Superficial arrow wound & mail

blackcat777

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I realized I could make something more exciting if a character took an arrow superficially to the shoulder during an escape scene.

Character is wearing (non-negotiable for plot reasons) a gambeson and mail. I'm aware of how to get the arrow out of him and all related issues to that, but what I'm trying to figure out is the best way to get the arrow into him.

Regular bow? Crossbow? What kind of arrow? What about the archer, what kind of precision, distance, force would be required?

From what I have researched, butted mail is likely to be penetrated by an arrow, but riveted mail will resist arrows?

Character who gets hit would also be able to afford blingin' mail.

Thanks <3
 

benbenberi

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What period & place is your piece set in/based on? What kind of environment (terrain, buildings, etc) is your scene set in? Do you want them shot from fairly close or from a distance?

Since you've got gambesons & mail I will assume a medieval European setting. So... English (Welsh) longbow was deadly at a long distance, and the arrows hit very hard. Could definitely penetrate all but the sturdiest mail. (One reason plate armor was replacing mail in that period.) The classic "rain of arrows" effect was achieved by a lot of archers aiming very high so the arrows would strike the target from above, not straight on -- on the battlefield, against a massed enemy, aim was less important than volume and speed. But longbows could be used for hunting, so a skilled archer could certainly hit a target. It's a specialist weapon, though, which required years of training to master; it never spread beyond Wales & England; and it had a fairly short heyday, 13-15c. Depending on your story parameters, it may not be available to you.

If not an English longbow, your best bet for armor-piercing is a crossbow. Not so much a long-range weapon, but at a shorter distance much more powerful than any other type of bow. Its battlefield disadvantage was that it was slow, and it wasn't necessarily very accurate -- all the sights & other aiming aids that modern archers use didn't exist till many centuries after gambesons & mail were out of fashion.
 

talktidy

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Longbows were recovered from Henry VIII's Mary Rose, and they seem to have been the real deal, so that time frame should extend upward to the 16thC.

Every so often a history prog on the telly demonstrates the effect of an armour piercing arrow head on armour, with a side of pig standing in for a human. It kind of leaves me with a burning pain in my chest. Shudder. Those things in the right hands could do a lot of damage.
 

blackcat777

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Time period (or rather, weapons/armor time period equivalent) is circa 1400, medieval Europe.

Thanks for the guidance. This helps to focus my search.
 

waylander

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Poosibly a crossbow at the edge of its effective range?
 

benbenberi

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Longbows were recovered from Henry VIII's Mary Rose, and they seem to have been the real deal, so that time frame should extend upward to the 16thC.

Longbows rapidly fell out of favor from the mid-15c for 2 main reasons:
1) it took many years of frequent practice to train an archer to be effective with the weapon. This meant embedding archery in popular culture, so there would be boys and men in all the villages practicing, competing, and developing their archery skills because it was the thing to do and everybody was doing it. Eventually the popular passion for archery passed, people found other things to do with their time and ways to compete with each other and show off their skills that didn't take twenty years of practice to master (e.g. football, wrestling). People had to be forced to archery practice on pain of fines. Even with that, the pool of village longbowmen dried up. Since the main military use of longbows depended on having a lot of them in one place, all able to shoot with great speed and accuracy to create a "rain of arrows" and take down down charging cavalry from a distance, insufficient recruiting pool meant the army couldn't depend on getting enough, which meant they needed something different instead. Crossbows had been the main alternative for centuries. They didn't require much training or physical strength -- much more mechanical, you could take a peasant out of the field and make him an adequate crossbowman in a couple of weeks.

2) Gunpowder weapons obsoleted both longbows and crossbows in the early 16c. First field artillery -- decisive in the later stages of the Hundred Years War. By the late 15c hand guns -- arquebuses and muskets -- especially used in combination with pikes, they became the prevalent weapons of infantry within a few years of their introduction. Same short learning curve advantage as the crossbow, plus you got (literally) more bang for your buck!

Different requirements and constraints probably made longbows desirable for naval use a little longer than on land. But they were fading fast from the scene by the days of the Mary Rose.
 
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Cyia

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A crossbow bolt could definitely do it, but what about a recurve bow? It's compact, can be wielded from horseback or on the run, and packs a more powerful punch than a standard longbow. It's also usually quicker and easier to reload than a crossbow due to the weight and the way it's held/carried, so your archer could get off more shots, increasing the chances of a hit.
 

