If you know someone is aiming a bow at you can you parry the incoming arrow with a shield?

If so what effect does it have on the damage?

I wouldn't say parry, more like hide behind and hope the archer hits the shield. Your best bet when facing an archer is to put your shield in front of you and close the distance as quickly as possible.

I wrote a section about this very thing for TFOB. The usual disclaimer about the book being a work in progress and what may or may not end up in it applies, of course.

Regards,
Brian.

If the guy with the shield sees he's being aimed at, he can put his shield up in a guard limiting his target areas just like with other weapons.
If the archer shoots his shield, remember that shields have an armour value as well, so it could be potentially pierced or even shot through depending. I'd say if the shield is wood or leather, and the shot/arrow/bolt whatevers' DR exceeds the AV roll a D6, and say, maybe on a 1 it sticks the arm or hand. If the DR is double the AV, maybe it hits the guy behind the shield.
As for the damage, the leftovers are what do it after the shields' AV is subtracted.

[disclaimer]I am not now, nor have I even been an archer so, please, forgive if I speak silliness...[/disclaimer]

I am assuming that the damage done by bows is related to the pull of the weapon (greater pull = greater damage). That being the case (and this may be where I have gone awry), would it not make sense to have bows that do more damage than the standard variety in TRoS? I'm thinking of the differences between self bows and composite bows (typically a greater pull, right?)...and even such wonders as the bow of Odysseus...you know, the one only he could string and draw (this of course could be apocryphal).

Am I way out of line here?

Chris

That's covered by the Effective Strength of the bows. And anyway, the stats are always for a typical weapon of its type.

Thanaeon wrote: That's covered by the Effective Strength of the bows. And anyway, the stats are always for a typical weapon of its type.

Sneaky Git wrote: And what of the crossbow? True, it is a typical weapon of its type...but what type is it? Are we talking light/medium/heavy? In other words, how was the darn thing "locked and loaded" and readied for firing? Is this variety pulled by hand after bracing with one's feet, or is the string cranked/winched/whatevered into place?

2+DR rounds preparation time.
Refresh begins once the arbalest is leveled.
4MP dice to reduce prep time by one second at Reflex/TN of 8.
Attack Target Number (ATN): 6
DR: Oh, anywhere from 8 for your little clawfoot prepped crossbow to 20 for your crew-serviced seige arbalest (this is mounted on a pedestal because it would weigh too much to aim accurately otherwise) using the rules as written. More for your javelin hurling miniature ballistas. Actually, I'd probably reduce this significantly, but then halve TO and armor effects. They don't do more damage than an arrow in terms of size, but they're more likely to penetrate. So I'd go about 6 to 12 actually. That ought to do it.
Range: +1 ATN per 10+2*DR yards.

Why do a weapon like the Ballista when you'll probably get a kill from the smaller weapon? Better range. With a ballista with a DR of 15, you get a weapon that you can expect to hit with out to 160 yards. That's impossible with other ranged weapons of the day.

Self bow or composite, the greater the pull the greater strength you need to pull it. The european longbow, for example, is a self bow, but it'd be impossible to make one stronger yet still usable by a mortal man.
So you can put in variety by saying one's a composite or self, but as far as game effects it makes no difference to damage.

It's something of a misnomer that composite bows are easier to pull. That's simply not true.

They're easier to hold while drawn, making it easier to aim with them (because the strain of holding the string back is less thanks to the mechanism) but the initial pull is just as hard as with a non-composite bow.

Brian.

I think you're getting composite and compound mixed up.

As I understand composite bows, they're made of a mix of wood, horn and perhaps a few other things, giving them a much stronger pull than comparably sized bows. They, unlike your standard recurve bows, have a constant curve to them, and are usually shorter. I believe the mongol horse bows were a form of composite bow.

Compound bows, on the other hand, are a more modern invention. I can't speak for how long ago they had them, but (and I know this isn't a good example, but..) I've never seen one featured in a fantasy game. Compound bows have the pulley-type mechanism which takes some of the tension off the string once it is pulled past a certain point. While compound bows are not necessarily stronger, they allowed a given user to have a stronger pull on his bow because the user would only have to pull it, not hold it.

Uh, yeah, I did mean compound actually. Oops :-) Silly mistake since there's one about 2 feet from me right now.

Brian.

