Just guessing Blain, but if you ever were in the situation where you HAD to use the 12 gauge for "defense", I'd guess you won't even fill the gun kick or hear it go off, so I would opt for the biggest, kickenist, hardest hitting load that the gun could handle.That's just me, and if I was beside you at this very point of finding out if it worked, I would just pray that my tenny shoes were lighter with better grip than the shoes you had on.