My father hunted with a compound for many, many years. He has taken a fair amount of deer with one.

About 10 years ago, he had shoulder problems and got a xbow and permit.

He has taken many deer with it also.

He states that the xbow is more awkward to carry in the woods and he was limited to only hunting on the ground with it. Because of his shoulder, he couldn't use a tree stand and couldn't draw the xbow from a tree stand anyway.

Even though he was limited to hunting from the ground, he managed to get more deer with the xbow. He said that all he needed to do was to determine how far the deer was and shoot.

He did not practice. He only sighted it in and rechecked the sights every once in a while.

With the xbow, he could take farther shots than he would with the compound. With the compound, he would not shoot at a deer over 25yds. With the xbow, he killed deer a 35 and 40yds. without a problem. I actually witnessed a kill at 33yds. because I ranged it on the rangefinder for him as it approached our decoy

Overall, he was more successful with a xbow than a coumpound because of a few factors

1. No need to draw while deer were within range and get busted

2. With a good rest, and properly ranged, deer were not missed.

3. He could shoot farther distances with more confidence.

My father quit hunting a few years ago.

In all his years hunting with a compound bow, he racked up more kills with a xbow, in a few short years, than he did with the compound in decades. He was even limited to hunting from the ground with the xbow.

He has had years of experience hunting with both weapons and he will tell you the xbow made it very easy.