Agree about the hogs. I've skinned a lot of big old boars with plates about 1.5 inches thick. My knife grits through the tough places because of all the calcium. In pathology we call it 'dystrophic calcification.' I saw a video of a fellow, using a bow, hit a big boar in the shoulder. It was almost night and you can see a perfect fireworks of sparks when the broadhead strikes it.
In terms of bullet failures that lose game during the hunt: Well, if the animal is never recovered and autopsied, we can't know if the bullet failed or not. No doubt some animals run away because the bullet blew up superficially. One time I was in Zululand with a self-proclaimed great reloader. He'd searched the world for this perfect bullet. I don't know the name but it was in 270 caliber, had an exposed lead tip. Embedded in this exposed lead was a small pyramid of brass. The expert told me that the pyramid was pushed back through the lead core producing rapid, lethal expansion. Before I left, this guy had wounded animals running all over the countryside but, one day, I saw a skinned impala hanging from a tree. The expert finally bagged something. I admired the huge exit wound that had removed an entire shoulder. Then I looked for the entrance wound--nothing. The huge 'exit' wound was actually an entrance wound. This is why he wounded so much game.
Virtually any bullet can fail given the right circumstances. In Africa, I usually shoot Nosler partitions with excellent results. One time, though, I recovered one that lost its core. The Barnes triple shock is also a good bullet, but one time my son knocked a 12 pt buck down with the TSX only to have it jump up and run away. We found it three months later, a mile away. It's upper humerus--shoulder--was fractured. The thing was mummified, but I boiled out his head, anyway. The bullet fell out of the head. The clover-leafed, 'point' end was canted about 45 degrees. I think this is what happened. The bullet broke the shoulder but was deflected out of shape. Rather than shoot right through the chest, it ran under the flesh of the chest and neck to terminate somewhere in the head.
Probably the single best bullet I've ever used [no longer sold], was the Barnes monolithic solid. It was made of solid alloy. I used it extensively in the 220 Swift. On hogs and deer, it was the crack of doom. Yes, I missed a couple but that was just me. If I hit it in the head, neck or chest, it was gone. There's something to say about hitting an animal with a bullet--even a very small bullet--at 4,000 fps.
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