I have gotten to the point that I believe our culture is a creation of corporate advertizing bureaus. We have been taught, in the mass media, that velocity is the alpha and omega of everything. For generations we have been reading “articles” that are little more than advertizing copy about how “we need” a magnum.
If you notice, a magnum will compensate for poor shooting skills. All you have to do is hit the poor animal, the magnum will do the rest. I would say, 99.9% of the rubbish we read in Gun magazines and the like, are ads convincing us that you can compensate for awful shooting skills by buying something. The more you spend, the better your hit probability.
I have been shooting competitively for several decades now, and accuracy is a skill you learn by shooting vast quantities of rounds down range. When you are arse deep in brass, you are just starting to get it.
Where I live, the woods are very dense and think the longest shot I have had was around 25 yards. I hit one deer holding my slug gun out like a pistol and firing. The deer had walked up on me, sleeping on the ground. There are locations where you can see, maybe a 100 yards, there are locations over fields where you can see 500 yards, but the long shots are very darn rare and I have never deer in the field. They stay in the deep dense woods during daylight. For most of my deer hunting, a slug gun is just the ticket. Hits very hard, leaves a big hole, and within range of most everything I have ever seen.
I have driven out West. I have stood on some of those tall mountains, I swear I saw Australia on the edge, but so what. Let’s say I hit a deer across one of those wide divides, how the heck would I ever get there. And how the heck would I ever find it? I have spent 15-30 minutes looking for squirrels that I shot not more 25 yards off. Moving towards the spot, the light, the brush covered woods changed so much, I lost my orientation. Had to go back to the original shooting spot to figure just what direction to go. I can’t imagine finding a deer 400, 500 yards away. By the time I got there, the woods would look totally different.
Ever since cheap chronographs came out, the magnum crazy has dampened somewhat. Now you can measure the velocity and compare against all those advertising claims. I am of the opinion that most people have figured out the blast and the recoil are not compensated by the little velocity increase. Magnums are loud! They kick hard! You flinch!!!