War elephants

[gagenater]

What are you talking abut there was records of tragets being hit from 500 meters away. We just suck compared to those people but an arrow can be shot at 100 meters. It can pierce the skin of an elephant its not iron or wood. That it has more fat an muscle it one thing but the skin will be pierced an it will hurt them and it will enrage them. Oh and since we have archer enthuziast on this thread ask the person who has an better accuracy an archer hitting from an 2.5 meters elephant that moves hitting down or an archer with less size or that arcehr hitting an elephant of 2.5 meters height and 2 meters in bulk?
The archer from the elephant will hit shit. If its riding the elephant does he not suffer from balance problems is the target not smaller then what the opposing archer has to hit? How can he hit the opposing archer when every step the elephant does shakes you when he is smaller target and when the elephant is enraged because it has arrows that pierced his skin and especially trunk and hurt him like crazy and it moving and attacking anyone he can?

I saw that the armor did not covered all of the trunk and the ears where it hurts the most your words. Also in an war there hundreds of archers with hundreds of arrows some will hit the elephant in the ear or trunk.

Also since the head of the elephant is so high does it not mess with visibility for the archer?

Sure you can hit a target from 500 meters. I can do it too. not consistently, and not with any real velocity, but it happens. The archer from the elephant doesn't have to hit from 500 meters, because as a practical matter, nobody is going to score useful hits from 500 meters range. Have you ever ridden an elephant? it CAN be rough at moments, but at other times it's quite smooth because the elephant is in between strides (each footfall takes so long that you have time to aim and shoot in between them) is accuracy going to be affected? Absolutely. However It's not going to be nearly as bad as trying to shoot from horseback, and plenty of people mastered that. Elephants were always a tiny part of a much larger army. Only THE best archers, spearmen, mahouts, etc. actually rode the elephants into battle. The rest of the army was doing everything else. It's not up to the archer or two on the elephant to shoot back at enemy archers - that's for your archers to do. your elephant archers have other better/easier targets to shoot at.

the bit about the elephant potentially getting enraged is real, and one of the reasons elephants were so carefully armored. their trunks were NOT carefully armored at least towards the lower ends because the trunk is an offensive weapon, and excess armor reduces its efficiency. Obviously there ARE ways to beat elephants, and archery is one of them, but it's not easy.

 

[Graf Zeppelin]

Alright
1st the quality of ancient bows,archers and arrows differ alot.ALOT
2nd the Elephant wont show me its broadside but its front where he has a thick skull.
3rd armoring against arrows is quite easy actually. a few thick linen carpets would make that elephant almost impervious to archer fire from 50m+
If you dont belive me take on as many shirts as you can and let someone beat you with knife or club.

So alright lets take some of the best archers available, those from Creta.
Those would hit an elephant at 100 meters good enough. Fire arrows would be even better but those kill accuracy.
Good archers like that been rare of course and most ranged combatants been slingers actually and now imagine how many of those you need to kill an elephant.

Skirmishers with javelins are your best bet imo. If the elephants charges arrows wont stop them quickly enough.


ps comparing modern archers to those from the antique is apples and oranges. I doubt I could bend their bows and they would not know how to use mine and mine would also heavily interfere with their shooting techniques.
In direct Comparison mine would be more a slow firing marksman rifle with better range and accuracy and theirs SMGs with 4 round clips. Those archers could fire 3-4 arrows more quickly than most can fire a semi automatic pistol but thats another topic.I can explain it tho if someone is curious.

 

[sleeperul]

Alright
1st the quality of ancient bows,archers and arrows differ alot.ALOT
2nd the Elephant wont show me its broadside but its front where he has a thick skull.
3rd armoring against arrows is quite easy actually. a few thick linen carpets would make that elephant almost impervious to archer fire from 50m+
If you dont belive me take on as many shirts as you can and let someone beat you with knife or club.

So alright lets take some of the best archers available, those from Creta.
Those would hit an elephant at 100 meters good enough. Fire arrows would be even better but those kill accuracy.
Good archers like that been rare of course and most ranged combatants been slingers actually and now imagine how many of those you need to kill an elephant.

