Jump to content
Brian Enos's Forums... Maku mozo!

How to keep stage design fresh?


Recommended Posts

I'm currently working on getting stages created for my clubs upcoming indoor season. I'm trying to create a bank of new stages now so I don't have so much work during the winter months. We run 2-3 matches per month during the week. (1st, 3rd, and 5th Wednesday | Oct - May). We have two indoor bays with FBI Battle Walls (Allows 180 degree shooting for the front 15 yards of the range). 2 large field courses, medium/speed shoot, one classifier.

Since I'm trying to create a whole lot all at once, I'm finding I'm creating similar types of stages with similar designs. I try avoiding shooting from Box "a" type stuff as much as possible.

What do you guys do to keep it fresh at your club? Take major match stages and modify them for your own range? Start with creating weird fault lines and fill in the rest? I seem to be running out of ideas.

Edited by Maximis228
Link to comment
Share on other sites

I leverage a lot of my stage plan ideas off of interesting stages that I have seen while shooting other matches. As a match director I have my match staff create stages as well. With 5 - 6 people all creating their own stages it comes up with some varied shooting challenges every match.

The other thing to consider is that you could take the exact same physical stage and simply change up the starting location and gun ready condition and it will dramatically change how the stage is shot. For example, starting in the back of a stage for the first version and then starting in the front of the stage for the second version.

The primary challenge with pilfering stages directly from other clubs is that all ranges don't have the same size berms or quantity/types of props. You always have to review the stage designs ahead of time to make sure that you can actually set it up given your berm size and restrictions and the props you have at hand.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Also, I'm a firm believer in having several people design stages. No matter how hard we try we tend to design stages that become easily recognizable. I think in my local area I can walk up to a stage and almost guess who designed it. Some lead towards hosers. Some towards memory, some lateral, some lots of tight shots, some lots of NS, etc.

Unless a guy is an exceptionally gifted stage designer they tend to look the same over time.

I recognized this at a few state matches and when I got my turn to MD the Ohio I reached out to every club/ designer in the state to insure a broad variety in stage design.

So, get a core group of 2-3 guys together and go to work. Plus it takes some of the load off your shoulders.

Edited by Sarge
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Just take good stages from majors and toss them in a notebook. Over time, you'll build a fairly substantial library to pick from. Seems like most matches post their stages ahead of time... And sharing is caring!

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Just take good stages from majors and toss them in a notebook. Over time, you'll build a fairly substantial library to pick from. Seems like most matches post their stages ahead of time... And sharing is caring!

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

exactly. unless you are really excited by the creative process, just steal everyone else's stages. The particulars of setup will always make them VASTLY different from the originals, which is a good thing.

some of the best stages I've seen didn't even come from a diagram. they came from people just setting up walls and barrels and putting targets out there, then spending 10 mins moving things around and proofing it for shoot-throughs and safety issues. without a designer's intent to force certain things, the creative process gets offloaded onto the individual shooters to come up with an efficient stage plan.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I run a weekly indoor match that does NOT have the angles flexibility you have; we cannot shoot the walls. That means that, other than standards/classifier type stages, very few stages from big matches can be translated. So we have to come up with an average of 3 stages per week, 50 weeks per year. And we frequently get favorable comments from serious shooters about the quality of our stages, especially given our geometric limitations.

There are lots of ways to design stages, but the method that works for me is to pick one or two or maybe three concepts to build the stage around. The concept could be a particular shot, an activator array, a choice for the shooter, an overall direction of movement, a big transition.... almost anything. Design/build the portion of the stage that embodies that concept. That's the heart of the stage. Then fill in the rest around it, based on available resources and desired stage size and time. This approach generally ensures that there's something interesting (at least to the designer) on every stage. It also helps when you're building a stage and realize that you've designed a shoot-through or RO trap or something that you don't want/can't have: you just sacrifice other elements of the stage to make the concept work. Make the heart of the stage as good as you can make it. Then fill in the rest.

And I second getting as many people involved in stage design as possible. Different folks definitely have different styles. That's good.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

If they truly take over as MD for the match, then yes. Otherwise, no.

Once you get the hang of it, designing stages is fun for a lot of people. It's a creative outlet. And you then get to shoot exactly the kind of stage you've been wishing for! Having to design a LOT of stages can eventually get to be a grind, but it's just not that big a deal.

Edited by ATLDave
Link to comment
Share on other sites

If I am doing an entire match, I attempt to look at the forest first, then the trees. Supposedly, scoring and poppers reward power in USPSA, but not enough. Anyway, I consider a skill, or set of skills to be challenged. With 8 divisions, that can be difficult, but it is still a baseline.

-Shooting on the move (open targets at middle distances with a controlled position to follow)

-Posting up (in and out of positions) and shooting

-Accuracy (steel, hardcover, distance, no-shoots)

-Speed (steel, open targets hardcover, max traps, drop turners)

-Changing speed (mixing of targets and engagements)

-Reloading (round counts at 22-24 leaving only a few targets and not much movement at the end tests all but Open)

-Movers (swingers, stars)

-Strong and weak hand only (Standards, walls with tight targets to insides)

-Positional Shooting (walls, props)

-Keeping track of shots (memory stages, 1, 3, 4 or 5 required hits per paper instead of 2)

There are of course others. Once you have picked a skill, or maybe 2 or 3, to test, consider the ways in which it can be tested, but which can be accomplished by D class shooters, just with more time or less points. I never want impossible shots or those that only A and up shooters can accomplish. For a local match, I try not to challenge all the same skills.

