OK, so I know steel weapons are superior for many reasons, but I was wondering if anyone here can outline the main differences between these metals, from a gaming perspective. Mainly I'm looking at pros and cons, strengths and weaknesses, that sort of thing to compare Bronze Age weapons and armor against Iron Age weapons and armor.
Thanks!
Pete
Copper is basically worthless as a weapon, and not much better as armour. Its main virtue was that it was better than stone, and saw most of its service in the production of maces. Arrows too, since you wouldn't be using them more than once in a battle. Bronze was originally superior to iron in fact, but it was much harder and more expensive to produce in Europe at the time. Over time iron then steel became far more effective at taking and holding an edge, and hence was the iron age born.
In real history, the only reason people moved to iron from Bronze was a tin shortage. Bronze is softer so it doesn't hold an edge as well, but before reliable steel smelting (staring around the fifteenth century I believe), Iron was a lot more brittle.
Copper is, I believe, soft like bronze while still being more brittle (like iron), which is why it wasn't used after bronze was invented (and as an alloy, it realy was invented and refined...).
Copper may be harder than bronze, but not as hard as Iron. To be honest, the copper age was very short and I don't know much about it from a weapon-smithing point of view.
Interestingly, Gold was used by the egyptians in ceremonial (sacrficial) knives. Obviously, however, it was unsuitable for military use at all.
The Panoply of a Greek warrior was a very tanklike suit of bronze armor, not what you normally see in artwork. From pictures of real suits, it was ungainly as hell, but more or less impervious.
If you want more on bronze, I can give you a rough overview of how smiths worked around its bendyness. A properly polished bronze sword didn't look yellowish, either, but shone like steel.
Bronze is good stuff, hard and tough, don't let anyone tell you different. I recently saw a demo of cutting down trees with a bronze axe, it worked fine and wasn't dulled at all.
The problem with bronze is it needs tin, and tin is rare, so bronze is expensive. Iron, when available, is much cheaper.
OK, so there would likely be some in-game mechanical differences between bronze weapons/armor and iron or steel weapons/armor. Thanks.
Quote from: Spike;557646If you want more on bronze, I can give you a rough overview of how smiths worked around its bendyness. A properly polished bronze sword didn't look yellowish, either, but shone like steel.
Yes, from what I've been reading the largest tin and copper deposits were separated by great distances and that when the trade routes broke down (due to war, plague, natural disasters, etc.), the use of bronze diminished and iron increased.
One big question I've been trying to answer is after the ores were mined, how were they transported? So say you mined a lot of copper and tin and wanted to send them to another city for trade. What form did they take? Chunks? Bars? Sheets? Rods?
Quote from: pspahn;557650One big question I've been trying to answer is after the ores were mined, how were they transported? So say you mined a lot of copper and tin and wanted to send them to another city for trade. What form did they take? Chunks? Bars? Sheets? Rods?
Ingots.
Frequently called "pigs", as the roughly rounded oblong ingots resembled piglets suckling a mother sow when stacked side by side.
Pig iron/copper is ore that's been through a very quick-and-dirty smelting process. It still has lots of impurities in it, and it would be smelted and refined further by the blacksmith. Ore mines would typically have a smelter on premises or close by to produce the pigs for transport.
Quote from: pspahn;557650OK, so there would likely be some in-game mechanical differences between bronze weapons/armor and iron or steel weapons/armor. Thanks.
Don't confuse iron and steel. Steel is superior to bronze but iron really isn't.
Quote from: pspahn;557650Yes, from what I've been reading the largest tin and copper deposits were separated by great distances and that when the trade routes broke down (due to war, plague, natural disasters, etc.), the use of bronze diminished and iron increased.
Well, they also had to learn how to get high enough temperatures to smelt iron. It's easier to turn copper ore into copper than it is to turn iron ore into iron because the latter requires a higher temperature. Look up smelting if you are unfamiliar with that step.
Quote from: pspahn;557650One big question I've been trying to answer is after the ores were mined, how were they transported? So say you mined a lot of copper and tin and wanted to send them to another city for trade. What form did they take? Chunks? Bars? Sheets? Rods?
