I think the rules - both Pathfinder and previous D&D variants - undersell both the damaging power and difficulty of use of the sling.
Historically sling bullets (lead or clay/ceramic) had a greater range and more pentrative power than arrows from simple bows (a short bow in D&D rules). There are various reference for this - try www.slinging.org
Plus the sling is not a "simple" weapon - it takes a lot of practice to be proficient. It should be a martial weapon. At least with a short bow (a martial weapon) you can point in the right direction and hope for the best. With a sling you need to have far more trainig to make sure the bullet heads in the right direction (and not sidewards or backwards!)
So I suggest - as I use in my own "house rules" - that the sling be a martial weapon. Damage using a sling bullet should be 1d4 / 1d6 and range increment 60ft. Damage using a stone should be 1d3/1d4 and range say 40ft.
Then there is the whole damage/range issue of using larger stones - baseball sized - that would have a shorter range if thrown from a hand sling (one with the the appropriately sized "cup") but a longer range if thrown from a staff-sling.
I think the rules - both Pathfinder and previous D&D variants - undersell both the damaging power and difficulty of use of the sling.
Historically sling bullets (lead or clay/ceramic) had a greater range and more pentrative power than arrows from simple bows (a short bow in D&D rules). There are various reference for this - try www.slinging.org
Maybe, but it's hardly likely that a sling stone, or even a bullet, hits hard enough at such long ranges to do real damage. I would suggest the maximum range for effective damage is no greater, and probably a bit less than, that of an arrow.
There is just something to be said about having a pointy tip.
Now, up close and personal, the sling bullet likely travels faster than an arrow, and if the damage is not dispersed by armor, it would be very damaging indeed.
Though I believe the pointy arrow wins in the armor-piercing department, more likely to punch through leather or to find a seam in other armor and punch through withuot dispersing as much damaging force as a sling projectile.
Plus the sling is not a "simple" weapon - it takes a lot of practice to be proficient. It should be a martial weapon. At least with a short bow (a martial weapon) you can point in the right direction and hope for the best. With a sling you need to have far more trainig to make sure the bullet heads in the right direction (and not sidewards or backwards!)
This I agree with.
But we don't have varying degrees of training in D&D, beyond simple, martial, and exotic.
So, it likely belongs under martial, ranking it equal to the training needed for a bow, except for one thing.
Every herdsman from Iberia to China used them when herding their flocks, herds, etc., which implies that any Tom, Dick, or Harry was proficient, or could be proficient, with no military or official training at all.
Which implies the sling might be a simple weapon after all.
In reality, it was just easier to construct. Anyone with a little bit of leather could add some thongs to a pouch and make a sling, but making a bow took a skilled craftsman.
This is why the herdsmen had slings and not bows.
Which means we're back to martial, but now we know why.
So I suggest - as I use in my own "house rules" - that the sling be a martial weapon. Damage using a sling bullet should be 1d4 / 1d6 and range increment 60ft. Damage using a stone should be 1d3/1d4 and range say 40ft.
Sounds quite reasonable.
But there is one thing to consider.
Slings let you apply your STR modifier to damage. This is huge benefit, and must be taken into consideration when calculating sling damage.
Are you sure you want to houserule it that a sling can do considerably more damage than a shortbow without having to pay compound prices, and they have similar ranges, but but the shortbow costs a commoner a year's wage? Further, when you're far from town and out of arrows, your bow is worthless, but at least with a sling, you can find ammo everywhere.
Why would anyone ever use a bow with that houserule.
Tough call, realism vs. gamism.
I leave with one final thought.
Slings vanished in the real world. Became toys for children, tools for herdsmen, but their usage as weapons of warfare disappeared entirely, while bows lasted until firearms became cheap and widespread.
There is a reason for this.
Armor.
Slings were great against unarmored foes. But once body armor became more common, the ability of armor to disperse the blunt damage of sling ammo reduced the desirability of slings in warfare.
In D&D we don't reduce damage for various weapons vs. various armors (though in older editions we did exactly that).
It might be possible that the sling is treated as a weaker weapon to account for the fact that nearly every target we attack has either body armor or natural armor.
Slings are great for hunting, but less so for warfare. It takes awhile to ramp it up, while an arrow takes less time to 'aim'; slings have more of a 'timing' issue. (Which is OK when hunting.)
Certain races have them as common weapons (Haflings) as they are culturally used for sport or for hunting, but not for warfare so much.
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Plus the sling is not a "simple" weapon - it takes a lot of practice to be proficient. It should be a martial weapon. At least with a short bow (a martial weapon) you can point in the right direction and hope for the best. With a sling you need to have far more trainig to make sure the bullet heads in the right direction (and not sidewards or backwards!)
