"With the heaviest bows (a modern warbow archer) does not like to try for more than six a minute".
Significantly less than the 12-20 arrows per minute indicated by typical D&Desque ROF. [The whole idea of using ROF is broken, bows aren't bloody machine guns]. Not that I really needed it (game = game, not historical simulation). Still, that's certainly some support for the elimination of multiple attacks for bows and my "1 round, 1 attack roll regardless of weapon" rule.
It's also totally bogus that bows do the same or even more than crossbows. But that's an rantgument for another day. ;)
Flavour: Default bow is made of Ash. The better, "expert craftsman" bows are made of Yew and provide +1 bonus to hit. It takes 2-4 years to make a quality long selfbow!
But in AD&D, wasn't a round a minute? Doesn't that mean that the RoF for bows should be 6, not 2?
ReplyDeleteOf course not. I find that the abstractness of the rest of the system doesn't necessarily matchwith archery rules that assume one shot per missile -- whether it comes to tracking arrow supplies to rates of fire...
@Doug
ReplyDeleteDoh! I remember 10sec and 6sec rounds, but OD&D might have been a minute. Let's looky up...
1 min 2/rnd = 2 Swords & Wizardry
1 min 2/rnd = 2 AD&D DMG
10 sec 1/rnd = 6 Cyclopedia
10 sec 1/rnd = 6 Labyrinth Lord
6 sec 1/rnd = 10 3.5 PHB
6 sec 1/rnd = 10 True20 Pocket Guide
10 sec 1/rnd = 6 Castles & Crusades
Ah, so it started as 1 min and with very reasonable in combat / non-volley rate. Should have known those wargamer dudes would have known historic missile fire rates. I sure thought more rules used 2/rnd rof.
Well poop, seems like it's all not that unreasonable. I hate when facts get in the way of my rants. My excuse is most recently I've DMed 6 sec round game and been player in 2/round bow fire game but forget the 1min round part.
Like you said the melee is abstract / ranged not so much. It bothers me to distraction esp since both are occuring during combat and as DM I have weave both into a narrative.
I believe people were/are hung up on wanting to track ammunition. But, instead of objectifying ranged combat I prefer to abstract ammunition. With rules like "a bundle of arrows runs out when you get to-hit roll of '1'"
I go for a faster combat round (6 seconds) and don't give bows much of an edge over mechanical weapons (and they do less damage). What I do give them a speed edge on is that I make them fire as many shots per round as the bearer gets attacks.
ReplyDeleteIf the game included fatigue rules, you could give dungeoneers the opportunity to go all-out and get tired immediately, or husband their energy carefully and be able to last longer.
ReplyDeleteYou certainly don't want to spend yourself immediately upon entering.
Otherwise saying that your ROF is limited not to what you're able to do but to what would be a good idea is kind of lame. If I have an ogre charging at me and he has like 1 HP left, I want to shoot that arrow even if it means I actually take HP damage from fatigue. Because what the ogre will do to me is far worse, I ga-ron-tee.
That said, I'm cool with just saying "one attack per weapon regardless of type" because it's a good rule for the game.
"With the heaviest bows (a modern warbow archer) does not like to try for more than six a minute".
ReplyDelete_Modern warbow archer_. A yeoman archer of a lord's retinue would have trained from an early age to strict standards (a matter of some import, a younger son wasn't going inherit the cottage and the money made from free company work was good) in accuracy, rate of fire, and weight of pull.
Probably more like 9-12 a minute during emergencies but not sustained.
Also, they've found skeletons of archers who were deformed from their constant work. The muscles on one side were so overdeveloped in certain ways that it slowly tweaked out the entire skeleton.
ReplyDeleteI doubt any "modern warbow archers" are even a tenth that dedicated. Xrays or gtfo, one might say.
Not to be incendiary. I just thought it was clever ;P