Do some Google searches on these two famous shipwrecks (http://www.archaeology.org/online/features/underwater/bronzeage.html), both of which contained copper and tin ingots in the standard oxhide form used in the Bronze Age.
Quote from: John Morrow;557662Do some Google searches on these two famous shipwrecks (http://www.archaeology.org/online/features/underwater/bronzeage.html), both of which contained copper and tin ingots in the standard oxhide form used in the Bronze Age.
See also http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oxhide_ingot
(http://www.inadiscover.com/galleries/projects/ul_3.jpg)
(http://www.liutprand.it/articoliMondo/oxhide.jpg)
(http://maritime2.haifa.ac.il/eng/nl/cms24/24_22.jpg)
Bronze was the equal of iron, and possibly even superior, until well into the iron age, but as other have pointed out it became hard to come by. Bronze is made by uniting copper with tin (about 90%/10%). Another, less durable kind of bronze was made from uniting copper with arsenic (usually called Arsenical Bronze or Arsenical copper). This was most popular common in the bronze age c.3000-2900 BC. Arsenic is poisonous, of course, and the existence of mythical dwarf smiths like Hephaestus in myth is thought to be related to Arsenical bronze.
Ores were usually refined at the source and transported in ingots of smelted metal. Those that have been found resemble the skin of an animal and give credence to the idea of a 'golden fleece'. The ores themselves were mineral clusters, like Malachite or Haematite and would have resembled coloured rocks.
One big difference between bronze and iron that hasn't been touches on is that bronze had to be cast into shape and then sharpened, whereas iron could be forged. A broken bronze sword had to be recast, but a broken iron sword could be re-forged.
Not all iron is the same, either. Meteoric iron (from fallen meteors) was known since very early days and was used as a decorative metal or for light tools. But it didn't have enough carbon in it to give it strength, so it was brittle. Smelted iron had more carbon and was much more durable but still nowhere near steel. Better methods for dealing with iron were developed c.300BC in Sri Lanka, leading eventually to Damascus steel. From what I've read, anyway.
All in all, I would suggest (assuming a Bronze Age setting) that bronze weapons work as the baseline but are expensive (and not available everywhere), while iron weapons are cheaper and work the same, but - in D&D terms - take a penalty to saves against damage and become damaged on a natural attack roll of 1. Perhaps a cumulative -1 to attacks and damage until -3, then it breaks.
Quote from: S'mon;557648Bronze is good stuff, hard and tough, don't let anyone tell you different. I recently saw a demo of cutting down trees with a bronze axe, it worked fine and wasn't dulled at all.
The problem with bronze is it needs tin, and tin is rare, so bronze is expensive. Iron, when available, is much cheaper.
The way I put this (and some info in a couple other comments) into useful gaming terms is:
- Copper: cheap, but soft; damage roll of 5+ blunts
- Bronze = Copper + Tin: hard, expensive, easy to make
- Iron: hard, cheap, hard to make
- Steel: hard and flexible, harder to make
Hard armor or a parry with a hard weapon automatically blunts copper knives. Bronze blunts on damage 5+ against bronze/iron/steel weapon or armor. Iron breaks on 5+ when parried by bronze/iron/steel.
(This is all assuming a d6-based D&D-like damage roll. You may need to fiddle numbers for other systems.)
See also this thread (http://www.therpgsite.com/showthread.php?t=20281) and the sources that I suggested in that thread, including the Bronze Age reenactment pages (http://www.larp.com/hoplite/bronze.html).
Thanks all! Very much appreciated and I believe I have some of my questions answered.
What I've got basically is an isolated kingdom that is stuck in a sort of Bronze Age that is about to clash with a more typical fantasy medieval culture. I needed to include some basic commerce details and I wanted to make sure to account for any discrepancy in weapon/armor durability.
Thanks for all the help. Some of these links have actually inspired me to add a few elements I hadn't thought of.