Skirmishers with javelins are your best bet imo. If the elephants charges arrows wont stop them quickly enough.


ps comparing modern archers to those from the antique is apples and oranges. I doubt I could bend their bows and they would not know how to use mine and mine would also heavily interfere with their shooting techniques.
In direct Comparison mine would be more a slow firing marksman rifle with better range and accuracy and theirs SMGs with 4 round clips. Those archers could fire 3-4 arrows more quickly than most can fire a semi automatic pistol but thats another topic.I can explain it tho if someone is curious.

Yeah but you can enrage the elephant be it with an arrow or with an rock and that is not good for anyone and its owner will have to kill the elephant so he does not kill more of his mates. Also those years are huge targets and there not armored.

 

[Graf Zeppelin]

Yeah but you can enrage the elephant be it with an arrow or with an rock and that is not good for anyone and its owner will have to kill the elephant so he does not kill more of his mates. Also those years are huge targets and there not armored.

I am of course no expert in anti elephant warfare. I dont know if one can clip those ears back or not.
Elephants have been used for warfare and so I assume they had their role depending when and where.
I assume sometimes they have been used with sucess and sometimes not. At least they must have made an impression if only for psychological reasons.
Again I only know something about archery and what I know is that I doubt I would bring down a charging oxen before it gets me and geting charged by enraged elephants sounds nasty.

 

[sleeperul]

I am of course no expert in anti elephant warfare. I dont know if one can clip those ears back or not.
Elephants have been used for warfare and so I assume they had their role depending when and where.
I assume sometimes they have been used with sucess and sometimes not. At least they must have made an impression if only for psychological reasons.
Again I only know something about archery and what I know is that I doubt I would bring down a charging oxen before it gets me and geting charged by enraged elephants sounds nasty.

I honestly do not remember an battle besides Hannibal greatest victory where armies that employed elephants won.
About clipping the ear pretty sure that will be bad and confuses the elephant he really needs those ears. Also when elephants charge there ears are shoiwn as much as they can.
Also Hannibal had like one left for that battle and that one was killed when he put it to fight against an captured roman solider who killed the elephant.
When there is notthing lost to lose no problem to morale.

 

[Antediluvian Monster]

I honestly do not remember an battle besides Hannibal greatest victory where armies that employed elephants won.

Elephants are supposed to have had a decisive effect at battles of Ipsus, Heraclea and Tunis (1st Punic War) at least. In addition there are battles where the victorious side had them but the defeated did not, e.g. Cynoscephalae and Pydna (but not limited to these). For Hannibal in Italy they weren't very important since most of them died in transit.

 

[gagenater]

I honestly do not remember an battle besides Hannibal greatest victory where armies that employed elephants won.
About clipping the ear pretty sure that will be bad and confuses the elephant he really needs those ears. Also when elephants charge there ears are shoiwn as much as they can.
Also Hannibal had like one left for that battle and that one was killed when he put it to fight against an captured roman solider who killed the elephant.
When there is notthing lost to lose no problem to morale.

Google is your friend. there are many many many instances of elephants being in numerous battles on the winning and on the loosing sides. They just weren't very common in Europe. Most of the major battles that saw lots of elephant useage were in S.E. asia, and India and they took place over thousands of years. The middle east, North Africa and Europe only saw scattered used of elephants for limited time periods.

 

[Geriander]

Google is your friend. there are many many many instances of elephants being in numerous battles on the winning and on the loosing sides. They just weren't very common in Europe. Most of the major battles that saw lots of elephant useage were in S.E. asia, and India and they took place over thousands of years. The middle east, North Africa and Europe only saw scattered used of elephants for limited time periods.

The extinction of elephants in North Africa probably has more to do with this than any view in the West of elephants as ineffective in war. With hostile Parthians, Sassanids, Rashidun Caliphate, etc, separating Europe from India, there wasn't really any reliable access to elephants. The Romans seemed to prefer killing elephants to extinction in the circus over using them in their legions but from the extinction around 100 AD onwards neither the Romans nor any other state in Europe had much of a option.

 

[Narwhal]

Now we have settled it about elephants, what about the usage of dinosaurs in pre-Jesus armies ?

How did one stop triceratops riders coming at you ?

 

[Kovax]

Now we have settled it about elephants, what about the usage of dinosaurs in pre-Jesus armies ?

How did one stop triceratops riders coming at you ?

Easy, just wait until they become extinct, or for the next "dinosaur killer" meteorite to hit and stop that charge cold. Prehistoric artillery at its finest, and doesn't even require a spotter to call in fire.