Extreme Heavyweight Slinging

Historically this would be ideal ammo for ambushes against heavily armored infantry best used en masse against tight formations, for skirmishers on higher ground.

this video is an answer to the question and request of a fellow slinger "how heavy can you sling? can you make a video about it?"


Last part of the video

Conclusions :
Fist sized stones for me are 400-500grams , 1lb or 1 mina ( ancient measure).

In De re militari is mentioned that every soldier is trained in throwing 1 pound stones with the hand. With the sling I estimate (haven't tested it yet) that I can throw 1 pound stones @ 100m and w/ 800 grams max ~45m , w/ 1kg max ~30m



I used a simple split pouch 70cm in length don't know how different the result would be with a longer sling. I did only occasional throwing at this high projectile mass, could use the same one arm technique without injuring myself, only got muscle soreness on the forearm for a day. So it can be done and it probably was useful for the ancient skirmishers. I'll talk about how it could be used more effectively on the battlefield in a later video.


People playing Rome Total war 2 mention that slingers cannot shoot volleys over obstacles they can only shoot straight. This is not true in real life, they can shoot volleys either by aiming higher with normal ammo like archers do or use higher mass ammo that is suitable for high angles and more effective than light ammo in that case. Slingers are very versatile, it's difficult to depict that in a game.