**skip to 2nd body of text if “fire arms background” or “experience level” isn’t relevant in your opinion*

So I am very much familiar with firearms overall. I Grew up in an avid hunting (mostly harvest for food over trophy and never waterfowl) family. My father started teaching me basics like gun safety shortly after I was old enough to understand complete sentences. I’ve done A LOT of target/Range shooting, I’ve sighted many rifles in, and have even harvested a few deer, a couple turkey, coyote and uncounted squirrel/woodchuck/nuisance animals. That’s around where it ends though so while I’m a state like NY it seems to some like I some expert (simply due to their lack of knowledge) but to real dedicate/serious hunters, gun enthusiasts or instructors I know nothing except maybe enough to start learning lmao. Once conversation starts to turn to firearms of less common cal than the main 3-4, proper terminology, and more specifics I’m lost (in the sense I fully understand if I take the time to hit Google and give it a 5 min read but real time won’t know exactly what’s being discussed. Just to give broad background. Semi auto Rifles in NY now are more difficult to get bc u basically have to take a permit course similar to original pistol permit course. Which (political opinion aside) fine w/e it’s not difficult but it IS $200-300 and I HAVE signed up and paid for two, waited 2 months, showed up and had the course “canceled for lack of participation” bc only 3-6 people showed up without refund. So that’s on hold.

So I’m looking for a semi auto shotgun preferably 12g or 20g just bc their popularity/versatility, wide range of ammunition versatility and well they arnt a .410 or large enough to blow my shoulder off lol. Also bc I’ve shot both at the range more times than I can count. However I almost just bought the centurion bp-12 bullpup to fill the role bc many reviews seemed to love it for the defense application and the current summer sale had it priced at $150 down the road from me. However every Reddit gun sub I checked seemed to hate it trash it and claim it jammed often, bolt broke off and fired back, and the mag didn’t release or reload correctly. Which brings me here asking for real peoples advice? Tia