I'd agree with the shorter range, the better. The couple long range shots (30+ yards) I've attempted with the x-bow ended up with a miss or a wounded deer. Keep in mind, I had practiced regularly out to 40 yards and could place my arrows accurately at that range. But a couple times of attempting those longer shots made me change my mind.

Anymore, I make about 25 yards my maximum range for deer. Past that you get in to a whole lot of problems regarding arrow flight time, deer jumping the string, range estimation errors, etc. Sure, people can get lucky - I took a turkey with my x-bow at 37 yards cleanly, but looking back I see that was probably the exception rather than the rule. IMO, in most circumstances, X-bows should have less of a range than a quality compound because of the noise factor. A well-designed compound is going to be far, far quieter than a x-bow. This makes it less likely for deer to jump the string. Every crossbow that I've ever shot is pretty loud, and deer tend to jump, duck, turn, etc. at the sound- this problem is magnified at longer ranges. That's why I keep it short....