Crossbow's......... Really that effective ?

[MercenaryCanary]

So why does the Crossbow still get alot of hype and love ?

Because it is the most silent and effective way to kill someone from a distance.

 

[thepj]

Almost in all genre's of gaming and movies the crossbow is considered the most deadliest weapon in the mediums stock, It makes sense since a Crossbow is just really really cool but to think of it hard a crossbow shouldn't really be considered the best out of the given lot since as a weapon it's pretty damn useless if you don't know how to use it.

It has to be made out of the right material.

The arrow ammo is not the easiest to carry around nor the best to manufacture.

Many factors such as weather conditions can effect the efficany of the weapon.

It takes skill to use making it only useful for the person who has extreme training in it.

It has a higher chance of backfire then any other ranger weapon.

Some mediums made sense out of it such as Killzone 2 with rocket like power to blot hostiles into walls then blow them up, but overall if you compare the cross bow to the gun the gun is just better.

So why does the Crossbow still get alot of hype and love ?

may i point you to: http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/RuleOfCool]

 

[Koeryn]

Almost in all genre's of gaming and movies the crossbow is considered the most deadliest weapon in the mediums stock, It makes sense since a Crossbow is just really really cool but to think of it hard a crossbow shouldn't really be considered the best out of the given lot since as a weapon it's pretty damn useless if you don't know how to use it.

It has to be made out of the right material.

The arrow ammo is not the easiest to carry around nor the best to manufacture.

Many factors such as weather conditions can effect the efficany of the weapon.

It takes skill to use making it only useful for the person who has extreme training in it.

It has a higher chance of backfire then any other ranger weapon.

Some mediums made sense out of it such as Killzone 2 with rocket like power to blot hostiles into walls then blow them up, but overall if you compare the cross bow to the gun the gun is just better.

So why does the Crossbow still get alot of hype and love ?

It does NOT take any more skill to fire a cross bow and any longarm. The skill only plays in at long ranges, where you have to account for the dropping of the bolt. Archery requires a lot of skill and control, but not crossbowmanship.

And no, it doesn't have a high-chance of backfiring. What the hell peice of shit crossbows have you used? I have seen ONE cammed bow fail EVER, out of the YEARS I've done archery, and it wasn't the cams that failed. The limbs snapped on a compound bow. Crossbow's are even more reliable than revolvers, seriously.

And if you want a really scary one:

Spoiler: Try the TAC-15 AR Upper reciever

Now, as for whether it's an effective weapon? Honestly, I'd rather have a gun. Crossbows are slow to reload, give you one shot per chance, and while they'll most likely drop anyone with that one shot (If for nothing other than the psychological effects of being shot by such a 'barbaric' weapon in an age of guns and science, and there IS a psychological shock)(though a half-pound crossbow bolt with a hunting broad head would SERIOUSLY ruin your day), you've only got the one shot. Great for stealth as, let's face it: They're a hell of a lot quieter than even supressed handguns, but for straight combat?

I'll take just about any gun over a crossbow any day. I'll take a regular bow over a crossbow as well

How bout a pros and cons?

Bow
PRO: Faster than crossbow to reload
PRO: Quiet
PRO: Aluminum / Carbon fiber arrow shafts are cheap and plentiful at any out-door sporting store and reusable
PRO: Often unregulated, or much less regulated than firearms
CON: Requires lots of training
CON: Less Stopping power than crossbow/Rifle
CON: Replacing broken strings is a pain
CON: Bulky, not easy to travel with, even if they are light weight.

Crossbow
PRO: Powerful, good range
PRO: Easy to use as long as you're strong enough to reset it
PRO: Quiet
PRO: Ammunition is readily reusable (especially with modern materials)
CON: Requires a lot of strength to draw, even with stirrups/winch
CON: Slow to reload
CON: Often more akward to carry than bows or rifles
CON: Harder to find ammunition than bow or rifle

hunting rifle (Bolt action, to be fair)
PRO: Point and click (ease of use)
PRO: Excellent stopping power and range
PRO: Plentiful ammunition at any out-door supplier
PRO: Very easy and quick to cycle between shots
CON: LOUD
CON: Heavily regulated, harder to get/keep than above
CON: Ammunition is heavy, cannot be reused
CON: Reloading magazines is slow

4/4 for the three, I think it works.

Anyways, my thoughts.

EDIT: Oh yeah, bows and crossbows will both punch through kevlar like no body's business. It was designed to spread the impact of a bullet, but they don't do ANYTHING against blades, and that's exactly what broadhead's are.

 

[similar.squirrel]

I think it's mostly for their silence that they're used so much. It's a whisper-quiet long-range weapon. 'Twould be a shame not to include it in games.

I was especially baffled by the gas-fed crossbow in the Van Helsing film a couple of years ago..That weapon made very little sense.

 

[nathan-dts]

Have you been playing Uncharted 2?

Who cares about realism, they are cool!

Plus they kill those smurf things in TWO hits, TWO I say.

You had to hold on to those for your life while playing the final level on hardest difficulty!

No easy task, I'll tell you that.

Oh cmon, Crushing wasn't that hard.

 

[anthony87]

It works better than a regular bow.

Depends, even the best crossbowman couldn't beat a well trained longbowman for range and power.

/Welsh heritage

Because they're pretty cool. But I always thought that the deadliest weapon was one of these:

Spoiler: MORE DAKKA!!!!

Who touched Sasha?

