The biggest issue is that arrows and bolts are treated like massive hunks of metal instead of wood with a metal tip. The second biggest issue is their tips are 1/10 the size of a spear's tip, because their contact area is absurdly small. A copper arrow is treated as an arrow-sized piece of copper with a tip the size of a needle, moving at the speed of mostly-wood, reasonably-tipped arrow. It's no surprise that they fuck shit up. They don't need to penetrate armor because they'll broke bones through it. Increasing the contact area to something more reasonable (20 is a spear's) will help, but it will continue to be an issue until arrows are treated like they're mostly made of wood. Once that's done, arrows will be underpowered until they can't be dodged and parried like they're being shot from a nerf gun. There's a lot of balancing that needs to be done.
Arrows, like bullets, easily penetrate any armor. You need to only look at the historical record.
So, tell me. If arrows could penetrate armor so easily, why didn't they become ubiquitous like guns? They could, after all, fire significantly faster than early guns, and even have the advantage that they can fire in an arc, allowing them to shoot over defenses and bombard enemy positions. A skilled archer would also have more accuracy and greater range than someone using an early gun. If they could also consistently penetrate armor, why did armor not only persist, but become even more prevalent, more evolved, and more expensive? Why didn't armies simply equip every soldier with a bow with a melee weapons as a sidearm? Why would they ever decide to use guns in the first place? After all, even early guns could not penetrate
all armor, and armor was pretty commonplace on the battlefield up until the late 1600s, despite its expense. The "London lobsters", a famous group of Parliamentarian cuirassiers in the English Civil War were known for their heavy, expensive armor, which was known to deflect swords
and bullets. Mind you, this was in the 1640s, hundreds of years after guns first arrived in Europe, and after they had already become commonplace in armies.
Despite common myths, no, arrows could not easily penetrate armor. Or at least not in the way you're thinking of. Penetrating metal armor does not mean an arrow is harmful. The reason why is that arrows only have the energy you initially put into them. In contrast, if you're holding a sword and pushing forward with it, you are constantly applying force. If you get through armor with a sword, you can keep applying force and pushing through. If an arrow gets through metal armor, it has to expend a lot of its limited energy to do so. Consequently, when arrows penetrated plate or mail armor, they would often be stopped by the underlying cloth or leather armor, since most of their energy was already lost. Even if they
did cause wounds, they did not penetrate as deeply and were
much less likely to be serious.
That's, of course, assuming a direct hit from close range. Armor was specifically designed to not allow direct hits. It was curved so arrows would very often hit at an angle, causing them to deflect off the armor.
I Should also point out that chainmail is terrible at stopping arrows, althought the layering effect of leather+Chain+ Plate could stop frontal penetrations. Typically, an arrow volley fell from above, which is the weakest point in any armor.
1.) Chainmail, while not as effective as plate, was not 'terrible' at stopping arrows. It certainly did the job for knights in the Crusades, who were known to have dozens of arrows sticking in them after a battle but still be standing. It also did the job for thousands of years when it was used all across the world by countless civilizations, seeing use by the ancient Celts, Rome, India, and Japan, among others. It was pretty far-reaching for a pretty significant period of time.
2.) By the time plate armor became the norm, leather+chain+plate was not layered. That only happened early in its history when plate armor was limited in where it protected. That would have been extraordinarily hot, heavy, and impractical. Chain was mainly just used in joints like the armpits, back of the knees, etc, where plate armor could not effectively protect, where it would be riveted on the plate armor, or sewn onto the underlying cloth/leather armor.
3.) Do you have any actual sources for the top being the weakest point of any armor? At all? Firing in a volley from a high angle would mean the arrows would hit the armor at an angle, making them much more likely to deflect off it. If anything, it would make arrows
less effective, especially since the head and chest were the most protected parts of the armor for obvious reasons.
True enough, but you need pretty heavy or specially-designed armor to deflect a good arrow. again, if this wasn't the case, the English would have had slightly more chance of defeating the French at Agincourt than you would of defeating a brick wall by throwing pebbles at it.
Being bogged down in the mud wouldn't mean carp if the arrows weren't good at their job of piercing armor.
I don't want to get into a thorough analysis, but I'll just leave it at "it's a bit more complicated than that".
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Topic: Update on issue #5516, A fix for overpowered ammunition. (Read 3479 times)