Chinese Crossbows

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I know that this is a bit OT, but I was just watching part of a show on the History Channel on ancient Chinese military tech and they discussed crossbows and the repeating crossbow. And showed examples.

I was utterly shocked by how simple the repeating crossbow was. SHOCKED!!!

Frankly, it was simpler for an untrained soldier to use than a bow. They showed a person using it and the repeating crossbow seemed incredibly similar to using a pump shotgun. Fire, pump, fire, pump, fire, and so on.

It didn't have the raw power of the non-repeating chinese crossbow, but it could put out fire at about 1 shot per second!!! They probably weren't terribly accurate, because the bolts didn't have any feathers and were maybe about a foot long. OTOH, they said that it was common for them to use poison tipped bolts, so any one hit would still kill, despite not having the raw power of a non-repeating crossbow.

The repeating xbow reloaded by pushing the bolt-box forward where it would pick up the string. You then pulled the bolt-box back and when it touched some sort of trigger pin, it fired the bolt. Then you just pumped the bolt box forward again, and so on. Utterly idiot proof simple to use. Not terribly accurate, but when used in large numbers, it could pump out an incredible number of bolts in a short period of time. A rate of fire that was not repeated until the invention of the machine gun.

OTOH, a heavy chinese crossbow has the power to punch thru plate armor at up to 500 yards. Holy freaking crap! And the bolts that it was firing weren't these crappy little things. They were fully as big as any longbow's arrows. Maybe longer. But definitely only a 1 shot per round weapon. It was a "foot loaded" xbow. That is, there was a place to put the foot at the front of the bow, and you pulled the string back.


From a DnD and IWD2 perspective, a chinese repeating Xbow should probably have only about a range of 30-40, compared to the ~100 increment range of normal xbows. And probably no damage nor attack bonuses for an unchanted versions. I wouldn't automatically give it a hard-set X number of attacks per round. I'd probably just let it be like a bow, i.e. you get as many attacks/round as your character properly gets.

 

The Player's Handbook actually lists stats for a repeating light crossbow and heavy crossbow, now mind you, I don't know the statistics for them off hand (because I never use them as they're considered exotic weapons), but you should be able to find a official statistic for the weapon. I don't have my handbook on hand so I can't really help you out here.

 

Oh, I actually did look them up in the 3.5 PHB, but after seeing this TV show, I don't buy the PHB's description of the repeating Xbow. From what I saw on the TV show, repeating Xbows, while able to pump out a high volume of fire at shorter range, they couldn't have the accuracy, range, or hitting power of a single shot crossbow.

For one thing, at least in the chinese version, their normal Xbows looked like traditional recurved bows attached to a stock, that created a LOT of tensile strength and power. OTOH, the repeaters had dead straight bow that only curved when the boltbox was pulled back with the bolt notched. And given how much easier it was to pull back the string in the repeating bow, it simply couldn't have had anywhere near the same pull, and hence power and range of the single shot xbow.

Mind you everything I'm saying is based entirely on what I saw and heard in this TV show. But from what I saw, simple (unenchanted) repeating xbows should have much less range, power, and accuracy than the standard, single shot crossbow. It truly appears that from a purely mechanical standpoint, the cost of the repeater's simplicity and rate of fire was at the cost of range and power.

Of course, there's no accounting for what happens when you start talking about adding in magic, and dwarven or gnomish ingenuity.

Still, the comparison between a repeating Xbow and a traditional xbow seems a little like (though not perfectly) to comparing a pump action shotgun and a military grade bolt action rifle. One will have a good rate of fire but short range. The other will have long range and accuracy.


Also, seeing a chinese repeating crossbow in action makes it clear that thinking of it as requiring any special skill (i.e. an exotic feat) to use is hilarious. Apparantly, the chinese repeating crossbow was considered a good weapon for untrained peasant soldiers because it did NOT require any special skill to use. Just get a bunch of peasants all using this weapon, pump, point and shoot. There seemed to be not much worrying about great accuracy. Just aim in the general direction and the volume of fire of (poisoned) bolts would make up for any overall lack of skill and accuracy on the part of the peasant soldiers.

 

You can also find some detail description from the Wiki.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Repeating_crossbow

And the inventor:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zhuge_Liang

 

Thanks for the links. Good stuff! Further confirmation that DnD repeating xbows shouldn't have the range or raw single-shot damage potential of a traditional crossbow, but should be easy to use (i.e. not requiring an exotic Feat).