As far as I can tell, it will only hit a single orc. The shot doesn't pass thorough or hit other targets, just the first target.
Ultimate Combat has the rules for cannons. Dont forget to use blast shot when the orcs get close to the cannons. - Gauss
I am checking but I cannot find rules for cannons doing grazing shots.
Traditionally, a cannonball would be fired at the ground in order to do a grazing shot. This allowed it to bounce along the ground taking out many infantrymen. A direct shot into the infantry would only take out a few. - Gauss
I would treat a grazing shot like this: a line 15feet wide that does 1/2 damage. Cut the range of the cannon in 1/4 AFTER the first hit to represent the grazing shot effect. I realize that would get a bit complicated but how I can see it is like this:
The enemy is 200feet away (2 range increments). Normally it can go to 1000feet but since the grazing shot starts at 200feet it would only be able to go to 200+800/4 = 400feet. Of course, a hill would shorten the grazing effect.
I would treat a nongrazing shot (flat trajectory) as a line 5feet wide that does full damage out to maximum normal range or until it strikes an obstacle more substantial than a meatbag.
Of course, this is all custom. - Gauss
Load grape-shot and don't fire until you see the green of their eyes!
Seriously, cannons and melee-armed fantasy critters don't mix too well. A battery of field guns in 16th century warfare normally consisted of between four and eight cannons. Firing grape-shot (blast-shot, I suppose is the Pathfinder term) at formed ranks would decimate an attacking regiment: two or three hundred dead or wounded from a single salvo. At short-range, of course, and by short range I am talking forty or fifty years (120-150').
There is a reason artillery is called the Queen of Battle.
Master Arminas
King Gustavus Adolphus of Sweden (1594-1632) was a major user of cannons and revolutionized both the rate of fire and the use of them. In many respects he is the father of the civil war style military.
In his age tercios would just march into his cannons and with grazing shots he would obliterate them. While he did use grapeshot (blast-shot in PF) it was his devastating use of grazing fire that really did the enemy in.
His cannons fired faster, were more accurate, and were incorporated into his infantry lines. A shame he died on the battlefield in the 30years war.
Anyhow, point is....use grazing fire at longer ranges and shot at short ranges. Except for the shot you will have to come up with your own rules for the grazing fire as PF has not seemed to provide any.
- Gauss
Firing grape-shot (blast-shot, I suppose is the Pathfinder term) at formed ranks would decimate an attacking regiment: two or three hundred dead or wounded from a single salvo.
Decimate actually does not mean "destroy utterly." It means "removeal of a tenth"
Sorry to be pedantic, but this always bothers me...
|
Firing grape-shot (blast-shot, I suppose is the Pathfinder term) at formed ranks would decimate an attacking regiment: two or three hundred dead or wounded from a single salvo.
Decimate actually does not mean "destroy utterly." It means "removeal of a tenth"
Sorry to be pedantic, but this always bothers me...
Err...regiments are often two or three thousand men, so.....
Grazing shots can involve alot of shrapnel. In a normal situation I would agree that it would be a 5' wide line but in your river (thus riverbed) situation all of that stone is turned into shrapnel making the grazing shots ALOT more dangerous. - Gauss
Firing grape-shot (blast-shot, I suppose is the Pathfinder term) at formed ranks would decimate an attacking regiment: two or three hundred dead or wounded from a single salvo.
Decimate actually does not mean "destroy utterly." It means "removeal of a tenth"
Sorry to be pedantic, but this always bothers me...
And a typical regiment of the period would have a strength of between 1,000 to 3,000 troops. So decimate is indeed an accurate term, hence my use of it.
But the sudden loss of so many would often leave the survivors falling back in disorder. Morale plays a bigger role in real life than many people believe.
Master Arminas
Master Arminas, the scary part is...you are wrong. Tercios of the 80years war and then the 30years war (as opposed to later linear style 17th century tercios) would suffer over 50% casualties before actually breaking from cannonfire. Usually it took a calvary charge to break a tercio, not ranged fire. - Gauss
Edit: I should say, you are partly wrong. Not all units can stand up to that kind of fire but since we are talking regiments of the period which is usually Tercios (up until mid 1600s when the original-style Tercios became obsolete).
Some well-trained tericos could and did withstand horrendous casualties--but it all depended on (a) training and (b) leadership. I doubt that orcish tribesmen have the type of discipline and training of Gustav Aldolphus's infantry, or Spanish tericos, or the French or Swiss. That said, you are right in that I was over-generalizing.
Even with improved artillery during the Napoleonic Wars, the soldiers could take heavy fire without breaking--so long as they had a leader to exhort them to stand for 'king and country'. Or the 'revolution'. Such units did not break and rout, but often times the fire of the guns would stop them.
But poorly led, poorly trained troops, could and did break under fire. I stand corrected, that this did not often occur until the Napoleonic Wars.
Master Arminas