Pete
I know its a silly geek show but in the "Deadliest Warrior" Matchup, they had the Ninja vs Spartan and later Samurai vs Spartan. The Tetsubo? Made of iron? Lost--against that bronze layered over wood over bronze shield?
The Spartan's effectiveness in their computer matchups is pretty significant, even against the later ages of weapons.
They wouldn't use IIRC a katana on the shield, because it was "to precious' to risk against that big Spartan shield.
Bronze wins, in many ways.
Modern Steel, MIGHT be a match. Still, I am not sure I'd bet on it.
Pretty sure that has more to do with the effectiveness of shields than the effectiveness of bronze vs. steel, Silverlion. Shields good.
From what I know of history, Iron is generally superior to Bronze, and that the early dominance of the Assyrians was due to their skill in working Iron. Bronze is actually a range of materials due to being an alloy, and as such its properties can vary greatly.
In general though later period Bronzes with sufficient metallurgical knowledge would be comparable to Iron, but not to Steel. Steel is likewise an alloy, and thus rare kinds such as 'Damascus' due to trace metals can be much harder and stronger.
In terms of gaming, I would probably use a sliding metric of some kind based on the generally available technology. That is to say, bronze would function per the PHB in the bronze age, but would have a penalty compared to iron, and likewise a bonus against stone, bone or obsidian.
Quote from: Imp;557746Pretty sure that has more to do with the effectiveness of shields than the effectiveness of bronze vs. steel, Silverlion. Shields good.
Possibly true--but a viking shield or a knight one wouldn't hold up to that blow...
Of course they were dealing with vastly different weapons too..so they didn't' need it.
Nothing to add beyond this thread is literally a history lesson for me. Please do continue.:)
Quote from: Thalaba;557668Meteoric iron (from fallen meteors) was known since very early days and was used as a decorative metal or for light tools. But it didn't have enough carbon in it to give it strength, so it was brittle.
?? Pure iron is soft and bendy! It's the carbon that makes it hard and brittle.
'Steel' is used to refer to iron-with-carbon alloys today, but early 'iron' smelting resulted in excessive amounts of carbon, unevenly distributed, making it brittle. The trick was to forge steel with the right amount of carbon to make the steel hard but flexible. Not an easy trick. Also for a weapon you want a hard edge for cutting, but a soft core for toughness so it doesn't shatter on impact.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steel
Quote from: S'mon;557803?? Pure iron is soft and bendy! It's the carbon that makes it hard and brittle.
Woops! That's what you get for not fact-checking your memory before posting! :o
See this page (http://www.bronze-age-swords.com/intro.htm) for details about bronze sword making and how well made bronze swords fare against iron swords from the same period.
My suggestion would be to not differentiate between bronze and iron but to differentiate between steel and non-steel.
Quote from: John Morrow;557848See this page (http://www.bronze-age-swords.com/intro.htm) for details about bronze sword making and how well made bronze swords fare against iron swords from the same period.
My suggestion would be to not differentiate between bronze and iron but to differentiate between steel and non-steel.
Yes i think that sounds right.
Great link!
Pete
What is it about bronze and early ironwork that skews production towards short blades? Was it because of some intrinsic property (or lack thereof) of the material, or did it have to do with tactics and weapon choice?
Alternatively, was anyone crafting long (75cm+) blades before the Roman spatha? And what was their metallurgy like?
Well, bronze was bendy, so longer thinner blades were impractical. Early iron work was using casting methods more suited to bronze, and a long iron blade would break.
Still, the common bronze age swords were necessarily all that terribly short. No great hewing zwiehanders that I'm aware of, but you wouldn't call them really long knives unless you were talking from some agenda.
The Roman use of shorter blades was purely strategic, though we are talking Iron age, not bronze here. The Celts uses long swords (in fact, they buried their warriors with their swords bent to prevent looting, which the Romans considered a sign of inferior craftsmanship, rather than the mark of respect it was). With short stabby blades, you could back a formation shoulder to shoulder. The Celts and Gauls and various germanic tribes would swing great honking blades, requiring some five feet of clearance between warriors, allowing the Romans to gang up on each warrior, some three or four to one.
