Crossbows:
It seems there are many views on how common crossbows are. Personally I prefer them to be kind of rare outside dwarven areas and Kralorela. A crossbow just doesn't feel ancient.
Me:
>The people I game with include a couple of inveterate min-maxers who
>always choose heavy crossbows as their missile weapon
Sandy:
>Wow. What incompetent minimaxers. Do you let them carry the
>crossbows around perpetually strung and ready to fire?
This is not in the campaign I GM (my PCs are East Islanders who have never seen a crossbow). But the other GMs I know let the players get away with this (and a lot of other things too, like going around in heavy armour all day in the hottest, driest parts of Prax).
I'm just a bit tired of how some (most) of the players act in the campaigns where I am a player too: get the heaviest equipment possible, disregard all cultural barriers in order to get as much advantages as possible, etc.
Sandy's Zamokil veldang: interesting reading!
Back to the bows:
Sandy:
>Colin Watson usefully adds a new fact to the archery debate,
>mentioning that longbows are no good in the heat, while composite
>bows come unstuck in damp climates.
Longbows being useless in a hot climate sounds strange considering that the most powerful longbows in the real world are used in east Africa, by a people whose name I have forgotten (will check).
Unicorn riders:
Me:
>>Do the unicorn riders use stirrups? I think of them as not even
>>using saddles
Sandy:
> I'm willing to believe that the unicorn riders don't use
>stirrups or saddles. They don't need lances, after all (the unicorns
>supply those).
Ian Gorlick:
>I suspect that there is a lot of variation among the URiders. With both mount
>and rider being intelligent, rational beings, I suspect that they discuss the
>use of equipment and come up with a solution that is agreeable to both of them.
This of course makes perfect sense. If the rider feels better with a saddle she uses one. If not, I think the fact that you are in mindlink with your mount can compensate for a lot of the inconveniences of a less secure seat.
The unicorn rider I play in a campaign doesn't use a saddle, but on the other hand she doesn't fight mounted either. She gallops at high speed at the opponents and then uses magic and her ridiculously high acrobatic skills to leap from her unicorn onto the opponents mount, usually behind him where she can stab him with her daggers.
/Nils W
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