Disappearing Texas Star

[rpd]

I'm new to stage design and I'm trying to put together a stage for one of the local clubs. As part of the stage I want to use a texas star propped up to be at rest with only two plates on so that it swings when activated by a popper. The star would be propped so the plates are up high and offset to maximize the initial speed and hard cover would be placed in front of the plates prior to activation.

My question is if I use cover that goes all the way to the ground can one of the plates(the one that would come to rest behind the cover after the star settles) be considered a disappearing target?

To complicate matters, if one plate is shot off the star and the remaining plate comes to rest straight down and not behind cover will that make it a non-disappearing target?

I'm sorry but I can't post pictures yet.

[Poppa Bear]

So what happens if I do not take any of the plates? Are they both hidden at rest? It sounds like they will be hidden at the start and relying on the popper to activate it and bring them into view.

[rpd]

The plates are hidden prior to activation. After activation the star will spin and if no plates are shot at rest one plate will be available and the other will be behind hard cover.

If one plate is shot the remaining plate will come to rest available.

[Poppa Bear]

If no plates are taken off then the one target would be considered and scored as disappearing, so no penalty for the miss. The other target would be considered available so at a minimum it would be scored as a miss so -15 (5 for the alpha, 10 for the miss). If no shots are fired at the plates then there would be an additional -10 for the Failure to Engage. The second plate would still be a no penalty miss so no FTE.

The question becomes is it worth it to pop a couple in the direction of the star to avoid the FTE, and possibly get lucky and take one of the plates. How many other targets are planned for the stage? 4 paper and it is not worth it, you need to take both plates. 15 paper it is worth it.

[rpd]

This would be the last array in a 32 round field course. I'm trying to set it up so the activator for this is available almost right away but it would be a long shot and require you to slow down when you want to run and gun.

[yoshidaex]

Wouldn't rule 9.9.1 apply in your situation?

[a matt]

I would be worried that spent all this time getting things to work just to have someone like myself (lol) not activate it and take the NPM.

[Poppa Bear]

I would be worried that spent all this time getting things to work just to have someone like myself (lol) not activate it and take the NPM.

-25 Plate 1

-25 Plate 2

-15 to -25 for the Popper

So a minimum of -65 if you do not activate the star.

9.9.3 Moving scoring targets will always incur failure to shoot at and miss

penalties if a competitor fails to activate the mechanism which initiates

the target movement

Edited July 27, 2012 by Poppa Bear

[rpd]

Wouldn't rule 9.9.1 apply in your situation?

I believe it would. My thinking is that each plate on a star is an individual target for scoring purposes. The thing that throws me is that depending on how I setup the cover one of the plates could be a no penalty mike if the shooter misses both plates. So here's my scenarios(just scoring Mikes and procedurals):

1. Shooter activates the target (popper), engages the targets (two shots) but does not hit them = 1 Mike, 1 No penalty mike

2. Shooter activates the target (popper), engages the targets (two shots) and drops 1 plate = 1 Mike

The interesting one is this:

3. Shooter activates the target (popper), engages one target (one shot) bus does not hit either target = 1 Mike, 1 No Penalty Mike

Is there an FTE procedural on scenario 3? Not engaging a disappearing target is not an FTE, correct? If we are getting to rules forum esque let me know.

[Poppa Bear]

Wouldn't rule 9.9.1 apply in your situation?

I believe it would. My thinking is that each plate on a star is an individual target for scoring purposes. The thing that throws me is that depending on how I setup the cover one of the plates could be a no penalty mike if the shooter misses both plates. So here's my scenarios(just scoring Mikes and procedurals):

1. Shooter activates the target (popper), engages the targets (two shots) but does not hit them = 1 Mike, 1 No penalty mike

2. Shooter activates the target (popper), engages the targets (two shots) and drops 1 plate = 1 Mike

The interesting one is this:

3. Shooter activates the target (popper), engages one target (one shot) bus does not hit either target = 1 Mike, 1 No Penalty Mike

Is there an FTE procedural on scenario 3? Not engaging a disappearing target is not an FTE, correct? If we are getting to rules forum esque let me know.

