Muskets vs. Crossbows - Why do firearms exist?

[Smitty-48]

Seemed to work out for them in the end, where are all the great crossbow powers of the world? Shot dead with guns apparently. Next topic?

Yeah, it worked out in the end .. . even if no one can say how or why.

But you send me into battle c.1450 and offer me a crossbow or a hand cannon and I'll be taking that crossbow, thanks.

You'll take what you're issued and do as you're told, this is 1450, son, ain't no fuckin' hippie commune up in here, now get back in ranks.

[DBTrek]

Seemed to work out for them in the end, where are all the great crossbow powers of the world? Shot dead with guns apparently. Next topic?

Yeah, it worked out in the end .. . even if no one can say how or why.

But you send me into battle c.1450 and offer me a crossbow or a hand cannon and I'll be taking that crossbow, thanks.

You'll take what you're issued and do as you're told, this is 1450, son, ain't no fuckin' hippie commune up in here, now get back in ranks.

This is how highwaymen happen.
Hand a peasant a weapon and treat them like shit.

[Smitty-48]

Yeah, it worked out in the end .. . even if no one can say how or why.

But you send me into battle c.1450 and offer me a crossbow or a hand cannon and I'll be taking that crossbow, thanks.

You'll take what you're issued and do as you're told, this is 1450, son, ain't no fuckin' hippie commune up in here, now get back in ranks.

This is how highwaymen happen.
Hand a peasant a weapon and treat them like shit.

You might be onto something there, crossbolt; you can provide your own ammo, whereas with guns; I control the ammo, could actually be the reason staring you in face. If I hand you a crossbow, you can turn it against me with homemade ammo, but since you don't have the powder and shot back in your village, when I hand you a gun, not so much.

Maybe the crossbow was the AK-47 and the musket was the bolt action rifle, so when I go to arm my peasants, maybe I want to arm them with weapons which are decisive only in massed ranks under my control, rather than arming them to be the Viet Cong packing AK's in the countryside.

A few AK crossbows kicking around is not a big issue, but maybe I don't want to hand out a hundred thousand of them all at once, whereas since I have the monopoly on powder and shot at this juncture, if I hand out a hundred thousand guns, they're really not usefull to you without my wagon trains.

With the guns of this era, the peasants are only effective in massed ranks under the control of my professional officers supplied by my logistics tail, if the peasants run off with those firelocks, doesn't make them an army, so could be that the tactical disadvantage was the whole point.

[DBTrek]

Hmmm . . . another good point.

[TheReal_ND]

If I hand you a crossbow, you can turn it against me with homemade ammo,

Laughing hard rn at these newfound fletchers popping out of the woodwork to tell us we don't need AR15's and that we can just whittle down broom handles and glue a couple pigeon feathers to them. Laughing. So. Hard. R.N.

[Smitty-48]

In Japan, Tokugawa actually armed the peasants with guns to win a civil war against the other clans, but then when the war was over, the Samurai confiscated all the guns from the peasants, so if there had been a moment for the peasants to rise up with the guns, that was it, but once the peasants were no longer massed in ranks under command and control of the Samurai, disarming them was no problemo. The samurai could hand out the guns for war, and then take them back again and put them under lock and key when the war was over, and they were apparently pretty confident that this could be done.

Even if peasants have firelocks, how much gunpowder and .65 caliber ball rounds do they have? Without the logistics tail from the fortress, those guns are just fancy clubs, if you wave one at the Samurai, he's just gonna chop your head off, so you might as well just hand it over, because it's no good to you, unless you have the know how and means to make gunpowder and shot in large quantities, and then command and control massed ranks in formation for battle, which, peasants in the 15th century? Probably not.

The firelock is no AR15, its effectiveness is totally dependant on two elements at the time, professional military logistics, and professional military command and control, as a guerilla weapon, the firelock is just a fancy club. The lords and their professional military officers, even if they give you firelocks, they still retain the keys to making them effective, unlike a crossbow, a firelock is no good to you, unless you're a very organized and disciplined army under strict command and control, in massed ranks, with a logistics train to support it all, which, even if they have the firelocks, the peasants don't actually amount to all that by default.

Even if you wind the clock forward to say, Culloden for example, why did the British win? Was it because they had better guns? No, it was because they were professionals, who knew how to use their guns more effectively, as an organized force with strict discipline in massed ranks.

[Hastur]

This was the turning point:

[ssu]

What makes it so difficult?

Keeping powder dry.
Having fire available on the battlefield, rain or shine, quickly enough to utilize your weapon.
Hitting targets with an admittedly inaccurate weapon.

Those would be three off the top of my head.

- With a medieval crossbow, you also have to keep the string dry. Was it in Crecy that the English Longbowmen had an advantage that they could take the strings off their longbows as the Italian crossbowmen serving the French King couldn't. I guess today it isn't an issue with modern crossbows.
- Do notice that at longer range a crossbow also is innaccurate.
- Crossbow doesn't penetrate plate armour, firearms do.

The handgun/handcannon admittedly is inaccurate, yet other firearms aren't so wildly innaccurate.

[ssu]

This was the turning point:

Notice the year there. 15th Century really is still the age of the crossbow, in the 16th Century they are replaced by firearms.

I'm not sure, but it may even be so that the longbow is used longer than the crossbow, actually.

[Hastur]

This was the turning point:

Notice the year there. 15th Century really is still the age of the crossbow, in the 16th Century they are replaced by firearms.

I'm not sure, but it may even be so that the longbow is used longer than the crossbow, actually.

My theory on this is that the transition to gunpowder was driven by artillery. Everyone wanted big guns to counter fortifications. The advantage of a cannon over the trebuchet is pretty obvious. When you have cannons you have to get a supply of gunpowder. An abundance of gunpowder + human inventiveness gets us to the musket.
A lot of people must have realised that the handgun was just in the early stages whereas the crossbow was as good as it gets. It was a race to improve the boom sticks faster than the opposition. I'm sure there were a lot of luddites in the armed forces back then as well but the side that embraces new technology the fastest usually gets the advantage.
I know that the crossbow was used a lot longer in the New World. It was most likely due to the problems of bringing enough gunpowder along on long expeditions into the interior. Crossbowmen participated in Hernán Cortés' conquest of Mexico and accompanied Francisco Pizarro on his initial expedition to Peru.