black powder,The Encore,is a great gun,and if your into centerfire(and it sounds like you are) they are hard to beat! With the selection of barrels and cal. that T/C offers,it could be a "one gun" arsnel! I have allot of center fire rifles,and really don't want to "sell off" any of them,but I keep looking at the C/F barrels. My Encore is a Pro Hunter. The stock on them are incrediable at soaking up recoil. Two of my friends have Encores,and ordered the Pro Hunter stock for them. They say it's a diffrent gun with the stock exchange,around half the recoil. I can shoot all day with 150gr. loads,and never give recoil a thought. The gun just shoots soft. Ron