nikto

but 10.5" of AR barrel and 7.5" of silencer is handier yet, and won't blow out your ears, run off game, or call in every enemy within a mile radius, has 400 yds of effective range vs men, and the .22 unit = BB gun quiet loads, 10x as easy to carry as 12 ga shells and much more likely to be found beside the dead, in abandoned homes, or bartered for, too. plenty will be TRYING to dump 12 ga rds (and 308, too) but few will be dumb enough to give anything for ammo that's so ill-suited to the task of shtf foraging/fighting.

gripper

Interestingly enough, the 18 inch barrels on unsuppressed rifles(intermediate to full sized rifle cases) work rather well -for me at least-as an " all around " rifle.
Most of my shotgun experience has been with the 18-22 inch lengths. THAT was mostly " social work"/military/security gigs. Never really had much " sporting shotgun usage experience ". I can see the utility, but they've never really been a default setting for me,the way some guys will prefer them for everything under 100 yards.
Shotgun and archery really is something I should get into when time allows for it.

nikto

both are a big waste of time and money, before you get properly set up. Once you've hunted with a suppressed gun, it's really hard to go back to that noisy bs. Even more so if you hunt small game with a silenced .22lr handgun. Having the gun be (mostly) out of sight AND quiet opens up a ton of possibilities.