https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=mIkCIE47b_A

Killkor
Quick Charge is an interesting enchantment added in this snapshot: it shortens the crossbow reload time by 0.25 seconds per level.
The highest level available in game is III, which allows you to reload the weapon pretty quickly. However...


We can cheat the level with commands. And here's where it gets interesting.
Each level higher decreases the reload time by 0.25 seconds, and each level lower increases it by 0.25 seconds.
The value is constant.


The highest working level is Quick Charge V, which allows you to shoot your crossbow at instant (just spam your mouse button)


However, Quick Charge VI doesn't seem to work - the reload time goes into negatives, thus you're "unreloading" your crossbow, when trying to reload it. Like trying to break Bedrock with your pickaxe.

Quick Charge of negative values works fine - it simply adds more seconds to the reload time. Quick Charge -10 makes the reload take good few seconds.


But, so far, Quick Charge V is the best thing out of this all - turns your crossbow into a literal Gatling gun. It's so OP, you can take on an Illager Beast, and take it down in less than 10 seconds. Watch out though - this enchatment eats through your arrow supply and your crossbow durability very quickly. Mending and Unbreaking enchantments are a must.

Wolk
Power is a no-brainer.

Infinity should definitely be added to the crossbows in my opinion, of course mutually exclusive with mending and having all the downsides of bows, no infinite rockets or infinite tipped arrows, only normal arrows.

I am not sure how flame would work with fireworks though, perhaps the rockets explode immedietly? And yes, that would make you not want to have flame onh your rockets launchers. Alternatively, they could set things on fire similar to ghast balls, but I do not think that is a good idea since they are not terrain damaging at the moment, and I think it would be overpowered if they were.

Punch should be kept exclusive to bows, since crossbows have their unique enchants. However if it is added to crossbows it should be mutually exclusive to piercing, and piercing should then be added to bows, mutually exclusive to punch.

I agree that piercing should not be mutually exclusive to multishot.

I also think multishot should be added for bows as well, however instead of the arrows being distributed horizontally, they would be distributed vertically.

Personally I hope all the bow enchantments will be functional on crossbows and vice versa, for creative purposes, even if unavailable in survival.


Robert Skitch
Did you read how the crossbow was originally going to be a Beast-mounted ballista? Might be an idea to play with...

“The original design of the Illager Beast basically had a ballista on top,” Nathan tells me. “Which is a gigantic crossbow made for sieges. That just got shrunk down over time during development. Now it’s a handheld version!” https://minecraft.net/en-us/article/java-developers-talk-village-and-pillage

Prinzherbert
No it doesnt. The main point of using a crossbow is to deal damage in a bunch of enemies at the same time. Piercing, multishot and fireworks can be used to kill a group of enemies with ease. Bows can deal massive damage to a single enemy, and crossbows can deal decent damage to more enemies.


Machadeon
I disagree. I think the two weapons are actually very well balanced. We've just had the bow for so long we can only think of using the crossbow like we would a bow, which of course is going to make the bow look better.

I propose that a bow is better for fighting single targets (such as the ender dragon or the wither), however the crossbow is better for fighting groups of targets (such as zombies, skeletons and spiders at night). The crossbow's enchantments are designed specifically for this.

When considering the damage caused by the two weapons (or damage per second), one must consider them fully enchanted and being used for their intended purpose.

First, consider the bow. The Power V enchantment increases the bow's damage by 150%, giving it a theoretical range of 15-28 based on your results (though in testing I couldn't get it above 23).

Now consider the crossbow, not against a single target, but against a group. One arrow does 7-11 damage, but it does this damage to every target. This means that the damage for a crossbow with multishot is 21-33, and a crossbow with piercing IV is a whopping 35-55!

Further, consider damage per second in each case. It takes exactly 1 second to fully charge a bow, which makes for convenient math: it has an average output of 20dps at power V. Now look at a crossbow with quick charge III, which fully charges in 0.75 seconds. This means the dps for a quick charge III multishot crossbow is 28-44, and a quick charge III piercing IV crossbow is an incredible 47-73! Nothing in the game comes close to that, not even the Ender Dragon or Wither.

That being said, it is extremely unlikely to reach such damage in game, as lining up 5 mobs every 0.75 seconds is not going to happen. However, groups of mobs are frequently encountered when roaming around at night, or even while caving. After all, most mobs spawn in packs, so it's uncommon to find a single mob alone. So you may not get 5 mobs lined up all the time, but 2 or 3 wouldn't be a challenge, and multishot makes it easier once the mobs have approached you.

All things considered I believe the crossbow is actually very well balanced with the bow. It's definitely not as powerful per hit, but it unquestionably does better against groups.

The one thing I think could be improved upon is the crossbow's range. They say it has a longer range, but that extra distance is almost negligible. In real life crossbows have a much longer range than traditional bows. Then it would be extremely useful in the nether for taking out ghasts and blazes from a distance. The infinity enchantment should also be applicable, though of course not compatible with mending.

Prinzherbert
Crossbows are supposed to be AoE weapons. Just use fireworks in them and explode a bunch of monsters coming for you.

Josiah Brown
I did find the difference between the crossbow enchantments and the bow enchantments.  Crossbow enchantments increase the amount of mobs AT ONCE that can be damaged, piercing and multishot. But the bow enchantments increase the amount of DAMAGE DONE in a single shot,  power and flame. But I do agree with everyone that infinity and punch should be available for the crossbow.

Undeemiss
The crossbow honestly should be a flat-out upgrade from the bow, since it costs more to make and takes longer to load. They should have the piercing enchantment by default, is my thought, and their range should be significantly higher than the bow's. By that, I mean it should be like double the bow's. Not an extra ten blocks. Enchantment wise, there should be an enchantment to shoot multiple arrows vertically as opposed to horizontally, but make them mutually exclusive. Maybe also add an option to shoot two arrows at once in a single direction?

Undeemiss
Actually, after thinking a moment about it, I think the crossbows should pierce at short range, and not pierce at long range, based on velocity. That way, the crossbow would be slightly more capable at short range without without being OP at long range.