Stone throwing Ballista

[Invigilator]

In the Roman Legion trailer, several large stone throwing Ballista are shown being used by Roman legions.

I've read about the large stone ballista in many historical texts, but I can never find a decent picture or design of one.

Does anyone know what they looked like exactly, or how they worked? I'm guessing they would look like much larger scorpions, except that they throw stones instead of bolts.

I can't wait to put these to use in Roma Surrectum 2.0, much better than the Onagers in vanilla RTW, which I thought were historically inaccurate.

Congratulations to the RS team on improving an already great mod!

[neoiq5719]

In the Roman Legion trailer, several large stone throwing Ballista are shown being used by Roman legions.

I've read about the large stone ballista in many historical texts, but I can never find a decent picture or design of one.

Does anyone know what they looked like exactly, or how they worked? I'm guessing they would look like much larger scorpions, except that they throw stones instead of bolts.

I can't wait to put these to use in Roma Surrectum 2.0, much better than the Onagers in vanilla RTW, which I thought were historically inaccurate.

Congratulations to the RS team on improving an already great mod!

http://www.google.es/imgres?imgurl=h...ed=0CBsQ9QEwAA

[tone]

No, that's a catapult. He's talking about the lithobolos (try googling it)

We've got two - a big one and a massive one:





Try here:
http://www.stormthewalls.kicks-ass.n...uctionPics.htm

[The Man With No Name]

Holy ! That thing is massive!

I heard you took out onagers from the game, as they were not used in it's timeframe. Are these the replacement?

[xXEsotericXx]

Holy ! That thing is massive!

I heard you took out onagers from the game, as they were not used in it's timeframe. Are these the replacement?

That Siege weapon of mass destruction is hella bad azz, if i would be some gaul back in those days , i would be like ... lol surenda!

[tone]

yes they are, but as I said above, there are two sizes, one of which is like this one above, and the other is smaller.

[Sandrus Castus]

I was at a historical event in Marle, France, this weekend. The ESG was there and they had, as usual, some artillery with them. This is a reconstructed, fully functional ballista. I've seen it firing stones... frightening! You wouldn't want such rock crash onto your head.

[Invigilator]

Wow, that thing is intimidating as hell. It says on the site that Tone linked to that the largest ones were 21 feet long and fired stones weighing 25 pounds. At that speed a stone that large could probably kill a lot of people, must have really scared the less advanced factions when they came up against them.

Did the Greeks create war engines of this kind, or was it only the Romans?

[Eshmunamesh]

I can't wait to see the destruction wrought by these machines in the battles...
It will be....inspiring...

[Invigilator]

How mobile are they in RS 2? The big ones were deployed in that winter forest against Dacians in the trailer, but I'm guessing they would be very slow and would really hinder the speed of a legion.

[Megas Antiviros <3 Gaesatae :p]

I have read an interesting book about roman and greek artillery pieces, and there are some things that aren't correct in this mod,
historicaly there where two kinds of catapults:
-onagers (No, there is nothing wrong with your eyes)
pro: they can fire flamming projectiles
contra: they are sooooo inacurate...
-stone throwing Ballistas
pro: they are very acurate
contra: they cannot fire flamming projectiles

[dvk901]

I have read an interesting book about roman and greek artillery pieces, and there are some thing that aren't correct in this mod,
there where two kinds of catapults:
-onagers (No, there is nothing wrong with your eyes)
pro: they can fire flamming projectiles
contra: they are sooooo inacurate...
-stone throwing Ballistas
pro: they are very acurate
contra: they cannot fire flamming projectiles

Onagers were a much later 'invention' than the time we cover. So in effect, they are totally inaccurate no matter what they fire. Thus, we removed them.

The stone throwing ballista was invented during our time period, and used. But, there is the compromise of allowing it to fire flaming projectiles. Mainly, because it's an ability of the game, and secondly because I like them.
Regardless of how anal one may get in the pursuit of a historical mod, you really just have to kick back and have a little fun too. There are a number of things in RS2 that people could conceivably point at and say, "That's not historical!", either because of the time period or the content, but we've included them nonetheless for balance reasons or just pure joy. It's hard to cover a 500 year period with things you can't really change on the fly, when in fact things changed all the time in real life.

[Invigilator]

Why couldn't these ballista fire flaming stones? Would the flaming stone set the wooden construction or the sinew thing itself on fire? Either way the ballistas in-game look great.

Also, could the smaller bolt firing scorpions fire flaming bolts?

As for historical accuracy, I completely agree with you dvk. After all, if people want 100% historical accuracy, why even play a game where it is interactive? If you are just trying to reenact history as it happened exactly, you shouldn't be playing a game, you should be in one of those battle re-enactment things.

Rome Total War and mods like this are so enjoyable to me because they are historically accurate to the point that I learn many things just from playing, while at the same time let me influence events, as I might have as a commander in the time period.

Of course, the most historically inaccurate thing about RTW is simply the way the player commands, from an omniscient point of view. One of the toughest things about ruling a Republic or Empire in those periods would have been simply communicating with governors and leaders of geographically distant provinces. In RTW it's done instantaneously. Imagine what someone like Caesar or Augustus could have done with the ease of communication that TW games use, not to mention such a flexible view of the battlefield.

[Megas Antiviros <3 Gaesatae :p]

Why couldn't these ballista fire flaming stones?

therfore:
-scorpion:


Uploaded with ImageShack.us
-stone throwing ballista:


Uploaded with ImageShack.us

[Marcus Aemilius Longinus]

Holy ! That thing is massive!

I heard you took out onagers from the game, as they were not used in it's timeframe. Are these the replacement?

Isnt that the BBC ballista. Fantastic effort but I heard that they basically doomed the project by not listening to the experts they had on hand. For example they made the thing out of pine and it cracked near the springs after the first or second shots which were both rather disapointing as far as range is concerned.