Sure it will ruin your barrel if you are retarded and never clean your barrel. They do lead the barrel up after a few shots, but it is nothing that can't be cleaned. Makes a mess though.

My H&R ultra shoots some rifled slugs better than it does some 15 dollar a box of high end sabot slugs. Until the barrel fouls out, which is about 4 or 5 shots. With good winchester rifled slugs I can get three shots touching at 100 yards for maybe a total of a 3 inch group. The 4th shot usually starts to drift but not bad enough that it would miss the vitals of a deer. I have never had to shoot more than once at a deer, so this doesn't bother me too much.

Where as I have tried some expensive sabots that would not stay on a 8x11 sheet of paper at 100 yards from shot to shot. Mine shoots really well with winchester platinum tips though.

Will a rifled slug work, heck ya it will if you don't mind scrubbing the heck out of your barrel when you are done shooting. But in my opinion the modern sabot loads perform better on game and are usually more accurate if you find a good one.

For those sabot only people keep in mind your barrel will also foul with plastic as well, so you still need to clean it well with a good solvent made for removing plastic fouling. It is not as extreme as lead fouling, but it happens. you should ALWAYS clean your shotgun after shooting it.

My opinions anyway.

Paul