[The Dark]

Originally Posted by rcaf_777

I really don't see them as common weapons but you can certainly built them with a little know how and some scrounged materials.

High powered ones definitely wouldn't be common (torsion ones in particular take a lot of tuning and big brass ones to be that close to that much potential energy in the twisted skeins of rope).

Some communities could use against criminals or marauders, not a effective weapon but a fear weapon.

A half-kilogram projectile traveling 100 m/s seems like it'd be plenty effective to me, and that's what Nick Watts gets out of his Orsova simulant (I don't call it a replica or reproduction because he's trying to simulate its performance with modern materials in a historical configuration, then back-engineer) his way to more historically accurate materials. The original Orsova ballista was supposedly capable of launching projectiles across the Danube, an 800 meter shot. Watts has gotten just under a kilometer (998 yards was his best shot), and shooting freehand had 20-foot groups at 880 yards. It'd essentially be a stationary or vehicle-mounted sniper's weapon.

Some Examples Are

Hwacha - A multiple rocket launcher developed by Koreans based on ancient Han Chinese technological innovations and deployed in the defence of the Korean peninsula against Japanese invasion in the 1590s. As some of you might know this system was rebuilt and tested on the show MythBusters durring it 2008 season.

These use black powder, and would potentially be effective area-denial systems. They'd be incredibly slow to reload, and range is only about 100 meters, so operators would be vulnerable.

Ballista - An ancient military siege engine in the form of a crossbow. Typically it was used to hurl large bolts, and had better accuracy than a catapult at the expense of reduced range.

Note that there are two types of ballista - the "giant bow", and the torsion ballista, which uses twisted skeins of rope to hold two arms (which are not attached to each other). Torsion ballistae can have very long (relatively speaking) ranges (cf. the near-kilometer range mentioned above).

[/quote]Catapult or Trebuchet - Used to hurl large objects, like say a cow, at english dig dog K NITES who are looking for the Holy Grail.[/quote]The range for these goes from around 75 meters (for a traction trebuchet) to 300 meters (for a large counterweight trebuchet).

Another option is for a Old Black Powder Cannon, Say like from the US Civil War.

I've done the most common US Civil War field artillery, and I've got the numbers for naval artillery (though I need to re-do some of them before posting, since I used the smoothbore's 70% Pen modifier for all rounds, including rifled artillery).