serramanico, so searching for "coltello" covers them. Am I missing something?

[Vinyadan]

Oooh, since you shared that link, a language question. I like researching knives and daggers, and the words I know to look for in Italian sources/museums are daga, pugnale, coltello, and the more specific sfondagiaco, stiletto. And folding knives/clasp knives are usually called coltelli a serramanico, so searching for "coltello" covers them. Am I missing something?

Some more words: quadrello, trafiere, misericordia. I'm not sure about the Italian academic classification, however. But yes, given how the website works, coltello/coltelli should cover everything (fermo, a serramanico, a scatto, da tasca); maybe you can add temperino, although it's a small utility knife.

I once found a historical dictionary of military terminology, but I didn't think of bookmarking it. :smallsigh:

EDIT: Some more words from the Italian Wikipedia: costoliere, fusetto/regola/centoventi, manosinistra/mancina, pistolese, balestra (di Avigliano or aviglianese, a kind of folding knife; normally, balestra means crossbow).

[gbaji]

In a recent video (https://youtu.be/dSQNnNY8JN0), Matt Easton claims that the pike is "awful" for single combat. Period sources directly contest this notion.

Yeah. I'd take his assessment with a massive grain of salt. He seems almost obsessed with the idea that "closer is better" for one on one combat, which is not really the case. A lot of this is dependent on terrain and conditions, but the advantage of being able to threaten an opponent 6-8 feet further away than he can threaten you is massive in any arms comparison. I think there's a lot of arm chair quarterbacking that goes along with this sort of assessment, where it's just assumed to be super easy to "slip past the tip of his weapon, get inside his reach, and I've got him!", which I've seen favored by a number of folks who seem eternally to be the ones who get picked to make videos like this (seen him do his spiel on poleaxe use on a segment of some show at one point as well IIRC).

This often leads to what I've perceived as basically modern martial artists assessing older weapons based on how *they* would prefer to use them, with their existing, close in, rapid shifts in direction, style of fighting. Which naturally leans towards shorter, balanced weapons, with multiple attack methods (thrust, slash, hook), not because those were actually more likely to be useful in real combat historically, but because those are the weapons that fit most with how they would want to fight if put in that situation today.

These assessments just miss the most basic of all combat concepts. If I poke a hole if you 10-15+ feet away from me, or even just threaten to do so, your ability to close with me is massively limited. All those fancy close-in fighting techniques you may want to use, if only you could close that distance, can't actually be used until/unless you get past the tip of that pike. And guess what? As much as you may think "I'll just quickly slip by", the reality is that an even semi-skilled pikeman can pull back that tip, and re-thrust it right into you far far faster than you can perform a slip-by maneuver. Even held in a more center/balanced position (especially so, given a one on one situation), that pikeman is going to be able to quickly re-position his weapon to any direction of attack from a single opponent. Where the pike may fail most is in a one on many situation, where the pikeman can't block directional access from multiple angles at the same time. A single person trying to attack? Barring some sort of terrain that allows one to close, or the pikeman losing his footing/balance or something, it's almost impossible to actually get close enough to threaten him seriously.

While I would agree that some weapons may be "better" in one on one situations, giving it a 1 out of 10 is, frankly, absurd. And maybe reflects a significant bias on his own part. Or a massive lack of imagination, maybe.

I also kinda took issue with his assessment of flails in formation fighting. Again, I think he's missing some of the points of formation fighting techniques. The advantage of the longer military flail was that the swinging end could bypass defenses more easily than a rigidly mounted "head on a shaft" that most pole arms used. The real advantage of the flail was against the very formation weapon combo he ranked highest (spear and shield). And while I generally agree with his assessment of spear and shield, the point of the flail was that the swinging weight was designed specifically to move "over and around" a shield. Weapons that could only thrust or were swung directly can effectively be blocked by a shield by re-positioning the shield slightly. The flail will strike the shield with the haft of the weapon when parried, but the swinging end will then strike the opponent on the head and shoulders anyway, where a halberd or axe would be just blocked.

As someone who has some experience with heavy armor recreation fighting, I've seen a lot of fights end, not because someone received a single blow sufficient to "take them out", but due to repeated blows on the helmet, which will produce a ringing in the ears that will eventually result in one just not being able to continue fighting effectively anymore (used to do fighting in heavy armor where the rules were "person falls and is helpless, or taps out", not "points scored", or "assume injured location from every hit", which are in common use in most organizations, but doesn't really accurately simulate armor). What is often forgotten in the modern assumption of "killing blows matter", especially when we are looking at heavy armor situations, it was more about the effect over time of continual non-lethal blows that just plain wore down the opposing line. Modern combat sequences love to show dramatic scenes with blood spurting everywhere, but the reality is that formation fighting was more of a scrum, with folks pushing back and forth, bashing/hacking at each other, often to little immediate effect, for a significant period of time, with one side gradually wearing down the other, until they were able to break through their lines. That's when effective fighting and killing blows often started. But it could take hours of sustained wearing down of the line first.

And yeah. In that sort of situation, long hafted flails were an incredibly effective weapon. And guess what? Shorter flails were effective as well, in single combat, for the exact same reason. To be fair, they are somewhat specialized, but they are specialized against the shield. It's literally why you use a flail in combat. So to the degree that shields + <some other weapon> are ranked, you have to consider flails as well, as a sort of paper to their rock or something.



People are only beginning to spar with pike simulators against other weapons, & the existing simulators may not sufficiently match historical pikes. As with other staff weapons, full-force sparring with pikes is difficult to do safely. Without robust evidence from accurate modern sparring by people experienced with historical techniques, dismissing period sources strikes me as very reckless & misguided.

Historical sources often clash with our common-sense preconceptions.

Yup. The fact that most recreation fighting organizations place rules specifically against thrust attacks with hafted weapons (for very real safety reasons) might just suggest why they were more effective in actual combat than many people think. So yeah, it does tend to create a false perception that they aren't as effective as they really were when they were in active use. Most organizations basically only allow for halberd style polearms, and usually only allow downward or slightly angled from downward swings to be used (again, for safety reasons).

[PhoenixPhyre]

Yeah. I'd take his assessment with a massive grain of salt. He seems almost obsessed with the idea that "closer is better" for one on one combat, which is not really the case. A lot of this is dependent on terrain and conditions, but the advantage of being able to threaten an opponent 6-8 feet further away than he can threaten you is massive in any arms comparison. I think there's a lot of arm chair quarterbacking that goes along with this sort of assessment, where it's just assumed to be super easy to "slip past the tip of his weapon, get inside his reach, and I've got him!", which I've seen favored by a number of folks who seem eternally to be the ones who get picked to make videos like this (seen him do his spiel on poleaxe use on a segment of some show at one point as well IIRC).

This often leads to what I've perceived as basically modern martial artists assessing older weapons based on how *they* would prefer to use them, with their existing, close in, rapid shifts in direction, style of fighting. Which naturally leans towards shorter, balanced weapons, with multiple attack methods (thrust, slash, hook), not because those were actually more likely to be useful in real combat historically, but because those are the weapons that fit most with how they would want to fight if put in that situation today.

These assessments just miss the most basic of all combat concepts. If I poke a hole if you 10-15+ feet away from me, or even just threaten to do so, your ability to close with me is massively limited. All those fancy close-in fighting techniques you may want to use, if only you could close that distance, can't actually be used until/unless you get past the tip of that pike. And guess what? As much as you may think "I'll just quickly slip by", the reality is that an even semi-skilled pikeman can pull back that tip, and re-thrust it right into you far far faster than you can perform a slip-by maneuver. Even held in a more center/balanced position (especially so, given a one on one situation), that pikeman is going to be able to quickly re-position his weapon to any direction of attack from a single opponent. Where the pike may fail most is in a one on many situation, where the pikeman can't block directional access from multiple angles at the same time. A single person trying to attack? Barring some sort of terrain that allows one to close, or the pikeman losing his footing/balance or something, it's almost impossible to actually get close enough to threaten him seriously.

