LogFAQs > #960378950

I was just replaying Pillars of Eternity 2 since I never passed it. That and warhammer: total war made me realize how much I like the 'renaissance' fantasy setting and I'm glad they have guns in their setting.

That made me realize that not many fantasy settings include guns, especially those "medieval" ones that take bits and pieces of inspiration from other historical eras, like plate armor and rapiers being part of a medieval fantasy setting despite those things coming later. Of course if they aim for "realism" in a fantasy setting you would have chainmail and coat of plates rather than plater armor. I've seen arguments citing pop-history views of renaissance era firearms like muskets and arquebuses as being inaccurate, or having short range and some other things. The thing is that historically firearms originally were seen to perform best in "small wars" such as raids, ambuscades and the like where firearm wielders could operate independently, take cover and use the terrain for their advantage basically what your average RPG has you doing. Originally mass number of firearms proved to be ineffective without later drills because a lot of smoke and the stress of battle put a big dent in the accuracy, something that was noted by a French captain who wrote that during the French protestant war of religions the Protestants had a large number of guns but they couldn't stop blocs of pikes from reaching them. Basically the opposite of what people say that "mass guns = win".

In terms of accuracy and even range English mercenary veterans of continental European wars noted that the arquebus was more accurate, more powerful and shot farther than the longbow they had been accustomed to. These authors wrote that the firearm was the weapon of a professional soldier who required extensive drilling meanwhile the longbow was the weapon of the untrained who should only be used when there wasn't any guns around. On the other hand those that favored the longbow tended to be moralists and traditionalists rather than veterans who had experienced the effects these guns had first hand. By the Tudor era the Privy Council deemed any man showing up to muster with a longbow as an "unarmed man".

Just a mini-rant because I really like early firearms. It's a shame they're seldom seen in fantasy RPGs.

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Aut viam inveniam aut faciam.
Will not change sig until the Tsar is put back in the Russian throne (July 08, 2010)