The Glade 4.0

The whole point of archery in the military sense is massed fire..

They bring up this point in the video, but I still wonder about the draw of his bow. He has to be using a very light weight bow to be able to pull and release that fast, no?

Mounted Comanches and Mongols might argue with that.

Mongols at least used *very* different style bows, with effective draws ~ 200lbs, and actual draws around 30-80lbs. They used asymmetric limbs though.

Their style of horse archery wasn't anything like that shown in the video.

That part is very true.

Massed fire was only really important with the true english longbows, which were not mobile in any real sense.

Also, those longbows were meant to be used against plate armor, rather than chain- pretty sure the draw on any bow that mobile (non compound) won't be enough to punch through plate, even with the proper head.

Yeah, stylistically, he's like a grown-up version of Star Wars Kid, but with a bow. Still, he's damn quick and seems to hit the targets, so there at least appears to be some skill underneath.

Here's a good discussion of plate armor penetration around the Agincourt era:

http://historum.com/medieval-byzantine- ... our-2.html

With the lighter end bows, no, but the 120-150 lb bows with a bodkin? Up to 200 yes away.

Armour penetration
Modern testing

In an early modern test by Saxton Pope, a direct hit from a steel bodkin point penetrated Damascus mail armour.[28][29]

A 2006 test was made by Matheus Bane using a 75 lbf (330 N) draw (at 28") bow, shooting at 10 yards; according to Bane's calculations, this would be approximately equivalent to a 110 lbf (490 N) bow at 250 yards.[30] Measured against a replica of the thinnest contemporary "Jack coat" armour, a 905 grain needle bodkin and a 935 grain curved broadhead penetrated over 3.5 inches (89 mm). ("Jack coat" armour could be up to twice as thick as the coat tested; in Bane's opinion such a thick coat would have stopped bodkin arrows but not the cutting force of broadhead arrows.) Against "high quality riveted maille", the needle bodkin and curved broadhead penetrated 2.8". Against a coat of plates, the needle bodkin achieved 0.3" penetration. The curved broadhead did not penetrate but caused 0.3" of deformation of the metal. Results against plate armour of "minimum thickness" (1.2mm) were similar to the coat of plates, in that the needle bodkin penetrated to a shallow depth, the other arrows not at all. In Bane's view, the plate armour would have kept out all the arrows if thicker or worn with more padding.

Other modern tests described by Bane include those by Williams (which concluded that longbows could not penetrate mail, but in Bane's view did not use a realistic arrow tip), Robert Hardy's tests (which achieved broadly similar results to Bane), and a Primitive Archer test which demonstrated that a longbow could penetrate a plate armour breastplate. However, the Primitive Archer test used a 160 lbf (710 N) longbow at very short range, generating 160 joules (vs. 73 for Bane and 80 for Williams), so probably not representative of battles of the time.

In 2011, Mike Loades conducted an experiment in which short bodkin arrows were shot at a range of 10 yd (9.1 m) by bows of 140 pounds-force (620 N). The target was covered in a riveted mail over a fabric armour of deerskin over 24 linen layers. While most arrows went through the mail layer, none fully penetrated the textile armour. The experimenters, however, concluded that a long bodkin arrow would have penetrated through this armour combination. Even so, Loades cautions that this experiment did not reflect normal combat ranges and used powerful bows, so may not be typical of battlefield performance.[31]

Other research has also concluded that later medieval armour, such as that of the Italian city state mercenary companies, was effective at stopping contemporary arrows.[32]
Contemporary accounts

Gerald of Wales commented on the power of the Welsh longbow in the 12th century:

... [I]n the war against the Welsh, one of the men of arms was struck by an arrow shot at him by a Welshman. It went right through his thigh, high up, where it was protected inside and outside the leg by his iron cuirasses, and then through the skirt of his leather tunic; next it penetrated that part of the saddle which is called the alva or seat; and finally it lodged in his horse, driving so deep that it killed the animal.[33]

Archery was described by contemporaries as ineffective against plate armour in the Battle of Neville's Cross (1346), the siege of Bergerac (1345), and the Battle of Poitiers (1356); such armour became available to European knights of fairly modest means by the late 14th century, though never to all soldiers in any army. Strickland and Hardy suggest that "even at a range of 240 yards heavy war arrows shot from bows of poundages in the mid- to upper range possessed by the Mary Rose bows would have been capable of killing or severely wounding men equipped with armour of wrought iron. Higher-quality armour of steel would have given considerably greater protection, which accords well with the experience of Oxford's men against the elite French vanguard at Poitiers in 1356, and des Ursin's statement that the French knights of the first ranks at Agincourt, which included some of the most important (and thus best-equipped) nobles, remained comparatively unhurt by the English arrows".[34]
Summary

Modern tests and contemporary accounts agree therefore that well-made plate armour could protect against longbows. However this did not necessarily make the longbow ineffective; thousands of longbowmen were deployed in the English victory at Agincourt against plate armoured French knights in 1415. Clifford Rogers has argued that while longbows might not have been able to penetrate steel breastplates at Agincourt they could still penetrate the thinner armour on the limbs. Most of the French knights advanced on foot but, exhausted by walking across wet muddy terrain in heavy armour enduring a "terrifying hail of arrow shot", they were overwhelmed in the melee.

Less heavily armoured soldiers were more vulnerable than knights. For example, enemy crossbowmen were forced to retreat at Crecy when deployed without their protecting pavises. Horses were generally less well protected than the knights themselves; shooting the French knights' horses from the side (where they were less well armoured) is described by contemporary accounts of the Battle of Poitiers, and at Agincourt John Keegan has argued that the main effect of the longbow would have been in injuring the horses of the mounted French knights.