Re: Spelljammer Construction System (Part II)

	In Eric Marsden's book Greek and Roman Artillery:  Historical
Development, there is a table in the chapter on range that shows how the
energy would taper off and thus the Ancients considered a particular size
of artillery as optimal.  Sorry I don't have the book for specifics.
	I am no expert in physics, but I do know from reading that
trebuchets were built because they can throw heavier materials than
onagers, not for greater range.  You use trebuchets to batter walls.  The
question comes down to whether you want to do more damage to a ship or hit
them from further away.  AD&D is a simplistic game.  That's why there is
a single range and damage rating for artillery.  Hence, to do more damage
a weapon needs to throw a heavier missile which in turn will reduce the
range.
	Also, ballistics can obviously be affected by the material at
hand.  Hellenistic dart throwers were larger than Roman ones, yet they
had similar ranges.  Why?  The Hellenists used wood while the more
advanced Romans used iron.

John McCloud

On Sun, 25 Jan 1998, Paul and Kelly Westermeyer wrote:

> >>This is not actually the case in actual ballistics.  Heavier weapons tend
> >>to produce greater ranges in the real world,  the old E=MV<squared> thing
> >>is sort of a cause of this.
> >
> >Are the "actual balistics" you refer to current or medeaval? I ask simply
> >because it could make sense that a smaller weapon could have a longer range
> >simply because of the way that a ballista or a catapult produce and store
> >energy to hurl a 'payload.'  It seems to me that efficiency would rapidly be
> >lost when a seige engine is simply scaled up to accomodate more massive
> >projectiles.
> >
> >Rick.