I understand that we're pretty much immediately leaping into the "Rule of Cool" here, so I'm mostly trying to figure out which of these would be feasible enough on matters of size and firing mechanism for a pulpy campaign tone. For example, even Rule of Cool wouldn't allow you to fire a person out of a hand crossbow (it's too small), but I've struggled to figure out which of these siege engines could even Hollywood-believably let you pull this sort of stunt.
I'm pretty sure a trebuchet would work, it fires giant boulders that look larger than a humanoid curling themselves into a ball, but what about ballistae and mangonels? The internet describes either as firing "large stones", but it's tough to tell how large we're talking, as many ballista photos make the ammo look more like cannonball-sized and not person-sized stones. (Then again, in real life we have cannons that shoot humans, so maybe that's not the dealbreaker it sounds like?)
What if the party member is Small and wore a parachute (or was a monk with Slowfall) to deal with falling damage?
This really would fall into the classic ask-your-DM territory. All these different mechanical artillery options came in wildly varying sizes depending upon what country/region and year they where made. But as a general opinion I would rule that only the biggest versions (like Trebuchet or some Catapults) would be suitable for flinging a humanoid. Anything of the Ballista or Mangonel size would be too small.
You could not fire any PC out of a ballista. That weapon is designed to fire narrow spears. A person would not fit outside of literal cartoon physics. A mangonel would probably be too small to deliver a person of medium size with any sort of accuracy. We're talking like at least a -10 penalty to hit, and you'd be shooting with disadvantage for trying to shoot an oversized payload. Small size would be -5 to hit with disadvantage for being still too bulky compared to what the weapon is intended to fire.
This really would fall into the classic ask-your-DM territory.
Upper bound 100% agreed, what I'm trying to figure out is the lower bound (like, I don't think "Could you fire a human out of a hand crossbow" would fall into 'Ask your DM', it would fall into "absolutely not, under no circumstances whatsoever". So there is a common-sense limit, I'm just struggling to place it from looking at images of the siege engines online regarding which of them have sizes/ammunition/firing types that it's a sensible handwave to replace with a Small or possibly Medium humanoid).
Thank you both for the clarifications! Trebuchets are classified as Huge and maybe that's the best rubric to draw from, Large siege engines are too small to fire Medium or even Small-sized creatures, no ballista ever will due to the ammo type, so only an upscaled Huge mangonel or Huge cannon might also work. (There's of course one exception with the Gnomeflinger because it's literally designed to fire creatures).
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I understand that we're pretty much immediately leaping into the "Rule of Cool" here, so I'm mostly trying to figure out which of these would be feasible enough on matters of size and firing mechanism for a pulpy campaign tone. For example, even Rule of Cool wouldn't allow you to fire a person out of a hand crossbow (it's too small), but I've struggled to figure out which of these siege engines could even Hollywood-believably let you pull this sort of stunt.
I'm pretty sure a trebuchet would work, it fires giant boulders that look larger than a humanoid curling themselves into a ball, but what about ballistae and mangonels? The internet describes either as firing "large stones", but it's tough to tell how large we're talking, as many ballista photos make the ammo look more like cannonball-sized and not person-sized stones. (Then again, in real life we have cannons that shoot humans, so maybe that's not the dealbreaker it sounds like?)
What if the party member is Small and wore a parachute (or was a monk with Slowfall) to deal with falling damage?
This really would fall into the classic ask-your-DM territory. All these different mechanical artillery options came in wildly varying sizes depending upon what country/region and year they where made. But as a general opinion I would rule that only the biggest versions (like Trebuchet or some Catapults) would be suitable for flinging a humanoid. Anything of the Ballista or Mangonel size would be too small.
You could not fire any PC out of a ballista. That weapon is designed to fire narrow spears. A person would not fit outside of literal cartoon physics. A mangonel would probably be too small to deliver a person of medium size with any sort of accuracy. We're talking like at least a -10 penalty to hit, and you'd be shooting with disadvantage for trying to shoot an oversized payload. Small size would be -5 to hit with disadvantage for being still too bulky compared to what the weapon is intended to fire.
Upper bound 100% agreed, what I'm trying to figure out is the lower bound (like, I don't think "Could you fire a human out of a hand crossbow" would fall into 'Ask your DM', it would fall into "absolutely not, under no circumstances whatsoever". So there is a common-sense limit, I'm just struggling to place it from looking at images of the siege engines online regarding which of them have sizes/ammunition/firing types that it's a sensible handwave to replace with a Small or possibly Medium humanoid).
Thank you both for the clarifications! Trebuchets are classified as Huge and maybe that's the best rubric to draw from, Large siege engines are too small to fire Medium or even Small-sized creatures, no ballista ever will due to the ammo type, so only an upscaled Huge mangonel or Huge cannon might also work. (There's of course one exception with the Gnomeflinger because it's literally designed to fire creatures).