My first two deer kills were with a break action .223. Granted the first one was a poor shot right through both front knees and it had to be put down with a neck shot later on. but the other was close to a 110-130 inch 8pt shot right behind the shoulder with a 64 grain partition. took the hit like he didn't care, ran thirty yards up hill and collapsed into a cactus. probably weighed about 150 lbs. little partition blew a .22 size hole in one side and a quarter out of the other, perfect clean behind the shoulder shot.