Stupid Question from a New Guy

[M.T. Pockets]

Welcome aboard, you'll get a lot of good, friendly advise on this forum from some very experienced folks.

Do you have a preference in action ? Pump, auto...

Do you have a budget in mind ?

Once these are known it would help narrow things down quite a bit.

For many years I only had one shotgun which I used for everything you mentioned. Many, many hunters still do use one shotgun for everything. You can shoot slugs through a smoothbore, but with today's improvements in slugs I would highly recommend a second, fully rifled barrel, along with a low-powered scope designed for shotguns. You can certainly shoot slugs through a smoothbore if you'd like, most people still do, but there are better options out there today.

Get a shotgun with variable chokes and you can get a lot more versatility out of a single shotgun. Have fun looking.