I have had three 300 magnum rifles. One Weatherby and two 300 Win Mag rifles. I used them for deer at one time. Never will again. This year I will retire my 30-06 for deer duty as well. The 308 Browning that I used this year will be the biggest thing I will ever use agiain. Even that is much more than I need for deer. I will stick to the 25-06 and 6.5x55 mauser. The 25-06 will drop deer out to 400 yards as well as anything and thats a bit far to be shooting at game anyway. Meat dammage is caused by poor hits but less velocity will help when the poor hits happen and they always do. A 100 to 140 grain bullet at 2600-2800 fps will do a great job on deer.