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Furthermore, the amount of smoke produced by black powder weapons was considerable, making it hard to see the enemy after a few salvos, unless there was enough wind to disperse the smoke quickly.
( Conversely, this cloud of smoke also served to make it difficult for any archers to target the opposing soldiers that were using handguns ).
Prior to the wheellock, the need for a lit match made stealth and concealment nearly impossible, particularly at night.
Even with successful concealment, the smoke emitted by a single arquebus shot would make it quite obvious where a shot came from – at least in daylight.
While with a crossbow or bow a soldier could conceivably kill silently, this was of course impossible with an explosion-driven projectile weapon like the arquebus.
The noise of arquebuses and the ringing in the ears that it caused could also make it hard to hear shouted commands.
In the long run, the weapon could make the user permanently hard of hearing.
Bows and crossbows could shoot over obstacles by firing with high-arcing ballistic trajectories in order to reach the enemy when the person or object had some frontal but no overhead cover ( such as when troops are in melee with the enemy ) — albeit with much less accuracy.

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