Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[MonkeyHead]

Clearly Humans invented crossbows, being the ingenious problem solvers that they are, as a means to get more armed soldiers on the battlefield with a minimum cost and time wasted on training. Dwarves simply copied thier design and application after seeing thier usefulness, what with being unable to use bows due to stubby fingers and the need for a ranged combat weapon to deal with pesky flying creatures and bow armed enemies.

[Manveru Taurënér]

Clearly Humans invented crossbows, being the ingenious problem solvers that they are, as a means to get more armed soldiers on the battlefield with a minimum cost and time wasted on training. Dwarves simply copied thier design and application after seeing thier usefulness, what with being unable to use bows due to stubby fingers and the need for a ranged combat weapon to deal with pesky flying creatures and bow armed enemies.

I'd actually guess the opposite, that dwarves invented them, being the ingenious mechanical-oriented problem solvers they are, and humans adopting them due to the reasons you stated. Dwarves both have the bigger incentive to invent them as well as the technical know-how ^^

[TheDarkStar]

What bothers me is, what did dwarves use for ranged combat before crossbows? Slings? You have to have some sort of ranged weapon, not everyone can learn to throw rocks and fluffy wamblers with sniper accuracy.

Dwarves still quite enjoy throwing tantrums, other dwarves and cave sections. But I think tantrum is the first ranged weapon of dwarfkind.

The real question is why are dwarfs able to throw snowballs with enough force to explode a bronze colossus' head? They must just be lightly tapping their enemies with regular weapons, since they're not exploding in gore with every swing.
I conclude that outside adventure mode, nobody really cares about this whole "killing" thing. They're just putting in the minimal effort and hoping nobody notices.

Actually, it seems to be the opposite. All adventurers (successful ones, at least) have cannons built into their arms. When it says that they throw something, it really means that they shoot it at several hundred urists of distance per urist of time. You still see it rarely happening in Fortress mode, since you get adventurer migrants.