With the new ammo on the market if I were looking for a dedicated slug gun right now it would be a 20 gauge. They use simular loads as inline muzzle loaders, same bullets for the most part, same speeds and simular twist rates in the barrels. This would lend me to believe the performance and accuracy would be on par with the average inline ML, which is pretty good. And they will have plenty of down range power to take deer, especially with the better bullet designs.

Now if your looking for a gun with more versatility like a pump gun or auto with interchangable barrels you might want to look at a 12 ga. If you decide on a H&R Ultra get the 20 ga, because you can get different barrels for it in 20, 12 and centerfire. If you get the 12 ga the only thing you can swap onto is a 10 ga smooth bore, they use different frames. I own the 12 ga ultra, if I had it to do over again it would be 20 ga. However I got a pretty decent deal on the one I have. In all honesty I wish I would have saved up the money and got a savage slug gun instead. Oh well.

Paul