While I would agree that some weapons may be "better" in one on one situations, giving it a 1 out of 10 is, frankly, absurd. And maybe reflects a significant bias on his own part. Or a massive lack of imagination, maybe.

I also kinda took issue with his assessment of flails in formation fighting. Again, I think he's missing some of the points of formation fighting techniques. The advantage of the longer military flail was that the swinging end could bypass defenses more easily than a rigidly mounted "head on a shaft" that most pole arms used. The real advantage of the flail was against the very formation weapon combo he ranked highest (spear and shield). And while I generally agree with his assessment of spear and shield, the point of the flail was that the swinging weight was designed specifically to move "over and around" a shield. Weapons that could only thrust or were swung directly can effectively be blocked by a shield by re-positioning the shield slightly. The flail will strike the shield with the haft of the weapon when parried, but the swinging end will then strike the opponent on the head and shoulders anyway, where a halberd or axe would be just blocked.

As someone who has some experience with heavy armor recreation fighting, I've seen a lot of fights end, not because someone received a single blow sufficient to "take them out", but due to repeated blows on the helmet, which will produce a ringing in the ears that will eventually result in one just not being able to continue fighting effectively anymore (used to do fighting in heavy armor where the rules were "person falls and is helpless, or taps out", not "points scored", or "assume injured location from every hit", which are in common use in most organizations, but doesn't really accurately simulate armor). What is often forgotten in the modern assumption of "killing blows matter", especially when we are looking at heavy armor situations, it was more about the effect over time of continual non-lethal blows that just plain wore down the opposing line. Modern combat sequences love to show dramatic scenes with blood spurting everywhere, but the reality is that formation fighting was more of a scrum, with folks pushing back and forth, bashing/hacking at each other, often to little immediate effect, for a significant period of time, with one side gradually wearing down the other, until they were able to break through their lines. That's when effective fighting and killing blows often started. But it could take hours of sustained wearing down of the line first.

And yeah. In that sort of situation, long hafted flails were an incredibly effective weapon. And guess what? Shorter flails were effective as well, in single combat, for the exact same reason. To be fair, they are somewhat specialized, but they are specialized against the shield. It's literally why you use a flail in combat. So to the degree that shields + <some other weapon> are ranked, you have to consider flails as well, as a sort of paper to their rock or something.


All of this discussion makes me wonder more about something I've always wondered--muscle-powered[1] weapons in the real world and their martial disciplines/techniques have evolved over centuries based on fairly specific threat envelopes. Especially the military ones. The threat model seems to be "dudes with roughly similar shapes and sizes and equipment, plus maybe horses." So things evolved around, say, fighting heavily armored people. But they're all roughly the same size, shape, and have the same rough capabilities (strength, stamina, etc). And mostly either in formation or at least in company of a bunch of other people. Or in formalized one-on-one-ish duels, with slightly less emphasis on "I get mugged on the highroad". And even then, the enemies are basically people-shaped and people-equipped.

In a typical fantasy setting, weapons would have evolved in very different contexts. Especially when it comes to those that adventurers[2] would specialize in. Sure, you do fight bandits, evil knights, etc. But even they may have drastically different capabilities--some of them can cast spells. Some of them can make their weapons strike with holy/unholy fire. Etc. And then there are the huge variance in monster types. Everything from flying stuff (small and large) to oozes to dragons to giants and giant-kin (and giant animals) and fiends. Few of which wear conventional armor or wield conventional weapons with conventional, human-like capabilities. Parrying the giant's club doesn't get you very much benefit (assuming realistic-ish physics). Etc.

This seems to suggest that the amount we can directly assume about fantasy weapons, armor, and techniques from real-world historical records is, well, limited. And becomes even more limited the less we focus on men-at-arms (humanoid soldiers fighting other humanoid soldiers on battlefields) and the more we focus on monster-hunting/dungeon-delving/etc adventurers.

No, I don't have any answers. But it's something to consider, I think.

[1] leaving things like artillery and other crew-served or vehicle mounted stuff out of here, mainly focusing on the medieval-ish and before weapons
[2] assuming the world is such that such a thing exists, as it seems to do in most D&D-like settings (informally or formally). Even though it didn't exist as such (very much) in the real world.

[Mechalich]

This seems to suggest that the amount we can directly assume about fantasy weapons, armor, and techniques from real-world historical records is, well, limited. And becomes even more limited the less we focus on men-at-arms (humanoid soldiers fighting other humanoid soldiers on battlefields) and the more we focus on monster-hunting/dungeon-delving/etc adventurers.

Most military-oriented fantasy that takes itself even remotely seriously focuses heavily on humanoid soldiers fighting other humanoid soldiers on battlefields - and actually the modern trend is strongly towards 'humans only' - for exactly this reason.

[HeadlessMermaid]

Some more words: quadrello, trafiere, misericordia. I'm not sure about the Italian academic classification, however. But yes, given how the website works, coltello/coltelli should cover everything (fermo, a serramanico, a scatto, da tasca); maybe you can add temperino, although it's a small utility knife.

I once found a historical dictionary of military terminology, but I didn't think of bookmarking it. :smallsigh:

EDIT: Some more words from the Italian Wikipedia: costoliere, fusetto/regola/centoventi, manosinistra/mancina, pistolese, balestra (di Avigliano or aviglianese, a kind of folding knife; normally, balestra means crossbow).
A million thanks, that's super helpful!

[PhoenixPhyre]

Most military-oriented fantasy that takes itself even remotely seriously focuses heavily on humanoid soldiers fighting other humanoid soldiers on battlefields - and actually the modern trend is strongly towards 'humans only' - for exactly this reason.

This seems circular -- let "takes itself seriously" equal "things well approximated by real life"...

More importantly, it seems to miss the entire point (for me at least) of having fantasy worlda. The ability to deviate from the real, to ask "what if things were different?"

[Pauly]

Most military-oriented fantasy that takes itself even remotely seriously focuses heavily on humanoid soldiers fighting other humanoid soldiers on battlefields - and actually the modern trend is strongly towards 'humans only' - for exactly this reason.

Or if they do fight monsters they fight A monster or monster type. None of the trawling through the bestiary from days of yore.

[Gnoman]

In most fantasy settings I'm aware of, the most common foes to fight are humans or at least humanoid, even if they're often bigger and stronger than baseline humans, they're not absurdly so - orcs, goblins, Trollocs, zombies, draconians, etc. More exotic monsters are more rarely encountered, and are treated as a specialist threat. This would likely push weapons into the same channels that they went historically.

[Mechalich]

In most fantasy settings I'm aware of, the most common foes to fight are humans or at least humanoid, even if they're often bigger and stronger than baseline humans, they're not absurdly so - orcs, goblins, Trollocs, zombies, draconians, etc. More exotic monsters are more rarely encountered, and are treated as a specialist threat. This would likely push weapons into the same channels that they went historically.

I could see changes in muscle and organ structure even in humanoids leading to shifts in weapon design/choice, but it would be similar to the way shifts in armor composition did the same. For example, Trollocs are larger and stronger than humans, but are marginally less agile and, due to both their size and the high variability in their physique, have limited access to armor. Consequently, anti-trolloc weapon designs might emphasize broader points than those intended for use against humans to maximize flesh-cutting power as opposed to armor penetration.

