When did bows become a "female" weapon? Why do women use them so much?
It's (inaccuratly) seen as a 'dexterity' weapon.
It fits the aesthetic of acrobatic flexible and lightweight that also fits how most female adventurers are.
Which is a damn shame, cos a lot of systems completely miss the opportunity to have MASSIVE FUCKING SUPERHUMAN STRENGTH BOWS.
Because it's more efficient to shot arrows than going toe to toe with men in melee when they're in average stronger I would say.
You know why Anon
>>45958646
Equally, a lot of systems don't exactly encourage the image of MASSIVE FUCKING SUPERHUMAN WOMEN.
i want to play the big girl
>>45958633
Well it was kinda-sorta popular throughout history because a bow, while requiring strength, is still probably easier to master than kampfringen and swordsmanship for a woman. The Scythians were known for their female warriors, probably because riding a horse and shooting a bow are both less physically strenuous than, say, carrying 150 pounds of shit 20 miles a day on your back.
Once film came along, the deal was basically done, since bows that look impressive but have a very light weight were easy for female actors to use, and so didn't break suspension of disbelief when a slight woman is whipping off arrows that realistically would require a very fit man to loose at all, since most people aren't archers.
Warbows had draw weights going up to like 150 pounds, though that was the extreme end. You can't imagine that a woman who shoots such a bow for a living would look like Natalie Portman, she'd be ripped as fuck, but nobody likes looking at ripped actresses (the fags) and so female archers are always slight and lithe, when they should be Brienne of Tarth.
>>45958660
No, Hunger Games helped the trend, but it was definitely there before the series became popular. It dates back to at least the early nineties, possibly further.
>>45958646
This.
If you wanted to be accurate, bows would be more of a strength weapon than any other weapon type.
>>45958646
Doesn't the Stormlight Archive books have massive bows for use alongside the magic power armour?
>>45958633
You're kidding, right? A statement like that practically demands clarification. I'm sure that if they yet lived to do so, generations of English yeomen, samurai, and other warriors who predated firearms and were noted for archery would demand further explanation.
Better question-
what's the optimal weaponry and armor for a female warrior in a low fantasy setting?
>>45958633
Because of elves.
>>45958744
A gun. The Serbs trained female soldiers during the Balkan Wars because they were desperate for manpower and using firearms is much more about training than it is brute strength.
Not everyone can be a sexy brutish elf girl.
>>45958744
Armour:Minimal. Better well dressed than armoured.
Weapon:Dagger or poison.
Female assassins have always been a thing, female warriors are generally over embellished, more symbolic than useful.
>>45958633
Because they love gradually getting their nips slapped straight off with a bowstring.
>>45958744
Brigandine, longsword, and crossbow for low techonology or firearm for high technology setting.
They are light enough to be wielded by an average woman effectively, brigandine is lighter than plate armour and protects against ranged weapons much more effectively.
>>45958646
the whole strength vs dexterity dichotomy is false to begin with
>>45958669
i know your pain anon
>>45958646
>MASSIVE FUCKING SUPERHUMAN STRENGTH BOWS.
That's called a ballista, anon.
>>45958710
They're basically just used for hunting though, since you can only kill a couple of people at a time with a bowllista, and a shitload more with a goofy 8-foot sword that weighs two pounds and cuts through rock like butter.
>>45958780
Only if they shoot with the western grip.
Everyone else had the good sense to shoot with the thumb and the arrow on the outside of the bow, thus making the arm guard unnecessary and leaving all but the most ample nipples intact.
>>45958703
It is pretty true, I have some experience with archery. Using bows require good arm and fingers strengths, plus it is not easy to hit with.
Well for longbows you needed to be kind of a gorilla to pull them fully, but composite bows needed less strength to fire with the same force, they were more efficient.
>>45958744
Spear in order to compensate for lack of reach.
![Ballista[1].jpg](https://i.imgur.com/43D3wW8.jpg "Ballista[1].jpg")
>>45958804
No anon, this is a ballista.
>>45958710
yes! pretty cool I must say
>>45958633
Because some works of fiction wanted to include women, but the hero was already wielding the sword. Having a woman fight was already weird 40, 50 years ago and in close combat would have been even weirder, and the bow is the logical choice for a fantasy setting back then.
Everything after that just built on top of the established idea.
>>45958839
Remove the unnecessary bits from a ballista, and you got your superhuman strength bow, pretty much.
>>45958633
because most people don't want to see women get their heads bashed in with maces
>>45958646
>>45958744
Depends on the setting.
If we say 7th century tech viking culture for historical accuracy, then a wooden shield with a spear or an axe, real light on the use of iron, with chainmail only if she's well off.
I thought you had to have good upper body strength to be effective with a bow?
>>45958633
>bows
>a "female" weapon?
I mean, I know this is a bait thread, but come on.
>>45958694
The flipside is that in these arguments archery is reduced to HYW warbow shooting done by strong-huge yeoman. Which is probably the most physically demanding form of archery.
Other forms of archery are on offer.
Historically hunting with bows has been incredibly popular among both men and women across the world, in most cultures it was the main sport for nobility. Women can and did shoot hunting bows up to 100lbs which is more than enough to kill an unarmoured person stone dead.
While the waifish figure of some fictional archers is an exageration, there is no requirment to be ripped like a lumberjack in order to effectively use a bow as a weapon.
>>45958851
No.
>>45958651
It is more or less this. One thinf that comes into my mind is that archery was quite fun past time in 19th century for ladies. There might be some connection between these two. Or the case is just that the fellow first wrote that elven females carry bows has just stuck as an idea
>>45958880
>every fantasy artwork, card game or vidya that has people with bows consists of either Elves or women, men trailing far behind
b srs, m8
>>45958633
It's not as much that bows are ''female weapons'' as it is that women really are not build for melee.
Also almost all traditional, heroic melee weapons (swords, spears) are obvious phallic symbols, so naturally women can't wield them.
Hence women get bows.
>>45958646
>MASSIVE FUCKING SUPERHUMAN STRENGTH BOWS
Oh yeah
>>45958633
Since forever. Just look at Diana, Artemis, Neith, and so on.
>>45958633
The same time they became some kind of agility finesse weapon.
