Bows/Crossbows vs Guns

[+ILuvHats]

I've been thinking of a world where gunpowder doesn't exist for mysterious reasons I haven't worked out yet. Some cultures have developed firearm equivalents using magitech, but other societies still use crossbows and bows because they aren't cool with magic users, to put it lightly. So you see the problem. If I want these cultures to come into conflict, how do I level the playing field?

First of all, the world is at the peak of an industrial revolution and generally its technology and societies are roughly equivalent to the late 1800s to early 1900s (pre-WWI). Also, I've messed with the history of science so that plastics were invented a hundred years before they should be according to our timeline, so around 1810. Since plastics are established and mass produced, compound bow weapons are on the table, making these weapons more advanced than the medieval versions.

Meanwhile, the guns aren't up to modern standards and have only been recently invented (the first prototypes began to occur around the invention of plastics). However, the timeline of gun technology has been rapidly accelerated thanks to industrial machining processes and a society with a higher standard of living. The current firearm technology is somewhat comparable to the early 1800s. Automatic and semiautomatic firearms don't exist, and handheld weapons are limited almost solely to magazine fed muskets and pistols. I won't go into details about the magical mechanics, but essentially a small electrical charge can be applied to generate an explosion as powerful as gunpowder. Solid cell batteries aren't available yet, so miniature-sized electrostatic generators are built into the guns, making them bulkier and heavier than their 1800s analogs. The electrostatic generators have to be manually charged between each shot, which takes a few seconds. Replaceable magazines are common since the magic system lends itself to such technology, but circular bullets are used instead of modern, conical ones. In addition, barrels are smoothbore instead of rifled, which means the bullets don't spin as they leave the barrel and accuracy is greatly reduced. Cartridges are the standard but they're also slightly bulkier and heavier than gunpowder equivalents, so magazines are limited to 6-8 rounds. 

In summary, the weapons have the accuracy of American Revolution era muskets, but with a rate of fire of 8-10 rounds a minute, so a bit slower than the repeating rifle introduced in the civil war. For comparison, American Revolution era muskets had an approximate fire rate of 3 rounds a minute. Furthermore, the rifles and pistols are both heavier and bulkier than any analogs. Ah yes, and cannons exist which are powered by wet cell batteries, although they're muzzle loaded and not breech loaded. They're also exceedingly rare, so when you're comparing the power level of weapons, focus on the handheld ones. 

As you can see, I've thought a lot about the guns and not so much about the bows/crossbows. The existence of compound bows helps level the playing field since it makes the bows more powerful and increases the range, but they're still at a huge disadvantage. As I described them, guns take less training to use effectively, have a greater range, have MUCH more compact ammunition, and can fire as fast as a trained bowman and twice as fast as a crossbowman. The only advantage bows and crossbows have is that the user has much greater control over accuracy. I really want to increase the power level of the bow weapons instead of nerfing firearms, but I can't think of any major improvements myself. I'm sure if bows were the primary weapon of choice instead of guns throughout history and polymers were available for constructing compound bows,  people could have made them much more powerful than they are today. So if you have any ideas for mind-blowing improvements to bowed weapons, no matter how theoretical, I'd love to hear your suggestions. Also let me know if you don't think it's possible to bring them to a level equaling guns as a I described, and how much you think I'd have to nerf firearms for them to be approximately equal. 

[Karger]

42 minutes ago, ILuvHats said:

have a greater range, have MUCH more compact ammunition, and can fire as fast as a trained bowman and twice as fast as a crossbowman

While the guns you have described do have a greater range their effective range(range at which they will still be accurate) is probably pretty low.  If riffeling does not exist for example the accuracy rate is going to be so low that massed gunfire is your only really effective option which makes ambushing and sniping impossible unlike with a crossbow.

45 minutes ago, ILuvHats said:

I really want to increase the power level of the bow weapons instead of nerfing firearms

I am unsure how magic tec works but if your system does not integrate well with bullets bows can be used offensively(crossbows for normies compounds for the very skilled).  You might get explosive arrows or instant kill ones.  Alternatively if bullets are very easy to effect with magictec (magical anti bullet armor for example) then any magic people will utilize and the compound bow will be the weapon of choice for mage killers.  The final option I am aware of is to alter the morphology of your fantasy people so that they stand up to bullets easily but not arrows.

In summary trick arrows, no riffeling, or anti bullet stuff.

