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Originally Posted by Icelander
GURPS bows can punch through plate at over 200 yards and are no harder to use than muskets. Crossbows are actually easier to shoot accurately than 18th century muskets.
A soldier using a Brown Bess musket with 2 points in Guns (Musket) has skill 11 and fires at effective skill 13 after aiming. A soldier using a Composite Bow with 2 points in Bow has skill 10 and fires at skill 13 after aiming. The crossbow-using soldier with 2 points in Crossbow has skill 11 and fires at effective skill 15 after aiming.
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Training, assuming you start with Joe Average, to be able to use a Longbow at a skill of 10 will take 5,200 hours. I believe Sundays were the traditional day for such training, in Wales of course. That's 6-12 years of training to get ST+1 and DX/A [2] 10. And then he'll do 1d+1 with Acc3 out to 165yds.
Muskets and Crossbows are DX/E. Grab your conscript and give him 4 weeks training and he'll have DX/E [1] 10. Assuming you give him a goats foot with his outsize crossbow, he'll manage 1d+4 with Acc4 out to 280 yds. With a musket it's 4d with Acc 2 out to 100 yds but he gets almost double the 1/2D range and that's twice the damage at treble the effective Longbow range. At TL4, you'll be using flintlocks; quicker reload and 2.5x1/2D range.
Versus armour? GURPS TL3 plate is DR7; with a Longbow, you'll need extra muscles and real good luck on your die rolls to do anything or am I reading the stats wrong? Crossbows penetrate plate with comparative ease, and muskets can ignore it. The only place where Longbows win is reload rate:(
So, Longbow man, 6-12 years training, for a weapon of no use against heavy armour v's crossbow/musket, 4 weeks training, for battlefield clearance...