Spoiler

Wasn't me. I've got Natascha

 

[Glademaster_v1legacy]

I thought they were considered the sniper rifle because they fire where you point them and are pretty shitty in close range as there is no spread and you usually get 1 shot.

I can't actually think of any games which mix gun and crossbow. I don't play those kind of games...

Timeslitters 2 has a crossbow in the weapons list and it's an awesome game. OT Crossbows were the shotgun of the medieval world, the only problem with them was the amount of time it took to reload.

That's true, I'd forgotten about Timesplitters. However, how on earth are they like shotguns...? That's just illogical.

I was putting their power into perspective. Compare the power of a handgun to a shotgun...thats the relative difference between a bow and crossbow, they used to use them to take down armoured troops because the bolts had that much power behind them. {I wasn't saying they fired like shells XD}

Well longbows actually had more than enough power in them to take out armoured troops and taking the ranger into account I still think they are more like a sniperfrom the range and power.

 

[Goldeneye1989]

-SNIP-

in a time where death in warfare was common with a large range of weapons being used that can make grusome wounds.... to be called unholy by the pope. is an impressive feat, it was 1 hit one kill against heavily armored knights.

 

[HotFezz8]

well the longbow beat it repeatedly.... and the US army don't use it... so probably not...

 

[Sir_Tor]

Well a crossbow may take a year of traning to become an expert of while a bow takes a lifetime to perfect.

 

[Et3rnalLegend64]

You mean in real life? They're simple to use, but take an ungodly amount of time to load when compared to a bow. A good bow user can fire many more shots than a crossbow user in the same amount of time.

 

[Sethzard]

It does obscene damage to people, to such an extent that although it can't go through plate mail, it will kill the person inside due to the power of the shot.

 

[Adam80027]

Here's a Bow I can carry and fire with one hand, leaving my free hand for stuff like, oh I don't know... A GUN!?

Or another crossbow. Akimbo crossbows, man! Two times the deadly fun. Of course, reloading would also be twice the *****.

 

[TheGreatCoolEnergy]

I can't actually think of any games which mix gun and crossbow. I don't play those kind of games...

Half Life 2

OP: Yes but crossbows are damn powerful. In medieval times they were so deadly that a pope actually tried to get them removed from use, because people were dieing to fast.

 

[Shadowfaze]

In the correct hands, crossbow is more deadly than any gun. Especially with explosive tipped bolts.

 

[SnipErlite]

Longbow > Crossbow

 

[SimuLord]

It takes skill to use making it only useful for the person who has extreme training in it.

I thought one of the big pros to the crossbow was the fact that it could be given to people with little to no training and have them point it and pull the trigger thus killing whoever is directly in front of them. Sure you're not gonna be an expert marksman with it without experience and practice, but that goes for pretty much any weapon, even guns.

Regardless though, I don't know where you get this idea that crossbows are overhyped, most games and movies I've seen treat them as they are, a projectile weapon with often more force than a normal bow, but with a slower firing rate.

The X-bow was the first great social equalizer on the battlefield. An untrained peasant could take down a noble knight with one well-aimed shot, and all of a sudden a lifetime of military training wasn't worth much, at least not when compared to the soldiers of antiquity.

The Pope even tried to have crossbows banned and threatened to excommunicate any ruler who used them in his armies because it was considered a sin against God to engage in such social leveling. The crossbow could be seen as the first democratizing influence to hit society since the ancient Athenians and the first small baby step on the road to the modern world.

I'd say that's a pretty significant weapon!

 

[Tom the Feeble]

its better than a bat...

 

[CJ1145]

Almost in all genre's of gaming and movies the crossbow is considered the most deadliest weapon in the mediums stock, It makes sense since a Crossbow is just really really cool but to think of it hard a crossbow shouldn't really be considered the best out of the given lot since as a weapon it's pretty damn useless if you don't know how to use it.

It has to be made out of the right material.

Which is generally easy enough to find.

The arrow ammo is not the easiest to carry around nor the best to manufacture.

Compared to what? Arrows? Yeah, because arrows are pointed sticks, not that hard to make.

Many factors such as weather conditions can effect the efficany of the weapon.

Weather effects how my guitar sounds, but I still prefer it over a trumpet.

It takes skill to use making it only useful for the person who has extreme training in it.

Hold up, hold up. Do you even know why crossbows were used? Because they were so easy to learn to use. Archers took years of training to get the hang of their bows, but crossbowmen took a month at most.

It has a higher chance of backfire then any other ranger weapon.

Ranger weapon? I didn't realize we'd entered Dungeons and Dragons. When paired up with period-accurate guns, crossbows are far more reliable actually.

Some mediums made sense out of it such as Killzone 2 with rocket like power to blot hostiles into walls then blow them up, but overall if you compare the cross bow to the gun the gun is just better.

Then that's not a crossbow. It's a rocket launcher that looks suspiciously like a crossbow.

So why does the Crossbow still get alot of hype and love ?

 

[WaywardHaymaker]

Why crossbows? Why not?

I've seen games with guns featuring swords, and even then the sheer bad-assery of that weapon makes it seem less of "Why do you have that?" and more of "Why don't you?"

I assume that you mean in video games. But you know, that's just it: They're video games. I could have a flaming pair of scissors that doubled as chopsticks while riding my Shambling Devouring Fanged Weredragon Skeleton across a lake of kittens avoiding paintings of walking tables with Mac Computers on them and I wouldn't ask how this was possible (Granted I would ask how in God's name the developer thought of that, but then I would just commence enjoying myself).