I will, in practice set up an array and shoot it, have a M or GM shoot it, have my 12 year old shoot it, and balance the complexity, and HF of that array, tweak as needed.

After that is done, then it is time to add in creativity, which I will admit is not my strongest suit, at least the artsy part of it. My stages are often seen as more challenging than they looked. Knowing the metrics of top shooters and D class shooters and being able to space the targets and challenges out with great flow for the GMs while making them achievable for the Ds takes time and skill to get good at.

When I see a stage, or a match where people who are in the bottom half rave about it but the top shooters will only attend if it is close or their sponsor sends them, tells me it is a juvenile stage design (maybe fun and great artwork, but not challenging to the top shooters), and frankly, the amount of those has been increasing of late. Cha-Lee is an excellent stage designer and a lot of it comes from seeing a lot of stages, but also in his deep understanding of the elements of shooting pistols fast and accurately. Knowing what kinds of vision issues challenge the shooters who will win and those in the pack.

Take your dry or live fire skills book to the range and set those up as mini-stages. The ones you struggle with, pluck out those arrays and make them stages in a match. Also a great way to change up stages to test skills and not become stale.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I'd have to echo what MarkCO is after with the heart of his post:

A truly good stage won't turn off a new shooter due to it's insane level of complexity... or an extremely high level of difficulty.

That means I try to take it easy on memory stages: I think having to remember that there's ONE target you have to shoot from X and ONE target you have to shoot from Y is great, and I like having the option to skip targets in order to manage my loads efficiently in Production and then come back to them later on. But novices shooters can still just toss a flat-footed reload in there to get things done more simply. We've all been through the wringer with nightmare memory stages - at the end of the day, keep it a test of shooting skill. Not cognitive abilities.

A truly good stage also won't bore the A through GM guys either. That means some difficulty is required.

You might give the shooter two positions to engage an array with a noshoot-partial on a drop-turner: One deletes eight seconds of sprinting forward and then backing out, but gives a GM hard enough shots to make it fun. The novice can just sprint forward and hose 'em down and also have a blast. Just one example which comes to mind.

I said "difficulty" is what keeps the top guys coming back, but really I think options are more important. I always see them enjoying themselves the most on stages where the A-thru-GM shooters will shoot the stage several different ways.

The fundamental layout of the stage is a big factor in making things FEEL different: Two stages might have nearly identical arrays and shooting positions, but if one involves advancing straight down the middle of the bay with your gun and mags on barrels and the second has a wide shooting area making that movement lateral while starting facing uprange... they certainly don't seem like duplicates. Even if it's the same # of steel and same basic engagement order.

Edited by MemphisMechanic
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Think about what you want to learn to do better, then work with those parameters.  In essence; transitions then lots of transistions, movement- short quick lots of movement, the list goes on.  Same for your club, what are their weaknesses and work to shore those up-wh/sh?

 

Standards are always called for---at least one every month or every other month.  The more complaints the better the standards.

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 4 weeks later...

Mix it up between blasters and thinkers; lots of movement and little movement.  crank a few up for the high shooters, then add a few simple for us lower end shooters.  Challenge we the lower shooters but don't overwhelm us.  Also....build your second stage off what you have for the first stage and the third stage on what you have built for the second.  Stages get progressively more complex but build time is cut down.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 1 month later...

I run an indoor match down south, and we shoot twice a month.  It is tough keeping fresh stages and dealing with the issues that arise from shooting indoors.  I take ideas from other stages I see at larger matches however they usually require lots of tweaking for indoors.  We can't really get any long shots so that makes us switch to lots of tight shots.  We run two long stages and two classifiers.  

The limitations I have found indoors are the lack of backstop for shooting and moving unless you get some mobile bullet traps, then you're at the mercy of your shooters if you get a round that impacts directly into the cinder block wall.  Our indoor range bays are 9 lanes wide, lets call it 27 feet wide and 25 yards deep.  and we hang snow fence and some walls from the target track rails on the ceiling.  We do ok, but a lot of our shooting is changing speed, posting up, shooting movers, and standards.

If you're going to use moving targets on a slick concrete floor you need to make sure you have a good way to keep them in place.  We have some drop turns and some mgm swingers that we use.  They require LOTS of tape to hold them down to the floor.  Some places use sand bags, but we don't want to spill sand on the slick floor. For shooting steel targets you'll want to place some cheapo 3/32 or 1/4" plywood under them so you don't damage the concrete surface.  Also keep in mind the minimum distances for shooting steel....  We use mini classic poppers mainly.

The last issue I found is that sometimes there is 'too much'  with indoors sometimes less is really more.  If you don't have the space for 32rds, swingers, and steel don't try to throw it all in on one stage.  sometimes a 20-24rd stage will be just busy enough that it uses the space in a more efficient manner and it will flow better.

Here is a video one of the competitors took of our last match.

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 2 months later...

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
×
×
  • Create New...