Christopher Hall - 08:18am Sep 30, 2001 PST (#1578 of 1586)
Playing GMT's Kasserine, BSO's Longbow ... and easing into Mr. Zucker's 
body of work.

RHB,

Another design element I'd like some better insight into is the relative
effectiveness of longbows and crossbows vis a vis terrain.

I'm suprised that there is no fire combat disadvantage for the
crossbowmen firing up hill one or two elevation levels. I understand the
crossbow has a flat trajectory (thus no 'overfire' allowed, unlike
longbows). It seems that the flat trajectory, combined with an uphill
shot of, what, 50 feet per level (I'm guessing with that number - is it
somewhere in the rules?), would make for some kind of negative drm.

Similarly, there's no downhill fire advantage for the longbowmen sitting
at the crest of the hill at Crecy, firing down into the massed,
shieldless Genoese in the low terrain beneath them. Doesn't feel right.
And in my 3 tries so far, the Genoese are doing far better than they
ought to - even when I just send 'em straight up the hill.

Off the cuff - and subject to potential excommunication *grin* - I'd
throw out the following possible additional drm's for discussion:

*When firing uphill, crossbows only, -1 drm for each level of elevation
crossed.

*When firing downhill any number of levels, all units, +1 drm.

*"No shields" drm of +1 for an English firing unit when targetting a
Genoese crossbow unit.

All together, for a crossbow unit firing uphill, you'd have -1 for rain,
-1 or -2 for elevation, and either 0 or +2 for range.

English fire on the Geneose would involve +1 for downhill, +1 for 'no
shields,' and +1 for range.

At 2 hexes distance, the English fire net +3 against crossbows, the
Genoese fire net -2 or -3 (depending on whether there's 1 or 2 elevation
levels separating the units).

At one hex range, it's still +3 English against crossbows, but 0 for the
Genoese.

Ok, blow me up *LOL*

CJH