@Adamonic Currently sitting on mastery 12 and managed to get the feel of the bow now. The explosive bolt is a ohk, which is fun, however only has a 10 bolt mag. The bolt rack has a reload penalty which obviously becomes an issue in cqc. My go to is the standard bolt, cobra grip and the maul hybrid 3x.
As a bf4 phan-ficionado I've always enjoyed not using the meta weapons. You obviously have to pick your battles with the bow, like any other weapon but the setup mentioned above does (imo) make it viable, and fun.