[Osium]

The bow the Japanese used is called the "Yumi", it was a fairly unique bow in that the hand grip was about 1/3 of the way up the bow itself. This allowed for a large powerful bow to be fired from horse back. For all intents and purposes it is an assymetrical longbow designed for mounted soldier use.

It was also a very tall bow by most standards some over 200cm tall, the draw on the bow for a strong man was around 18 kilo's whatever that is in pounds, but due to its akward shape I imagine that accounts for the reputed difficulty in drawing.

Japanese archers also often used frog crotch arrows, basically an arrow head in the shape of a V so they'd look something like this. These were cutting and slashing arrows.

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The purpose of this arrow was to cut the straps of the bamboo armor that was commonly worn, they also used standard AP arrowheads as well.

Firing the Yumi was almost an artform. I've heard that a proper Yumi when fired should actually almost spin out of the holders hand so that bow is pointed towards the archer after the arrow is released. I assume this is due to its assymetrical design.

The Yumi was every bit as important to the Samurai as the sword was, and it is an arrow that a Samurai broke in half when he swore an oath of allegiance.

Perhaps a mounted horse archer with high precision would fit into this theme?