Can someone explain shotguns to me, ideally with some kind of

>>31896317
The shot comes out as a mass of pellets, you cannot spray a shotgun. Life isn't a movie.

>>31896370
/thread

>>31896317
They come out grouped together. Many things can effect spread, but basically, the farther they go, the more they spread. But as >>31896370
said, they don't "spray" like the movies.

Pretty sure what you're describing is skeet shooters leading their targets.
Shot and buckshot spread in a cone, how quickly it spreads is based on a number of factors with the most important being the choke of the barrel.

Observe:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0NjLIc44H_U
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rhZf_x8Esms

You swing because you're almost always shooting at flying targets with a shotgun. If you pause to shoot you'll miss.

shot cup is slotted and spreads out/slows down once it leaves the barrel, allowing the shot itself to spread. This is what you want. especially if using birdshot, because it gives you a field of pellets, not just one small cluster.
Buckshot should spread up to 1 inch per yard. no need to do anything special to make it spread. You can't count on it at long range though - at 100 yards you're sending ~8 pellets over a ~8 foot circle. You'll put more shot where you don't want it than where you want it at that range.

http://www.shootingillustrated.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/01/results1.jpg

>>31896317
Sweeping refers to the technique used to hit fast moving shit that flys like clays or birds. The idea is you swing the shotgun to target less than sighting down the barrel, but you still aim. Search Google for patterning boards and you can probably find video.

>>31896317
They are trying to convey to you that as your motion gets to the lead point to shoot that you imagine triggering a hose and continuing the motion as if "spraying" in a continuous arc...even though the act of triggering has already been completed and the shot have left the barrel in one expanding clump. That way you don't stop while triggering and therefore lose your lead on a moving target.

>>31896317
I recall the worst game for this was Halo 2. Point blank was insta-kill. Anything bayonet about 4m (About 12 feet) was just about useless. Oh, I guess OP's image is accurate. Anyways, IRL, accuracy is still very important for shotguns. Check out some Hickok vids of shotguns, he explains them quite well, and shows what the spread is like at close range. I think the worst spread came from the Taurus Judge, which is a revolver chambered in .410 shells (smallest commercially available shotgun shells) as well as .45 Colt Long.

>>31896418
Smoking a clay like that feels incredibly satisfying

>>31896479
>>31896418

I understand leading, but the way I've heard it makes it sound like the ball of pellets is significantly longer than it is wide. This both from a guy trying to teach me how to shoot clays and from a gun store employee trying to explain why I should use #4 buck for home defense instead of #00 because I would have a "better chance of hitting"

According to him, at like 25 yards I should be looking at a cloud of pellets that a few feet across and several feet long.

>>31896829
find a list of burglars / home invaders / rapists killed by shotguns. Figure out which kind of load killed the most criminals in home defense situations and use that.

Lead shot isn't as consistent in shape and weight as jacketed bullets, and firing it may make it even more irregular. Each pellet experiences slightly different air resistance, and the mass of pellets spreads out along the direction of flight. A target moving laterally is more likely to intersect with shot spread out into a long line than with shot clumped together in a small mass.

Steel shot is much more consistent, and some hunters say it's harder to hit a bird with steel than with lead.

>>31896504
Great description pay attention here

>>31896467
>Buckshot should spread up to 1 inch per yard. no need to do anything special to make it spread.
>You can't count on it at long range though - at 100 yards you're sending ~8 pellets over a ~8 foot circle.
That's where stuff like flite control wads really come in handy. They're designed to very gently detach from the shot inside with small airbrakes along the side of the wad instead of petaling out like an open flower the second they hit air resistance, more violently releasing the pellets and causing them to spread outward fast.
You can extend the range of accurate buckshot(and probably any shot you put in those wads) by a lot.
With flite control, I'm getting most of my 15 buck pellets within 2-3 inches at 20 yards, 4 inches at 30 yards, abd about 6 inches or so at 40 yards.