MDs/Course Designers, please consider....

[Braxton1]

While working stats at multi-stage matches, I've noticed that it would be a lot easier on the people scoring the match if MDs and Course Designers would ensure that none of the stages have the same round count. Here's why:

Let's say that you have six stages. These stages have 12, 12, 18, 18, 28, and 28 rounds each. If a scorecard from Stage 1 gets mixed in with the Stage 2s, it is very easy to accidentally enter a shooter's Stage 1 into Stage 2's scores. Nothing will "stick out", as they say. EZWS will accept those 12 scored rounds and a time. We won't catch it until somebody goes to enter his score from his Stage 2 scorecard and finds a score already entered. Time for a good bit of research and a re-do.

If we would just add a target to Stage 2, take one away from Stage 3, and throw an extra Plate or Popper into Stage 6, we'd end up with stages with 12, 14, 16, 18, 28, and 29 rounds required. When I try to input our shooter's Stage 1 into Stage 2, I'd instantly get that "You have entered 12 rounds instead of the required 14 rounds" message and thereby instantly "flag" the mistake. The only time-consuming act here is when my brain stops and says "W.T.F.?"

Just something to consider. When you're scoring 250 shooters over 10 stages, you're hauling butt and little delays like this add up.

[Graham Smith]

As the MD, priamary stage designer, and stats person for our monthly matches, all I can says is, "I understand". We do tend to always have stages with an even number of shots and sometimes have more than one stage with the same round count. It really has not created any problems for me, yet, but I can see how it might.

One thing that can make a difference it to make sure that you don't have two stages with the same round count and the same amount of steel.

[LPatterson]

Since I have to drive 170 miles (3 hours) each way minimum for a match I would like to see all the stages bigger not smaller. The MD's have the score sheets printed on different colored paper so there is no mix-up at the stage or at stats. KISS

[Flexmoney]

Since I have to drive 170 miles (3 hours) each way minimum for a match I would like to see all the stages bigger not smaller. The MD's have the score sheets printed on different colored paper so there is no mix-up at the stage or at stats. KISS

We have one club that does individual score sheets for each stage, on different colors. That is cool. Other clubs put it all on one sheet of paper.

You won't notice 5 or 6 rounds worth of difference.

The guy doing the scores will !!!

It is a ton easier for me to have the stages with the round count at least one round different. Heck, if it is a Level-I match...it can be 33 rounds.

[Seth]

When I was MD at Fredericksburg, round cound was set arbitrarily and the stages were made to fit for this reason exactly. Made the job of recording accurate scores markedly easier.

[Tim/GA]

This even applies to clubs using Palms to score. Mainly when talking about paper targets, since you don't change anything on steel unless there is one left standing, it is possible that a whole squad were to score on the wrong stage. Especially since you are generally having different score keeper ROs throughout a stage. I will be thinking about his from now on as MD and stage designer

[joseywales]

I think designing each stage in a match to have a unique round count is a really good practice.At our club, we try hard to hold to this practice. We also use Palm scorekeeping. It's a good practice.

[kevin c]

Our much suffering crew of scorekeepers have had the same request in for years now. We accommodate them by changing round counts on the morning safety walkthrough before the match. Gotta keep those guys happy - it's an aggravating job sometimes.

[Skydiver]

Our club was the last to convert to colored scoresheets in our section when I managed to get colored paper on sale the previous year. This made all the headaches go away. :-) I also try to make the color sequencing cool/warm/cool/warm, with the classifier stage always being yellow.

That maybe all moot if we decide to go electronic after our mostly successful pilot run this past weekend. Then maybe we may go with the different round counts to make it very very obvious to the scorekeeper which stage they are at. Frankly, though, the way PractiScore is setup, you have to select a stage before you can select shooters, so it's harder to screw up.

[Tim/GA]

...Frankly, though, the way PractiScore is setup, you have to select a stage before you can select shooters, so it's harder to screw up.

Harder, but somehow somebody will find a way! For instance, people get used to thinking in terms of bays being a certain stage number. Ran 2 stages (one speed, one short) in the same bay today so that would throw off the "normal" stage numbering. And most don't really look at the names. On the other hand, the first shooter that is scored and the targets don't match the ones in the Palm and it becomes obvious there is a problem.

[Jim Norman]

This even applies to clubs using Palms to score...

Tim, respectfully I disagree. We run Palms and have been about as long as anyone. We use one Palm per stage, not one per squad. This makes it virtually impossible to score a shooter on the wrong stage. You can however score the wrong shooter so you need to be careful there. The main reason to use unique palms for each stage is so that in the event of some catastrophic failure, you lose a stage, not a whole match for one squad.

In the case where paper is still being used, making stages have different counts is not a bad idea. Along those lines we are looking to mandate a certain target and steel count for each pit. This is more to help the designers and allow stats to pre-build the match before Saturday.