People don't really think about how strong you became in the process of becoming a proffessional archer (as opposed to just a random hunter) so it's the go to weapon for characters that are either meant to look cool and skilled, or sexy, because you don't need to put on a lot of annoying armour that covers up your cleavage when you just kill stuff from a distance (that never shoots back).
The optimal female weapon in most fantasy settings if you want to be "real" about it, is
1: Magic
and
2: Blowing someone stronger than the guy you want killed, but that doesn't make for compelling movie characters or videogames. So they usually give her a bow instead and make her cartoonishly accurate.
>>45958873
>with chainmail only if she's well off.
And damn buff. Chainmail is not light. Even with a belt, a lot of the weights on your shoulders and arms. It's fine if your just standing around, but fighting in it is exhausting. Good plate was valued because it was also lighter than full mail.
>>45958994
>Good plate was valued because it was also lighter than full mail.
*Lighter per inch of coverage.
A full suit of plate is not lighter than a mail byrnie, but a breastplate is lighter than a mail shirt.
Also, by the time full plate armour existed people had been using plate pieces for the limbs and brigandines or similar for the torso for ages, so choosing between mail and full plate was not really a relevant scenario for those who could afford plate, they would have been using intermediate armour.
>>45958964
Arrows are pretty dosh garn phallic though.
>>45958633
The Amazons.
>>45958994
He said 7th century viking culture, in this case there is no plate to be had. At that time it's believed that maybe, some of the best off vikings had some form of armor besides a helmet.
>>45959032
What has to do a river with female bow users?
>>45958633
Because otherwise you ahve a Buffy fight where the baddies seem almost afraid to hit a woman or you have every tumblrina getting ultratriggered when the woman gets the shit bloodily kicked out of her.
Bows allow distance.
>>45958633
As already mentioned in the thread, there have been a few notable examples of women archers in mythology/ancient history.
Modern fantasy may have built on these stereotypes, but I believe it has mostly to do with style. Women in fantasy have classically been illustrated as graceful, which doesn't come across when they are armed for a brutish melee scenario. The exception would be bladedancers and acrobatic knifefighters, but then again these two are more equipped for duel situations instead of bulk-melee.
>>45958744
Assuming we're talking a rank-and-file soldier/mercenary, I would say shield and a melee weapon, combined with whatever kind of armour would be available to her peer soldiers.
If we're talking about stereotypical main-character female warriors, go for sword and buckler and comparably light armour.
>>45958744
Polearm and the best armor they can get. The increased reach will make up for the fact that she's physically smaller and has shorter arms and the leverage generated makes up for the fact she's physically weaker.
A woman isn't going to attack any faster with a sword than anybody else, but she's likely to be overpowered when the two weapons clash.
A pan.
Bows are an elf's weapon. And Elves are girls.
>>45959267
using a polearm effectively requires a good bit of strength.
even a relatively light weapon can tire you out when you have to swing around 6 feet of it.
Remember that leverage works both ways, it makes swings harder hitting,and harder to perform.
>>45959024
Yeah, but they're tiny compared to spears and such, more feminine and delicate.
Did you know that the clit is actually a teeny tiny penis when you really think about it?
>>45958633
Generally speaking, bows became the woman's weapon in the fantasy genre because it allowed a woman to participate in combat without placing her on the front line where she had little hope of success. Rather than trying to wrap her in chainmail and give her a sword, you could sit her off to the side and pick off targets by sneaking, which already fit with the history of women as poisoners and assassins. As time went on, the short bow they used got bigger as the art got more exaggerated.
>>45958992
>it's the go to weapon for characters that are either meant to look cool and skilled, or sexy, because you don't need to put on a lot of annoying armour that covers up your cleavage when you just kill stuff from a distance (that never shoots back).
Nailed it.
>>45959302
>And Elves are girls.
>>45958633
Some anons said it's because it's a range weapon and people don't want to see the woman get hurt in close combat.
I say, if I was in a battle between me and someone, I'd not want to get hurt in close combat either.
However, I can not see your problem? Is it because of DotA? And LoL? And HotS? Remember that they are basicly the same game and try to find another example, because I can't fucking remember another movie where a woman uses a bow and a man doesn't.
Quite the opposite, really.
>>45958633
Because ranged weapons mean your female characters can still contribute without being put into melee combat. It's the old "you can't hit a girl" thing.
>>45959429
>the "male" has the more neotenous features
>>45958633
Because bow was considered as unworthy weapon in medieval.
>>45959447
Elf society is one of heavy to industrial-strength /ss/.
>>45958851
Are you aware that a ballista works by means of a pair of torsion springs and not with the spring action of a bow?
>>45958633
Because since the greeks wrote about amazons, they wrote they rely on bows and throwing spears.
And the myth that amazons cut of one of their breast for better use of bow and arrow did its thing.
Since then, bows are prime weapons for females.
>>45959433
Of the five signature Solars in Exalted, the girls are a mage and an archer
In Chrono Trigger, the girls use a bow and a gun. In Final Fantasy IV, Rosa is the only one with a bow.
In Metal Gear Solid, the only sniper is a girl.
In some Zelda games, Link gives the bow to the princess while continuing to use the sword.
In Ogre Battle, the starting male class is a swordsman, while the starting female class is an archer.
In Clash of Clans, the first two units are the swordfighting male Barbarians and the female Archers.
IIRC in Game of Thrones, Ygritte is the the only wildling who mains a bow.
>>45958964
Almost all weapons are phallic symbols. Hence why all the wars in our world are only enormous dick waving contests with lots of killing involved.
>swords: long and straight for Europe, curved for the middle east, curved and short for the far east, and all kinds of weird shapes in sizes in Africa. Obvious phallic symbols.
>spears, the longer the better
>clubs, maces and hammers, the thicker the better
>all kinds of polearms for compensation
>arrows, bolts
>blowpipes
>guns (long tube with a thicker rear end that shoots stuff from the front) magazines are a great analogue to testicles.
>rockets/missiles
>modern bullets
>cannons for compensation
>proud display of nuclear warheads and other shit during military parades
>sling projectiles and hand grenades are obviously testicles
It's all a big Freudian nightmare.