I imagine this would lead to duplicate arsenals in groups that face most trolloc-type opponents and armored humans with some regularity, similar to how an archer would carry different arrow types. The Witcher, in which Geralt has one sword for fighting people and another for killing monsters, gestures in this direction, albeit in a limited way.

[Mr Beer]

Significantly > man-sized opponents = spears or variants thereof.

[gbaji]

Significantly > man-sized opponents = spears or variants thereof.

As a general rule, yes. But that can often assume we're talking about larger humanoid shaped opponents. What about a giant serpent? Where a thrusting weapon against a curved armored surface may not be the best approach and arguably becomes less effective the longer the shaft and farther away you are. Thrusting with a sword up close may penetrate just fine, with a spear from 15 feet away? Not as much. Just too hard to get a "straight in" line of attack without glancing off. What about tactics against draconic foes? Even setting aside breath weapons and flying, creatures that shape (and with some variable combinations of limbs/claws/bite) may have multiple attack angles, and may require some special tactics to approach and attack successfully (though I still might see spears being pretty useful in that case as well).

And that's before we consider more "exotic" creatures, like Ropers, or Shoggoths, or slime variants. Or *really big* things. I came up with some custom rules for running a Purple Worm in my game (I wasn't playing D&D). We're talking about something with about a 20' diameter, and some 200' long. Super thick hide. Piercing weapons were great for penetrating, but did literally nothing to its total structure (You're literally poking it with a toothpick and doing no significant tissue/muscle damage underneath the skin). Crushing weapons? Mostly bounced off. Only slashing weapons could do much (you're cutting muscle that it needs to move, and tearing gashes in its side, which may let the blood/ichor out), but even then, what's the total length of your swing relative to the size of the creature? Pretty small. So even the most powerful "can cut through anything" type weapons could only basically cut a good sized gash in one segment of the creature.

It was a fun exercise in creature design. And was absolutely about the players figuring out the best tactics and weapons to use, and basically cutting enough gashes in the thing that it eventually just couldn't move anymore and collapsed. It didn't even attack in the usual way. Basically it flexed as it moved through/by them, so merely attempting to stand next to it within weapons range as it steamrolled by had a chance of being caught up in a flex and shoved away violently (possibly before even getting in a good swing). And, of course, those who weren't able to get out of the way of its massive maw, could get swallowed (which presented a whole new set of problems).

One of the most difficult things to do in any game is come up with a consistent set of combat rules and weapon system that can handle the "normal" range of human vs human combat (and hopefully do that well), while also scaling up (and down) to larger/smaller creatures, exotic creature types/shapes, and still do so in a manner that respects the "traditional" uses and pros/cons of historical weapons. And a lot of that is going to be based on an understanding of *why* some weapons were historically used in different situations, since that can tell you about how effective they may be (or may not be) in more exotic gaming situations.

[Lapak]

As a general rule, yes. But that can often assume we're talking about larger humanoid shaped opponents. What about a giant serpent? Where a thrusting weapon against a curved armored surface may not be the best approach and arguably becomes less effective the longer the shaft and farther away you are. Thrusting with a sword up close may penetrate just fine, with a spear from 15 feet away? Not as much. Just too hard to get a "straight in" line of attack without glancing off. What about tactics against draconic foes? Even setting aside breath weapons and flying, creatures that shape (and with some variable combinations of limbs/claws/bite) may have multiple attack angles, and may require some special tactics to approach and attack successfully (though I still might see spears being pretty useful in that case as well).Thinking of the Runelords series of books here, where the primary non-human threat in the first series was giant evil bug/crustacean type things, too heavily armored for spears to be useful most of the time. The (superhuman) characters fighting them in that series mostly relied on all-metal long-hafted warhammer-type pole arms, IIRC - increased the reach enough to survive but had enough force to crack a shell rather than skidding off. It really does depend on what you're fighting once you leave the 'basically humanoid' realm, but gets muddy in fantasy because we're already talking about things that don't quite work given normal physics (body shapes don't scale up readily, superhuman warriors can use weapons regular people can't, etc.)

[Rynjin]

From what I remember the superhuman characters primarily killed them by attacking their weakpoints for massive damage; a maneuver mostly too dangerous for people who didn't have endowments.

[Grim Portent]

Spears and pikes work fine against elephants, rhinos and other large animals, especially in groups. Unless something breaks the laws of physics I see no reason to assume any creature would be able to resist them.

Scales, chitin, osteoderms and so on can only realistically be so thick before they stop scaling well, especially chitin what with it being an invertebrate thing and all. After a certain point spears become the best weapons for killing things because they can pierce through thick hide, part scales and so on and penetrate deep into organs. People don't hunt crocodiles with swords after all.


If you toss realism out the window them what weapons would be effective is also completely out the window because the laws of physics are working differently. If you scaled a crab up to the size of an elephant and didn't have to care that it would suffocate or crush itself under it's own weight then it would probably be more or less immune to any man scale attack that isn't on exposed flesh. Something like a pickaxe or warhammer might be able to pierce or crush them in a small area, but chitin isn't like stone or metal, it's organic and doesn't crack or crumple quite the same way.

[halfeye]

If you toss realism out the window them what weapons would be effective is also completely out the window because the laws of physics are working differently. If you scaled a crab up to the size of an elephant and didn't have to care that it would suffocate or crush itself under it's own weight then it would probably be more or less immune to any man scale attack that isn't on exposed flesh. Something like a pickaxe or warhammer might be able to pierce or crush them in a small area, but chitin isn't like stone or metal, it's organic and doesn't crack or crumple quite the same way.
Chitin is strange stuff alright, but there's a reason larger crustaceans typically have calcium based backing for it. I'm not sure that there isn't another limit on the size of arthropods, the lungs on spiders are really inefficient as sizes get larger, but coconut crabs have better lungs and they're still limited in size. Lobsters that have gills, but they also don't grow much beyond a certain size.

[Grim Portent]

Chitin is strange stuff alright, but there's a reason larger crustaceans typically have calcium based backing for it. I'm not sure that there isn't another limit on the size of arthropods, the lungs on spiders are really inefficient as sizes get larger, but coconut crabs have better lungs and they're still limited in size. Lobsters that have gills, but they also don't grow much beyond a certain size.

My understanding is that weight is the biggest problem rather than their lungs/gills per se, though their circulation isn't great as I understand it.

The big issue with growing big is that exoskeletons are heavy compared to bones and have to be shed rather than growing with the animal. Shedding is dangerous for multiple reasons and gets harder the bigger the exoskeleton is. There's a theory that some lobsters die as a result of growing too large to moult rather than any directly aging related diseases (telomerase FTW,) but given their habitat it's hard to prove their maximum size or cause of death in the wild.

Really big invertebrates are all boneless for a reason.

[halfeye]

My understanding is that weight is the biggest problem rather than their lungs/gills per se, though their circulation isn't great as I understand it.

The big issue with growing big is that exoskeletons are heavy compared to bones and have to be shed rather than growing with the animal. Shedding is dangerous for multiple reasons and gets harder the bigger the exoskeleton is. There's a theory that some lobsters die as a result of growing too large to moult rather than any directly aging related diseases (telomerase FTW,) but given their habitat it's hard to prove their maximum size or cause of death in the wild.

Really big invertebrates are all boneless for a reason.

Shedding is a problem all right, but it's mainly due to chitin being dead stuff that can't grow. There's no reason that a non-chitinous exoskeleton couldn't grow, all the exoskeletons we know of are chitinous though. Lignin is similar, and has similar conequences.

