Missile Weapon of Choice For Dwarves

What is your preference? Composite bows because dwarves are strong and therefore can bend very powerful bows? Or crossbows because dwarves are great craftsmen and can make mechanical parts for the more advanced weapons?
or maybe both?

I prefer Crossbows on my dwarves, but that's mostly because I think the most effective ranged tactic in tunnel based encounters would consist of squads forming two row firing lines. Using crossbows in such a situation would be preferable because you can fit more wielders into a smaller space, bows increase the space a singular entity takes up in the lateral direction when drawing. Whereas a cross bow only extends one way from the body and is drawn (whether by hand or crank) vertically beforehand. Crossbows are also more easily fired from a crouching position, making the forward row more reliably accurate as oppose to if they were wielding bows in the same position.

Outdoors is a different matter though, so in conclusion both, but leaning more towards crossbows in weapon prevalence.

Springbows.
>Can be more powerful than normal bows, use metal instead of wood, higher weight (pull weight and weapon weight) mitigated by being stronger overall, lack of arms makes using them in tight formations in tunnels easier

Throwing spears.
It's less of a strain on resources, it's a good hunting tool, can also become a makeshift torch, can also be used in dwarvish, goblin, Halfling, and gnomish phalanx, is easily replaceable when broken, and spearmen can be fielded much faster then archers can.

>dwarves are strong and therefore can bend very powerful bows
Wouldn't that also mean they can reload heavier crossbows in the field, reload normal crossbows without a lever, and can have sort of Chinese repeating crossbow things with considerable draw strength?

Dwarves are strong, but are they considerably stronger than humans? If no, it's not super likely that they'll be using particularily powerful bows since the longbow's out of the question. Doesn't mean they can't use solid bows still, and I imagine they would, but there's something about the crossbow that feels more dwarfish.

In some RPG systems like TOR the dwarves can't use great bows at all because of their size.

I've been influenced enough by Warcraft which of course got the idea from Warhammer to prefer them having guns.

They got them gorilla arms- shorter, bent bones where the tendons connect further up the arm. This means they're considerably less flexible than people but have much more strength. You see this even in other humans- I'm sure you've known someone who when they extend their arm the arm actually bends past a 180, whereas other people have the tendons further down the arm preventing that. Personally when I fully extend my arm it doesn't even reach a full 180 due to my refrigerator-like build.

Another thing to consider that shorter arms and a shorter height means they can't use English-style Longbows, which could be like 6 and a half feet tall IIRC, and can't draw them as far back anyways.

Guns don't make sense for cave dwelling underground thingies.

1. You make the gunpowder on that tech level from animal excrement and piss, and dwarves don't keep such animals.
2. The smoke from firing a gun at that tech level made it unusable indoors, and dwarves mostly live "indoors".
3. Even if you really want dwarves to have guns, they would, based on their aesthetic, mood, etc, probably use pistols. Like a belt with 5-6 loaded pistols, discharge them all, fight with your sword.

>Dwarves are strong, but are they considerably stronger than humans?

In my headcanon dwarves are about as strong as a human wrestler/weight lifter/strength training type.
They are stronger per pound, because they are smaller, but have the same overall strength. The same muscle spread on shorter bones.
But dwarves can achieve this strength "naturally", without needing to train for it, they just grow more muscle. Humans are the "adaptive" ones, that can be weak or strong depending on their life so far.