Wow...
...I thought this thread was one of the most excellent questions I ever heard on this forum. The original question was, is a 44 cap and ball pistol enough to kill a deer. It absolutely is. I have taken countless deer with a 44 cap and ball pistol.
Anyone here who is a paper puncher and never killed a deer in their life, has absolutely no business even commenting on this question.
I am a hunter, not a paper puncher. I know exactly what every single one of my firearms will do and what they won't do. I prefer black powder firearms. Long gun and pistol alike, along with bow and arrow, and I work at it. Any 44 caliber pistol or long gun whatever... is easily, and completely capable of taking a deer.
I have only ever had one deer get away from me in my life. It was because after I shot it, my hunting partner drove his truck into the field where the deer was laying down dying and it jumped the fence on to a property that we were forbidden to go on. Honestly, it ticked me off terribly.
I have a tremendous reverence for the whitetail deer. They are one of God's finest creatures. Way high on the intelligence chain as far as I'm concerned. Their primary objective in life, is to feed, reproduce and exist. Sometimes, their desire to survive is extreme. Even though they are dead, they don't even know it.
I was hunting with my dad, and watched him shoot a deer at 50 yards with a 50 caliber in line, perfect shot through both lungs and heart and that deer ran 300 yards and piled up on the edge of a woods across an open field. All along the way, there was blood sprayed all over the ground on both sides as though somebody ran through the field with a can of red spray paint.
If you are a paper puncher and have never taken a deer with a rifle or a handgun, why are you bothering everyone here with your bull roar? You have no idea what you are talking about. All your talk about ballistics, feet per second, round ball vs conical, is all speculation as you have never done it. I have been there, & I have done it and the answer to the question is simply this... A 44 with 35 grains of powder and even a round ball is plenty enough to kill a deer at 50 yards or under even a hundred yards if you practice.
When you decide to stop punching paper, and get your butt out in the woods and kill a whitetail then, come back here to this forum and comment on this topic. Until then, you have no idea what you're talking about.