Hmmm ... we don't have the same historical data.
Slinging was primarily a hunting tool for children. In medieval Paris (and even much later), children were expected to learn slinging so that they could hunt small birds and bring something to eat to the family instead of being just deadweights.
It led to gangs of teenagers fighting each other with slings around the town. And what you highlight is that yes, it is too difficult to wield to be used efficiently on the battlefield. Which is why it was eliminated from armies since antiquity.
In short, while damage could be revised up maybe, I don't buy the "martial weapon" part at all. Also, the question of the rate of fire leaves me somewhat perplex.
And what you highlight is that yes, it is too difficult to wield to be used efficiently on the battlefield. Which is why it was eliminated from armies since antiquity.
Well, that's not entirely correct. Alexander the Great had slingers in his army during the battle of Gaugamela, Roman doctors left behind manuscripts on how to remove sling bullets from wounded soldiers (the Carthiginians had mercenaries called Balearic slingers who could outrange Roman archers with lethality), and slingers were even used during the Hundred Years' War (poor match against a longbow, I'm afraid). Slings definitely have their place in ancient/medieval warfare (well, more ancient than medieval, but still).
Plus the sling is not a "simple" weapon - it takes a lot of practice to be proficient. It should be a martial weapon. At least with a short bow (a martial weapon) you can point in the right direction and hope for the best. With a sling you need to have far more trainig to make sure the bullet heads in the right direction (and not sidewards or backwards!)
Hmmm ... we don't have the same historical data.
Slinging was primarily a hunting tool for children. In medieval Paris (and even much later), children were expected to learn slinging so that they could hunt small birds and bring something to eat to the family instead of being just deadweights.
It led to gangs of teenagers fighting each other with slings around the town. And what you highlight is that yes, it is too difficult to wield to be used efficiently on the battlefield. Which is why it was eliminated from armies since antiquity.
In short, while damage could be revised up maybe, I don't buy the "martial weapon" part at all. Also, the question of the rate of fire leaves me somewhat perplex.
I think we're looking at this all wrong.
I have practiced both with slings and with bows.
I can say this. I hit the target with my 3rd or 4th arrow. Not great, but I hit it.
With a sling, I was up around 30 or 40 stones before I hit the target, and some of those misses were off by as much as 90 degrees or more. Downright embarrassing.
It takes a lot of practice to get good with a sling.
It also takes a lot of practice to get good with a bow.
It takes considerably less practice to get good with a crossbow.
So why do children hunt with a weapon that is difficult to learn? You are right, Stereo, slings have been childrens' toys, simple hunting weapons, and tools for simple herdsmen all throughout recorded history (primarily European and Mediterranean history, though they also saw use in the Americas).
Three simple reasons.
One, crossbows are expensive, and heavy, and take a fair amount of strenth to wield, Too, the ammunition is expensive, and medieval bolts were often so damaged the first time they were fired that they were discarded without ever being fired a second time (parts were salvaged, but the process took time and energy and a little cost). Any family that could afford a crossbow and its ammo, so easily that they sent their child out to hunt with it, probably had little concern over what was for dinner.
Two, crossbows are very deadly. A misfire and Old Widow Mergatroid has seen her last day. Even if a child fired it. But not so with a child and a sling. Sure, and adult slinger could fell Goliath with one stone, but not so likely a child. A misfired slingstone and Old Widow Mergatroid has a new bruise to complain about over tea. Probably.
Three, children have all the time in the world to practice with their sling. They didn't have X-Box, or the Internet, or cell phones, or Dungeons and Dragons to keep them busy. Heck, most of them barely had any toys at all. But a little leather or rawhide and a moment with a leather punch and off you go. Ready to play "Stone the Heathens" with the other boys. And there is no worry about ammo. The world is full of ammo. You can't break it, or ruin it, or run out of it.
So off you go, mon frer, and while you're out stoning those heathens, see if you can't stone us a quail or a thrush, or a wild goose if you can find one.
So is the sling simple to learn. Heck no.
But is it easy to practice? Absolutely.
Is it easy to own a sling? Yep. And it's ammo too.
So, any commoner or child who wanted a sling had a sling. And ammo. And could practice until they could stone a heathen right between the eyes at 200 paces.
But almost nobody had that kind of access to crossbows and quarrels.
Does this make a sling simple? Not really. It's still takes forever to get good with it.
But it does make it a weapon that just about every simple commoner knew how to use.
Which does mean it's not a martial weapon, either. There is no need to join a military (or paramilitary) force to gain the training or access to the military grade weaponry in order to learn how to use a sling.
