No, when a buff is broadside, you can't make a brain shot, but you can stick it in his neck.

A lot of times when the conditions are not good for a brain shot, the neck shot is easily available. It just seems to me like I see a lot of cases where people take the heart/lung shot, when the neck would have been just as easy. One of my favorite shots in North America is to stick the bullet right where the head and neck are joined, and the animal is virtually decapitated. To me, it is just as easy to put the crosshairs there as the heart/lung area. And I understand what you mean about barely missing the brain, but if you get your shot just a little too far back with a lung shot, you end up gutshooting him and that is just as bad. I understand, though, that the heart/lung area is a bigger target. I don't know, I just usually put the crosshairs at the base of the skull, pull the trigger - game, set, match. I wonder if maybe a lot of guys are better shots than they think they are, but they lack the confidence to try that kind of shot. Maybe I'm wrong, I don't know. It just never seemed all that tough to me. I am planning a trip to Monterrey after the first of the year for bear, lion, and feral cattle. I will for sure be shooting necks and heads on the feral cattle, if at all possible.

Maybe the difference is just in different people's perception of "ideal conditions." I mean, maybe to me a certain set of conditions looks just fine for a neck or head shot, and then to another person the conditions seem terrible for that kind of shot. My philosophy is that if you try the head or neck shot, yes, you might miss-but you for sure won't make it if you don't try. I remember being scared to try it the first few times I did it, in case I miss. But then after I did it a few times I had a lot of confidence in taking that shot.