I don't thenk that many are arguing that the crossbow is useless, but the ongoing survey shows long bows being favored by a ni better than a 2:1 margin.
You've mentioned many of the points I made in comparing the two
hereLikely because of differences in playstyle, many of what you cite as advantages ( e.g.
piercing and
multishot) are things I see as
dis-advantges... in the case of both those enchantments the possibility of hitting something other than the intended target outweighs for me any additional damage that might be done.
[A clear case is ghasts, as there is often the potential to set off an aggro cascade if the unintended target stuck is a zombie piglin.]
The anti-shield capability is only useful in PvP; avoid this and it's value in that respect vanishes.
The slightly greater accuracy (actually slighly less imposed inaaccuracy) of the crossbow may represent a reasonable trad-off with the longbo's greater rate of fire, but (for those already skilled in the bow at the time of the crossbow's introduction) the advantage is likely to be with the known and practiced weapon.
As to whether the MC crossbow is well designed:
a fundamental issue is that we are in the possition of having to infer the criteria the designers were trying to meet.
I suspect that some part of the goal was to differentiate pillagers from skeletons, which goal the crossbow meets well. (A part of this was also probably a disinclination to add futher enhancements to the longbow which was already a quite powerful weapon and one that sees widespread use.)
For the crossbow to suplant the longbow as a common player choice, however, both the range and accuracy advantage are far too small.
[Historically the crossbow was favored largely because it was an 'idiot's weapon' i.e. one that could be used with reasonable effect with a bare minimum of training – in contrast to yeomen about whom the [semi-serious] joke was that if you wanted one, you started with his grandfather.]If, however, one assumes that the idea of the MS/Mj designers was to produce a weapon that was mechanically distinct from the extant longbow without overpowering it, then some of the choices that violate verisimilitude can be seen in a more favorable light.
[Had the targeting advantage been increased to give a realistic representation of what an untrained user would experience with both weapons IRL, the crossbow would likely have become the default weapon for new players and any unwillling to put in some serious practice. This would likely be true even if the rate-of-fire of the crossbow was lowered to be in a similar ration to the longbow as found historically. ]