>>45959433
>Melee means that you can get hit back, and violence against women is sexist and triggering
>Ranged means you wear lighter, sexier armor
>True or no, bows imply lithe precision over brute strength
Here's another reason. Have you ever seen one of the girls with guns threads on /k/? Every once in a while, they do a girls of archery thread. Have you ever seen a girl drawing a bow? Standing straight, back arched, arms up, chest out?
Image search around and you will see EXACTLY what I mean.
>>45958851
This nigger serious ? If anything I'd say use it as a fuck huge crossbow for your giant ( if giants are like...15 feet tall in your setting.
>>45959666
>>45959506
Same goes for crossbows.
Bows became a female weapon because of JRPGs.
Why?
Because bows are associated with the primary Japanese goddess figure, Amaterasu, who wielded a bow.
Shrine maidens prepare arrow charms for homes and good luck.
Archery is an important part of Shinto exorcisms and coming-of-age rituals, there really wasn't a stigma against women practicing the art, which made it popular with them, similar to how the naginata was considered an acceptable martial hobby for women.
>>45959517
>In Metal Gear Solid, the only sniper is a girl.
Mind you, in MGS everyone uses a gun unless they have crazy psychic powers.
In 3e women are the Wizard, the Druid...and the Paladin and Monk. About evenly split if we don't count 'Turning into a bear' as normal melee.
Disgaea has melee and female fighters and one of the premier melee classes is female-only.
Many of the most terrifying melee characters in Fire Emblem have been female, including one of the best lords.
While there is a BIT of a lean towards 'girls use ranged weapons' it's not quite as strong as you make it out to be.
>>45959018
>A full suit of plate is not lighter than a mail byrnie
No, but it distributes the weight around the body rather than just having it all sitting on the shoulders, arms, and neck, making it FEEL much lighter to wear in combat for an extended period.
>>45959517
Tomoe Gozen (she's traditionally depicted with a bow, although this case is a bit confusing as in the culture she came from it's the bow that was considered masculine, not the other way around)?
>>45958989
This guy gets it.
>>45959513
Artemis was a hunting goddess even before that. You go about a thousand years further back in time, and the Canaanite war goddess Anat was depicted as an archer. The image of the female archer is clearly far older than the Hunger Games, but it's hard to say why or when exactly it started.
>>45959703
This post is a very intriguing combination of informativeness and ignorance.
>>45958646
>stronk bow
>playing homebrew on skype somewhere between SPECIAL and GMs own shit with the GM just making shit up as he goes
>each character gets a special stat and gets a bonus to everything that can be related to that stat
>make COMMANDO man
>find a small tree and punch it into a bow with my arnie commando powers
>>45960328
Probably less risk for a woman using a less effective bow, than a less effective melee weapon.
If you fuck up in melee you get chopped the fuck up. If you fuck up with archery, you get another go hopefully or you can run the fuck away or you've positioned yourself out of reach etc. More tactical options that don't rely on strength/endurance.
>>45960362
This was literally millennia before the concept of feminism, much less the modern one. Whatever gave the Canaanites or whatever the idea of archer women probably wasn't related to PR. Some even theorize that the image recalls even earlier (as in, thousands of years earlier) practices, preserved in myth, from a time where human societies were so tiny every once in a while even the women had to go hunting.
Haven't women always been associated with bows, at least since antiquity? A lot of mythologies have a hunter goddess who not surprisingly uses a bow? Flidais, Neith, Artemis/Diana, Bendis, Skaoi, yes there are plenty of male hunter deities but that's not the point. There has long been an association between women and bow hunting, it wasn't some modern invention to appeal to our sensibilities. They might not be "dex" weapons, but they don't require a lot of strength to use not every bow is an English self bow.
I did a bit of research, and it looks like women have about the same potential in endurance, measured by efficiency of converting oxygen into movement, as men.
Sedentary men have higher efficiency in this than sedentary women, but in athletes of both sexes it appears to be about even.
In other words, it would seem that if you can reach the minimum requisite strength to effectively wield a bow, it doesn't really matter what you've got hanging off your chest
>>45961003
>I did a bit of research
I'm sure you did tons of research on tumblr you fat landwhale piece of shit. Fuck off and tie, and besmirch the glorious realm of /tg/ no more.
>>45961003
>>45960996
The issue in the long run would be lactic acid build-up which women fair poorly in, their chest width and therefore muscle mass able to be held their, their muscles being weaker (less cells per fiber, less fiber per bundle, and less bundles overall). They just don't fair well in any sort of upper body or endurance test when compared to men as they lack the natural endowment and ability to reduce downtime and recovery speed.was gonna post this in the other thread but i figure lets keep this contained.
>>45961270
Did not mean to add that secondary thread bit.
>>45959513
Initially, I was under the impression that the Greeks got their idea of the Amazons from women warriors among the Scythians, who as horsemen often used bows and spears. It seems that they placed Amazons in Asia Minor as often as not, but there seem to a be a lot of Scythian undertones and they were often considered to be mounted warriors. Soyeah, the bow association is at least as old as pre-classical Greece, but it was not exclusive - Amazons were depicted with spears and occasionally swords as well.
I have a theory that the hunt goddess might be partly symbolic - the bow is not unlike a lunar crescent, and the moon is usually associated with femininity. As far as I am aware, this association was not just limited to hunt goddesses - Ishtar was supposedly drawn in a lion-drawn chariot with a bow in her aspect as a war goddess.
>>45958633
Girls look cute while shooting and it puts them far away from combat where your precious waifu won't get a hair on her head touched.
Anyways it's basically a thing because it's a thing, the archetype existing is what makes people use the archetype.
>>45958694
I remember an early episode of Arrow that kind of played on this. Queen took in a widowed Helena Bertenelli and basically turned her into the Huntress.
He tried to teach her to use a bow, but she sucked at it since unlike him she didn't spend ten hours a day doing salmon ladders. So he commissioned the Huntress's signature crossbow and gave it to her.
>>45958744
>what's the optimal weaponry and armor for a female warrior in a low fantasy setting?
Pots and pans, because she should have been in the kitchen in the first place. Nothing about "low fantasy" allows women to be warriors or soldiers any more than "real life" does. If there isn't a magical crutch for women to use (ie, high magic setting), then they have no place anywhere near a battlefield, save as camp followers, booty, or both.