So if it isn't martial, and it isn't simple, then what is it?
Well, since everyone could have one, and everyone could be fairly good with it, competent at least, before they hit puberty, it ought to be on everyone's weapon list.
Don't you think?
So while it's not easy to use, classifying it as simple puts the sling right where it belongs - in everybody's hands.
Every herdsman from Iberia to China used them when herding their flocks, herds, etc., which implies that any Tom, Dick, or Harry was proficient, or could be proficient, with no military or official training at all.
The reason herdsmen were - and in some cultures still are - proficient is that they spent every day practicing. If it's a choice between hitting that fox trying to kill one of your lambs or having dad beat you with a stick that night for letting the fox eat the lamb, you will become proficient very quickly.
Just because anyone could be proficient does not mean everyone is proficient. It's all about how much you practice and the average person would not have much time unless they had a compelling reason to do so.
According to some historical sources all Roman legionaries received training with the sling (normal sling or staff-sling). Now their skill levels would vary and at the least would be sufficient to put down a volume of surpressing fire when used enmasse. But to be able to hit an individual target (which is essentially what the D&D combat rules cover), you need to be far more proficient.
A sling bullet - for example one made of lead - is quite pointy and when launched would spin and have considerable penetrative power. Armour wouldn't completely negate the impact of a lead bullet. Damage is not solely reliant on penetrative power - otherwise everyone would use spears and maces would be relegated to cracking walnuts. Short of being clad in full plate much of a soldier's body would be exposed - lower legs, feet, arms, face etc even when wearing armour that by D&D rules has a high protective value. Sling bullets have been shown in historical references to hit a metal helmet and kill the wearer.
The round bullets in some historical references are more likely to be large stones fired from a staff-sling which had a shorter range but higher trajectory and were ideal for lobbing stones, and other items over walls of towns.
Well, that's not entirely correct. Alexander the Great had slingers in his army during the battle of Gaugamela, Roman doctors left behind manuscripts on how to remove sling bullets from wounded soldiers (the Carthiginians had mercenaries called Balearic slingers who could outrange Roman archers with lethality), and slingers were even used during the Hundred Years' War (poor match against a longbow, I'm afraid). Slings definitely have their place in ancient/medieval warfare (well, more ancient than medieval, but still).And what you highlight is that yes, it is too difficult to wield to be used efficiently on the battlefield. Which is why it was eliminated from armies since antiquity.
The lastest reference to use of slings in warfare was the Spanish Civil War (1936-39). Soldiers used staff-slings to lob grenades further than they could throw them by hand. Perhaps it was an enterprising soldier from the Balaeric Islands.
Slings were widely used up until the same time bows went out of use. They just have less of a presence in the records. One of the reasons I suspect there is little reference to them, for example in paintings, is that they were looked down upon as peasant weapons (even more than bows were looked down upon by knights and the like).
The Aztecs used them, so did various Pacific Island cultures and many Native American nations too. One interesting things is that rarely was there an overlap. There are few examples of cultures using both bow and sling as weapons of war.
One of the problems with the sling is that it takes a more room to wield (depending on which style of slinging you use - underhand, overhead or the "throw"). This is illustrated in a battle scene from the recent movie Alexander. The Persian bowmen are lined up virtually shoulder to shoulder firing away. Then you see a Greek slinger race out from between two phalanxes are fire a bullet at a charioteer (iirc). Whirling a sling takes up more room so it is harder to get the density of fire that you could with even realtively untrained bowmen standing close together.
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The OP could make a house rule that Simple Weapon slings function as listed in the PHB, but a character with Martial Weapons proficiency (or who specifically learns Sling as a Martial Weapon*) learns advanced slinging techniques / training and can use the more favorable damage die numbers he provides.
*Which Halflings might get as a racial bonus, free Martial Weapon proficiency in Sling.
There's precedent for a weapon functioning differently depending on level of training in the Bastard Sword, which can be Martial or Exotic.
1st ed had rules for sling fired stones vs sling fired sling bullets. The sling stone was free and did less damage, the bullet cost a little but did more damage.
The sling though is a weapon anyone can make and anyone can train with. I think that is why it is a simple weapon. If I am a young cleric in training with little down time there is nothing stopping me from taking that down time and spending it playing with a sling. I don't need someone to explain how to use it, nor do I need someone to make me ammo. Even the hardest working farm boy with dreams of being an adventurer can find the time to learn the sling, if he's so inclinded.
Don't forget the thing always grants strength bonus. That's not a small thing, a guy with a 16 strength at level one is better off with a sling then a bow, you need to spend a good deal on a bow that does that.
