Well, I always thought of the shotgun for hunting deer as an ugly way to get a deer, but now I'm warming up to the idea. Part of my disdain has to do with not having a left hand. I think I will be able to operate the pump action just fine with my prosthesis if I get a vertical foregrip. I can operate a Rem 870 with the standard forend, but not well enough for hunting or trap shooting.

I have a few questions:
1) Can one get an 18.5" rifled slug barrel? It would be nice to have the short barrel for hunting the woods around here.
2) Are all the 870 models from $200 - $600 the same internally(for the same gauge and chamber), or are they different?
3) For a slug gun, do I want 12ga 2 3/4, 3 or 3 1/4" chamber?
4) Also, how does the Mossberg 500 compare to the Rem 870 pricewise?
5) Do 870's have a key lock?