>>45958744
Ideally a firearm, then crossbow, then bow. Women won't have nearly the same pull strength, but you can get some decent range off a moderate weight, especially against unarmored targets like militia. A crank mechanism on a crossbow is a good equalizer.
If melee, any suitably lighter version of a weapon so they can use it as well as male opponents.
>>45958646
This.
Oddly enough, having had experience with both swordplay and archery, I'm pretty confident in saying that using a bow is more rooted in strength, and swordsmanship is focused precision and speed.
>>45958744
Dragoon. Horseback pistoleers/lancers.
>>45962421
Yep, and your fat grognard ass would get slaughtered along with all the other pig farmers by actual men.
Fantasy. Fan-Ta-Seeee. Say it with me now. Faaann-Taaaaaa-Seeeeee.
>>45962530
Caught in a landslide!
>>45959703
>>45960337
>>45958744
a Gun, seriously a gun doesnt care who is holding it, it will always preform the same, all you need to do is aim.
in a past setting, then a crank crossbow, or chinese repeating crossbow. it is easy to draw and fires like a gun.
melee weapons? probably a rapier, smallsword, or a saber.
>>45959433
All this post really tells us is that you only ever played MOBAs
>>45958744
>the optimal weaponry
Her cunny
>and armor
Her reputation
>>45958633
>>45958646
Still my favorite fucking scene in DaS1.
>"HAH! A truer shot was never loosed!"
>>45962421
>>45961270
Would battles last long enough for this to become an issue though? I know napoleonic warfare could be really short, but I'm not super familiar with large scale conflicts before then. I still don't see it being an issue in smaller engagements though.
>>45962421
vikings had female warriors and they fucked shit up everywhere in the known world and in parts of the unknown world. There's a pretty fucking metal tale of a viking dame losing her shit when the fuccbois she went to vinland with were fleeing from a bunch of native americans. She picked up a sword, ripped off her shirt and slapped her titties with the blade which freaked the natives out so bad it let everyone get away
>>45963105
If "low fantasy" is meant to resemble a more real-life setting, than our own history is proof enough that female soldiers are nearly non-existent for a multitude of reasons.
If you wanted an accurate female character I'd suggest sticking to lighter weapons and armor. If firearms are allowed in the setting they'd make an excellent choice as well.
>>45963668
Female warriors were rare but it did happen in the real world.
>>45959061
Scythians basically gave birth to the Amazonian woman warriors.
>>45958633
They are a way for women to take part in fantasy violence and fights without the problematic issue of having her getting seriously hurt in a melee. Male leads can get the shit kicked out of them and it adds to the cool factor. If a woman so much as gets a punch, it's triggering.
>>45959355
>the clit is actually a teeny tiny penis
Got that backwards. The penis is actually a scaled up and elongated clit
Flails, Guns, Faith and some seriously good leadership.Kids get slings.
>>45958633
Well
Mostly because bow are viewed as gracefull weapon, that is symbolize feminimity , but that mostly just public view.
>>45958646
>>45958703
Dude, strength of the archery doesnt come from brute muscle force, it come from technique. With continuous training, the body muscle are atuned to draw the bow with correct proportion of strength without wasting much energy, hence why most of the ol english longbowman are trained from early age.
Things like that dont require you to have bulky manmuscle, but fit enought body is enought.
>>45963907
*should be in response to >>45958744 derp.
Not all bows are Welsh longbows. Many cultures around the world have used ones which are quite a bit easier on the muscles, but no less effective.
>>45963768
What part of "nearly non-existent" do you not understand? In the histories of all wars and conflict, the number of female soldiers, that is females whose profession was fighting, wouldn't even register on a meaningful scale.
If you want "sunshine, rainbows, and everybodies equal" then go with a regular fantasy setting. Truth is, women don't make good fighters and don't want to be.
>>45963832
people keep citing the modern trigger tumblr shit, but the bowfighter trope is way older than the fucking internet so it kind of sounds like you're just saying that to be edgy?
>>45963984
You know what was also fucking rare? Heroes.
>>45963997
My phrasing is tumblerite, yeah, but I still think what I said stands. People don't tend to like the sight of women getting their shit wrecked, so they're kept in the fight but at the back. Unless of course she's a femme fatale sort who's totally badass and puts boys in their place.
>>45963984
You know what was also fucking rare? Aluminum
>>45964050
Show me on the doll where the fictional female character refused to touch you.
>>45959513
>And the myth that amazons cut of one of their breast for better use of bow and arrow did its thing.
I'm not going to say it never happened, but I feel like this would kill most of the people who tried due to medical complications and infection however many thousand years ago they existed
>>45963984
You know what was also fucking rare? Brain cells in your head. Read all of the fucking reply chain before opening your retarded mouth.
>>45959517
I didn't play Chrono Trigger. I didn't play Final Fantasy IV.
Metal gear solid did have the old guy.
Zelda games? But Link wielded the bow all the fucking adventure, you're projecting.
I didn't play Ogre battle or Clash of Clans.
I only watched the first 2 seasons of GoT.
>>45962912
I only pointed to MOBAs because they are the only games that came to my mind where this was the case? Hanzo uses a bow? Legolas uses a fucking bow? Crysis suit-guy uses a bow?
>>45959610
I can see your point, still can't see where it became a female weapon, to be honest.
Weapons are based on character tropes, not on gender.
>>45964131
Keep clucking nu-male. What I said is still worthwhile. So much media frowns upon any female characters suffering graphic harm so using a bow is still a way for them to take part in fights without putting them in the middle of a melee scrum where they will be at risk of getting hurt or coming out looking spotless while everyone else is a bloodied wreck, thus diminishing them. Now either put forth a counter-argument, an agreement or spew forth more memespeak.
>>45964473
That plus the fact that the Amazons never actually existed.
Also I can't believe this thread has gone so far without anyone mentioning the Pink Power Ranger.
