Tuesday, May 30, 2017

Bow Ranges for Elthos - Part II


... The next morning ...

Ok, so in thinking about this more and realizing that I have another problem I'm on to the next thing.  The ranges for the medium and heavy weight bows.

If I extrapolate the chart out a bit more you'll see this:

Yards Feet 40 lbs bow 80 lbs bow 120 lbs bow


Penetration Damage Penetration Damage Penetration Damage
12 36 5.5 1d6 +6 9 2d6 +9 12 3d6 +12
14 42 5 1d6 +5 8 2d6 +8 11 3d6 +11
16 48 4.5 1d6 +4 7 2d6 +7 10 3d6 +10
18 54 4 1d6 +3 6 2d6 +6 9 3d6 +9
20 60 3 1d6 +2 5 2d6 +5 8 3d6 +8
22 66 2 1d6 +1 4 2d6 +4 7 3d6 +7
24 72 1 1d6 +0 3 2d6 +3 6 3d6 +6
26 78 0 1d6 -1 2 2d6 +2 5 3d6 +5
28 84 -1 1d6 -2 1 2d6 +1 4 3d6 +4
30 90 -2 1d6 -3 0 2d6 +0 3 3d6 +3
32 96 -3 1d6 -4 -1 2d6 -1 2 3d6 +2
34 102 -4 1d6 -5 -2 2d6 -2 1 3d6 +1
36 108 -5 1d6 -6 -3 2d6 -3 0 3d6 +0

The problem being that the heavy bow, which represents (abstractly) the Longbow, has a range that is far too short for a long bow, I THINK. I'm really not sure. The reason I say that is because I was really caught by surprise that the light bow ranges turn out to be 12 to 14 yards, or around 40'. That was surprising to me. I thought in the real world the ranges would be much farther. But as it happens, when you're actually hunting, about 40' is pretty much the common range. I was thinking it must be more like 100', or more. But no. So now I'm wondering if those ranges I had for the Longbow at like 300 yards is actually way too far? It may be that 300 yards if you are shooting high in the air to get as much distance as possible, and standing with hundreds of other archers so you are collectively creating a cloud of arrows wherein no given shot has to be accurate, then 300 yards is fine. But if you are trying to hit a specific target then maybe the range at 36 yards makes sense?  Naaaahhhh... I kind of doubt that.

So I think I need to recalibrate the chart to deal with more extended distances for medium and heavy bows.  Hmmm... ok.  I'll stop here and think some more.  Any thoughts on this would be appreciated.  Thanks.  :)

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