Bows
My bet, if I was trying to put together a missile armed infantry unit from scratch, would be heavy crossbows. They are much easier to learn to use than bows, have very good range and hitting power, and can be made by any red/blacksmith. They are also not as slow to reload as some games like to make out. The disadvantages are that they are more expensive than a self-bow (they are manufactured goods, not seasoned pieces of wood) and the best RW quarrels were made of iron.
Heavy crossbows, with pikes to deal with the HTH types. Both fairly easy to learn to use and not horribly expensive.
Composite bows blow away all the other bows bows in terms of range and performance. They are just better mechanically. But they are horribly complex to build and require a lot of labor. But the Mongol bows are not as fragile as were has been suggested. The Mongols liked to start their campaigns in mid-winter (the rivers were frozen) so their bows probably worked ok when it was very cold. The finished bows were sealed to keep out water. As the Mongols and the Turks occupied areas that had 40-60 inches of rain a year I don't think they were terribly affected by humidity. Sure, they might not perform optimally, but they are still very good.
Not that the Mongols would want to leave their bows out in a rainstorm, but they won't melt if they get wet. It would not be good, but it wouldn't be a disaster.
The main problem with bows is that it takes years to become good, vs months for crossbows. And horse archers are even worse, as you have to learn to ride really well and shoot the damn bow. Suppossedly the shooting from horseback stuff isn't that hard, if you are a good archer, a good rider, and know the trick. Or so someone who found a Turkish horse archery manual and tried the techniques once told me.
The Mongols (or the Pentans) are more than a bunch of guys with bows on horseback. They are the society in arms, a lot of really tough guys, with a couple of really tough ponies each, who make up an organized and disciplined army that practices, manevers, and fights as an army.
Another culture that tried to adopt the composite bow on horseback would have problems unless they were willing to change their society to become successful. A society that highly values personal bravery and glory (like the Orlanthi or the Western knight culture) would have a great deal of difficulty in using the tactics that allow horse archers to fight successfully.
RW Siege engines
The stone throwing engines were not really field engines. A 30 minta (~30 lbs) engine is somewhere around the size of a full sized pickup truck, but it's arms are wider than that. Nomally it would be assembled on site. They couldn't knock down walls, but they could remove the parapets. The defenders could do a significant amount of damage to the attackers siege equipment using their wall engines (although the defenders usually used smaller engines than the 30 minta, as they had to fit in the wall towers.)
The light cheroballista (sp?) is a field engine, but it is a bolt thrower. This is the one that is shown as mounted on wagons. Ranges in excess of 300 yards are reasonable. It tended to put nasty rectangular holes in people who got hit. I wouldn't want to bet on your armor keeping it out.
Kevin
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