>>45961478
My take is women often hunted small game while men needed weapons with more heft for larger game during the times of hunter-gatherer societies. Though I guess you'd need to see when bows first start appearing in history and see if it corresponds to the times of hunter-gatherers, measure the pull of one too I guess. Though 20-30lbs is more than enough to kill most small animals
>>45958633
Because it's a "dexterity" based weapon (when in reality no, bows require a ton of dexterity), but mostly it's because it's a distance weapon that keeps the woman away from the enemy and out of danger of injury or death.
We react poorly to seeing women being beat up, injured, or killed, and bows are a convenient way for women to contribute to a fight without us ever actually seeing them get beat up like the men do.
>>45964836
>when in reality no, bows require a ton of dexterity
Strength, I meant.
At least for longbows.
>>45958744
Samurai wives would be trained on a Naginata, which was pretty much the top-tier weapon of fuedal Japan, and raised as a defense force when needed. You could easily export that as a cultural norm to a low fantasy setting.
But really the optimal weaponry and armor for a female warrior is going to be the same as the optimal weaponry and armor for a male warrior - whatever kills the guy attacking you the fastest, without exposing yourself to being killed, that you have the time to be trained in using and the resources to produce en masse. If the female warrior is a career soldier for whatever reason, she's going to train in a variety of weapons and bring the one that makes sense for the battle she expects to fight (while keeping the sword as an all-around backup option). If she's part of an emergency levy that needs to defend the city, she'll either be one of the many given a pointy stick and a prayer or be lucky enough to hang out with the people who have bows and slings.
>>45964950
The only real issue I see is that she might not have the optimal strength to use a pike or halberd.
>>45964131
Are you going to kiss it and make it feel better?
>>45959018
>armour
europoor detected
>>45958633
serious answer: it has nothing to do with any historical inspirations, although bows = elves = girls is very close.
women use bows because once you close and disarm them, they are non threats and can be captured.
sometimes, this is so the audience can anticipate/imagine her being disarmed and raped, and sometimes this is so that the audience doesn't have to worry about her being hurt or killed unnecessarily.
also, bow users have an excuse to be hot/not buff/half naked, w/e, without it looking as dumb as if they were a melee fighter
>>45964021
Not really. A hero only takes a good amount of luck and skill. A hero would be anyone that could survive the battlefield while killing a decent amount of people on their own.
>>45963465
Absolutely. Bows take some endurance because you gotta knock and aim which can take time and holding a warbow strength bow (80lbs usually) takes some endurance. Example: try holding an 80lb weight up with a slightly bent left arm laying on your right side. See how long you last or how long till you really feel that deep muscle burn.
An hour visit to an archery range can be a serious workout and i'm a big guy. Imagine the tiny less muscular frame of a woman with less ability to reduce muscle fatigue trying to shoot effectively for long.
Short fights should be easy enough if there's not alot of short intervals between them.
>>45963600
I thought that whole idea came from some corpse buried with a sword which was merely an honor for important people and warriors. She may or may not have been a warrior and saying she was is merely a guess at this point until we learn more about their culture which is going to be hard.
>>45959447
>Female elves are pedos
Is there no end to their heresy?
>>45963925
>Things like that dont require you to have bulky manmuscle, but fit enought body is enough
Then why did dedicated bow users have deformed skeletons from all the gainz they got from practicing with bows.
>>45962924
That seems like a bad combination. Her armor would be diminished by each use of her weapon.
>>45966198
This. You can train muscles to deal with the fatigue it brings about better like training leg muscles for marathons but you absolutely need muscle strength to pull and hold that bow taut.
Look up archers deformity. Its where the clavicle doesn't fuse properly or at all with the acromion due to repeated shoulder movements such as tennis, javelin throwing, baseball throwing, ARCHERY, and other shoulder strenous activities from a young age and actually undermines shoulder strength. Many many bones have been disocovered from battlefield graves with this deformity.
>>45966269
Her reputation is she's the neighborhood slut.
>>45962648
NO ESCAPE FROM REALITY!!
>>45967176
Open your eyes!
>>45958669For you.
>>45967345
Look up to the skies and seeeeeeeee
>>45968000
I'm just a poor boy, I need no sympathy
>>45968054
Because I'm easy come
Easy go
Little high
Little low
>>45959429
>>45968119
Any way the wind blows,
>>45968119
Any way the wind blows, doesn't really matter to meeee....
>>45968170
To meeeeeee.......
>>45958646
I loved AD&D 2e's bows that could have draw weights for inhumanly great strength. If you had 18/00 strength. you had a bow that was more akin to a fucking howitzer
>>45968189
Mama,
Just killed a man.
Put a gun against his head,
pulled my trigger,
now he's dead.
>>45958633
Alright so in general bows are really a strength weapon, and being bigger and taller means you can use a larger bow, and probably with enough training manage a heavier draw.
That said, a short bow will kill you just as dead as a longbow if the arrow goes in the neck or through your eye or something.
Also generally pulling strength is more equal across genders than height or weight.
What this means is that female archers don't suffer much disadvantage in battle, especially if you're in a setting / historical period where big ass bows are not a thing.
In real life battle sheer weight is a very large advantage, as is height due to reach.
Aside from the practicalities, I think there's a degree of machismo to it. Bows are women's weapons because if a women can use a bow as well as you can then your mainliness is wasted behind a bow. A real man would get out on the front lines and prove his dick is the biggest by doing something a woman, and presumably lesser men, could not.
>>45968222
Mama, life had just begun, but now I've gone and thrown it all away.
>>45958633
Women don't have the strength to wear the heavy armour of a footman or lug around a sword and shield.
Hence to be effective in combat they have to be scantily clad and use a bow. This also allows them to keep some distance between themselves and the enemy who will surely rape them in close quarter combat.
>>45968299
Mama
ooOOOOooo
Didn't mean to make you sad
>>45968315
Psst, Anon.It's cry not sad.
>>45968315
>>45968299
>>45968222
>>45968315
If I'm not back this time tomorrow, Carry on, carry on as if nothing really matters.
>>45968315
>>45968347
Fuck.
>>45963465
Ancient combat was almost entirely a test of endurance and willpower. Two lines would come together and shove at each other, causing few casualties, and generally after a few minutes one side would break off and pull back and the two sides would shout abuse at each other and use whatever ranged weapons they had. Then after they caught their breath they would go again. The two most effective armies of the era were the ones that could break this mold. The Macedonians used phalanx tactics to make pushing the other guys out of the way much easier. The Romans did a bunch of stuff (like rotating the front line and equipping everybody with javelins) that made fighting them like fighting a meat grinder.