[+ILuvHats]

1 hour ago, Karger said:

While the guns you have described do have a greater range their effective range(range at which they will still be accurate) is probably pretty low.  If riffeling does not exist for example the accuracy rate is going to be so low that massed gunfire is your only really effective option which makes ambushing and sniping impossible unlike with a crossbow.

I totally agree with your points. Guns without rifling have horrid accuracy, and massed gunfire is your only option. However, as I’m sure you’re aware, massed gunfire is terribly effective at mitigating the inaccuracy of the weapons. When two large groups of people are just shooting into one another, accuracy doesn’t matter that much, and the effective range of the muskets will essentially be their full range. Guerilla warfare definitely favors bows, and I definitely want to create a situation in which guerilla tactics are used a lot.

However, the war I’m envisioning is massive, like a miniature version of one of the world wars, involving many nations. And such a war has to be executed on a massive scale which limits guerilla tactics and favors the side with guns. In fact, it’s not even that I’d want such a war to occur in the story; it’s simply that with the technological difference, it’d be unrealistic not to have a war. If the side with guns knows how great an advantage they have, they’d invade in an instant. The state I want to occur is something like the Cold War where both sides are equally matched, so nobody wants to make the first move. Obviously not as stable as the Cold War (if you could call it that) because there’s no MAD, but you get my point.

1 hour ago, Karger said:

I am unsure how magic tec works but if your system does not integrate well with bullets bows can be used offensively(crossbows for normies compounds for the very skilled).  You might get explosive arrows or instant kill ones.  Alternatively if bullets are very easy to effect with magictec (magical anti bullet armor for example) then any magic people will utilize and the compound bow will be the weapon of choice for mage killers.  The final option I am aware of is to alter the morphology of your fantasy people so that they stand up to bullets easily but not arrows.

In summary trick arrows, no riffeling, or anti bullet stuff.

Thanks for the suggestions. The magic system doesn’t really interact with the guns/bullets beyond allowing them to function in the first place, and I’m not interested in changing morphology. But enhancing the arrows with a fantasy toxin that is cheap, mass-producible, and rapidly lethally would have interesting ramifications. For example, you could scale down the size of the bows since impact energy doesn’t matter as much; as long as the tip reaches blood, it doesn’t matter how deeply the arrow pierces. The arrows would become smaller and repeating crossbows would even become possible. I’lol have to think on it more.

Edited April 29, 2020 by ILuvHats

[+Invocation]

Secret explosive invention on the disadvantage side. If the magitech folks are used to having the upperhand, why would they explore beyond that tech level for their warfare? Then, when the no-magic side figures out explosives (timeline would be correct for them to have at least nitroglycerin and dynamite), maybe there's a particular material on this world that you can coat arrowheads in and then soak it in nitroglycerin for exploding arrows.

[+Oltux72]

How do you prevent guns using compressed air?  Removing gun powder will solve only a part of the problem.

If you are looking at largely removing artillery, the decline of castles will never happen. Looking at military weapons from a viewpoint of stuff you are holding in your arms is not accurate.

Also what is the influence of magic on transport and logistics? That is important. For example the Ottoman advances against Austria all followed the Danube. Not because the Turks were stupid enough to act predictably, but because so many supplies could be transported only by river.

[+ILuvHats]

2 hours ago, Oltux72 said:

How do you prevent guns using compressed air?  Removing gun powder will solve only a part of the problem.

Shoot, you’re right. I’ll have to rethink a lot of stuff. 

So now I'm wondering whether pneumatic firearms could scale up to artillery. My gut instinct is no, or at least not efficiently. If that's the case, then castle-style fortresses would never phase out, as you pointed out.

Edited April 29, 2020 by ILuvHats

[Xardan Ta'Caran]

I'm also not sure how your magic system works, but just based on what I've read it seems that your magic is based a LOT around electricity. Could the other side use EMP type technology in their arrow heads that upon impact shut off all of the ammunition in a certain area?

I do realize it would make the effect very localized, but if they knew what they were doing they could create a large crossbow (even a ballista would work) and launch their EMP arrowhead into the center of the enemy lines at least temporarily giving themselves an advantage.

Edited April 29, 2020 by Xardan Ta'Caran

[+ILuvHats]

9 minutes ago, Xardan Ta'Caran said:

 

I'm also not sure how your magic system works, but just based on what I've read it seems that your magic is based a LOT around electricity. Could the other side use EMP type technology in their arrow heads that upon impact shot off all of the ammunition of a certain size of an area?

