White Tail Hunting:

Find a used one?  You shouldn't really need a scope for a slug gun.  When are the seasons?  If they don't overlap, you can get a slud gun now and get a smooth bore in a couple of months for birds. 

You would be hard pressed to beat an 870 or the like. Hell, used Winchesters from the good old days are cheap and plentiful.

So, it was just too good a deal to pass up over on Numrich. $112 with free shipping for a 24" Mossy 500 Super Slugster 12ga fully rifled and ported accu-choke barrel with integrated cantilevered scope mount.

That leaves me ~$100 or so for a decent BDC scope for 50-100 yards.

I figure Foster or Sabot slugs plus that should put some meat in the freezer.

Too late now since you bought the barrel, but bowhunters kill tons of deer, I would've gone with buckshot. $100 for a scope is hardly worth wasting money on. I'd buy $100 worth of slugs and practice my shooting. 

Low light and brush are my big reasons for considering optics. I've had too many missed opportunities when I could not take an ethical shot because I just couldn't tell if there was a twig in my way, or make out the factory sights. I love irons, but my slug un, and many more offer a poor sight radius of about 12". Had I brought out grandpa's smooth bore Model 12 with home-made fixed receiver mounted irons with a fat florescent bead front and V-not rear and 32" sight radius I actually would have been much more likely to get a hit, and a bit more confident.

oldsoldier wrote: Just a question, why all the need for a 'scope' at 'slug' ranges. I have yet to shoot deer in excess of 100m and use iron sights, usually the shot is less than 50m, and a pair of bino's as spotting assist in the brush. Off porch no need.

rednekk98 basically answered my main need for some glass.

rednekk98 wrote: Low light and brush are my big reasons for considering optics.

I'll be using irons with my rifle when hunting back in WV, but around here, since it's shotgun and muzzleloader only for firearms season, and since I'm using a 500bbl on my Maverick 88, that means I don't have any stock rear sights. 88's only have a bead on the front of the barrel, no rifle sights, no ghost ring, no fiber, nada. What's more, I'm in wooded, rolling hills with a LOT of brush. Local regs require firing from an elevated position or with a "significant earthen backstop" (i.e. the side of a hill). After all, the hunting grounds around here are usually very small and there are lots of other people and even domiciles around that could suffer some less than desirable consequences with a missed shot if you don't have something there to act as a backstop. If I was out in NE with some prairie land or thinned woods, it'd be one thing, but over here, it's a different game, and the regs mean that scoped is better, just to make sure.

proteus316 wrote: I would've gone with buckshot.

It's illegal to use anything other than slugs for deer where I live.

rednekk98 wrote: You may need to try a few different sabot slugs to find one that really works, and they have a tendency to vary by lot. I can vouch for the terminal performance of Hornady SSTs and heard good things about the newer offerings from Remington, but sometimes the older, heavier slugs like the Federal Barnes expander or even Lightfield Hybrids or Brennakkes give better and more consistent accuracy.

Yeah, I was reading an article yesterday that said that Brennakkes and traditional Fosters work very well out of fully rifled barrels given the stabilization from both the spin of the rifling and then the "rifled" grooves they have (actually, they're for stabilization when used in smoothbore guns, they don't actually impart any spin on the round) I figured I'd get a reasonable zero on my gun, strap it into a sled, and then see what gives me the most consistent performance out of the different types of rounds and go with what seems to work best.

rednekk98 wrote: Nikkon seems to offer the best glass at the low end of the price range.

Yeah, I saw that they were pretty predominant on the sites I've checked. Obviously I'll not be taking a shot at more than 100 yards for all intents and purposes, so low power but good field of vision is important. Most everything I've seen suggests 3-9x40 for slugs and muzzleloaders. Is that what you'd go with? Or would you suggest a different power?

Ceesman762 wrote: 3x9 is more than enough.

Should I go with a lower power then?

I'm looking at 1-4Xor 2-7X respectively. Some of the AR type scopes might have the eye-relief and durability. Slug guns murder scopes, something designed for a rimfire might not hold up, but a 50 or 75 yard parallax setting helps. I was looking into something like this http://www.ebay.com/itm/Bushnell-Trophy-XLT-Riflescope-1-5-6x42mm-Matte-Black-Illuminated-4A-Reticle-/251379209620?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item3a875e5594 it's big, but about what I want.