JNG01

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Bernard Cornwell's "Archer's Tale" is--besides being a great read in historical fiction--a detailed primer in the ins and outs of English longbow archery. Lots of discussion of the kinds of arrowheads the archers used against armor, draw weight, strategy and tactics, and effect at different ranges, for both longbows and crossbows.
 

lonestarlibrarian

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I think I have one crossbow (arbalest?) from here, and one crossbow from one of his students. They were gifts, so I don't know exactly which models I have. With my foot stirrup, I can shoot one bolt every 30-45 seconds, so someone who is actually trained can probably cut the draw/load/aim/fire process to half of that or better. Here's a side-by-side speed contest between a faster crossbow (arbalest?) and a longbow. The longbow had better speed, but required more strength and skill to use. The crossbow (arbalest?) was slower, but could be employed by people with less strength/skill/practice/training.

In other news, here's a video of longbow vs motorcycle helmet. When looking at videos about bows vs chainmail, check to see if they're using butted or riveted mail and if they have the gambeson underneath; it does make a difference, as you pointed out, and the consensus seems to be that butted mail was avoided in your time period precisely because of its unreliability.
 

AwP_writer

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Butted mail was rarely used in any period as real armor, it's major role was for ceremonial armor. Bodkin arrowheads are your best bet for piercing mail, but fare poorly against a gambeson. Broadheads will cut right through a gambeson, but would have great difficulty against the mail. Of the two, the bodkin would probably be more likely to make it through both layers.
 

Criccieth

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Well - it depends.

For example, an English/Welsh longbow with a needle-point bodkin would go through the mail: it's what they were designed to do. But that was a specific type of arrow for a specific set of circumstances - war. It's the same with other arrow types such as a hunting arrow - they were all designed for different purposes and the question a knowledgeable reader will have is: is it logical for this archer to have these arrows under these circumstances. Hawkeye can get away with having multiple arrows each with a different use in the same quiver but that's the Marvel films for you. :D The same is true of crossbows: different bolts for different circumstances.

So without knowing the circumstance of the escape, it's hard to say what type of weapon would be best and thus hard to say what level of skill etc would be needed.
Where is this happening - both in terms of actual location (England, Burgundy etc) and type of location (castle, manor, plains etc)? Because if for example it's in Venice then you're not that likely to find a longbowman unless you've put one there for another reason. A Genoses mercenary with his crossbow, on the other hand, might be in Venice but is less than likely to be in the Western Highlands of Scotland.

So - what's the set-up? Do you want him to think he's out of danger and then an arrow/bolt comes from nowhere and hits him?

Also - there's not really any such thing as a "superficial" arrow wound unless it's a really bad shot. I mean, if the arrow literally bounces off his shoulder, then it's going to bruise but that's about it. But if the arrow hits, it's going to do damage. It's almost certain to force mail and leather into the wound for a start. With an open wound, of course, you're looking at the risk of infection and prior to that blood loss and shock. Then there's the reduced use of the damaged arm. Longer term, of course, possible damage to the muscle or a chipped bone. As a one-time re-enactor, I'd not be able to buy a "Hollywood injury" type of arrow-wound, where your character somehow manages to carry on running around with a snapped-off arrow in his shoulder (unless he does this for a few minutes because the alternative is certain death of course).

It's certainly a workable scenario, but you'd have to be very specific to make it work. If all you want is a minor injury during the escape, then you might be better off going with a bit of a scrap with someone on the "other side"
 

blackcat777

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So - what's the set-up?

Setting is pseudo-medieval Europe, but for weapons/armor I've been approximating equipment from roughly 1400.

Villain and some extras are chasing hero and magic girl to a magical cave (which includes magical means of escape).

If all you want is a minor injury during the escape, then you might be better off going with a bit of a scrap with someone on the "other side"

I thought of doing that originally, but wanted to entertain other ideas because I don't want my hero to draw his sword on the villain until the very end (they're all on the same side... technically). But I need some kind of confrontation before they escape.

I also considered a situation where the hero would be forced to draw, if any scenario with an arrow is implausible.

The aftermath of an arrow wound (and the complications of realistically dealing with it) is particularly appealing to me because it would enhance a major thematic point of conflict I'm already running with.