I have the savage 17HMR in the blued heavy barrel with plain wood stock. I think mine was around 200 bucks new at Cabela's. I have sort of an expensive 6.5-20 power varmint scope on mine though.

Mine easily shoot 1 inch or better at 100 yards if I do my part and the wind is low. I did a trigger job myself that they explian how to do on rimfirecentral.com .

If you plan on shooting small critters and eating them you best take head shots, the V-max bullets are pretty distructive on small soft animals.

I think you will like it though, I love mine.

Paul