Back in college, we'd shoot flies off the wall with 22 LRs. We'd run out of .22s on occasion, so we'd dump the pellets out of some quail loads, and fire the wads at the flies. Those wads never once failed to penetrate sheetrock. That's my way of saying, shotguns have serious potential, especially at self defense range.
Shotguns have made the absolutely nastiest wounds, on people or critters I have ever seen and yes: the sound of a pump being racked is a psychological deterrent. I've seen it. Maybe not to someone whacked out on meth, but to anyone resembling sober it can very possibly have a guy avoiding a lot of paperwork, lawyer troubles and mental issues. Killing anyone who breaks in may sound good in theory but I'll bet $ most folks who are unfortunately put into that situation have different afterthoughts...Lethal shot absolutely has it's place, but I think the non-lethal loads do too.
Probably 10-12 years ago, some Rambo near my hometown shot at a burglar in his home, fully intent on killing him and ended up shooting and killing a family member in the next room over. I can't remember if it was with a shotgun or rifle, or any specifics about the situation, but Rambo committed suicide a while later. Chew on that for a while.