>>45960400
That amazon may not be buff, but she's definitively fit.
>>45966198
Its because of his continuous training and use with the device, repeated movement over and over will make change to some parts of your body, even small things like using mouse will do change to your wrist if you do continuously.
>>45969133
Oh and the gainz is mostly because of his endurance, you know, being soldier in battlefield and all, and that gain mostly not at the same level bulk as bodybuilder, mostly its just regular well tuned one.
>>45958669
l5r lets you do it fairly well to be honest. I am currently playing one funny enough.
>>45968268
Ability to draw the bow is dependent on the muscles in the chest and back. Having a wider bigger chest means you have more muscle tissue which leads to more strength. Men tend to have bigger chests and their muscles have more power due to being more cell dense naturally.
The issue of draw strength being relatively equal is the fact bows are generally universal in pound options. Usually the average is a 50lb but plenty of people use 80-100 for hunting.
Now the issue comes down to what you're doing with this bow. Women can absolutely train, albeit more intensely to achieve similar results, to draw the same bow strength, but holding that is far more strenuous for their smaller, less cell dense muscles. No matter what anybody says or for how little time you are absolutely holding that bow taut for some period of time to settle, aim, and loose. This holding puts serious strain on the back muscles which men naturally develop more of as they mature during puberty to support the mass of the chest and arms while women do not. Combine this with the fact our muscles deal with fatigue and recovery much better than women do, and womens smaller boned and weaker forearm and fingers and men are more suited to this task for any period of time other than single firings with long periods of waiting between.
Small bows are actually much harder to draw when not using cantilevers since the arms must be thicker and more stiff to achieve the same poundage for the draw.
Sadly there is no area in physical activity women aren't better suited for, they just aren't built for it.
>>45958804
Odysseus did not string up his ballista to kill his wife's unwanted suitors when he got home, anon. He DID string up the bow that none of said annoying girly-men could even bend. READ A BOOK!
>>45970321
>Sadly there is no area in physical activity women aren't better suited for, they just aren't built for it.
Discus throw
>>45971298
Understandable but technically non-relevant. She was an absolute outlier (like PC's and why women being just as good as men PC's is the best arguement) and is therefore non-relevant to the majority of womens capabilities overall.
Its like claiming all women are geniuses because 1 out of the 3 top geniuses was a women.
>>45958646
For all it's flaws, D&D does bows right.
>>45971407
>outlier
The top men's performer would be tied for 4th would compared to the top women's performers
>>45971298
Wow I learned something.Is the disc women throw identical to the one the men throw? If it is I am amazed.
>>45971543
Ah it seems it is not. Don't know why you would bring it up when its lighter then the mens one who gives a shit.
>>45971543
Nope its half the weight, men's discus is 4.4 pounds, women's is 2.2 pounds.
>>45971684
there ya go. Either way outliers topping outliers is again statistically irrelevant versus the each populations sexual dimorphism working for or against them.
>>45963600
There's absolutely no evidence for shield maidens aside from the sagas.
You might aswell claim Amazons were real.
>>45959517
>In Chrono Trigger, the girls use a bow and a gun
I don't disagree with the point you're trying to make, but wrong example here, CT has a pure brawler girl
>>45971839
Actually, there are several graves of viking warriors with female bodies in it (We can tell from the bone structure)
>>45971900
You mean like those epic badass grrrrrl power Viking graves that turned out to be the wives of settlers?
>>45964131
Except that he's got a point. In the SJW era, feminists get irate when fictional hero groups don't include a girl (or, now, TWO girls who have to have conversations where they don't mention a man). That leads to twitter rage, boycotts, bad press, etc. Studio exec calls producer, producer calls writers and directors, and female characters are added. Or, if you like, editor calls writer, writer adds female characters. "Includes strong female characters" is turning into a cliche for critics.
And that's fine so far as it goes, but there's a flip side. If you depict violence against women, then you're also sent to Twitter Outrage Hell. Except that in a combat-heavy setting, the front line bruisers are going to get their asses kicked from time to time. If only to show how badass the enemy du jour is, build suspense for the climactic final battle.
Also, sex sells, and if there's one thing that nobody wants in their fiction, it's an ugly girl. Hot girls need to wear sexy costumes, and can't be sporting disfiguring scars and compound fractures.
So wat do? You find a role for the girl that isn't likely to result in her getting an audience-alienating graphic beatdown.
That means magical girl, rogue girl, ninja girl*... or archer girl. All are female archetypes. Archer girl has gotten more popular in recent years because it's a nature-friendly class that's able to fight without cheating and therefore lets her be One Of The Boys. And when one of these classes goes in fashion for girls, it crowds out the men because in most fiction it's one person per role.
Really, if you want the meta-cliche that spawns this, it's not that some classes are supposed to be female. It's that one very important class (frontline warrior types) can't be women** because feminism.
* Melee, but supposed to be fast not strong so you can throw her against the wall a few times and knock her out instead of pounding her into submission.
*Buffy and Brienne being notable exceptions.
>>45971464
DnD is literally what I was talking about.
Bow damage is based on DX. You can be ripped to shit and you'll deal less damage with a bow than an ST8 halfling with nifty fingers.
>>45972865
Not in older versions where bows are dex to hit but str to damage.
>>45958633
It originates from Artemis, the greek godess, after that its just associated for the same reasons that Artemis is depicted with a bow, because everyone thought women are more in tuned to nature, thus the hunting bow.
>>45958633
Not to sound like a SJW, but I think that men could wield a bow fine desu.
>>45972805
What the fuck are you even on?
Don't say the redpill.
>>45959447
Apparently female elves have puberty and male elves don't.
>>45959429
>>45972805
Good point.
Luckily, however, we're seeing these SJWs getting BTFO and revealed for their bullshit.
I don't give a crap about strong female characters, provided that they're not a straw feminist, or mary-sue shit-heads who "give two fingers to the patriarchyMTV"
If you can have great characters like Furiosa, or Veronica Mars, or the PPGs who in my opinion should be feminist icons, as they don't hate men, but rather work along side them and treat them as equals, and have some pretty based attitudes to them as well.