[Mechalich]

Arthropod size is limited by a combination of factors, including respiration, molting, and locomotion. The two largest lineages of arthropods known, the giant millipede Arthropleura and the giant sea scorpion Jaekelopterus, appear to have had very thin exoskeletons. The circulation issue isn't the lungs, but rather the nature of the open circulatory system. Arthropods don't have arteries and veins, their hemolymph if pumped by the heart into direct contact with the organs and then drawn back through a series of pores. This system loses efficacy at larger sizes. Still, under the right environmental conditions arthropods can get quite large. Jaekelopterus holds the aquatic record at 2.6 meters of length, and Arthropleura hits 2.5 on land.

An interesting possibility, in fantasy, is an animal with a jointed exoskeleton and an closed circulatory system like that of vertebrates. This would, potentially all for larger animals, or a higher activity level among very large exoskeletal animals.

[gbaji]

If you toss realism out the window them what weapons would be effective is also completely out the window because the laws of physics are working differently. If you scaled a crab up to the size of an elephant and didn't have to care that it would suffocate or crush itself under it's own weight then it would probably be more or less immune to any man scale attack that isn't on exposed flesh. Something like a pickaxe or warhammer might be able to pierce or crush them in a small area, but chitin isn't like stone or metal, it's organic and doesn't crack or crumple quite the same way.

I do think you can have consistent sets of rules even in alternative worlds/whatever in which things that are impossible happen. You can have giant spiders, crabs, serpents, dragons (even ones that fly!), while still coming up with some reasonable and consistent ways of handling such things. You don't have to just toss all the rules out just because some of the rules are broken.

And yeah, things like "Ok. If we imagine some magic allows for creatures with 8 inch thick chitin to exist, what weapons would be effective against them" do tend to still work as a basic thought experiment. So you can create rules that model such things. You just have to spend a bit more time thinking about them.

[Mechalich]

I do think you can have consistent sets of rules even in alternative worlds/whatever in which things that are impossible happen. You can have giant spiders, crabs, serpents, dragons (even ones that fly!), while still coming up with some reasonable and consistent ways of handling such things. You don't have to just toss all the rules out just because some of the rules are broken.

The way evolution works, a lot of things are 'impossible' now, because of events that happened in the Cambrian or even earlier. For example, you can't have a six-limbed tetrapod because there's no way for that developmentally to occur without, you know, killing the embryo, but there's absolutely no intrinsic reason why large animals can't have six limbs. It's actually quite difficult to tease out biological options, especially in the region of overall organismal design or 'bauplan,' that aren't available because of evolutionary history from those that aren't available because some aspect of chemistry or physics says 'doesn't work, sorry' in part because we can't (yet) design organisms from scratch outside the bounds of said evolutionary history and find out.

[halfeye]

The way evolution works, a lot of things are 'impossible' now, because of events that happened in the Cambrian or even earlier. For example, you can't have a six-limbed tetrapod because there's no way for that developmentally to occur without, you know, killing the embryo, but there's absolutely no intrinsic reason why large animals can't have six limbs. It's actually quite difficult to tease out biological options, especially in the region of overall organismal design or 'bauplan,' that aren't available because of evolutionary history from those that aren't available because some aspect of chemistry or physics says 'doesn't work, sorry' in part because we can't (yet) design organisms from scratch outside the bounds of said evolutionary history and find out.

Absolutely. We do seem to be heading in the direction of being able to design organisms quite quickly at the moment though.

[Grim Portent]

I do think you can have consistent sets of rules even in alternative worlds/whatever in which things that are impossible happen. You can have giant spiders, crabs, serpents, dragons (even ones that fly!), while still coming up with some reasonable and consistent ways of handling such things. You don't have to just toss all the rules out just because some of the rules are broken.

And yeah, things like "Ok. If we imagine some magic allows for creatures with 8 inch thick chitin to exist, what weapons would be effective against them" do tend to still work as a basic thought experiment. So you can create rules that model such things. You just have to spend a bit more time thinking about them.

Consistent parhaps, but it's largely going to fall down to stylistic choices and retroactive justifications than any real logic. I'm not sure we can even predict what properties shells, be they chitin, calcium, ferric or otherwise, would have once you get outside the thicknesses and structures we know of, it's not unusual for materials to exhibit divergent properties when arranged differently or in different quantities.

What weapons would kill a giant crab? In the real world it would be spears and even arrows, like every other large animal, because a crab past a certain size can't be heavily armoured.

In fantasy though it's usually going to be hammers or picks, because they work on metal armour and that's basically the same thing isn't it?

[Vinyadan]

The big issue with growing big is that exoskeletons are heavy compared to bones and have to be shed rather than growing with the animal. Shedding is dangerous for multiple reasons and gets harder the bigger the exoskeleton is. There's a theory that some lobsters die as a result of growing too large to moult rather than any directly aging related diseases (telomerase FTW,) but given their habitat it's hard to prove their maximum size or cause of death in the wild.

Really big invertebrates are all boneless for a reason.

You might want to google the Holy Order of the Claw as a way to have an answer in the future :smallwink:

[halfeye]

Really big invertebrates are all boneless for a reason.


B. latro is the largest terrestrial arthropod, and indeed terrestrial invertebrate, in the world;

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coconut_crab#Description

On land they're not.

[Grim Portent]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coconut_crab#Description

On land they're not.

9 pounds is not a big animal by any definition. You can pick up a coconut crab in one hand with some effort.

It's the biggest terrestrial invertebrate, but it's still tiny as animals go, and miniscule compared to the size of the larger soft bodied invertebrates. Even the giant octopus, not even close to the biggest invertebrate in terms of mass, outweighs it several times over.

The coconut crab is an impressive animal in many ways, but it's not exactly a standout in terms of size.

[Vinyadan]

Even the giant octopus, not even close to the biggest invertebrate in terms of mass, outweighs it several times over.

About this specific example: water in general increases sizes, though. Bears and elephants are pretty small, compared to water mammals, and an ocean turtle can be twice as heavy as the heaviest land tortoise.

Anyway, if we use the megafauna 100-pound indicator, the coconut crab is certainly below it.

[Mr Beer]

I think teams fighting heavily armoured giant monsters would still have people wielding long spears in order to fight at a distance and target vulnerable points. I suspect an exoskeleton that utterly nullifies any use of 18 foot pikes with hardened steel tips designed to pierce armour, would be too strong to damage with warhammers or mauls. Remember a pike can be set into the ground and if the creature advances, it uses it's own bulk to pierce itself - surely applying force that a human can't match. So I think a heavily armoured foe that can still be injured with difficulty might be best tackled with a mix of pikes, polearms that can be swung and employ a spike or hammer head and maybe sharpshooters targeting eyes or other such vulnerable points.

D&D-style oozes tend to have a wide range of immunities and a small list of specific attacks that can be employed successfully. A more realistic protoplasmic monster would be probably vulnerable to fire and caustic or corrosive liquids. So any weapon which allows liquids to be sprayed onto the beast would be the key "melee" weapon and then for distance attacks, ceramic or glass vials with liquid inside, thrown pitch torches, fire arrows and catapaults with larger containers of liquids or buckets of live coals.

[KineticDiplomat]

Re: Weapons and Humanoids in Fantasy

The issue here is that "realistic" means understanding arms and armor as an intersection of production capability and need. This does not tend to produce cool results, and at some point as a fantasy environment you're going to start fibbing...at which point you run into trying to produce "realistic" results for something based well outside the bounds of reality.

Take the spear. Comparatively easy to make - examples go well back into pre-history, literally hundreds of thousands of years. And pretty much any beast without true armor is threatened by a man with spear. Elephant, tiger, crocodile, gorilla, giant snake...a man with long spear has a pretty good chance to kill it. So here we have something easy to use and easy to make that could reliably kill most "realistic" fantasy beasts.

