After reading all this, I miss my 45 shield.
Kind of
I had one and put over 500 rounds through it. I LOVED it! It was very accurate, stayed put in my hands, and had a lot of punch!
It was a bit of a work out to shoot 100 rounds from it, but it was still enjoyable.
However, mine was extremely unreliable! I would experience any number of failures from that dang gun. I think I had something like 4-5 different progressions/types of failures from it. And I would experience on average about one failure for every 10 or 15 rounds fired. All with various different types of 230 grain FMJ factory ammo.
I sent the gun back to S&W 4 times! They ended up replacing the entire top half of the gun and all the magazines, and it still didn't solve the issues. I can say with absolute certainty that it was not shooter error, Absolute Certainty.
They finally offered me a replacement firearm, but by then I had honestly had my fill of shooting that little monster so I asked them if I could get ahold of an M&P 45C instead of another shield as a replacement. After considering all the time, energy and ammo I had put into that 45 shield they were kind enough to honor my request.
To tell the truth, I bought the shield just for something fun to shoot (little gun, big bullets) and boy oh boy could it shoot! Great trigger and one ragged hole at 7 yards when I focused. I do kind of miss it because it was a good gun, I just had a real lemon! Something must have been off with the frame but I will never know.I seriously considered going for another one (I'm sure the replacement would have been fine) but in the end I was glad that I chose the 45C. That is a very enjoyable pistol once you take care of the horrible factory trigger.
I also like the XDS in 45. I shot someone's at the range one day and was impressed. The geometry of that gun allows for great controllability, a good feel, and a feeling of straight back recoil, provided you add a little extra traction to the grip like skateboard tape or a sleeve of bicycle inner tube. The factory grips are a bit slick if I remember correctly while the grip on the 45 shield has plenty of traction!
I'm referring to the first generation of each handgun.