I do realize it would make the effect very localized, but if they knew what they were doing they could create a large crossbow (even a ballista would work) and launch their EMP arrowhead into the center of the enemy lines at least temporarily giving themselves an advantage.

 

Sorry for not explaining the magic system, but this wouldn't exactly work. If you want to check the system out, you can do it here. And anyways, Oltux has basically convinced me to make it a matter of pneumatic weaponry vs magic-based gun analogs. It seems a lot more realistic, and wouldn't be as hard to figure out the warfare because it's more similar to real life wars. I guess I wasn't as committed as I thought to the bows vs guns narrative.

[+Oltux72]

21 hours ago, ILuvHats said:

Sorry for not explaining the magic system, but this wouldn't exactly work. If you want to check the system out, you can do it here.

Having read this I am afraid I will have to come up with two more issues, one technical, the other one developmental..

1. What happens to the material you blow up?
   Gun barrels need to be cleaned periodically from the residue of the propellant. If you are blowing up metal fragments, your residue will be molten metal and metal oxides. The barrel is cold compared to molten metal. The residues will stick quite closely to the barrel. Your guns won't fire often before they need to be cleaned quite thoroughly.
2. Your magic system leads straight to explosive projectiles, especially the wooden parts of arrows and crossbow bolts.
3. That kind of magic begs for grenades launched by trebuchet.

 

[+ILuvHats]

Since it seems like you read the article, I'll be using some of the terminology from it.

3 hours ago, Oltux72 said:

What happens to the material you blow up?
Gun barrels need to be cleaned periodically from the residue of the propellant. If you are blowing up metal fragments, your residue will be molten metal and metal oxides. The barrel is cold compared to molten metal. The residues will stick quite closely to the barrel. Your guns won't fire often before they need to be cleaned quite thoroughly.

Molten metal is something I've thought about. It's a technical difficulty that could be overcome by ensuring the applied voltage is distributed enough to trigger almost all of the metal (copper's the metal replacing gunpowder). Just as a reminder, materials convert directly to energy upon being triggered, so depending on the distribution of the voltage there could be virtually no residue. There could also be mechanisms designed to eject remaining molten metal, though this feels more problematic. Either way, it's possible to overcome this problem. The guns might have to be cleaned out a few times a year, but not that much more than normal firearms. The metal oxide doesn't react to the applied voltage, so it won't be turned into energy like the metal is. However, it forms in very thin layers. To be precise, CuO forms in layers 10-50 nm thick according to a quick google search. I don't think it should accrue significantly. 

3 hours ago, Oltux72 said:

Your magic system leads straight to explosive projectiles, especially the wooden parts of arrows and crossbow bolts.

Sure, but there's a delay to the explosion of biological matter which is hard to predict. Accurately determining the time it takes for the UV radiation to diffuse and trigger an explosion is extremely difficult because it depends on so many variables; the mass, density, and type of wood, the amount of sunlight it's receiving, and the slight differences between magic users' power level. Yours only option is to immediately fire the bolt, in which case you'd shoot the bolt, then have to wait 10-15 minutes before it blows. Not terribly useful except in a few situations. You could decrease the wait time, but at the expense of the explosive power.

3 hours ago, Oltux72 said:

That kind of magic begs for grenades launched by trebuchet.

Metals have problems because people don't have the technical knowhow to cause an electrical charge to be applied upon impact. Dry cell batteries don't even exist yet, and there's no way wet cells could function after being catapulted. The only material that lends itself well to explosive projectiles are ceramics, and there are technical issues ensuring the initial blast doesn't cause it to explode but the impact will. More importantly, the ammunition has to be prepared shortly before being fired since ceramics lose their ability to explode a few hours after being Primed. So, a magic user needs to be on site and able to operate these weapons, which is inherently limited by the rarity of magic users. Explosive projectiles will be limited to hand-held weapons operated by magic users or large siege weapons with a magic user on site. They will exist, but trebuchets/cannons with a non-explosive payload will be more common (while still rare). 

Again, thank you a ton for your feedback regarding air rifles. I'd completely forgotten they existed and have been weaponized since the 16th century if I recall correctly. Bows vs guns was probably too much of a stress, but pneumatic firearms vs explosive magic tech feels much more natural, and the second could naturally develop from the engineering already done to develop the first. Plus, the tech difference still reflects the cultural one like I wanted. One last thing; I don't know if you saw me edit my reply to your first post, but do you have any thoughts on upscaling pneumatic weaponry to artillery?

