SplitSling wrote on Jan 20
th, 2019 at 10:24am:
"what if the targets are wearing full plate armor", in which no projectile would be much use. Feel free to argue this point, although I will defend it.
Arguably, compared to javelins, warbow arrows and crossbow bolts, Slingstones theoretically should be more reliable than the above concerning the 'penetration' of armour, when one conciders penetration through blunt-force trauma, rather than through perforation of armour.
Although the sling and staff-sling are unable to cause damage through perforation of the armour in question, unlike arrows or crossbow bolts they are harder to glance and they can transfer their energy much quicker into a target, this means that the angle of impact is not as important a consideration as it is with arrows, javelins or crossbow bolts (The globose shape of the chestplate can cause most arrows or crossbow bolts to glance or deflect off at certain angles, it should be harder to causee a slingstone to glance off).
As far as I am concerned, in order for a plate-armoured knight to be granted adequate protection against the heavier projectiles used by either the sling or staffsling (Which could mass anywhere from 150 grams to over 500 grams), his armour should be composed of well-tempered medium or high-carbon steel plates of around ~2mm thickness (Which is also likely going to be 'proof' against arquebus), or if he is wearing plate armour made from case-hardened iron or 'mild-steel', he should be wearing a Jupon over his harness, perhaps one not unlike that which was worn by Charles de Blois, which could be around 1-inch thick in parts.
Outside of this, against heavier projectiles, there is likely going to be a valid concern for any plate-armoured knight, not unlike the concern faced by Conquistadors who fought against Incan slingers, because the only thing beneath the plate armour worn by most knights is going to be an arming garment that would likely be composed of around 4 layers of linen or fustian, and this in my opinion, is not going to provide adequate protection if the armour is going to be buckled and the force centred into the body. My real concern would be impacts against the shoulders and against the arms and legs, where the armour generally has less spacing between the body unlike at the chest, where there is a buffer-zone of perhaps a centimetre or more between the globose-shaped plate harness and the arming doublet. Arm and leg plates also tends to be thinner, perhaps ~0.7-0.8mm thick, and there should be a real concern.
So in my opinion the average sixteenth century harness would provide adequate protection against slingers (Because these armours tend to be proof against arquebus fire), earlier period harnesses would probably have some difficulty providing adequate protection, both because tempering was much rarer in the period and also because good medium or high-carbon steels were also rare as well, and so most earlier harnesses were made from case-hardened iron or 'mild' carbon steel, the earlier harnesses also tended to be thinner than later armours, perhaps with ~1.2-1.4mm being the thickest parts in some harnesses. With these factors combinend, older 14th and 15th century harnesses would likely be easier to 'buckle' under projectile impacts, especially concerning larger slingstones because you are easily dealing with projectile impacts of around ~100-200J, if not more.
So in my opinion, slingstones are more likely to cause damage to a plate-armoured knight then would a javelin or arrow, because the high likelihood is that those projectiles are going to glance off. This is harder to do against a stone thrown from either a sling or a staff-sling. This does make sense, given that there are a fair few images and marginalia which depict staff-slings being used to pelt knights to death that are outside of a 'biblical' context.
Does this make the sling 'The best weapon ever!'... No. I personally would say that the advantage offered by the sling/staff-sling over other projectile weapons of the period would be very slight, because plate armour is a tough son-of-a-bitch to defeat!
Still, I feel that the sling would be better than bows or javelins at sullying the pride of plate-armour wearers!
Of course, if anyone wants to reliably kill a knight, you would go for the Spanish musket and not a sling. A shot of about 30-50 grams going to about 400-450 m/s is going to ruin anybodys armour. Im not even sure if 8mm thick wrought-iron munitions armour from 17th century England would be able to protect you from that weapon.
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The Search for the Ideal Sling Projectile for warfare (Read 330 times)
