The STR requirement on Composite Longbows
RedWizard
Member Posts: 242
...is insane. Isn't 18 supposed to be super heroic strength?
Seriously, who the hell would be able to use it in the entire Realms besides amazingly gifted humans/elves/dwarves, the ocasional half-orc or monstrous humanoids like ogres and others who would rather crush things to goo with melee weapons.
Sounds like making those would be a bad business, considering pretty much nobody would be able to achieve the hilarious power to manhandle the string.
Seriously, who the hell would be able to use it in the entire Realms besides amazingly gifted humans/elves/dwarves, the ocasional half-orc or monstrous humanoids like ogres and others who would rather crush things to goo with melee weapons.
Sounds like making those would be a bad business, considering pretty much nobody would be able to achieve the hilarious power to manhandle the string.
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This leads to a workaround, +2 to damage, and enforces 18 Strength to justify it.
And what are you talking about nobody? There's an entire tribe of goblins on Neera's BG:EE questline who wield composite bows.
In real life, I would put my own STR stat at 8 - 10 range, but I can certainly use a longbow competently (and have done). Composite Longbow, I'm not sure about.. but fairly certain you don't have to look like Arnie in his Conan days to use it.
Some bows do require huge strength to draw. Odesius proved his identity because he was the only person strong enough to draw his bow. English/welsh longbowmen had one shoulder bigger than the other from training to draw their bow from a very young age. Evidence from the Mary Rose suggests they may have been well over average height.
It makes no mention of requiring more strength to draw them. So it seems to me that the higher STR requirement is yet more silliness in the 2nd Ed system.
In third Ed, composites simply have the "mighty" property, allowing str bonus while not actually requiring more strength. So two archers, one normal strength and another being Conan, can both fire the bow, but Conans arrow will have more power in the shot (hence the bonus damage). A much better implementation according to their real world counterparts.
However, for all of the wacky nonsensical rules in 2nd edition, I still love it.
The English/Welsh Longbow is made from a single piece of yew wood, which is idea for bow construction because the "heartwood resists compression while the sapwood resists stretching", which allows the bows to produce an enormous amount of power to fire with an effective range of about 300 yards. Yew wood kind of naturally achieves the same thing as Eastern Composite bows, which use different materials to achieve the same desired properties, and Mongol bows are also known to be effective up to around 300 yards, and capable of penetrating chain-mail armour, like the English longbow. English Bodkin arrow tips further enhanced the armour penetration of longbows, to the extent that it can even defeat plate mail at close range.
The advantage of composite bows was that it produced a similar amount of power, but was small enough to be used from horseback.
I'd imagine that if a composite long bow was actually produced, it probably would require an extraordinary amount upper body strength to use.
Or fix the exceptional STR roll for halfling fighters so they can have 18 instead of 17 maxium, like in PnP, where they do not get to roll for Exceptional STR, but they can have 18 STR.
I agree wholeheartedly
Composite bows were invented by nomadic tribes, most probably by mongolic, turkic tribes north of China for the sole purpose of horse archery. A long composite bow is a nonsense.
The average pull of composite bows was usually around 70lbs some were even around 50lbs, the English longbows had a pull around 100lbs and more.
The composite bows are hi-tech with low pull strength and lots of power in a small package. The drawback is less durability due to organic material used, especially the collagen glue and sinews.
Composite bows have been around for much longer than English long bows, which was first used (in large numbers) by Welsh rebels in the 13th Century, and later adopted by the English army, and featured prominently in English armies in 14th and 15th Century, in the Scottish Wars of Independence and the Hundred Years War against France. In contrast, the Xiongnu and Huns (likely related nomadic groups) threatened the frontiers of Roman Empire and the Han Empire (of China) in the 1st Century to 4th Century. The primary weapon of the nomads were composite bows fired from horseback, a style of warfare that barely changed when the Mongols swept across Eurasia in the 13th Century, and the Manchus conquered China in the 17th Century.
Such tactics only became obsolete when gunpowder weapons became reliable and accurate. The Qing Empire was shocked when its Mongol regiments were defeated by much smaller British armies (with rifles) in the 19 Century during the Opium Wars, because the Chinese had long considered Mongol horsemen to be near-unbeatable in open battle.
The term 'composite bow' technically just means any bow made with more than one material. It does not necessarily imply anything about its design, materials, workmanship, length or power. When most people talk about composite bows historically, they usually mean those of an eastern design, where the bow is bent against the natural shape of the wood, forming a 'recurve bow', which generates greater power within a smaller weapon, which can be fired from horseback. It was so effective that the Roman Legions employed large numbers of eastern tribes as Auxiliary bow regiments, to counter the same threat from their eastern enemies.
In fact D&D is a bit odd to divide bows so clearly between 'long bow' and 'short bow'. In practise the most commonly used bows historically are neither 'long' or 'short'. Long Bows are about 6ft long, which is rather unwieldy and unnecessary in a dungeon environment, where most encounters occur at a short range. Short bows are typically cavalry bows. Most Eastern civilisations used a slightly larger version of the composite bow for infantry regiments, and it is these that I'd imagine would be most sensible for your average arrow shootin' adventurer!
I imagine an adventurer bringing a longbow into the dungeon is kind of like a soldier trying to using a huge sniper rifle indoors.
I always wondered what an archer would make of a modern compound bow...
Modern compound bows use a system of pulleys that start with the same draw strength, but allow the user to hold at the ready much more easily, which in turn makes aiming and moving while drawn much easier. Classic composite bows require greater strength to keep drawn, making it more difficult to perform those activities.
Basically, the high strength requirement isn't to pull the string, it's to keep the string drawn while you do everything else.