It also is pretty good at killing humans, and by extension, other humanoids. There's really only a narrow portion of muscle powered warfare where the spear or pike aren't the dominant melee weapon...and even that is up to debate by how you frame dominant.

The bow falls in a similar niche. Turns out shooting someone or something from a safe distance is popular. Turns out that if you're not armored, it has a pretty good chance to kill or maim anything short of the truly huge (think elephant).

So the "realistic" fantasy answer is usually to either armor up, remove the lethal mechanism (aka poking a hole in, crushing, or cutting through flesh and organs somehow isn't fatal - usually because magic), or just make the thing so big that things Ike spears would be like poking you with a thumb tac.

But that causes its own issues. How exactly do your primitive orcs go about wearing plates of heavy iron - they have the muscles, but do they have the agrarian society pumping out their presumably higher caloric needs to the point where there is enough excess productivity to both mine iron in the right quantities and smith it? If so, are they really orcs any more, in the style the common fantasy wants to use them?

f the dragon is naturally covered in plate and several thousand pounds, then chances are very little you have in the way of personal weaponry is going to matter. "The PC" doesn't kill the dragon with basic chopping and stabbing, barring something like stabbing it in the eye while it sleeps. There's still plenty of realistic ways to kill it, but not the kind that most fantasy game systems envision. Definitely not the kind where someone is making "and this is the cool dragon slaying sword."

We could go on, but you get the point. Realistic weapon looks are often uncool (you killed thraaka dum the ogre master by...stabbing him once in his belly with a common spear? Yes) or not winnable in the core game play loop sense (you roll to hit, and it's irrelevant. Anyhow, you die). And tracing weapons dev off it becomes irrelevant either because "I have an answer...it's a spear" or "we aren't killing that one on one, shoot it with a siege engine" are going to be main directions you go.

[gbaji]

The way evolution works, a lot of things are 'impossible' now, because of events that happened in the Cambrian or even earlier. For example, you can't have a six-limbed tetrapod because there's no way for that developmentally to occur without, you know, killing the embryo, but there's absolutely no intrinsic reason why large animals can't have six limbs. It's actually quite difficult to tease out biological options, especially in the region of overall organismal design or 'bauplan,' that aren't available because of evolutionary history from those that aren't available because some aspect of chemistry or physics says 'doesn't work, sorry' in part because we can't (yet) design organisms from scratch outside the bounds of said evolutionary history and find out.

I think we were more talking about "violates the laws of physics" sorts of things rather than "that's not how evolution progressed on planet Earth" sorts of things. And yeah, once you get to "20 ft crabs with 6" thick shells", you're getting into the "how the heck can this thing move/breathe/whatever" questions. But handwaving that away as "a wizard did it", doesn't mean you also have to handwave away other logical concepts of combat. You can still go through the thought experiment of "Ok. Let's assume that 20ft crabs with 6" shells exist, and can walk around, and attack folks with their claws and whatnot. What weapons would work against them?".

Now you could also have "rules" in your fantasy world in which 6' humanoids can stride around wielding 20' long flaming swords of adamant, cutting through solid rock or something. And yeah... You have to take that sort of thing into account as well. Didn't say that the thought experiments were always going to be easy.


Consistent parhaps, but it's largely going to fall down to stylistic choices and retroactive justifications than any real logic. I'm not sure we can even predict what properties shells, be they chitin, calcium, ferric or otherwise, would have once you get outside the thicknesses and structures we know of, it's not unusual for materials to exhibit divergent properties when arranged differently or in different quantities.

Sure. But fortunately, most game systems abstract and simplify such things already. We don't have to know the precise tensile/ductile/whatever properties of every material in every type of armor option available in a game to do basic things like "it weighs X lbs/encumbrance/whatever , and has Y armor class/points/whatever". We can then abstract rules for slashing/crushing/thrusting weapons, with slightly different damage/reach/whatever effects based on weapon type (and perhaps specific properties of each weapon within each type). We can make that as simple or complex as we want, while still making the game system "usable". That's always going to be a balance between how much detail and realism you want versus how playable you want your system to be, but those rules are always going to be at least to some degree a simplified abstraction of "real life" (or whatever passes as "real life" in the game world you are simulating).

And yes, we can then go further and create specific creatures, with yet more special rules to handle their odd/unusual shapes or defenses. And already having the existing weapons system rules, most game systems should allow for insertion of these sorts of things. Are they ever going to perfectly match the "real world"? No. Can't. However, you can still consider "real world" weapons capabilities when creating those abstracted rules (and creature specific sub-rules).

As I did in my purple worm example earlier. I considered not just how thick its hide was (armor points in this case), but how different weapons would work against both the hide *and* how effective at damaging the tissues/muscle beneath. And in that case, I came up with a sort of "segmented HPs" model, where hitting one section just couldn't do much to the whole (unless someone actually was wielding a 20' flaming adamant sword, I suppose). And pointy weapons were less useful as a logical result of examining the body type.


What weapons would kill a giant crab? In the real world it would be spears and even arrows, like every other large animal, because a crab past a certain size can't be heavily armoured.

In fantasy though it's usually going to be hammers or picks, because they work on metal armour and that's basically the same thing isn't it?

Kinda depends on how you scale up that crab's armor, and how that interacts with some combination of weapon damage and armor piercing potentials. Hammers and picks may be great at smashing parts of the thick armor, but may not penetrate very far into the crab to hit its vulnerable bits. Maybe spears will more readily poke a hole in the armor (or just bounce off?), but do even less damage unless you just happen to target the right spot (deeper penetration, but narrow hole, which could miss vital bits entirely).

I could certainly see hammers being pretty useful against the legs/claws of the crab. Spears almost certainly less so, but maybe a wash against the body, with the distinct advantage that you could probably poke it with a spear without getting as far into claw range doing so.

To be honest, long before I'd insert rules in my game to distinguish different types of weapon damage, I'd put in rules for reach effects for different weapons. So the biggest advantage to using a spear in a hypothetical (perhaps more simple) game where all weapons just have "damage", and all damage works equally against all "armor", spears would allow one to attack from farther away. So even if we added more rules to model weapon types against different armor (and creature) types, I'd still maybe want to be the spear guy fighting the giant crab, while someone else goes up and stands right under it with their sword and shield.

[Mechalich]

I think we were more talking about "violates the laws of physics" sorts of things rather than "that's not how evolution progressed on planet Earth" sorts of things. And yeah, once you get to "20 ft crabs with 6" thick shells", you're getting into the "how the heck can this thing move/breathe/whatever" questions.

Well, it depends how wedded you are to the 'crab' aspect of 'giant crab' as opposed to 'thing that looks extremely crab-like but has the appropriate adaptations to actually be 20' tall.' Because a decapod with big claws that's 20' tall with segmented appendages is not necessarily something that violates the laws of physics, it just won't operate 'under the chitin' anything like a crab does on Earth. In many ways this depends on how you think about fantastical creatures, do you treat them via fantasy handwaving, or do you try to think about them as designed organism that should, as much as possible, actually work.

Now, the 6" thick shell bit is a little different, since nothing of such size is likely to have such massive armor. Triceratops, for instance, was a 25' long animal with a massive defensive frill, but it was nothing like 6" thick (more like 1-2"). This is one of the problems of fantasy creatures, attempts to 'scale up' linearly, when that is not how biology actually works.

