Rules for archery volleys?

[RangerWickett]

Aside from the law of averages saying 1-in-20 arrows hits and 1-in-400 crits regardless of AC, are there any rules for archery volleys, so as to simplify them? Namely, I want to have a thousand or so archers pounding the party with arrows from 800 ft. away.

 

[javcs]

Heroes of Battle has rules for this, Complete Warrior might have something, but I'd definitely go to Heroes of Battle.

Basics of it, the units of archers have to be in contiguous squares, one archer (presumably the guy with the best attack bonus) makes an attack roll to hit a square, everything in the area of the same shape as the archers takes a reflex save to avoid the arrow. Another variant the 'point volley', I think it is, everybody aims at the same square, the more archers firing, the higher the save required to avoid looking like a pincushion.

Don't remember the page numbers, unfortunately.

 

[Ltheb Silverfrond]

The WotC books Heroes of Battle had rules for archer volley. IIRC, it did several dice in damage with a reflex save for half. No attack roll, but hits a large area. That might be what you are looking for.

 

[RangerWickett]

If someone could post specifics, it would greatly help. I don't have that book.

 

[Primitive Screwhead]

Pg 68

In short:
Volley:
Full round action
Need at least 10 archers standing adjacent to each other and fire a single arrow
The arrows strike a similar grouping of squares as your archer formation has, designate a specific square to use a 'center' in case of a miss {you roll a missed ranged attack as normal to see where it lands}
Leader rolls an attack vs AC 15 using BAB + Int mod - range mods
- 2 circumstance mod if > half the archers dont have LOS to the target.
Creatures within the target area get a REF save DC 15 - range mods + lowest magical bonus of the arrows.
Failed save takes damage as if hit by a single arrow.

Concentrated Volley
As above except up to 10 archers strike one square and may fire a full attack
Attack is vs AC 20
Ref save vs DC 15 for half damage
Target gets hit by 1 out of every 5 arrows fired.

Weapon enhancements must be on all arrows in order to count for damage.
The Deflect Arrows/Block Arrows can be used to deflect/block an arrow that 'hit'
Volley attacks cannot result in a crit.

Indirect fire.. there is a paragraph about it but the only mechanic is some funky math.. gives the arrow a 'rise' of 10' per range increment to allow it to fly over some cover. I prefer my HR of adding a range increment to reduce frontal cover one step {Full to partial, partial to none.. allows for arching fire over a formation of tower shields within 110'..something WoTC rules don't allow for.}


The book has rules for Catapults and Ballista as well