# Medieval archery questions.



## thorinsbeard (Jan 8, 2014)

Hi fellow archery fans, I am working on a realism mod for archery in a video game called skyrim. the bows in this game are medieval of sorts, and I was wondering what the experts on here think the average fps of bows would be from that time period, arrow recovery chance, the maximum possible rate of fire on such bows, and how deep such arrows would penetrate a body. any contributions would be awesome, as well as links to where I could find this information on my own.


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## thorinsbeard (Jan 8, 2014)

I totally forgot to mention that there is also a crossbow in this game, so the same information as above applying to crossbow would be great. the crossbow is not a crank reload, the string is reloaded by pulling it back with your hand only, so keep in mind it's not a huge war crossbow to be fired from the battlements.


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## Yewselfbow (Jan 28, 2006)

The best examples to work from would be the bows recovered from the Mary Rose. Although there is some debate regarding the draw weight of the bows, the general consensus is the bows were from around 100lb to around 150lbs + . Examples of arrows suggests that arrow weights of 1200 grains were in common use with arrow speeds at around 170 fps. As for penetration ... depends what your shooting at.
Hope this helps


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## thorinsbeard (Jan 8, 2014)

I really appreciate the help and this information is very usefull. as for penetration in skyrim, you shoot at people, animals, targets made of straw and many other things but I can only set the depth of penetration value as one number unfortunately. so assuming the arrow is hitting a flesh target as that is what you are usually aiming at, can you guess what how deep it would penetrate?


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## Yewselfbow (Jan 28, 2006)

thorinsbeard said:


> I really appreciate the help and this information is very usefull. as for penetration in skyrim, you shoot at people, animals, targets made of straw and many other things but I can only set the depth of penetration value as one number unfortunately. so assuming the arrow is hitting a flesh target as that is what you are usually aiming at, can you guess what how deep it would penetrate?


With the mass and the speed of the arrow, I would imagine there would be full penetration into the centre of most organic tissue. Although due to the length and diameter of the shaft I doubt if you'd see a complete pass through. Remember these arrow shafts were half inch diameter and 32 to 34 inches long.
Hope this helps


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