Topic: Different size longbows

[EvilWilliam]

OK, I asked this before in a different place, but, Longbows in RMU, there are tables for a regular, large and small longbow: but surely, a small longbow is just a regular bow?  Shouldn't it be that there is a single 'bows' table, and the long bow is the large version?

[Hurin]

The tables are for Longbow and Shortbow. You also need tables for small and large versions of each when for example a Halfling crafts a halfling-size (small) Longbow, or a Giant crafts a big size Shortbow. A giant size shortbow would be much, much larger than a Halfing-sized longbow.

We also used to have Composite Bow table to represent composite bows, as they were built in a quite different fashion than Longbows/self bows. I am hoping that we get a supplement in the future that adds Composite bows back in.

[EvilWilliam]

But is there a qualitative difference between a longbow and a shortbow, surely a halfling long bow is a human's short bow?  So, maybe it should be a table for bows, and a table for composite bows?

[jdale]

A human longbow (medium) is around 2.5 lbs. A human shortbow is around 2 lbs.

A halfling longbow (small) is around 0.6 lbs (one quarter the weight of the medium version). So that makes it substantially lighter than the medium shortbow.

To be honest though, we probably could have set them up to use the same table.

[Hurin]

A human longbow (medium) is around 2.5 lbs. A human shortbow is around 2 lbs.

A halfling longbow (small) is around 0.6 lbs (one quarter the weight of the medium version). So that makes it substantially lighter than the medium shortbow.

And for comparison I think that also means that a Troll's shortbow (big size) would be something like 8 lbs. So, something like 16x the weight of a Halfling Longbow.