Been tinkering with some urban fantasy ideas recently, and I was thinking about gadgets a modern vampire hunter might design and use.

Putting a wooden stake through a vampire’s heart is usually quite effective at either paralyzing them or dusting them outright, depending on the author. Of course, a wooden stake is a lousy weapon in a fight, so usually it’s used after the vamp is already close to defeated.

But what if you could stake a bloodsucker at range? Crossbows could work, but they’re not the only possibility. What about a shotgun which fires wooden slugs?

I’m not a gunsmith or even a gun aficionado, so I’m not sure how feasible that is. What would be the challenges inherent in making wooden shotgun slugs? Would there be a better way to fire stakes into your supernatural enemies from range?