Weapons vs Armor

[Kindling]

I am far from an expert on the subject but here is my two low-denomination-monetary-units.
I remember seeing a documentary a few years back about Agincourt where they set up a test to see whether a longbow really could pierce plate armour. they had an experienced archer fire a reproduction longbow at a plate of steel (as in Atsisodhi's example). There was a big dent in the plate, but no actual penetration.
As I said, I'm no expert, but there did seem to me to be two issues with their experiment. One was that they placed the steel on what seemed to be a block of another metallic substance. I don't know, but I'd guess this would reinforce the steel from behind the same way that piling stuff against a door makes it harder to bash in. Certainly a big difference between metal and the padded armour I understand was historically worn under plate.
The other problem was that the archer drew the bow using his arm. Again this isn't a subject I have any great knowledge in, but I have always been lead to believe that a properly trained longbowman would draw his bow using his whole body rather than just the arm, to give his shot more power and range, but sacrificing accuracy.

So, feel free to shoot me down seeing as I really have no clue what I'm talking about and can barely even remember the documentary, but that's my contribution to the debate :P

[LordVreeg]

A)  Not all crossbows were winch-drawn.
[ooc]Although a longbow had greater range, could achieve comparable accuracy and faster shooting rate than an average crossbow, crossbows could release more kinetic energy and be used effectively after a week of training, while a comparable single-shot skill with a longbow could take years of practice.[/ooc]

you have push levers, pull levers, cranquins, and windlass systems, and the force is still dependent on other variations, such as recurving and the use of composite, and later, steel materials.

2) Firearms really pushed the development of armor.

Crossbows such as the Gatrophetes and arcuballista and the chinese varients had been around forever, but early firearms did penetrate almost all current armor, but arrmor on the battlefield from that point on (up to today) was developed primarily to deal with firearm upgrades.
[ooc]
In the early 15th century, small "hand cannon" first began to be used, in the Hussite Wars, in combination with Wagenburg tactics, allowing infantry to defeat armoured knights on the battlefield. At the same time crossbows were made more powerful to pierce armour. Rather than dooming the use of body armour, the threat of small firearms intensified the use and further refinement of plate armour. There was a 150 year period in which better and more metallurgically advanced steel armour was being used, precisely because of the danger posed by the gun. Hence, guns and cavalry in plate armour were "threat and remedy" together on the battlefield for almost 400 years. By the 15th century Italian armour plates were almost always made of steel[8]. In Southern Germany armourers began to harden their steel armour only in the late 15th century. They would continue to harden their steel for the next century because they quenched and tempered their product which allowed for the fire-gilding to be combined with tempering[9].[/ooc]

[beejazz]

Wow. This thread sparked more discussion than I'd expected it would. I guess it's something relevant to most of us regardless of system if we're going for slightly more accurate representations of weapons. I'll settle for just getting things to feel right, if I can manage it.

Before I try sorting through the discussion and responding, here's what the guy I'm writing my game with had to say on the weapon list I've got so far. I wanna just run this by more people and make sure it sounds about right.

Sword:Short-penetrates leather, high damage, low penetration
Long-leather, maybe mail-average
2Hands-leather, mail, maybe plate?-amazing penetration, slightly better than average damage. Perhaps make it some sort of specialized weapon? or extra penalties

Axes :Throwing-leather, hgh penetration, low damage
1hand-leather, mail, high pen, low damage
2hand-leather, mail, plate(?)-high pen, low damage

Standard piercing weapons include:(all high pen, low damage unless otherwise mentioned)
Dagger/Rapier leather,
Spears:Short-leather, mail
Long-leather, mail, plate
Picks, leather, mail, plate
Morningstar leather, mai

Standard bludgeoning weapons include:
Maces-plate, mail-high damage, low pen
Hammers-same
Flails-same
Club/Staff-none, high damage, low pen

Standard projectiles include:
Guns: Revolver:-leather, chain-average
Rifle-leather, chain, plate-average
Sniper-leahter, chain, plate,low pen, high damage
Gatling-everything-low pen, high damage
Shotgun-low pen, high damage-leather
Bows-leather-high pen, low camage
Crossbows-leather-average
Slings-none-high damage, low pen

Polearms include: all (unless otherwise listed)-leather-high pen, low damage-all get set
(I'm thinking we just rip off D&D here)
Glaive-leather-high damage, low pen
Guisarme (trip)
Halberd (trip)
Ranseur (disarm)-leather high damage, low pen
Trident

Miscellaneous other weapons include:
Gauntlets-bludgeoning-mail-low damage, low pen
Javelins-piercing-leather, mail-high pen, low damage
Whip-trip-no penetration, high damage
Net-no damage, entangle?

For game reasons, I'm critical of the idea of weapons that penetrate everything (a few that penetrate nothing are alright... in either case, I'm thinking they only need one damage bonus).

Oh, and he did skip sickle and scythe. I asked him about it and he said leather high damage low penetration.

EDIT: I'm also looking for excuses to make certain weapons less similar overall... I don't want duplicate stats and it looks like there'd be a lot of that.