Yeah bow is what I'm using atm as it's just good all around with no real weaknesses, E does good single target damage, Q does good aoe and is a quick click for single target also and the primary can be cancelled early so it doesn't force you to commit too much, while also allowing to draw longer for max range kiting.
I've been mostly playing ranged during this brutal run, Crossbows on some bosses/early game but the primary forces you to commit for a long time and you end up having to space out of it too often imo, the skills otherwise are great and the ramp up power is strong if you can keep that 21% atk speed buff going.
Pistols I tried on a couple of bosses but not a fan, mostly because the range isn't as long as xbow/bow so you have to be more mindful of the spacing which I find annoying. Reaper has the same issues since E has limited range, but it is a melee weap so makes sense.
I'll say overall weapon balance is pretty solid, I think every weapon has some interesting choices, at least for pve. The ones I dislike the most are whip(primary is kinda slow, E feels pretty bad to use in general, Q is good but if I'm gonna do medium range I want a more snappy primary like pistol) and Spear, which I find clunky since it's basically melee range but no swing aoe and the actives feel like shit on bosses cause they're immune to the CCs. Everything else I've used at some point in my normal run and liked it, although axes were my favorite as an allrounder weap since it has gap closing+burst and ranged aoe+CC so it does everything pretty well.
For spells in my brutal run I've been mostly using Aftershock for damage and Ward of the Damned for blocking, and if I don't need to block Death Knight for more damage/summon. I really like aftershock cause it ignores issues like trash mobs blocking the way or bosses countering, since it's a ground effect. Makes it very reliable to get damage out of it. As for ward of the damned that shit's pretty broken, blocks in general are super strong but this one spawns skeletons per block and can be reused to do a little bit of dmg+condemn(15% increased dmg) so it does a bunch of things in one single skill.