Ezias said:
I don't know about that hearing thing -- i think it might depend on how close the arrow is. gratned, I have never been in a battle so this is just conjecture. One hears teh whistle of bullets as they go by, and can feel/hear a ball or other objects as they fly by teh head. Granted these all have varying velocities and shapes that would make teh physics very different from that of an arrow, but I don't know that it'd be impossible to hear one as it flies by your head.
But you don't hear a ball
before it flies by. In the case of artillery you do hear the shells before they land -- unless the shell is coming directly at you (the shell travelling faster than the speed of sound, it will reach you before the sound does). In the case of arrows, obviously arrows are not supersonic and you might well hear them before they hit you. I have no idea, however, as I've never been shot at with an arrow before. But I can't imagine that the sound would be loud enough to hear through both the battle
and the helmet -- until it was too late to do anything about it, anyway. I believe you'd hear a projectile whizzing close by your head even with a solid, padded helmet covering your entire head, but I don't see how that matters in any way.