Bronze age swords had something like a two foot average length, maybe evne 30 inches, quite respectably swordy, though don't quote me on that.
Quote from: The Butcher;557901What is it about bronze and early ironwork that skews production towards short blades? Was it because of some intrinsic property (or lack thereof) of the material, or did it have to do with tactics and weapon choice?
Casting skill/technology, at least for bronze. Earlier thrusting swords had the hilt riveted on so that the blade could have maximum length. Sickle swords, which were used for slashing like an axe, had an integrated hilt and so were done all in one cast. I've seen a few Egyptian models in museums and all are about 60cm/24" in length, including the hilt.
This page discusses this a little more (but still doesn't quite get at what would happen if one tried to make a longer weapon): http://www.bronze-age-craft.com/swordcasting.htm
Most samples of bronze age swords I've seen were all of one piece. Grips might be riveted to a tang, but the tang itself was part of the blade
Quote from: Spike;557930Most samples of bronze age swords I've seen were all of one piece. Grips might be riveted to a tang, but the tang itself was part of the blade
You can find a lot of examples on this page (http://www.salimbeti.com/micenei/weapons1.htm).
Quote from: The Butcher;557901What is it about bronze and early ironwork that skews production towards short blades? Was it because of some intrinsic property (or lack thereof) of the material, or did it have to do with tactics and weapon choice?
Alternatively, was anyone crafting long (75cm+) blades before the Roman spatha? And what was their metallurgy like?
The Chinese were crafting 90 cm double edged blades with handles long enough to fit two hands from Bronze during the Qin dynasty, which were very high quality swords for the time period.
They were also creating very early steel swords (about as low on the scale of steel as you can get, but it still was steel in classification) that were about a meter in length. This was from about 220-207 BC. Han dynasty smiths later developed the differential heat treatment, and they also developed the blast furnace, which was making high quality steel tools and weapons (for the time at least) by the 1st century BC.
Quote from: John Morrow;557959You can find a lot of examples on this page (http://www.salimbeti.com/micenei/weapons1.htm).
Yeah, that page references the Type A, which as I recall from research last year is the single most common* design of bronze age sword, at being a meter long.
*Provided I'm not completely off my rocker about
which sword design, its is more accurately the most successful of sword designs, due to geographic distribution, number of artifacts recovered, and length of time in use. No other weapon design in history can match its run for popularity, or so I recall.
Arrows of Indra's setting is a society that's in a state of transition; the default equipment is iron, but steel is beginning to make an appearance; the equipment section allows for the purchasing of steel weapons in certain places.
Likewise, because there's shitloads of ancient ruins and treasure hordes, its possible to end up obtaining bronze items, even though these aren't really produced for sale anymore.
RPGPundit
What differences does Arrows of Indra have between the three types of weapon/armor?
Bronze armor is slightly poorer AC, Bronze weapons have a penalty to their damage and their modifiers "to hit vs. AC", steel weapons have a bonus to their damage and "to hit vs. AC" mods.
RPGPundit
I bring this up from time to time, but anyone who wants some background on Bronze age Europe and the Med should read this book Europe Between the Oceans (http://www.amazon.com/Europe-Between-Oceans-9000-BC-AD/dp/0300170866/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1342131026&sr=8-1&keywords=europe+between+the+oceans). A basic knowledge of archaeology would probably be helpful, but I'm pretty sure you could get most of what you need clarified via wikipedia and google searches. Anyway, it's a fucking great read.
Quote from: Gib;559363I bring this up from time to time, but anyone who wants some background on Bronze age Europe and the Med should read this book Europe Between the Oceans (http://www.amazon.com/Europe-Between-Oceans-9000-BC-AD/dp/0300170866/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1342131026&sr=8-1&keywords=europe+between+the+oceans). A basic knowledge of archaeology would probably be helpful, but I'm pretty sure you could get most of what you need clarified via wikipedia and google searches. Anyway, it's a fucking great read.
just placed a hold on it at another library branch. thanks for the recommendation!