1st ed had rules for sling fired stones vs sling fired sling bullets. The sling stone was free and did less damage, the bullet cost a little but did more damage.
This is similar in 3.x and in Pathfinder.
Beta PFRPG, page 106:
"You can hurl ordinary stones with a sling, but stones are not as dense or as round as bullets. Thus, such an attack deals damage as if the weapon were designed for a creature one size category smaller than you and you take a –1 penalty on attack rolls."
(the SRD is identical)
1st ed had rules for sling fired stones vs sling fired sling bullets. The sling stone was free and did less damage, the bullet cost a little but did more damage.This is similar in 3.x and in Pathfinder.
Beta PFRPG, page 106:
"You can hurl ordinary stones with a sling, but stones are not as dense or as round as bullets. Thus, such an attack deals damage as if the weapon were designed for a creature one size category smaller than you and you take a –1 penalty on attack rolls."(the SRD is identical)
Perfect. I just don't see the issue with it being simple.
A bow has to contend with arcing your shot to reach the extreme ranges. You have to "load" a bow a specific way (hold it in place), and a particular bow can require certain strength to use. It also has specific care and setup (stringing, etc).
The sling is a bit of leather that you load with a roughly round object. You also tend to fire a bullet directly at your target, not arcing.
The fact that you have to wind up to attack with it isn't enough to warrant making it a martial weapon over say.. a spear that can be set for charge and has reach...
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A sling bullet can definitely cause decent damage. That's why it does lethal damage as a bludgeoning weapon, instead of non-lethal damage.
An arrow does far more damage though, not only because it has a physical point capable of cutting into skin easier (and hide when it comes to animals, etc), but also because it focuses all it's kinetic energy over a single point. Armor definitely helps... but energy over a point vs over a larger area means the armor has to work harder to dissipate that energy. Arrows punching through armor isn't unheard of.
It's why the sword didn't necessarily "cut" armored opponents, and rather left them with crushed bones and organs... but was still more effective than a bludgeoning weapon, because it focused the energy of the attack over a smaller area, getting more energy into the soft bits behind the armor.
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Arrows "should" be doing more damage than a sling bullet, and should be capable of going further (arcing shots). While a shortbow wasn't primarily used in history for firing in an arc, since you'd grab a longbow for that... the simple fact is that you *can* arc a shot with an arrow, even from a shortbow, and get that extra bit of range.
Or maybe I'm wrong here... someone who's used a sling with training.. can you arc your shot effectively? Or is it like an improvised use of the weapon?
*Edit: Let me be clear... can you arc your sling shot like you can a bow shot (45 degree angle, etc) to get the most out of the range?
*Edit: Let me be clear... can you arc your sling shot like you can a bow shot (45 degree angle, etc) to get the most out of the...
You can release it differently for a serious arch that increases its range. It hits hard too that way, I've easily destroyed wooden targets at 50 yards with a good arch, but it aint easy to hit so you need lots of practice. Took me all summer to even hit one, once I did I could do so again more often then not. ('course I beaned myself in the head once practicing too) It's been years and I am much older, I would not even try now, now I would buy a crossbow and be done with it. :)
Or maybe I'm wrong here... someone who's used a sling with training.. can you arc your shot effectively? Or is it like an improvised use of the weapon?
*Edit: Let me be clear... can you arc your sling shot like you can a bow shot (45 degree angle, etc) to get the most out of the range?
Of course you can.
Everything traveling through the air, without its own means of propulsion (jets, rockets, flapping wings) always arcs.
You know, gravity and all.
Newton's laws of motion. What can go up must come down and all.
To get the maximum range of any non-self-propelled projectile, arching is the way to go.
Ask any golfer, or baseball batter (or outfielder making the throw to home). Ask any olympic javelin thrower, or discus thrower.
Ask any military sniper about projectile declination.
Everything arches, and everything gets more distance when you find the right angle, trajectory, at which to fire your projectile to gain the maximum distance.
A physicist could do the math for you, but I can't.
But I guarantee you that whatever "maximum range" is for a sling, you cannot get anywhere near that range with linear shot that leaves your sling in a horizontal trajectory.
Ask any golfer, or baseball batter (or outfielder making the throw to home). Ask any olympic javelin thrower, or discus thrower.
Thanks,
Now I have this image of a gnome weaponsmith holding up a bag full of white sling bullets covered with divots.Gnome: "I know they look wierd, but I swear, the little holes make it go farther and straighter!"
Elf Druid: With a skeptical look. "Don't try to sell me a bag of goods, everyone knows a smooth bullet goes farther, all those little holes you put into them will make it go slower! Do I look like I fell out of a tree yesterday?"