Fire arrows or not??

[professorchaos]

We have siege weapon with flammable ammo (though I never bothered using it), should we also have fire arrows?

Lighting up trees in field battle and wooden structures in siege (especially Battanian) would be super cool. Fire arrows raining down at night would be great as well. This would still be historically accurate, I think?

I could think of two ways to implement this. One, have special troops that have fire arrows. Two, add fire arrows to inventory which is consumable in battle.

 

[hruza]

No.

 

[sub_0ptimal]

yeah, no...

 

[Doggo]

Fire arrows only work reliably with gunpowders, so no, the time period is too early.

 

[stevehoos]

Fire arrows only work reliably with gunpowders, so no, the time period is too early.

The Romans used fire with arrows and other projectiles in siege battles. Gun power has nothing to do with fire projectiles of The Roman period or 11th century Europe. They were hardly ever used because of general impracticality, but if you wanted to set a building on fire during a siege it was possible.

 

[haleondk]

We have siege weapon with flammable ammo (though I never bothered using it), should we also have fire arrows?

Lighting up trees in field battle and wooden structures in siege (especially Battanian) would be super cool. Fire arrows raining down at night would be great as well. This would still be historically accurate, I think?

I could think of two ways to implement this. One, have special troops that have fire arrows. Two, add fire arrows to inventory which is consumable in battle.

Fire arrow in siege defense, in basket on Wall, to put siege Towers on fire

 

[TechnoSarge]

Fire arrow in siege defense, in basket on Wall, to put siege Towers on fire

Total War Medieval let's you light arrows to try and burn siege towers. You can use them against troops too, which degrades their morale as well as making crispy critters of troops hit by them - I believe you trade rate of fire for the improved effects, and more dispersion in the arrows. That's a tactical decision I like having.

 

[KSHMR]

Nope, not gonna happen XD

 

[Gelimer]

I am not sure they were ever used in field battles though, never heard about it. Because not only it would make them totally inaccurate but it wouldnt bring any benefit either because the fire would extinguish during the arrow flight most of the time and the few arrows that would land would not set anything on fire as most would extinguish in a matter of seconds and most arrows would be much less effective at penetrating anything ( it was not meant to hit) and most would hit at weird angles due to the balance of the arrow being messed up and that is not counting the fire itself damaging the arrow in the first place.

Against wooden towers? Maybe yes in this case it could make sense but it should take ages to set anything on fire with fire arrows and that is if the weather allows for it IMO.

 

[Julio-Claudian]

It should be an option for the defenders in siege battles.

 

[benefactr]

There's as MOD for fire arrows. Seen someone stream play using it.

 

[mAtAtA]

Ah yes, i see the self-proclaimed youtube/wikipedia historians gathered in furst rows for a another nonsensical rant of theirs.

Stop watching movies, read a history book or two.
If you have, you would have found the words "nafata" or "nafatin" somewhere.

Yes, flaming arrows were used in medieval europe and levant as far as 8th century AD.
+1
Peace out

 

[Terco_Viejo]

I share @hruza 's opinion, but......I think it would be interesting to implement it, but with restrictions of fun >realism.

1. An incendiary arrow will not bonfire someone who has been hit with it (maybe a little +5 additional damage by fire? I don't know). Instead a wooden structure can eventually be destroyed/carbonized by the destructive effect of fire. Doors, siege engines, straw roofs, etc... Certainly, it would give an unprecedented spectacularity to the scene.

2. For sieges only.

Something similar to this mod (Fire Arrow - Turn into an inferno) but with the "restrictions" I'm talking about:


-----
That said, it would be fun to find this in the native and a fire damage system for structures only. @Bloc proved with his mod (Advanced Custom Battle) that it is possible to "burn things". I'd also fix the trail of incendiary arrows so they wouldn't look like tracer bullets

 

[Crowcorrector]

I'd say no, because it's not historically accurate.... then again, neither is having 10% of fielded armies for every faction being led by women, so maybe we'll get fire arrows at some point, along with a faction of Amazonian warriors.

 

[Mardochaios]

It's coming in the winter update including Archimedes' Mirror.

 

[Hairy Yahoo]

I say leave it to modders, devs have more problems at the core to fix.

Like AI pathfinding and behavior in battles, economy balance, pricing policy of items and balance.

 

[thefirst1nvad3r]

Surely this would be a very cool addition, but I think is hard to make it well balanced in the game system. For now, arrows are very strong: making them flammable could break the game balance.

For all those who say "historically inaccurate", I remember you that incendiary arrows have been used in the ancient times by Assyrian and later by Romans. Surely they can't be shot from too far away and they can't be too fast, otherwise the fire extinguishes.
Also, this game is set in a fictional world, so it doesn't have to be exactly like our real history.

 

[Hairy Yahoo]

Surely this would be a very cool addition, but I think is hard to make it well balanced in the game system. For now, arrows are very strong: making them flammable could break the game balance.

For all those who say "historically inaccurate", I remember you that incendiary arrows have been used in the ancient times by Assyrian and later by Romans. Surely they can't be shot from too far away and they can't be too fast, otherwise the fire extinguishes.
Also, this game is set in a fictional world, so it doesn't have to be exactly like our real history.

For me the game breaking and immersion killing part of implementing fire arrows is the lack of ignite animation of arrows. It's like that in total war games aswell, archers nock the arrows and magically they burn upon release of the string.

 

[KSHMR]

could be possible to use them in big sieges where archers standing to a barrel with fire to light them. But in warband people literally just shot burning arrows like normal arrows which isn't very realistic. in skirmish they shouldn't be a thing imo

 

[Premu]

Surely this would be a very cool addition, but I think is hard to make it well balanced in the game system. For now, arrows are very strong: making them flammable could break the game balance.

For all those who say "historically inaccurate", I remember you that incendiary arrows have been used in the ancient times by Assyrian and later by Romans. Surely they can't be shot from too far away and they can't be too fast, otherwise the fire extinguishes.
Also, this game is set in a fictional world, so it doesn't have to be exactly like our real history.

The problem here is not that fire arrows didn't exist at all - but that they have very limited usecases in which their only advantage is worth the disadvantages they bring.

They are utterly useless in field battles, nor is it realistic to light arrows here. In sieges they might be used, but if you keep it realistic they would have a very limited effect.

You might think the defenders could use them to ignite siege towers. That won't work, though - or have you ever tried to ignite a wooden block with a match? A small flame from an arrow will extinguish too soon before being able to ignite a massive wooden plank. Especially if the attackers use methods to reduce the inflammibility of the siege tower further.

The attackers could theoretically use fire arrows to set fire to buildings behind the walls - Depending on the building material some parts might actually be easily flammable. Of course, they can't actually see what they are hitting, as they have to shoot over the walls and the arrows will just spread over an unseen area. Also, these archers must be pretty close the wall where the defenders can shoot them with pointy arrows and take them out quickly. So not a very practial application either.

So if we want to keep the game "realistic", fire arrows would be either completly underwhelming and not worth it to use, or they would be buffed unrealisticly and break the immersion.