just started Crystal souls with steam version (15% cut f yeah!) and when i played Escape From The Pit my bowman fell short compared to my sorceress, priestess and berserker towards the end of the game. the archer is nice at low level, but unable to keep up with the other classes
weapons wise ( maybe i wasn't thorough enough ) i never find an awesome bow, my best weapon is poison enchanted bow iwth attack little less than limewood, while my berserker got demon slayer, my spellcaters have crazy massive damage spells with magic and mana enchantment
javelin and chackrams are useless since there's ammo for it, and bow doesn't really get better skills than warrior. right now i just went with a sorcerer, shaman, berserker and warrior