All have given you good advise. I'd love to add a beautiful over and under to my gun case but I haven't gotten around to it yet. I'll add $.02 in favor of the more flexible Remington 870 or if you can add a little more to the budget the Remington 1187 autoloader. With the vent rib, Rem Choke barrel you can do any thing you want to get started in shooting sports. The choke tubes are reasonably priced and readily available. Use "improved cylinder" for skeet and fast flushing small birds like quail or even rabbits sitting tight on a cold winter morning. Also use this choke for Deer slugs. "Modified" is good for general upland game hunting and I have been known to break a few clay birds with my old Winchester 1400 modified autoloader. Both skeet and trap. Use the full choke tube for trap and longer distance shot shell hunting. Like shooting larger, fast flying birds like grouse or pheasants also ducks and geese as an example. Extra full choke tubes are available for turkey and long range geese. You can later add a "deerslayer" barrel made specifially for shooting deer slugs. These come with either open "iron" sights or scope mounts. Either platform is a good one to start with for multipurpose shooting and hunting and can be built upon for you future desires. I'll also add that the 1187, as a gas operated autoloader has far less recoil, though it is a little more expensive. Both of these are in my gun safe.