How good were early handguns? If not good, why did anyone bother and not just use crossbows?

They were used mostly as shock weapons. Good to disorient and confuse your opponent but not super effective.

Did bows really require training? I feel this is super exaggerated at times. Military archers didn't need to fire at an apple accurately at long ranges. They needed to be able to fire in an arc not perform extraordinary feats. While gunners needed to be familiar with the way their weapons worked, they needed to be drilled in formation and be disciplined enough to fire in volleys. I'd reckon your average gunner was better trained than your average bowman.

The kind of bows that were used by medieval archers were a lot different from a modern bow. These things had an enormous draw weight and someone not accustomed to using them would become fatigued after only a couple shots.

Well, that's what training is for. I don't believe that you needed to train for a long time to get decent bowman. The fact most levied archers in the Middle Ages were already people familiar with bows like hunters, they pretty much already had the training. Early guns also weren't all that easy to use. One wrong move and that gun could explode. You needed someone with technical knowledge to properly operate those arms, they were pretty dangerous to operate.

Bows required a great deal of training. I can't remember, but one of those English kings required men of age to practice it when they weren't working in the fields so they'd have better archers.

Training for what, exactly? Bows were indirect fire weapons, they fired in an arc they didn't individually aim just like gunners. They just discharged their weapons at the direction of the enemy. To me it seems you need someone in good health.

Archery is an art, you have to know how far to draw your arrow, you have know where to aim above your target, you have to be physically fit and you have to compensate for wind.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/English_longbow#Training

Longbows were very difficult to master because the force required to deliver an arrow through the improving armour of medieval Europe was very high by modern standards. Although the draw weight of a typical English longbow is disputed, it was at least 360 newtons (81 pounds-force) and possibly more than 600 N (130 lbf), with some estimates as high as 900 N (200 lbf).[citation needed] Considerable practice was required to produce the swift and effective combat shooting required. Skeletons of longbow archers are recognisably adapted, with enlarged left arms and often osteophytes on left wrists, left shoulders and right fingers.[24]

It was the difficulty in using the longbow that led various monarchs of England to issue instructions encouraging their ownership and practice, including the Assize of Arms of 1252 and Edward III of England's declaration of 1363:

Whereas the people of our realm, rich and poor alike, were accustomed formerly in their games to practise archery – whence by God's help, it is well known that high honour and profit came to our realm, and no small advantage to ourselves in our warlike enterprises... that every man in the same country, if he be able-bodied, shall, upon holidays, make use, in his games, of bows and arrows... and so learn and practise archery.[citation needed]

If the people practised archery, it would be that much easier for the King to recruit the proficient longbowmen he needed for his wars. Along with the improving ability of gunfire to penetrate plate armour, it was the long training needed by longbowmen that eventually led to their being replaced by musketeers.

I'm not saying it isn't an art. But just like you don't need to have sharpshooters for a line of musketeers you don't need some highly specialized archer for formation. Archers just targeted at a direction and fired many arrows at will, nothing special about that. Plus with a bow, you could learn easily to use your muscles, aim at a direction and shoot. Bows were fired en masse.
I'm sure learning the basics of a bow was a little more time consuming than learning a bow but archers didn't fight in formation nor did they practice the drills that musketeers did. I find some of the whole "lifetime of training" to be nonsense. That's just my opinion.

>Yes I meant Handgonne but Handgun is the same thing
Not even close, nofuns.

>The fact most levied archers in the Middle Ages were already people familiar with bows like hunters, they pretty much already had the training.
hunting bow is no way comparable to full sized english warbow. they were used to kill relatively small animals from around 10-20 meters, not armoured soldiers from 300 meters so you understand that they didn't need to have even third of warbow's drawing weight.

>why did anyone bother and not just use crossbows?
because every single bolt/arrow is handmade and requires lots of materials and several work phases. lead balls and black powder are simply far better suited for mass production.

You severely underestimate how much strength conditioning is required to use a full longbow.

It literally takes years of experience to be competent in battle with a bow, longbows were particularly hard to use

>Did bows really require training? I feel this is super exaggerated at times
Shit bows for peasants didn't. However if you went to the battlefield of 15th century Europe with your archers being armed only with shit bows for peasants you could as well tell them to grab axes/hammers and go melee.

Even shit bows for peasants required years of training

no. just no. any healthy, full grown man can learn to shoot light hunting bow well enough within a week. the thing with warbows is that no man as he is is just not physically capable of drawing it.

Bows are highly overrated anyways.
Bows just didn't pack the punch early guns had and they were about equal in range. Accuracy is pretty much a non factor when these bows were shot at an arc and as quickly as possible plus their accuracy was affected a lot more by the weather than guns plus they were just as inaccurate at longer ranges, probably even more. A high rate of fire was all it had going for but how long can an archer sustain that before becoming tired? A unit of mustekeers can maintain cohesion and not tire as fast. A unit of arches will tire out much more quickly and lose their rate of fire and accuracy. What kind of military would waste their resources in such an inferior weapon? The Ottomans certainly didn't and they had better bows than the English

How long do you think it would take to reload one of those things? Especially in the Heat of battle. You,d get crushed by cavalry after the first shot. Even with muskets it took a lot of drilling to get soldiers to load their weapon fast and efficiently. Can you imagine what a shitshow it would be if it were conscripts with shitty early firearms? The ability to maintain a high rate of fire with the longbow is what made it so effective.

Excuses the spelling, my phone has a mind of its own.

Black powder weapons didn't take that long. IIRC they were quicker than crossbows. Anyways that's the reason tactics switched to pike and shot.
And as I said, for how long can longbowmen maintain their rate of fire? Pulling those bows was a physically demanding task so eventually they will get tired and see a significant decrease in accuracy and rate of fire. Plus longbows wouldn't be able to do the damage that a gun volley could to calvary.

They made a loud noise that terrified horses and enemies who never encountered them before.The potential to become effective was just the extra plus.