All non-compound bows stack (that is the felt poundage goes up all the way to full draw). To give an idea of the strength required for one of these, I shoot a 75# compound bow with 50% letoff and can draw and hold it fairly comfortably. My 50# longbow is a real strain to hold for more than about 2 seconds and the same goes for a couple of other composite and recurve bows that I have shot.

The main difference between bow designs is efficiency. A recurve bow generally delivers less hand shock when fired than does a long bow. on the other hand, the long bow is generally more accurate since it is longer and more stable. They both shoot the same distance and speed at the same poundage with the same arrow. the recurve is easier to maneuver thru the brush during hunting season, and if you don't have a large supply of trees then a composite bow is the way to go.

IMHO drawing comparisons between modern bows and midieval european or mongol bows is an exercise in futility. They are just not on the same scale. A modern bow hunter uses a compound bow with a poundage of from 55 to 80 or a traditional bow with a poundage from 45 to 60. From everything that I've seen or heard English longbowmen drew anywhere from 100 to 130# with eastern bows being in about the same range. These bows are so ridiculously heavy that an archeologist can tell if someone was a bowman, just by looking at the skeleton. most modern archers would have about as much chance of drawing one of these monsters a he would of bending a piece of rebar by hand.

A bit of clarification on terminology..

As far as I understand, bows are classified as recurve simply by the the way they are built, ie. a single piece of wood, generally straight with a slight curve near the ends, meant to be bowed backward (away from the curves on the end) and held bowed by the string. this would include both longbows and "shortbows" in most cases.

Essentially, all bows made of a single piece of wood are recurve, bows made of pieces of wood, horn, etc. are composite, and with the pulley-assembly are compound. Any other classifications, such as horsebows, longbows and shortbows are sub-classifications of those.

This is my understanding, but I am far from an archery afficionado. If I am incorrect in any particulars, any experts should feel free to educate me.

:edited because my ASCII skills suck whilst buzzed.
::edited thrice for poor spelling.
:::edited yet again to include links to pictures of bows, after googled search
http://worldclassbows.com/takedown2.htm#slidelock
http://worldclassbows.com/standard2.htm#standard
http://worldclassbows.com/longbows2.htm#spike
This may just be a matter of cosmetics, except the bows that come in pieces, I assume to be assembled and disassembled for carrying in a bag *shrug*

Bah, that took too much effort, and beer.(and it failed because this thing hates me, or ASCII, both, etc.
But you see that what I meant to address is that a longbow has only one curve in it. Where as the recurve is a longbow that 'recurves' inversely to the original curve, at the tips, to which the bowstring is attached.

Where the hell do ya think the name came from anyway?!
-Ingenious
P.s. maybe have a spellchecker installed into the forge for us alcoholic-posting users that are also lazy...?

I found a very nice reference article here:

http://www.student.utwente.nl/~sagi/faq/trad.shtml

Good information on types of bows, materials, classifications, and usage.

And here is what happens when us engineers take an interest in a topic.

http://www.student.utwente.nl/~sagi/artikel/mathmod/mat1.html

There is probably other useful information on the site, but I haven't had the time to go through it in detail.

Some Archery terms:

composite bows are made from different materials glued together. Horn and sinew are glued to a wooden or bamboo core in most cases. they may be either recurved or 'straight'.
recurve bows have a compound curve or s shape, they may be either composite or wholly made of wood.
longbows are the classic D shape when strung and may be either deflexed or reflexed
a deflexed long bow bends slightly bellyward when unstrung
a reflexed long bow bends slightly backward when unstrung
the back of a bow is the part away from the archer
the belly of a bow is the side toward the archer
Laminate bows are made wholly of wood strips glued together and are considered a subcategory of composite bow.
Compound bows use some type of mechanical advantage (in most cases a pulley) to give greater draw and some letoff.
letoff is the percentage of weight that is held at full draw as compared to the maximum pull weight. Some compound bows have up to an 80% letoff. Such a bow drawing 75# would feel like 15# at full draw.

modern bowyers use fiberglass cloth as a material in bows to replace sinew or horn.

There are literally hundreds of different modifications and variations on the above, each region had it's own characteristic bows depending on the material available. japan had it's classic meticulous craftsmanship with the Daiku, a bamboo recurve laminate bow that took months to complete. Mongol horn bows had very little wood in them, mostly just for a spine. England had the classic yew bow, 6' long and pulling up to 130# and the east coast Native Americans used what are called flat bows, which had wide limbs to spread the stress across as much of the soft wood used as possible.