Of course, even 1" thick mineralized chitin would be some pretty formidable armor, probably equivalent to plate and many of the strategies useful against a human being in plate, ie. knock them down and stick a dagger in the joints, aren't going to be useful on something like a gigantic crab or even a completely non-fictional ankylosaur. And this is definitely a thing game systems have trouble with. There's a comparable problem of anti-personnel weapons versus vehicles that shows up a lot in modern games, such as the rather common situation of someone unloading an entire assault rifle clip at a target in an SUV.

I'd imagine, in a fantasy setting where large, armored, and extremely tough animals were common - especially if they were domesticated or semi-intelligent, such as the troll-powered army of Mordor in Peter Jackson's LotR films - specialized anti-big-animal weapons would exist just in the same fashion as modern militaries carry anti-armor weapons to take out vehicles. History is clear that specialized anti-elephant tactics were devised in the places and periods where elephants were common enough in warfare for armies to need to think about this, so fantasy civilizations would to the same.

One other important thing to note, with regard to biology, is that big animals have big appetites, which means they have low population densities overall - herd animals may form huge, localized aggregations, but those herds have to move to survive - so the actual number of these things is going to be fairly small. Also, because big animals generally start out as much smaller animals, the solution to say, the local T-Rex problem, is generally 'smash all the eggs' and then wait for the adults to die off.

[Vinyadan]

I suspect that some particularly large placoderms might have had 15-cm thick armour, but they were fish, and it only covered the forward part of their body. Among land animals, I'm not sure that even the armour of ankylosaurus reached such thickness.

[Mechalich]

I suspect that some particularly large placoderms might have had 15-cm thick armour, but they were fish, and it only covered the forward part of their body. Among land animals, I'm not sure that even the armour of ankylosaurus reached such thickness.

Dunkleosteus, among the largest placoderms (certainly that's well-studied), had armor that maxed out at 5-cm thick, so not much thicker than the largest armored land animals. Or course, in evolutionary terms there are considerations beyond pure physics. Armor is energetically expensive to produce, so there's no reason to evolve overprotective defenses. Nothing's going to evolve armor beyond whatever's necessary to protect from the local apex predator. Triceratops evolved that sturdy frill in environment containing T-Rex, who had a bite force for the ages.

Predator size, however, is sensitive to energetic constraints, specifically, a predator can only get as big as the energy they are able to pull out of the environment (this is why a lot of the biggest predators are giant crocodile relatives that had the metabolic advantage of being cold-blooded). In a fantasy scenario it's possible to produce hyper-productive environments - for instance a tidally locked planet where it's constantly sunny on one side - beyond anything ever seen on Earth which would allow for super-sized animals and the development of incredible levels of armor and weaponry as a result.

[halfeye]

In a fantasy scenario it's possible to produce hyper-productive environments - for instance a tidally locked planet where it's constantly sunny on one side - beyond anything ever seen on Earth which would allow for super-sized animals and the development of incredible levels of armor and weaponry as a result.

There's a possibility that on a tidally locked planet, all the air would freeze out at the back, making the whole thing effectively airless.

[VoxRationis]

There's a possibility that on a tidally locked planet, all the air would freeze out at the back, making the whole thing effectively airless.

Not to mention the fact that the only part of the planet that wasn't scorching or frozen would have sunlight at an oblique angle, minimizing photosynthetic productivity.

[D&D_Fan]

In a fantasy scenario it's possible to produce hyper-productive environments - for instance a tidally locked planet where it's constantly sunny on one side - beyond anything ever seen on Earth which would allow for super-sized animals and the development of incredible levels of armor and weaponry as a result.


There's a possibility that on a tidally locked planet, all the air would freeze out at the back, making the whole thing effectively airless.

And the whole thing of that the front of the planet is constantly exposed to the sunlight and doesn't have at atmosphere to block harmful radiation.

It would be inhospitable to most life that needs to breathe and is vulnerable to radiation and needs to eat food that also doesn't need to breathe and isn't harmed by radiation.

I could see some radiotrophic fungi and some water bear, but even that environment could be too intense for them, since they still need some water I suspect.

So no, if there was life, it wouldn't be bigger, it would probably be quite small little things or it wouldn't exist at all.

[Satinavian]

I do think fantasy worlds should develop different kinds of weapons than the real world.

But no because real-world weapons are best at killing humans and other targets should produce other weapons, but because real-world weapons are best at being wielded by humans.

Now, some of the more basic primitive concepts like a spear or club would probably work for anything that can grab things, but the more sophisticated the weapon is, the more likely it would be not a good fit for inhuman physiology. And then there is also the thing that humans tend to be naturally talented at throwing things and how that influences all the ranges weaponry.

[gbaji]

I do think fantasy worlds should develop different kinds of weapons than the real world.

But no because real-world weapons are best at killing humans and other targets should produce other weapons, but because real-world weapons are best at being wielded by humans.

Now, some of the more basic primitive concepts like a spear or club would probably work for anything that can grab things, but the more sophisticated the weapon is, the more likely it would be not a good fit for inhuman physiology. And then there is also the thing that humans tend to be naturally talented at throwing things and how that influences all the ranges weaponry.

Hah. Go read the Niven/Pournelle book Footfall. It's an excellent story, but also spends quite a bit of time dealing with not only the physiological differences between the aliens and the humans, but also some significant psychological ones as well (well, and technological ones too).

When you mentioned the bit about humans being incredibly good at throwing things, it literally flashed me back to a specific scene in the book, where this exact point is highlighted.

[Mr Beer]

When you mentioned the bit about humans being incredibly good at throwing things, it literally flashed me back to a specific scene in the book, where this exact point is highlighted.

African guy demonstrates how to use the weapon by skewering one of the elephant-aliens. Good scene.

[Spamotron]

Just a head's up to everyone that Tod Cutler's sequel/expansion to Arrow vs. Armour is up on YouTube.

There are four set up videos laying out the fine specifics and explaining why they made the choices they did: Mail Tests (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qiyOIZ4Vm_I), Arrowhead Material Tests (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=30RuqOH-7xw), Armour Plate Tests (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C0TfSW0FfiA) and Arrows Vs. Armour 2 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qZotewSan_k]How Powerful Is A Warbow?[/url]. But you don't need to watch them to understand the main film [url="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ds-Ev5msyzo).

They're very well made.

[halfeye]

There was probably a particular automatic pistol that I don't know about. I remember seeing it as a toy a long time ago, it had a visible barrel (like a Luger, but I think shorter) a handle that came straight down from the body, the back of which was convex, the handle was less than twice as long (top to bottom) as it was wide (front to back) the magazine was in the handle, and apart from that I'm not sure of anything. Does anyone know what this might have been? I'd guess it was from between the wars, but I'm only sure that if it existed it wasn't modern.

[Martin Greywolf]

There was probably a particular automatic pistol that I don't know about. I remember seeing it as a toy a long time ago, it had a visible barrel (like a Luger, but I think shorter) a handle that came straight down from the body, the back of which was convex, the handle was less than twice as long (top to bottom) as it was wide (front to back) the magazine was in the handle, and apart from that I'm not sure of anything. Does anyone know what this might have been? I'd guess it was from between the wars, but I'm only sure that if it existed it wasn't modern.

If it is kinda weird looking, there are good odds it's Czechoslovak.

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/8/80/CZ-24-1937-left-side_grey_BG_02.jpg/220px-CZ-24-1937-left-side_grey_BG_02.jpg
But maybe not.

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/86/Walther_P38_%286971798779%29.jpg
https://www.lugerforums.com/attachments/img_5854a-jpg.102033/
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/37/Savage_1907_%286825677636%29.jpg

But with toy pistols, who the hell knows - they may well have just cobbled together 1911 and a luger to make it look more interesting.

[halfeye]

If it is kinda weird looking, there are good odds it's Czechoslovak.

