Why weren't mounted crossbows common? You'd think putting

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>>2149282
Largely because its hard to pull at the bowstring.

An interesting utilization of mobile crossbowmen however was in Ancient China. Since the cunts had both the crossbow AND the chariot at the same time, and with you being able to stand on a chariot and draw the thing with your upper body, the Chinks managed to use chariots as mounted crossbowmen platforms.

>mounted crossbow
Wouldn't they be a fucking bitch to reload or have I played too much Rhodoks in Warband?

How are you going to restring a crossbow on a horse, numbnuts?

It was hard as shit to do on the ground, with a winch

>>2149282
>>2149294
>>2149299
>>2149302
Also, Bows on horses are great, because they arch.

Crossbow bolts don't arch significantly

>>2149302
Just use your foot seated in the stirrup, or add a special restrain to the saddle ?

>>2149304
I don't see where you're getting at.

>>2149339
>I don't see where you're getting at
You could only shoot ahead of you, or straight into the air.

You couldn't arc one into the enemy battalion

>>2149282
If anything you should use them like dragoons. Stationary crossbowmen with paveses beat horse archers.

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>>2149377
The English used something similar. Mounted bands of longbowmen rode to a location, dismounted, let loose a few shafts at niggas, and promptly rode their horses and fucked off.

Did it well into the first bankrupted half of 16th century England.

>>2149356
Crossbows are basically bows on a stick, the ballistic characteristics of both of their projectiles are technically the same.
What do you mean by crossbow bolts don't "arch", you think they magically fly in a straight line until they hit something?
>>2149282
The crossbows' main advantage is that they can be made with a much larger draw weight than simple bows because you can use both of your hands or different cocking mechanisms to pull the string, and the mechanism of the crossbow can contain this kinetic energy to fire later. The problem is that using two hands to cock a crossbow is fucking inconvenient on horseback.
Of course, you could use a lighter crossbow that you can cock with one hand, but then you're better off with a simple bow.

They could have made special crossbows and thaught horses to draw them with a hoof.

>>2149282
Because it would have been around 100 times easier to have mounted bowmen. Also, one of the advantages crossbows had over bows was that they could be taught relatively quickly compared to bows, such as the longbow. If you have mounted crossbowmen, you lose that advantage, as most mounted bowmen learnt from an early age (I'm presuming loading, aiming and firing a crossbow on a horse wasn't that simple and couldn't be learnt quickly).

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>>2149458
>crossbows could be taught relatively quickly compared to bows
>If you have mounted crossbowmen, you lose that advantage
What...

Anyway, there were mounted bowmen and crossbowmen in Europe, but they were used like dragoons : they used horses to move and dismounted to fire.

>>2149596
I don't think OP is talking about dragoon-type 'mounted' bowmen. I'm pretty sure he's talking about firing the crossbow whilst mounted, hence the picture. Also, the other two points were true.