Any ideas of bringing slings into line with Deadly Spring bows?

[Flyndaran]

I love the article Deadly Spring, especially the rules for realistic damage.
But I would like for slings to remain a viable option for my SM+1 giants, so I can't just ignore their existence. Huge bows are quite expensive and frightening as they should be.
So any ideas on how to tweak slings into line? Changing damage to crushing like the Low Tech blurb is the first thing I would adopt.
But damage is still over the top.

Thank you for any suggestions.

[DouglasCole]

Originally Posted by Flyndaran

I love the article Deadly Spring, especially the rules for realistic damage.
But I would like for slings to remain a viable option for my SM+1 giants, so I can't just ignore their existence. Huge bows are quite expensive and frightening as they should be.
So any ideas on how to tweak slings into line? Changing damage to crushing like the Low Tech blurb is the first thing I would adopt.
But damage is still over the top.

Thank you for any suggestions.

There's some OK data out there on the velocity and mass of proper sling stones, from handheld and staff slings. If you want to use sqrt(KE) for penetration - that would scale with bows - then we'd have to figure out how the velocity of the stone scales with the length of the sling, the presence of the staff, and the ST and skill of the wielder. I'd probably treat skill as a bonus to ST, like the training bonus in The Last Gasp (which was invented for another book).

Once that relationship has been worked out, you can probably scale accordingly, at least with human-size slingers.

Not sure if that would scale well to giants.

[PK]

I genuinely love the irony of gamers working on more realistic damage rules . . . for slings wielded by giants. Only in GURPS. :)

[Flyndaran]

Originally Posted by PK

I genuinely love the irony of gamers working on more realistic damage rules . . . for slings wielded by giants. Only in GURPS. :)

8 to 9 foot humanoid giants are realistic if they obey physics. Humans aren't the largest primates possible by a long shot.

[DouglasCole]

Originally Posted by PK

I genuinely love the irony of gamers working on more realistic damage rules . . . for slings wielded by giants. Only in GURPS. :)

Horizontal trebuchet!

[DanHoward]

I have some stats on an Egyptian sling. Thom Richardson made some replicas a few years ago. Each was 1450 mm in length and weighed 45 g. He discovered that when stones were used, the results were very inconsistent, even when shooting stones of the same weight. Average range for stones weighing 45-75 g was 90 m, the range for stones weighing 80-85 g was 84 m, and the range for stones weighing 85-160 g was 82 m. He then tested lead shot and the results were more consistent. Two types were tested. One was spherical ('ball') and the other was more almond shaped ('shot'). The 38 g balls averaged 114 m and the 100 g balls averaged 107 m. The 40 g shot (29 x 18 x 13 mm) travelled 145 m on average and the 85 g shot (39 x 22 x 16 mm) averaged 120 m. Overall, lead outranged stone by about 50%.

Velocity at 3 m from the point of release: The 80-100 g stones averaged 30.3 m/s, the 100 g lead ball averaged 30.5 m/s, the 40 g lead shot averaged 30.6 m/s, and the 85 g shot averaged 31.2 m/s.

[vicky_molokh]

Pardon the less-math-savvy among the repliers, but do these changes bring slings in line with other weapons, or do they merely make ranged weapons inferior to other GURPS ST-based weapons?

[Icelander]

Originally Posted by vicky_molokh

Pardon the less-math-savvy among the repliers, but do these changes bring slings in line with other weapons, or do they merely make ranged weapons inferior to other GURPS ST-based weapons?

Given that momentum and mass are uniquely important in low-velocity penetration and wounding, it's not unreasonable that weapons optimised for long range have Damage that is comparatively poor even among other muscle-powered weapons.

Basically, if you want real physics to apply in your world, light projectiles moving at velocities realistic for muscle-powered weapons will not penetrate any serious armour. Doesn't matter if they're arrows, darts, stones or lead spheres. They need more velocity if they are to penetrate armour reliably.

Heavier projectiles do a bit better, enough so that I'd be happy enough with unmodified highly-optimistic muscle-powered stats for those. That would be javelins, spears, thrown maces, thrown axes, etc.

[Ulzgoroth]

Originally Posted by vicky_molokh

Pardon the less-math-savvy among the repliers, but do these changes bring slings in line with other weapons, or do they merely make ranged weapons inferior to other GURPS ST-based weapons?

Considering the lengthy discussions of how muscle-powered weapons are generally too good at penetrating, making slings closer correctly good at penetrating (which appears to be what Deadly Spring does to bows) would make them inferior to other GURPS ST-based weapons.

[RyanW]

Originally Posted by Flyndaran

8 to 9 foot humanoid giants are realistic if they obey physics. Humans aren't the largest primates possible by a long shot.

Sling armed gigantopithecus? I believe I'm suitably terrified now.