[+Oltux72]

2 hours ago, ILuvHats said:

Since it seems like you read the article, I'll be using some of the terminology from it.

Molten metal is something I've thought about. It's a technical difficulty that could be overcome by ensuring the applied voltage is distributed enough to trigger almost all of the metal (copper's the metal replacing gunpowder). Just as a reminder, materials convert directly to energy upon being triggered, so depending on the distribution of the voltage there could be virtually no residue.

Well, now you have deprived your gun of a propellant. What is supposed to push your bullet out of the barrel? In a chemical gun the gases generated from the powder in the charge do the job. That they are hot is helpful, but not essential. Look at an airbag.

If you convert metal to nothing and heat, you will generate a vaccum behind your bullet (and heat it and your weapon). The bullet will go backwards. OK, it, being a ball, will fit loosely, so there will be some air to heat up and expand. But efficiency will suck, if it works at all. Your gun will be immensely hot after each shot.

2 hours ago, ILuvHats said:

Sure, but there's a delay to the explosion of biological matter which is hard to predict. Accurately determining the time it takes for the UV radiation to diffuse and trigger an explosion is extremely difficult because it depends on so many variables; the mass, density, and type of wood, the amount of sunlight it's receiving, and the slight differences between magic users' power level. Yours only option is to immediately fire the bolt, in which case you'd shoot the bolt, then have to wait 10-15 minutes before it blows. Not terribly useful except in a few situations. You could decrease the wait time, but at the expense of the explosive power.

You had no friends trying to blow things up as a child? Easily solved. Use flour or sawdust as an explosive. Pack it in a dark bag  Use a bursting charge made from a primed ceramic.

2 hours ago, ILuvHats said:

Again, thank you a ton for your feedback regarding air rifles. I'd completely forgotten they existed and have been weaponized since the 16th century if I recall correctly. Bows vs guns was probably too much of a stress, but pneumatic firearms vs explosive magic tech feels much more natural, and the second could naturally develop from the engineering already done to develop the first. Plus, the tech difference still reflects the cultural one like I wanted. One last thing; I don't know if you saw me edit my reply to your first post, but do you have any thoughts on upscaling pneumatic weaponry to artillery?

Yes I read it. But I am a software engineer, not a gunsmith, so I have to think about such things. I believe the answer is no, as the projectile gets heavier faster than its diameter which determines how much force you can apply.

[Karger]

On 4/29/2020 at 9:42 AM, ILuvHats said:

So now I'm wondering whether pneumatic firearms could scale up to artillery. My gut instinct is no, or at least not efficiently. If that's the case, then castle-style fortresses would never phase out, as you pointed out.

Until the end of WW1 fortresses meant to stand against artillery existed.

 

 

Edited May 1, 2020 by Karger

[Frustration]

On 4/28/2020 at 8:16 PM, ILuvHats said:

 I really want to increase the power level of the bow weapons instead of nerfing firearms, but I can't think of any major improvements myself.

Go to YouTube find the channel Shadiversity, he's an advisor for Brandon, he has a video with the title along the lines of the next evolution of the bow, that might be of help to you.

It affectively makes automatically reloading bows.

Edited May 6, 2020 by Frustration

[Mulk]

One way you can level the playing field is by giving those without guns more difficult terrain to live in.  From the real world, WWII era Switzerland can be an example.  Switzerland wasn't the only neutral country at the start of that war, but they were the only one near the main axis of fighting whose neutrality was (mostly) respected.  While part of that was no doubt good fortune, I think part of it was also that it was understood forcing the passage would have had a pretty sizable cost in both time and casualties.

While their tech wasn't sub par in most places, they didn't have a huge store of tanks and in a flatter country like Belgium, they would have been easy prey for a blitzkrieg attack.  But Switzerland isn't a flat country.  Almost no part of it is flat, and you have to cross the some of the largest and steepest mountains in Europe to pass through it.  The Swiss had a very large standing army relative to how large the country is, and a large series of tunnels and stores set up for time of need; actually taking it or forcing passage across it for army units would have been murderously expensive, which is undoubtedly a large piece of why it never happened and why Belgium was rolled over instead. Fighting the inevitable guerilla war that would have ensued across the Swiss Alps in places you can't get tanks or artillery very easily and if you try, you have to approach via a few very well known spots?  Ouch.