Bows: The Antichrist?

[Woyzeck]

I don't think your average man has the capability to hew an arm off in a single blow. It would be a messy affair and require several swings to hack through muscle and bone. Or it'd require a sword with edges so keen that it could be used in surgery.

A longsword or arming sword will go just fine through an unprotected arm. A gladius or machete will do it in a couple whacks. Super-keen edges are for fiction, mainly. Real swords, axes, etc. used in war were ground with convex edges, as you would use on a wood maul or general-purpose hatchet - just with a thinner, wider, lighter overall blade design. A "dull" blade two to three feet out from the hilt will go right through muscle and bone, and do it without rolling or otherwise damaging the edge. It'll also hold up better against impacts with armor, the flat or haft of another weapon, and other various other inadvertent obstacles.

[NephilimNexus]

In laboratory tests that were done a few years back the actual power of such bows was not sufficient to penetrate plate armour of average quality except at near point blank range. The legend of a longbow being able to fell a mounted and armoured knight is at best wildly apocryphal and at worst outright smoke.

Absolutely correct!  Which is why the crossbow was invented.

[Woyzeck]

Absolutely correct!  Which is why the crossbow was invented.

Crossbows were invented in ancient China and ancient Europe, both, when piercing refined late medieval plate was not an issue. Crossbows serve the purpose of providing a weapon that requires far, far less training to become effective with, as well as one that can be kept immediately ready to fire on guard duty. They are not armor-piercing magic; that's why European armor didn't change drastically until firearms became a widespread battlefield weapon, with cuirasses getting heavier and the rest of harness covering less to compensate for the increasing weight. It's also one reason why bows remained weapons of war even after crossbows were widespread - their effectiveness against armor (or the unarmored) wasn't that dissimilar.

Crossbows do have much heavier draw weights, but that's because they need them as that force is applied to the projectile during a much shorter impulse, relative to a bow.

[b0rsuk]

Crossbows didn't become widespread in Europe until late medieval, shortly before the advent of firearms. They lost mainly to firearms, not bows. Still, the trigger and the stock used in a firearm bears striking resemblance to a crossbow. Even some photographers love it, because it allow to hold the camera very stable. The only flaw is that such a camera is dangerous to use in war zones, you look like aiming a weapon.

And yet, crossbows were supposedly banned by pope against Christians, because they threatened social order. A peasant with 2 weeks of training could shoot down a noble mounted knight with a lifetime of training.

[M]

Limbs removal is a myth for you... But it should not be.

Displaced fracture, comminuted fracture, open fracture, all those kind of bone fractures are very difficult to recover and need a proper hospital to heal completely.
Bones can shatter or fracture in a way you cannot fix or properly fix, making you lose the limb instantly.
Nerves can be cut off inside, ligaments cut off badly or totally, bone marrow could make you die.

Arrows can cause some of those injuries ad even instant death shot from a longbow, even a simple bow, even medieval ones. Mid-Large Melee weapons (knives and shivs maybe for fingers/hands) would also make you lose a limb easily in the proper hands.

Crushed shapeless, cut off completely, cut badly inside, badly torn, shattered inside... Limbs in a survival enviroment can be lost easily and in several ways, ways that would probably lead to a fast and horrible death.

Armors only cover torso and main organs while your limbs are exposed.
Power Armor should cover limbs properly but simple armor won't save colonist limbs from doom.

[Goo Poni]

In the proper hands, maybe. Your typical colonist or raider with 4 in shooting/melee really should not be hacking or shooting every single limb off a target/victim. Especially not shooting. No gun in Rimworld has the power to take limbs off in it's implied real world equivalents. Nor bow, nor sword that Fred used his Minecraftian powers to construct out of some unrefined metal on a generic worktable.

[Cazakatari]

Limbs removal is a myth for you... But it should not be.

Displaced fracture, comminuted fracture, open fracture, all those kind of bone fractures are very difficult to recover and need a proper hospital to heal completely.
Bones can shatter or fracture in a way you cannot fix or properly fix, making you lose the limb instantly.
Nerves can be cut off inside, ligaments cut off badly or totally, bone marrow could make you die.

Arrows can cause some of those injuries ad even instant death shot from a longbow, even a simple bow, even medieval ones. Mid-Large Melee weapons (knives and shivs maybe for fingers/hands) would also make you lose a limb easily in the proper hands.

Crushed shapeless, cut off completely, cut badly inside, badly torn, shattered inside... Limbs in a survival enviroment can be lost easily and in several ways, ways that would probably lead to a fast and horrible death.

Armors only cover torso and main organs while your limbs are exposed.
Power Armor should cover limbs properly but simple armor won't save colonist limbs from doom.

I understand all of that, the problem right now is that instead of the limb needing amputation, it simply falls off.  Even if someone loses most of their arm to that kind of damage, they will be better off with a stub than nothing at all.

That's why I'm suggesting that when the ''hp'' of a limb (and maybe some organs too) reaches zero, instead of simply being removed it should be heavily scarred and be much more susceptible to infection (perhaps infected immediately?).  Right now I rarely get the chance to amputate limbs almost never use ''donated'' organs, I would love to see having more use for both.

[M]

Guys, even a kid with totally no fighting or even "aggressivity" experience could hurt badly someone's limb, by breaking it with a rage kick, by cutting it randomly... I know it sounds crazy but it's reality.

I agree with Cazakatari about limbs that just fall off when reach 0hp instead of having a chance of being badly hurt forever or in need of an amputation. I think this is beacause the game is still in development and there are other trizzillion of stuff to add/improve, plus Tynan is keeping stuff "simple" to not make the game too tedious.

I disagreed the "a  bow cannot make you lose a limb" part, even a random rock picked form ground could make you lose a limb with one hit, or kill you... There are quintrillion variables: weapon type, weapon form, where, how, strenght, armor covering the point being hit etc. etc. etc.

I would agree about a better "damage range" for weapons based on more variables (that's already in the game, but maybe it could be improved).
I would agree about some sort of parry/evasion chance based on colonist melee when fighting in melee combat.

[Vagabond]

Hello,

Modern remakes aside, medieval bows and crossbows had an average bolt/arrow speed of 135 feet per second. Most crossbows bolts traveled marginally faster than arrows, but not enough to make a difference in just that regard.

What mattered really was how close they were, and the point on the arrow/bolt. Regardless, there was no blowing off of anything except maybe a finger or toe...But hitting those are more likely accidents, since I'd much rather try to kill you with the fast moving pointy stick of death than maim you.

Neither bows nor crossbows were particularly efficient and poking through a knight's plate armor at distances where you actually had to adjust for arc, movement of target, and wind speed. Basically a crossbow was a pike with long reach. You'd have a bunch of guys with them and when the knights got close enough, they'd let bolts lose. This is versus the tactic with bow where they sent volleys of arrows at really long distances; arrows are much more effective at longer distances than crossbows in regards to getting your arrow in the general vacinity of your target (not talking robin hood  crazy shots, so don't lynch me).

Even early firearms were countered by better armor smithing, proof of this is in pieces of armor and recorded accounts of smiths firing on newly pieces of forged armor to prove they could withstand a shot from point blank range. Eventually, the armor just became to expensive and ungainly to use.

So... I'd love to see more intricate ballistics. Firing modes. Penetration (vs different materials). Range. Damage. Less chance for someone to continue firing after a arrow has successfully penetrated their armor and is sticking out of their leg. Of course, certain backgrounds/traits could make incompacitation less likely (No way Rambo would drop after catching an arrow to a shoulder!).

Cheers,
Michael

Sources: W.F. Paterson and Stephen V. Grancsay. Check out their written work. It is facinating.