But then again, feminism has pretty much turned into a sexist "muh empowerment, kill all men" tumblr trigger fest.I used to consider myself a feminist, due to me being raised in a feminist household, but after seeing what it has become, I left that shit ASAP, as they violate the text book definition of what feminism is= EQUALITY of the genders. I'm surprised I uncucked myself as fast as I did
>>45959429
Male looks like a little boy.
>Legolas, my son...
>>45958646
Didn't the Numenoreans use bows made out of steel?
>>45968377
Too late... my time has come...
send shivers down my spine, bodies aching all the time.
>>45958646
>MASSIVE FUCKING SUPERHUMAN STRENGTH BOWS
Shadowrun troll archers, man. Launch exploding telephone poles at people.
>>45973608
Yes, and even their women could use them, you filthy mainland savage.
>>45960400
The bows aren't associated with women because Goddesses used them, the Goddesses are associated with bows because hunters use them.
Hell, Artemis may be known as the Huntress, but it was APOLLO that was the God of Archery.
>>45973684
Heck, even non-trolls.
One of the contacts a Shadowrun character I play has is an Elven Archer (She runs an archery range/dojo).
Do not fuck with a Str 9 elf, she will lay you out or put an arrow through your car.
>>45972805
>>45973506
>>45973714
Numenoreans are also ubermensch, live for two centuries in a "Nice" pseudo-medieval era filled with magic diseases on average -The Royal families could live three or four centuries longer-, were really fucking tall, and could, in a freshly conquered land with little to no infrastructure carve several mountains into impregnable functional fortress-cities and set up a half dozen other similarly impressive constructions, all with a uniform style and material usage, all of this after having their homeland sunk to the bottom of the ocean and making do with a populace that could fit several boats.
Numenoreans be whack yo.
>>45958839
You see a ballistae, I see a really big crossbow.
>>45958701
Early nineties? More like whenever the legend of the Amazons came about.
>>45974047
Or even better yet, when the Numenorean army arrived to challenge Sauron, he surrendered without a fight because his troops refused to face them.
That turned out to be the smart move, as corrupting them proved to be easier than flat-out beating them, but Sauron wasn't someone to abase himself willingly.
>>45958633
I want this meme to die.
>>45958633
Females are closet masochists, and wants to cut their left boobs away
Gives a female character in fiction a way to contribute without standing in the thick of the fight where she could get easily hurt.
In a modern setting, she'd be the sniper.
>>45973506
It's the nature of advocacy groups. They might start out with a good cause, be doing it purely out of the goodness of their hearts.
But what happens when they achieve their goals? When women get the rights they campaign for? They keep pushing for more of course, because the leaders have made a living out of it and they don't wish to let go of their power. Feminist studies are in pretty much every university - they have to keep pushing the envelope to stay relevant.
That's where you get bullshit like 'hurf durf, womens can't be harmed in any way in video games and other media otherwise it encourages violence against women!1!'
Because if they didn't keep bringing up bullshit 'problematic' issues, people would realise feminist studies serve no purpose anymore. Feminism killed feminism by achieving its original goals.
>>45958633
It's a cinema thing, actually.
In a physical fight if you want to show someone loosing, you see them cut up or physically fucked-up somehow, right? Well there is often STRONG studio resistance (Hollywood is ridiculously socially conservative, largely because it tends to have the same guys paying for everything and thus being in charge for decades and decades at a time) to seeing heroines physically hurt and attacked and the like.
So an action heroine can use a bow because it looks elegant, appears to the untrained observer to not require strength, allows them to contribute in the fight and thus be seen as equals, and best of all keeps them out of harm's way.
Now add twenty years of video games and shit copying movies that came before them and you have an answer.
>>45961536
>nlike him she didn't spend ten hours a day doing salmon ladders.
Stephen Amell just needs to get on American Ninja Warrior already
>>45958820
I'm confused, thumb on the outside? What kind of backwards handed person does that take?
Also I've never shot my nips off, but then my bow has a pretty heavy but short draw.
>>45958948
>>45976905
The outcome would be the same if Hollywood was ridiculously socially liberal. Nobody really wants to see women hurt.
>>45977173
Someone should edit TENGEN to TENGA.
>>45963984
You know what else is fucking rare? A good cobbler
>>45958694
Bending sexual dimorphism over and fucking it in the ass doesn't make for attractive females unless you are a closeted homossexual.
Unless you mean less Sophie and more well, female athlete.
>>45958633
As an archer myself I have no idea either. It makes no sense and It pisses me off. Most women do not have the strength and endurance required to draw 50-70lbs(even on a compound with 80% letoff) multiple times in a encounter, and the few that could would probably be so worn out that their accuracy would go to shit.
Plus draw weight required for bows to pierce armor in a medieval setting... yeah, no female is pulling that much even once.
>>45958633
Because most people don't know how bows actually work and assume it's no different to plucking a harp and only requires precision and nimble fingers.
What they fail to realize is that most conventional bows used for martial purposes or hunting big game need substantial upper body strenght, meaning strong arms and big chest -and back muscles.
And don't even get me started on the calloused fingers and the amount of training and dedication using a bow properly requires, both things females don't usually put up with well.
>>45976927
Supposedly they're planning a WWE match where he's gonna fight in-character.
>>45977089
Image plus placing the arrow on the side away from the body means the bow does this slight outward lean preventing armslap but making the bow not aim straight. While the arming bit can be compensated for so can keeping your elbow slightly bent like a decent archer can prevent arm slap. The above method does mean that the string on large straighter bows will slap back on the breast area closer to the target hence why the jap archers wear half boobplates.
>>45977659
What you're talking about doesn't happen naturally unless they're on some kind of gear.
>>45979653
>pinch draw
I just came here to say that I saw a kid slice his finger to the bone on the bowstring after trying that. After we told him to get a finger guard. After we told him not to pinch.
He insisted he knew what he was doing.
He managed to do that with a fucking 22-ish pound boy scout bow.
>>45980096
Well look on the brightside. If he ever wants to be that retarded again he'll NEED a thumbring now.
