A friend of mine bought the 1100 synthetic last year and has had no problems at all with it. The only drawback is he has to use 2 3/4" shells for geese, but he shot 16 of them this past season so I guess it's not really a drawback for him. I'm looking pretty hard at an 1100 synthetic in a 20ga right now. A shop about an hour away has a sale on them for $399. That's kinda hard to pass up. If you need to shoot 3" shells then you'll have to lean to the 870. You'll likely be happy with either one.