Rifle choice would depend on what type of hunting your doing and where your doing it. Spot and stalk for example your shot could be at longer ranges so you would want something with decent downrange performance in both categories energy and velocity. Bait hunting is way different. The guy I hunt with has killed 3 bears with a .243 although in my opinion thats too light. The .444 isnt very impressive at ranges over 50 yards (closer in my opinion)on bears especially if you have to find a blood trail...