Board Thread:Suggestions forum/@comment-31507215-20170314002708/@comment-31507215-20170315022148

Lord Eldacar wrote: Ballistae were extremely varied in size, ammunition, and construction. But generally, you can break them down into Torsion powered engines, and Tension powered engines. Torsion ballistae were in use before even the Roman Empire, although they did perfect the design. These devices used the torsion of coiled rope-springs to force the two wooden arms outward and loose the projectile. They ranged from two-man, portable dart-throwers, to behemoths that fired massive stones and fire-pots.

Tension ballistae work in the exact same way as crossbows, with the tension of the bow giving force to the projectile. They were in use during the later middle-ages, and rarely fired anything but bolts. Another quick question - In short, the difference between torsion ballistae and tension ballistae is that the tension ones use the wood as a spring, like a bow, and the torsion ones use ropes as springs, like catapults. Is that the general idea?