I hate taking a shot at a deer that is closer than 10 yards, especially when I am 20-25' up a tree (which I usually am during bow season). At ten yards or less, you are shooting at the top of the deer, and not the side. Where the ribs come out from the spine, they are much thicker and stronger than they are halfway down the rib cage. And this is what you have to shoot through. Second, a deer is deeper than it is wide, and you have to drive the broadhead through more muscle (backstrap) than on a broadside shot. This muscle is a lot more dense than lung/heart/liver, and sucks up kinetic energy and penetration. A quartering away shot is even worse for penetration, as now not only do you have to drive the arrow through the thick muscle of the backstrap, then the thick bones of the upper ribs, but then you have to push it through the offside shoulder, leg bone, or sternum. This means it is much, much harder to get a pass through on a close deer than a deer broadside at 20-30 yards. Combine a shot without an exit hole and a high entrance hole on the top of the deers back and you'll have a weak blood trail. I have shot several deer from 3-10 yards from my tree, with both fixed blade (muzzy and thunderheads) and expandables (rage and gators). You can kill a deer with any of them. But, you'll have trouble getting a pass through with any of them, and the blood will be sparse. I hate really close shots. I will say that the front opening broadheads (like the spitfires) do rob you of more kinetic energy than do rear deploying mechanicals or fixed blade heads. But, even with the smallest diameter cut on contact fixed blades, it is tough to get a pass through on a close deer with a normal bow. And I won't turn this into another broadhead discussion, but I will say that I don't like the spitfires. I bought three of them when they came out, and I shot 2 of the three into does. Neither was a pass through, though both killed the deer and I found both less than 100 yards away. I never shot the third one, and it still sits in my broadhead box. You will get better penetration with a rear deploying mechnical or a cut on contact fixed blade than with the front opening mechanicals.
