Decisions, decisions. For my first gun...

Well I think so far this is my top choice. It's a Springfield Armory Custom Loaded Long-Slide 1911. Although, I want it in a stainless black with a blackwood or maybe cherrywood smooth grip. And I'd want the 3-Dot Tritium combat sights. I like long barrels, so the six inch Long Slide is quite appealing to me.





As for shotguns, I'm digging two that I've found. The first is an 870 Express tactical shotgun.





And the 1878 Colt Hammer Coach.



And then, of course, there's the gun I wish my scrawny arms could handle. The S&W .460 Magnum. Mmmmmm... And there's one for sale at Gander Mountain.

There's "cool" and then there's something you can actually shoot well. For instance, in a tactical situation, a S&W .500 Mag is the penultimate "cool" thing, but I'd be lucky to hit the broad side of a barn with anything but the fireball.

Or, to put it simply:

A gun I can shoot well > a "cool" gun.

That said, you want what you want. There are several guns I have or want, that I'd never carry or bet my life on. But, I wanted them so I bought them.

My first handgun was a Desert Eagle. Sexy gun, always showing up in movies. Eight rounds of .44 Magnum on tap. The gun's mass and gas operating system soaked up the recoil. Accuracy was pretty decent, too. It still has a place of honor in my collection.

But would I recommend it to ANYONE as a first gun? Heeeeeeeeeeeeeeell no. It's very impractical as a defensive weapon and expensive to shoot. It can be fussy about ammo. It's too heavy to comfortably lug around.

I think the four choices you put up are pretty good ones, if suitable for widely divergent purposes. Every handgunner should have a good 1911, and that Springfield Armory looks good. Both of those shotguns are formidable defensive weapons, though I'd go the pump route for the added capacity and the click-clack sound that makes any would-be assailants soil themselves. The .460 is a masterpiece of modern technology and the fact that it can shoot .45 Long Colts and .454 Casull Magnums is a money-saving bonus.

Elwood said it: shooting well is more important than coolness. But there's no rule that says you have to be practical! Get what you can and will enjoy...

In your case....I'd go with the 870. They are dependable, powerful, inexpensive, and easy to learn how to shoot.

I want someone to make a magazine-fed version of that .500 magnum.

Pretty sure there a Desert Eagle semi-auto .50.

For a first gun I usually recommend a Ruger or S&W .357 revolver. Start with the basics.

Would that be the .50 AE round? For no practical reason, I still want the bigger one, dammit.

^Yep. The DE shoots the .50 Action Express (AE).

It is substantially outclassed by the .500 S&W Magnum, which is mainly found in S&W's X-Frame revolver series.

Right, and I imagine that round might be a bit large for a magazine in the grip, even for man-sized hands.

But what about a variation on this bad boy? Just imagine that magazine full of .500 S&W instead.

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the Desert Eagle is chambered in the .50Action Express, the .44 Magnum (the .50 AE round was designed to the length of the .44 mag for the Desert Eagle so all you needed was a barrel and mag change to swap calibers) and .357 mag, the .50 is just the most popular/famous chambering, if you want my advice on a handgun, honestly I'd reccomend the Beretta M9# model thats chambered in the .40S&W, as for shotguns, I'd reccomend the Mossberg 500 pistol grip model, or if you want to drop the cash, a Benelli M2 or M3 (i have the M2 which is auto only, and it makes just as much of a clack-clack as a pump-action when chambering a round)

To UA: actually, you can get pretty close to that.

There are AR pistol upper receivers chambered in the .458 SOCOM caliber, which, though not quite the .500's equal, is a pretty damned hard-hitting cartridge. Here is an example (second one down).

Ooooo. Nifty.

I'm guessing there's a hell of a lot of paperwork and smiling gratefully while Uncle Sam crawls up your ass with a microscope to satisfy that little "NFA rules apply" condition, though.

I should just get a bunch of blued steel and a lathe and learn to make my own shootin' irons.

Actually, the NFA rules apply only if you attach it to a rifle (i.e., something meant to be fired from the shoulder), thus making a short-barrelled rifle (which in a free state merely requires paying a $200 tax). In the pistol configuration (like the picture you posted), no paperwork/tax is required at all. You buy a lower receiver, register it as a pistol, then buy the upper receiver which is delivered to your home in the mail and--voila!--instant AR pistol.

Believe it or not, this can even been done in California, though the magazine can't be detachable.

You'd be hard-pressed to make something as complex as an AR with simple machine tools, though with patience and the right materials, I'm sure it could be done.

I figure the 1911 is the most practical of the options. It's accurate, pretty light, and reliable. I've fired a couple 1911's in the past, and was quite pleased with the performance. Now, both were the standard 5", rather than the Long Slide, but meh. The .460 mag would definitely qualify as a "fun gun." But then, so would several other guns I've been looking at. Like this old .44 Joslyn and .454 Casull Savage.

Recently I've just been flipping back to older pistols for the hell of it. Might be fun to draw an old pepperbox pistol on a mugger. But then, I love the "WTF!" factor.

Just out of curiosity, why do you prefer the long slide 1911 to the standard 5 inch model? Is it just looks? Because unless you plan on doing some hunting at distances beyond 30 yards, the gain in accuracy and muzzle velocity is pretty negligible. If you just like the looks, there's nothing wrong with that. Looks are important too.

Glock.

There are two reasons, really. One is looks, I've always preferred the appearance of a long barrel. The other is accuracy, because I'm a novice shooter right now, but I do plan to work heavily on my distance shooting. One of my friends is actually my gun expert and trainer. He does have an account on Wordforge under the name Red Phister. I wish he'd use his account more, he knows... well, I can't think of an adjective to describe how much he knows about guns. But he's bound and determined to make me quite gun-savvy. And I condone this active pursuit.

So, you all may very well see me become an active member of Gunforge fairly soon.

But I digress. Right now, a lot of my interest does ride on appearance and my ability to actually fire the weapon accurately and effectively. I believe the guns I've chosen, (save the .460), fall in this catagory.

Pffft, booooriiiing. Haha. I know how good they would be for a first gun, though, I have a couple of friends that own them. But I do require at least a LITTLE pizazz with my weapons.

Pizazz is all well and good until you're dead from a gun that fails on you.

Well, yes, but the 1911 is quite reliable.

It's a marketing thing. Glock has done a good job convincing people that they have the only guns that work. A good example of that is the movie U.S. Marshals where Tommy Lee Jones talks about pouring water and sand down the barrel and the gun still being able to fire. He also says the ever-so-cool line "Get rid of that nickle plated sissy pistol and get yourself a Glock". Great line, but a perfect example of the kind of cut throat marketing done by Glock.

Glocks do work. Obviously like any gun you have to take care of them but they are highly reliable even if you don't take care of them. And no you can't pour sand down the barrel and still be able to fire. You can't do that for any gun.

And Jazz, 1911's are only as reliable as the company that builds them. Talk to Elwood about them and he can probably give you good info on whose 1911's are worth the money you're going to be shelling out for one.

Yes, they work just fine. They're good guns and I'll own a Glock 19 eventually. They are cut throat marketers though.

if your going Glock, I reccomend the 32, I realy like the .357 sig

How do the triggers compare between a Glock and an M&P? I've never fired the S&W.

My best pal and I shot very well with his new S&W MP45. So much so, that I'm pretty sure that's the route I'm going to go for a modern .45...

I'd certainly go with the M&P over the Glock.