Ok, so from what you guys are saying, from a practical and pragmatic standpoint, there is little difference between 50fps, give or take, in personal defense scenarios. However, what about the fact that modern personal defense ammo utilizes hollow points of some sort, which need to be going a certain velocity to expand? I know people carrying .38 special snubbies were worried that their hp's wouldn't expand going out of a 2" barrel, so loads like the Speer 135gr +P were developed. Maybe velocity loss out of a higher pressure round like .40s&w or even 9mm may not be great enough to prevent the hollow points from opening up, but from a relatively low pressure low velocity cartridge like the .45acp, wouldn't you want to get it moving as fast as you could to ensure expansion? (That is, unless you only shoot fmj's, in which case velocity is less of a concern). Sure, 50-100fps loss from something like a .357mag going from a 4" barrel to a 2 1/2" barrel isn't really going to prevent expansion, but losing 50fps going from a 5" barrel to a 3" barrel on a round that was only going ~800fps to begin with seems more troublesome. What if that extra 50fps means the difference between expansion? Would you go with a lighter bullet then as not to compromise velocity as much, like say 185gr? I'm not trying to question your guys' opinions, just asking a couple of questions that come to mind.
