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SP - General Fire Arrows! Light up oil in sieges vs battering rams!
- Thread starter Wolf25
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Could be interesting if their hits lower morale and damages structures more, but they are fewer in quantity, so you have to choose wisely when to use them.
I also miss the possibility of hot oil being used as a defense measure during sieges, which could be lit up with a fire arrow and cause continuous high damage.
I also miss the possibility of hot oil being used as a defense measure during sieges, which could be lit up with a fire arrow and cause continuous high damage.
I agree with Wolf, but if they damaged (also destroy) aries, stairs or siege weapons, their construction should be easier too.
how do you make a fire arrow ? Do you have a furnace or something to heat it up ? And if there is some substance, how does it hold together ? I mean, Id like to see fire arrows IRL, historical evidence would be nice.
hot arrows wouldnt penetrate anything, since orange to white hot iron is easier to bend.
hot arrows wouldnt penetrate anything, since orange to white hot iron is easier to bend.
Google "Flaming arrows" or "Early Thermal Weapons". The second actually has a picture of German incendiary bolts. They were generally a cloth soaked with some type of oil or resin that could stay ignited in flight. Due to the added material, they were heavier and could not travel as far. They could be used as distance markers and, to an extent, lighting in order to better judge the opponent's distance. They may also be followed with unlit arrows as a 'surprise' since the archers would have their distance from the previous volley. Mostly they were used as incendiary devices due to the high use of wood and thatch at the time. Once people realized things they didn't need can burn (razing a city rather than capturing it), they found quite a few methods of doing so.
In-game they could be used for:
- Scare tactics to break moral.
- Against towns/villages to damage defensive structures.
- If one is capturing the location and uses this tactic, the location should take longer to recover.
- Possibly have an emergency action post-battle to have the conquering army put out the fires.
- demoralize attackers.
- While defending against a siege to:
- damage/destroy siege engines.
- damage/destroy attacker defenses (protective walls)
- demoralize attackers.
- Incendiary pots - This one has been brought up a lot and could be particularly useful if dropped from murder holes in and around the front gate. The users just have to be mindful of where they are throwing the things as you wouldn't want to toss one in a wooden fort...
- Flaming 'moats' - A stall tactic if you are confident that your ranged units are more skilled than those of the attacker. Igniting a line of pitch in front of your walls would force the attackers to stop advancing their siege engines, giving you more time to destroy them and your ranged units more time to take down enemy forces.
- Incendiary bombardment - For catapults and trebuchets, these clay pots would 'explode' on impact to splatter their flammable contents one anything at and past the impact point. Note that this would not really cover anything between the point of origin and the initial impact site or immediately to the sides, unless it hit a wall, due to the initial direction of the force (physics kids!). Think water ballow area of effect.
- Hot oil - Not technically incendiary but there are many who want this as well. Hot oil was tipped onto attackers to devastating effect. Not only did it kill/injure, but the mental effect on those who saw it happen was also debilitating. Picture the men in front of you screaming in agony as their flesh melts off, knowing that you're up next on the path they just attempted to assault. There was no way of knowing if that was the only pot, or if there was another one lined up already for your advance. Oil was very expensive though, so this would be a very costly use. More likely would have been the use of boiling water (I've also read passages alluding to the possibility of it being wastewater such as bathing, cleaning, or latrine...not only painful but possibly infectious).
- Fire Ship/Barge - Should they introduce sea battles, a fire ship aimed toward the enemy fleet would be a nice addition. Even if they manoeuver around it, there would still be tactics involved. Are you merely steering them away from your ranged units, or getting them in range? Perhaps forcing them right into your boarding units?
Edit: Added some info for hot oil.
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I just remembered another incendiary method.
Flaming shuriken:
You can see an image of it by searching - museum incendiary shuriken - It was in the third image on google image search.
Flaming shuriken:
I recalled seeing a documentary including a trip to a ninjitsu museum where they had a shuriken wrapped with a cloth cord toward the center. They explained that its purpose was similar to that of the flaming arrow in that it was soaked in a flammable substance, lit, then thrown into a flammable object to start fires. This would have been from a much closer distance though, and likely would have had limited use. The only situations I couldn't think of a better (period) solution for was killing an enemy while starting a fire if a bow wasn't an option, or starting a fire from a distance with limited noise output. Otherwise, just use an incendiary pot...
You can see an image of it by searching - museum incendiary shuriken - It was in the third image on google image search.
some say in 1241 mongols used gunpowder and set fire to the 'field fort' through stone throwers in northeast of hungary
Gunpowder has been in use a lot longer than most people realize. Understanding of its applications took some time though. The first firearms were little more than a miniature cannon on a pole and were very inaccurate. It was also not smokeless at the time, so it often hindered as much as it helped. There are acknowledged uses of gunpowder from the 10th century and an understanding that it may have been in use, but not recorded, earlier than that. The earliest known formula dates to around the 11th century. It hit Europe around the 13th century but was not immediately weaponized. To my knowledge, Bannerlord is supposed to be modeled around 7th to 12th century, so it may be unlikely that gunpowder will be added outside of a mod.
