For home defense you’re probably not going to be shooting any further than the length of your largest room.
I don’t think 20-or-12 is going to make much difference at that range. The 12 will make more hamburger, but that’s about it.
Your biggest worry in home defense is penetrating multiple walls and killing your next door neighbor. Buckshot is probably not a good idea. Bird shot at 20 feet and all the king’s horses and all the king’s men aren’t getting your guts back in their container.
I agree.
I had to present a weapon 2 times in my 70 year life.
First one was with a bunch of drunk cowboy friends of a college roommate. I was home studying, they came in an mocked and threatened me. Poured beer on me. I stepped into the closet and put a round in my 20 gauge single barrel shotgun, when the breach closed it was like a covey of quail flushing.
The other time, I had a couple of drunk miners try to run me off the road when I tried to pass them (they were slowing down too). First time I thought it was an accident, 2nd time I retrieved a 9mm pistol and put it on the dash, 3rd time I rolled down the passenger’s window and aimed it at the driver. It was like he put on a drag chute.
I had tried to dial into the local autopatch, it was down. It was 4:30 AM and I was leaving town for a 3 day business trip. There were no cell phones then. If I had not had a weapon either of those times, it might not have ended well.
I’ve never had to fire a weapon at anyone. But I will keep mine.