The more than 50,000 people in the city should have lost between 4,000 and 5,000 at this time. The heavy losses severely damaged morale.
Almost all the siege weapons against the city wall were burning fiercely. The flames and thick smoke prevented them from getting close.
While he was hesitating, those damn trebuchets showed their power again.
They had seen with their own eyes how these super long-range trebuchets defeated the camel artillery team. At this time, these stone bullets rained down on their heads.
Every minute, 20,000 stone bullets weighing one kilogram rain down like a downpour.
They raised their shields in vain to try to block it, but to no avail. The stone bullets and pebbles weighing one kilogram not only penetrated the five-layer rawhide shield, but also fractured their arms and then hit their bodies.
As long as they were hit by these falling rocks, they would break bones and tendons. At this time, they lost their siege vehicles and other protective equipment, and were completely exposed to the rain of bullets.
Inside the city wall, each trebuchet has a corps operator. A corps leader is responsible for measuring the angle and calculating the range.
The two loaders are responsible for loading stone bullets. The two launchers are responsible for pulling the chain under the pulley to raise the weight box.
Finally, the team leader adjusted the range based on the data transmitted from the city wall, then pulled the latch and launched.
The Oirat army outside the city kept running in fear, as if this could reduce the chance of being hit by stone bullets.
But in fact, which unlucky person is hit by the stone bullet is completely random.
Gushi Khan looked at it for a while and said, "Remove it."
Several other people also nodded. Now the northern city wall has been burned into a wall of fire. It is impossible to get close at all, and the trebuchets are firing non-stop. The current situation is just increasing casualties.
As the horn sounded, the army retreated like a tide.
Yan Yingyuan shouted loudly: "Don't stop the trebuchet, keep hitting it to the maximum range."
There are too many people in Oirat, and only by consuming them as much as possible can there be any hope of holding on. In Yan Yingyuan's view, every opportunity to kill them cannot be missed. Adding up a little makes a lot more is also a tactic.
This kind of pulley and counterweight trebuchet has an advantage, that is, it can be used unlimited times. Because it uses manpower to lift the counterweight box, it only consumes rice. And the cobblestones are everywhere on the Yellow River beach. You can get as many as you want.
It won't be used up even in a hundred years.
As long as the equipment is not damaged, you can continue to fight. If it is damaged, you can also ship parts. This is the disadvantage of siege.
If these trebuchets only carry a weight of one hundred kilograms, they can be projected to a distance of 500 meters, which is a full mile. It can be said to have reached the limit of mechanical projectile. And many firearms in this era have a range of
Didn't reach 500 meters.
The Oirat people ran back, enduring the heavy rain of stone bullets.
Every time a dark cloud composed of stone bullets fell from the sky, smoke and dust would rise from the ground, and countless people were hit with broken bones and tendons by the stones.
The trebuchet fired five more times before these men escaped from the range.
Dalai Tush looked at the miserable scene within 500 meters of the city in the distance, and let out a long sigh. He had already estimated that this city would be difficult to defeat, but he did not expect it to be so difficult to defeat.
Their only artillery was the camel cannon, and their muskets came from the Ottoman Empire, the same type of matchlock as the Rumi gun. In fact, these were not backward, and even seventy or eighty years later, they still had an advantage when confronting Kangxi.
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But although Yang Fan only used a trebuchet, it was a cold weapon. However, in terms of design and materials, it had reached its limit. Firearms in the early stages of development were still no match for cold weapons that had reached their peak.
The splashing of molten iron was a stroke of genius, causing Hala to suddenly feel a toothache.
This gray-white city has now been blackened by fire. It looks mottled and seems to be dilapidated. However, he knows that today's attack did not cause any substantial damage to the city wall.
The camel cannon only caused some stones to fall off the crenels. As for the rams and siege engines, they basically had no effect and were burned.
"We can no longer fight like this. At least more than 6,000 people died today. We can't stand it if we continue to fight like this. We must come up with new methods."
Gushi Khan, Dalai Tush and others were all frowning. There was no good solution for a while.
They didn't know what backup plan Yang Fan had. Judging from the current situation alone, there was nothing they could do if they kept pouring iron juice.
Because if you want to siege a city, you must have siege weapons. These weapons, whether they are building vehicles, siege vehicles, trench-filling vehicles, trebuchets, and ladders, are all made of wood.
Once these things get close to the city wall, the defenders will pour molten iron with a temperature of more than a thousand degrees. The wood will be ignited almost instantly.
Once a person is stuck with molten iron, even a drop of it cannot be tolerated. The molten iron can burn the skin instantly and even cause fat and clothes to burn.
Today, the army obviously rushed to the city. However, the molten metal poured down fell like raindrops on the densely packed army under the city. These people were so hot that they were rolling on the ground, and the entire battlefield smelled of cooked meat.
This tactic has no solution at all. Even if they can use camel cannon to block the crenels, it will be useless. They don't need to show their heads, they just need to throw the molten iron down.
No one knows how much molten iron they have and how much coal they have. Anyway, the Yellow River is still open to navigation, so I don’t know the specific situation.
For a while, the Taijis all lowered their heads in deep thought.
At this time, He Duo and Qin suddenly said: "I have thought of a way, but I don't know if it is feasible."
Gushi Khan quickly said: "Tell me what you think, we don't have a good solution anyway."
He Duo and Qin said: "Today is the first day of the Lunar New Year. There is no moon at night, so it will be very dark. We will take advantage of the darkness to push the trebuchet up. Bombard their city walls and kill their defenders on the walls."
Gushihan's eyes lit up, this was a good idea.
During the day, you can clearly see on the city wall that neither the camel cannon nor their trebuchets can go up. Because the opponent's trebuchet has a range of 500 meters, and their trebuchet has a range of 200 meters. The camel's range is only more than 300 meters.
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Moreover, the outside of the city can be seen from the city, but the city cannot be seen from the outside. There is no way to find the location of the trebuchet in the city and destroy it. This kind of fighting method that can only be passively beaten is impossible to win.
However, if they take advantage of the cover of darkness to transport the trebuchet to a place 150 meters away from the city wall, then launch an attack, bombard the city wall all night, and retreat at dawn, then they can destroy their city wall bit by bit.
After all, no matter how strong the city wall is, if it continues to be bombarded by forty or fifty kilograms of stone bullets, sooner or later it will be damaged. Ancient sieges were long-term operations, and there were also sieges of seven or eight years. The same goes for trebuchets hitting city walls.
What takes time is not that the city wall will collapse in a few days.
In this case, the advantages of both sides would be reversed. The Beijing camp would be in the open, while they would be in the dark.