>>45980096
I've been pinch drawing on bows since childhood and am now 30 and I've never done that nor seen it happen. How the hell did he rip his finger open just from drawing it that way, it doesn't even seem intuitive that it would do that.
Hello /r9k/. How'd you do on this fine morning?
>>45980705
>Pointing out historical inaccuracies made for no sake other than politically correctness is annoying means he's a virgin basement dweller
lmao luv dis meem senpai
>>45980689
Beats me. I'm just glad I wasn't the RO that year and didn't have to deal with the flak. Word is that it might have been an edge on the nock point.
>>45958633
Because, OP, they're not going to hurt anyone in melee with that -4 Str.
>>45958768
>low fantasy
>gun
>>45981075
Guns are low-technology weapons that have existed for a long time, though?
>>45981096
>guns
>low-tech
RaughingAshigaru.jpg
>>45971959
or worse, slaves
>>45981096
Guess he doesn't know a thing about the history of those Asian countries. No shock, really. Muh trebuchet.
>>45958646
Well, it's both depending on how you use it.
>>45981192
Mongols were literally ALL upper body strength. Being born in the saddle means you never have leg days, bro.
>>45977173
Look close its an elve
The false idea that Bow=Dex has already been mentioned.
The main reason is that people don't like seeing women get hurt and it's pretty much a social taboo for someone to attack a woman physically, even in the context of battle/war.
So they're given bows so they can still be 'badass' while staying in a safe position the entire time.
>>45981216
Confirmed for never have ridden a horse
>>45977969
Well, if you mean for most women is ordinary peasant women with little to no training with martial device and spend its time cooking or shoping to no end, the yes, its not possible. But the dedicated one that spend her life for training with the device? Meh, not entirely true. And it will be change the form of some part of her body like wider chest and back and more formed shoulder than "normal" women and all.
Most of women i met when gone hunting with my uncle in the old days that use bow usually use 70-90 lbs one (some of them even use longbows) , and they use it with little problems, but just take them years of training with the device. They do however, have more shaped upper bodies.
And there is some thing you must understand that muscle bulk not always the same as one person mass of strength. The bulk is only a product of testosterone that mostly a feature of male to work as intimidation factor (since it the male job anyway) and beauty factor. But the strength only come from training and that only makes your muscle size to well fitted level, you need some protein control and particular training to archieve a masive muscle size. Like most construction worker, that have smaller muscle bulk than a trained bodybuilder, but able to lift and do work twice more than said muscleboy can handle.
Damn, to this day i still envy those womens.
>>45981942
>And there is some thing you must understand that muscle bulk not always the same as one person mass of strength. The bulk is only a product of testosterone that mostly a feature of male to work as intimidation factor (since it the male job anyway) and beauty factor.
Are you seriously trying to argue that men are not on average far stronger than women?
>>45981942
You are quite literally retarded and have no idea how muscles work.
>>45982061
Hea arguing the muscle size has nothing to with it which is factually retarded. Men have bigger denser muscles from birth. Its biology.
>>45982061
>>45982180
Eh, men are only substantially more above women in term of strength, because of their natural shapes. Women are rather lacking at martial strength generally because they're not give enought fuck about it.
And i just speak as my experience goes, i dont really like theoryhammering much.
But seriously, do you guys are really care much about it? I personally dont care women have same strength as men or natural purpose and all, i just care about personal competence, whoever they are.
>>45982228
>Women are rather lacking at martial strength generally because they're not give enought fuck about it.
What I care about is you perpetuating stupid numale misconceptions like this.
We're all playing pretend in a basement, and it's of trivial concern to pretend you've found the one in a literal million woman who is as strong if not stronger than any man, but you appear to genuinely operate under the misconception that this is the rule, and not the ridiculously rare exception.
>>45982228
>men are only substantially more above women in term of strength, because of their natural shapes.
ahahahaha-
No.
>>45982270
Oh i see, personal ego then
Well i tell you something, "concept" today, whatever it is, are always a miss. Only shaped by cherrypic reference, and diluded by personal ego. There is always thing that will bend that "concept" by any means. Thats why us man must always be study more, and be open minded.
>>45981075
Guns aren't in the slightest part fantasy though.
handguns and Arquebuses date back to the 1200s in europe and even earlier in asia. They've always existed alongside medieval swords and pikes. They're as low fantasy as a crossbow or a suit or armor.
A repeating gun that fires lightning bolts and summons zombies after killing the enemy, now there's a fantasy weapon.
>>45982385
I can smell the fedora on you, just from the way you type.
>>45982385
>Get utterly blown the fuck out by raw facts posted in front of your stupid face
>"Y-you need to be open minded"
Good lord.
>>45982395
Guns are one of fantasy if you fantasize about it, since why it call fantasy, it depends on whenether you want it in your fantasy or not m8.
>>45982401
>>45982406
Ya whatever man
I don't want to rustle your personal ego more anyway, with your fact and all that shit.
This thread are always been /rekt/ palace anyway.
>>45968144
>read as "thick elf of cock"
Why is it so fucking hard to be a pure archer in 3.5?
>>45958633
I think OP made a thread very similar to this one about knightgirls.
But to answer your question, I suppose it's because bows don't have drawstength in fantasyland, so women can use them without the bow being less effective.
>>45982548
Because you're playing 3.5 as a NotCaster.
>>45959816
That's why you wear a belt to take some of the weight off of your shoulders.
>>45981216
Because holding on to the horse with your legs while shooting with both hands is no leg day. Right.
>>45982623
Not that anon but either way it wouldn't be nice. Women have wider less stable hips and weaker tendons through out the legs and hips (leg and hip injuries are olympic tier career enders almost entirely for women.) putting weight on the hips would be pretty bad and lead to serious injury. Mail might be the best option at that point.
>>45982481
>This thread are always been /rekt/ palace anyway.
Yes for the SJW/Cuck crowd such as you
>>45980689
He likely didn't pull it straight back. If the string is even slightly off center from the bow and you let go of the string, the string will not only snap forward, but to the side as well. When it digs into your finger and pulls away at the same time, it could definitely cause your skin to tear off.
>>45958633
Started with the greeks.
