the 450 marlin BLR is a very good quality rifle,
with good ammo 1.5" 3 shot, 100 yard groups are very common of a solid bench rest,
I think you grow to really appreciate over time, especially if matched to decent optics
find a load your rifle likes.
it will hammer any deer or elk inside 250 yards with good ammo and decent shot placement,
obviously youll want to practice shooting from field positions
you simply sight in, off the bench at 100 yards, put the scope cross hair centered ,
(at 100 yards off the bench) on the yellow dot,
and have all the shots print over the smaller red dot,
SO THAT when you get out in the field,put the scope cross hair centered where the light green dot is on the deer or elk, diagram above,
it will produce a fatal wound out a bit past 250 yards,(well past any range youll need so no range calc required if you can see clearly at low optic power, )
you sure don,t have to use this method or even agree but I can assure you its resulted in a bunch of dead, deer or elk
the vital organs or most effective shot placement is about an 8"-to-10" up, from lower chest, line, just behind the front leg and about mid chest ideally in a circle in the chest where the projectile will destroy the heart and lungs, that .458 caliber slug is already as big as several smaller caliber rifle bullets typically expand too before it expands so it devastates deer and its very lethal on elk with good shot placement.
btw theres no comparison between how effective a 44 mag carbine and a 450 marlin are, on rapidly putting down big game
both are lethal in skilled hands but lets compare the two,
I've loaded my
BLR with Remington 405 grain bullets over 50 grains of IMR 3031 roughly 1870 fps =
3079 ft lbs(best under 250-300 yards)
you can calculate energy easily
bullet weight in grains x velocity x velocity /450240= energy
I load my marlin 44 mag
carbine with a 300 hard cast over 20 grains of h110. roughly 1450 fps =
1400 ft lbs (best under 80-120 yards)
the 450 marlin caliber easily has a 100-150 yard longer effective range