Trip,

While I do not own a mossberg, all of the smoothbore shotguns I own are plenty capable of 4" groups or less within 100 yds when scoped. My rifled slug gun routinely has 3 holes touching at 100 yds, and I am fully comfortable shooting it out to 135 yds. However, these guns do not do this with every brand of ammo. I am fortunate that 2 3/4 " winchester Super-X slugs shoot excellent out of all of my smoothbore shotguns. Remington copper solids shoot so well out of my rifled barrel, I don't use anything else. If the cost of sabots is prohibitive, the smoothbore should do just fine.

As far as a scope goes, you need something with a large field of view and good eye relief. My 2 favorite scopes are a bushnell 1-4 power with a circle-X reticle and a heavy crosshair leupold 2-7. The circle -X allows you to just place the circle on the deer without having to bring him into the crosshairs. The heavy reticle really draws your eye into the center of the scope and stands out when it starts to get dark or there is a lot of brush behind the target. You don't need any higher than 4X magnification within 100 yds. Any higher magnification than that really diminishes you field of view.

Regards,

KJ