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/8/80/CZ-24-1937-left-side_grey_BG_02.jpg/220px-CZ-24-1937-left-side_grey_BG_02.jpg
But maybe not.

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/86/Walther_P38_%286971798779%29.jpg
https://www.lugerforums.com/attachments/img_5854a-jpg.102033/
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/37/Savage_1907_%286825677636%29.jpg

But with toy pistols, who the hell knows - they may well have just cobbled together 1911 and a luger to make it look more interesting.

Thanks, it was the P38, I was thinking it's nothing like the PPK, it can't be a Walther, but it was.

Funny thing is, with toys they often don't make them up. I remember having a "Man From Uncle" toy gun, it wasn't the gun from the TV series at all, it was a sort of model of the Mauser C96.

[Pauly]

If it is kinda weird looking, there are good odds it's Czechoslovak.

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/8/80/CZ-24-1937-left-side_grey_BG_02.jpg/220px-CZ-24-1937-left-side_grey_BG_02.jpg
But maybe not.

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/86/Walther_P38_%286971798779%29.jpg
https://www.lugerforums.com/attachments/img_5854a-jpg.102033/
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/37/Savage_1907_%286825677636%29.jpg

But with toy pistols, who the hell knows - they may well have just cobbled together 1911 and a luger to make it look more interesting.

The other source of weird looking automatic oistols is pre WW1 Austro-Hungarian pistols.

[Talakeal]

Is there a name for a weapon that is a warhammer on one side and a battle axe on the reverse face? Something like a lucerne hammer.

The rest of my gaming group insists that it is called a "hamaxe", but AFAICT that is a fictional weapon from Terraria or a regional name for a splitting maul, which is a tool and not the same thing.

[Pauly]

Is there a name for a weapon that is a warhammer on one side and a battle axe on the reverse face? Something like a lucerne hammer.

The rest of my gaming group insists that it is called a "hamaxe", but AFAICT that is a fictional weapon from Terraria or a regional name for a splitting maul, which is a tool and not the same thing.

Poleaxe aka pollaxe.

[Martin Greywolf]

Is there a name for a weapon that is a warhammer on one side and a battle axe on the reverse face? Something like a lucerne hammer.

The rest of my gaming group insists that it is called a "hamaxe", but AFAICT that is a fictional weapon from Terraria or a regional name for a splitting maul, which is a tool and not the same thing.

This link may come in handy. (https://collections.royalarmouries.org/hundred-years-war/arms-and-armour/type/rac-narrative-1165.html) It has pictures and is from as official an authority as you can get.

[Saint-Just]

Wasn't pollaxe sometimes used for hammer head + beak as well as hammer head + axe?

[snowblizz]

Wasn't pollaxe sometimes used for hammer head + beak as well as hammer head + axe?

Literally one of those pictured in the link M. Greywolf posted.

Just something to keep in mind is that the people who actually used these weapons were not really that particularly bothered by specific classifications of what kind of spike or not was present at what end. That's more a concern for people sitting in warm armchairs who don't have to use them in anger.

That is to say, it's hard to draw a line between halberds, Lucern hammers, Bec de Corbins, pollaxes, war hammers, billhooks etc etc etc and other such items (not tat they are identical but there is enough overlapping to make specific categorisation hit and miss). Anyone trying to argue an item can and must be one specific thing is usually arguing from ignorance and having read too many D&D or other rpg manuals.

[Pauly]

Wasn't pollaxe sometimes used for hammer head + beak as well as hammer head + axe?

Aside from the modern classification issues, Poleaxe can mean a knightly weapon typically from the 14th and 15th centuries and it can mean a butcher’s tool for slaughtering cattle. Very recently people have started referring to the weapon as pollaxe and the butcher’s tool as poleaxe, but historically both spellings have been acceptable for both items.

Poleaxe, the butcher’s tool, is typically hammer + blunt spike on the reverse.
Pollaxe the weapon is typically hammer + axe blade on the reverse + pointed spike on the top.

[Talakeal]

Thank you!

[Martin Greywolf]

Well, there is terminology and there is function.

In terms of terminology, pollaxe is an entirely English invention. Historical sources refer to what we call a pollaxe as just axe, e.g. in Fiore as azza (IT) and there is a French pollaxe manual that is called Le jeu de la hache (The play of the axe). Most slavic languages (I can only confirm Slovak and Czech with full certainty) would call it two-handed axe, or knightly axe (obojrucna sekera, rytierska sekera) or possibly two handed/knightly hammer - or again, simply axe (sekera).

As far as function goes, there are two distinct kinds of polearms of this era. The first is where the pollaxe and shortspear live, a weapon meant for fighting duels or skirmishes. These tend to be about as tall as the one using them.

The second type is your halberd category, they are about a meter longer than the user and meant for formation fighting primarily, hence the length.

The problem is that modern classification usually distinguishes by form, i.e. if it has a specific kind of hook, it is a billhook, even if it is short and heavy because someone wanted to use a billhook in an armored duel. And even if you wanted to divide them by length, where do you put your arbitrary separation point?

We have a lot of terminological problems because while some weapons are defined by form only (e.g. you can have a short halberd or spear, and then use it like a pollaxe), others are also tied to their function (a long pollaxe wouldn't make sense).

https://i0.wp.com/militaryhistorynow.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/10/Mercs.jpg?resize=650%2C471
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/3f/St%C3%B6r%2C_Niklas_Soldatenzug_6.jpg

One of those halberds reaches to the user's chin, the other's blade doesn't even start until it is past the ridiculously fancy hat. Those two weapons would handle very differently in use, even is everyone calls them by the same name.

This isn't limited to polearms, by the by, I've seen some examples of Magyar sabers that looked the exact same while having a difference in weight of half a kilo and a completely different point of balance.

So what is a modern definition of pollaxe?

It is a poleram, about as long as the user at most, meant for fighting in armor against armor. It can have a spear-like spike on the front and back of its shaft (it almost always has the front one, and the front one is sometimes just a spear blade), and its front side has two impact heads, oriented kinda like long and short edge of a sword. These heads can be any combination (including two of the same type) of:

axe (curved, straight or reverse curved blade)
hammer
spike
crow's beak (i.e. a curved spike)
multiple spikes
maybe a flat, dagger-like blade, but I can't remember if I saw one on pollaxe or if it is a halberd thing


They may or may not have a rondel guard on the shaft and two spikes coming off of the shaft in the right angle to the heads.

http://myarmoury.com/talk/files/pic_spot_poleaxe18_172.jpg
https://collectionapi.metmuseum.org/api/collection/v1/iiif/26720/1421863/main-image
http://media-cache-ec0.pinimg.com/736x/ff/5b/c9/ff5bc936b4b4eeda5e8e6159b68cc69e.jpg
http://www.manningimperial.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/06/main-3.jpg

But wait, Greywolf, some of you say. Are you saying that you can have a pollaxe that is just spikes all over?

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/FY_xW9hXkAAHahv.jpg

We just call them goedendags, or two-handed morningstars.

[InvisibleBison]

If historical people didn't have distinct terminology for these various sorts of similar weapons, how did they distinguish between them when they had cause to do so?

[Telok]

If historical people didn't have distinct terminology for these various sorts of similar weapons, how did they distinguish between them when they had cause to do so?

I would suspect in a similar way that we currently distinguish between 9mm pistols. By maker/region/user, part specification (short, long, heavy, etc.), and not relying on one single word to fully describe the exact item from a bunch of similar items.

Like a Toyota Corolla car is a Toyota Corolla car, right? But we use additional words to describe 2-door vs 4-door and the 1980s models from the 2020s models.

[Pauly]

If historical people didn't have distinct terminology for these various sorts of similar weapons, how did they distinguish between them when they had cause to do so?

Generally speaking weapons were names for their function not their form

A modern example is the Chef’s Knife. The 3 main schools of design are Japanese, German, and French. Each broad category has distinct blade geometry and handle design. Each design category handles differently and have different strengths and weaknesses. Within each category there are significant variations. The size can vary from 6 inches/15cm to 12inches/30cm. There are differences in preferred steel types.

However all of them are large general purpose kitchen knives, so they are all “Chef’s knives”. If you want to differentiate them you tack on the appropriate descriptor(s) you want to use to distinguish at the time you need it.

In 5000 years time when knives are forgotten and obsolete technology a bunch of nerds might come along and start giving different names to different forms of Chef’s knife, but currently we just use the name that describes the function.

Edit to add.
If there were 3 knives on a bench, a 8” German style, a 10” Japanese style and a 12” French style, here are some of the ways I might differentiate them to a co-worker:
Ownership - my knife, your knife, Steve’s knife
Size - the big one, the small one, the middle sized one.
Handle type - the plastic handled one, the steel handled one, the wooden handled one.
Handle color - black handle, silver handle, brown handle.
Manufacturer - the Wusthof, the Shun, the Sabatier.

What I would never do is differentiate them by classification as German style, Japanese style or French style. Classification would only come up in a knife nerd conversation, and surprisingly few chefs are knife nerds. Most chefs choose knives based on ‘can I afford it’, ‘is it comfortable to use’ and ‘does it look cool’, the nerdly fine points of design just aren’t considered for a tool of daily use

[Martin Greywolf]

If historical people didn't have distinct terminology for these various sorts of similar weapons, how did they distinguish between them when they had cause to do so?

The salient point here is:


when they had cause to do so

And the number one thing you need to realize is that this came up... almost never.

If you go looking for a kitchen knife today, you will find thousands, if not tens of thousands, of different types, from hundreds of countries and dozens schools of thought, because Google and internet (and catalogs in mail before that) are like that. But in pre-industrial era? If you want a kitchen knife, you have maybe two or three local knife-makers, all of whom make knives roughly the same way, simply because they are trying to compete with each other and if something becomes popular, they all switch to it.

Imports did happen, but that was for very famous items only - say, Solingen and Toledo get a very good reputation for swords, so they export their swords all over, and they are known as Solingen sword. Most of those exports are what swords look like locally at Solingen/Toledo, or customs made to specification, so in terms of form, you have three types of sword in any one place, Solingen-form, Toledo-form and local-form (this is obviously a simplified example, but you get the point).

Next factor in this is that not many of these items (let's focus on weapons) existed in the same time. A soldier in 1600 AD Germany has zero need to distinguish between a gladius and a katzbalger, he will simply say "sword" and everyone around him will know what he means. Well, not really, because our soldier sees use of three distinct types of swords, a katzbalger, a rapier (well, arming sword with complex hilt) and a massive two-hander. Most of the time, it will be clear what he is talking about from context, much like we know that "a cop carrying a gun" means a semiautomatic pistol of some kind (maybe a revolver in parts of USA) and not a 50cal anti-materiel rifle.

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/07/US_Soldier_with_800mm_gun_dora.jpg

If such a soldier needs to describe the sword more precisely, there is either jargon (see katzbalger) or there are descriptive words, like long sword. Those descriptives need to be examined in context, a Roman will say "long sword" and mean a 90cm spatha, a 1400 German will mean two-handed weapon and an 1800 gentleman will probably mean anything longer than a smallsword (backsword, maybe?).

https://wiktenauer.com/images/thumb/8/80/Cod.I.6.4%C2%BA.2_001r.jpg/408px-Cod.I.6.4%C2%BA.2_001r.jpg

So, taking our French pollaxe manual, it is called Le Jeu de la Hache, the Play of the Axe. Well, it uses the word "play" in the title, in the sense of martial arts kata which we can use to infer the axe has to be a military one. In the time it was written, there were three weapons describable as axe: one handed horseman's axe, pollaxe and halberd. We have no additional descriptives from title alone, so we must ask ourselves, what was THE axe in the mind of the noble soldier (since treatises weren't written for commoners at this time)? And the answer to that is pollaxe - it may not be the right answer from that alone, maybe the author was writing that treatise in different context than we assume, but lucky us, we can open the book. Sure enough, it *is* a pollaxe.

There is another factor to this as well - English, as much as many like to pretend otherwise, isn't the only language, and that causes problems. You know the English word for sabre, it is... well, sabre. The word comes from, most likely, Magyar/Hungarian word szablya, which got transported into Slavic languages. In Slovak, the word sabla, meaning "sabre" is also used colloquially as the word for any kind of long bladed weapon, so in some contexts it translates to "sword". (sidenote, hungarian doesn't even use the word szablya for the Olympic discipline)

This is all fine and good before a specific model of a sword is attached to word that sounded foreign and exotic to Victorian scholars and now we call the entire sword type by the word that, when translated, means "sword". The usual suspects are here: shamshir (sword), talwar (single edged sword), katana (single-edged sword) and so on. The crowning achievement here is the sword that is called firangi, which means "European" in translation. Because it was European blade mounted on local hilt.

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/e/e1/Mumtaz_Mahal_Museum%2C_Red_Fort_-_Firangi.jpg/150px-Mumtaz_Mahal_Museum%2C_Red_Fort_-_Firangi.jpg

Remember when I mentioned Victorian scholars? Well, that is where the mess really started. The peak of British Empire coincided with ancient Greek philosophers and intellectualism being the new cool thing, and if there is one thing Aristotle loved, it was categories. Which means that the people who created, if not modern science then its direct predecessor, wanted to put things in neat categories and started to make jargon and terminology for them. This is why there are a dozen words for different swords that British empire was near, but many varieties of Persian blades get rolled into shamshir. They started the categories from what they knew and only created a new one when a sword didn't easily fit into those - katana was called Japanese saber in Europe for a long time. And when these new categories were created, they were often named by the foreign language word.

Over time, we tried to solve that problem, but once a word is in widespread use, it is a lost fight, and most classification systems robust enough (e.g. Oakeshott or Petersen typologies for swords) are too clunky for everyday use. Hell, even most people doing HEMA - the people who know the most about how a sword works - don't use that system unless they really, really have to.

https://www.albion-swords.com/articles/images/typology/typology.jpg

The gist of it is this: if you decided to pick a single time and place for DnD from history, two thirds of weapon list would be gone and you could use generic words. If you try to encompass a solid chunk of time and space (and appease the fanboys who will not accept that katana is a sabre), well, you will run into some problems.

https://media.bidjs.com//image/upload/q_auto,f_auto,w_570,h_570,c_pad,g_center,b_white/v1587989596/bdx/1439-01_ixrg6w.jpg

[gbaji]

The peak of British Empire coincided with ancient Greek philosophers and intellectualism being the new cool thing, and if there is one thing Aristotle loved, it was categories. Which means that the people who created, if not modern science then its direct predecessor, wanted to put things in neat categories and started to make jargon and terminology for them.

Made worse by the tendency of the Aristotle mindset (inherited from Plato), in which the "scientific" (quotes used intentionally here) approach was basically "if you don't know something about something, fill it in with <something descriptive>". The thought was that it was more important to be "complete" with a description of something than "accurate". There's a whole lot of descriptive nonsense that you basically have to toss out the window that came from that approach. Sadly, I suspect the Victorians just ate it up, which in turn lead to a whole new round of "fanciful" thinking during that era. Add in the telephone game process when dealing with historical accounts/descriptions, and it could get pretty ridiculous.