One shot would satisfy the FTE requirements for both targets unless that one shot hit the target. Now they need to engage the second target to avoid a FTE.

The way I would play it is if both targets are visible or becoming visible, ie plate one is in the open and plate two is about to become visible. I would try to take both targets with a couple of quick shots. If they are on their way back to hidden I would pop off the shots to satisfy the FTE and then stop shooting. The miss will cost me less than waiting 3 to 4 seconds for the targets to come back into view.

[lcs]

While your idea might sound challenging-I would not do it. To complicated to setup, to complicated to score, and to complicated for average shooters. You can do other things with cover and no shoots to add difficulty and a challenge.

[rpd]

Thanks to everyone for the info. I have a lot to work on before I propose this to the match director but it would be a fun challenge.

[Poppa Bear]

Leave the star wide open and paint 2 of the 5 as No Shoots. The head and one shoulder makes it the hardest, both feet makes it the easiest, both shoulders would be in between.

[Skydiver]

Or be evil... Setup two or more metal no shoots behind the star.

[lef-t]

Leave the star wide open and paint 2 of the 5 as No Shoots. The head and one shoulder makes it the hardest, both feet makes it the easiest, both shoulders would be in between.

Ooh that's evil. I like it! I have a feeling people will bitch real hard if they can't start from the top. I love hearing shooters whine when they get thrown a curveball.

[orangeman711]

Another option is to paint the plates different colors and make them shoot in specific order by color, or paint them different colors and have the shooter draw 3 slips which show the colors they have to engage and not engage the other 2 colors. Makes shooters think before pulling the trigger. Good luck. Edited July 29, 2012 by orangeman711

[Skydiver]

Another option is to paint the plates different colors and make them shoot in specific order by color, or paint them different colors and have the shooter draw 3 slips which show the colors they have to engage and not engage the other 2 colors. Makes shooters think before pulling the trigger. Good luck.

Can't force target engagement order within an array, but it would be fun. We did that one evening at a plates league and it thoroughly messed up one of our fastest shooters who just sweeps through them.

The Friend or Foe with the 3 colors sounds good, though. :-) A friend of mine had an evil variation on that. The 3 slips of paper got drawn at the uprange part of the stage after the start signal, and thrown into a basket that the assistant RO looks at. Later, down at the down range end of the stage is the star. If the shooter doesn't remember, he has to either guess, or run back uprange to look again, or shoot and deliberately miss to not get the FTE penalties.

Edited July 29, 2012 by Skydiver

[rpd]

I like it. These are some great ideas. I've always had a love/hate thing with texas stars.

My concept for only using two plates on the star occurred to me when I saw a shooter at a recent match shoot the star in exactly the opposite order that you would want. I saw two plates spinning really fast and wanted to replicate those two plates only. What I really want is a swinger with plates on it, but that's not realistic.

I like the idea of painting no shoot plates on the star. That could get me to the same challenge without the activator. Either way, the setup would have to be fast and repeatable or the stage would become the bottleneck.

[Flexmoney]

<drift alert>

One shot would satisfy the FTE requirements for both targets unless that one shot hit the target. Now they need to engage the second target to avoid a FTE.

Huh?

How does one shot manage to "engage" two different targets?

[sperman]

Another option is to paint the plates different colors and make them shoot in specific order by color, or paint them different colors and have the shooter draw 3 slips which show the colors they have to engage and not engage the other 2 colors. Makes shooters think before pulling the trigger. Good luck.

Can't force target engagement order within an array, but it would be fun. We did that one evening at a plates league and it thoroughly messed up one of our fastest shooters who just sweeps through them.

The Friend or Foe with the 3 colors sounds good, though. :-) A friend of mine had an evil variation on that. The 3 slips of paper got drawn at the uprange part of the stage after the start signal, and thrown into a basket that the assistant RO looks at. Later, down at the down range end of the stage is the star. If the shooter doesn't remember, he has to either guess, or run back uprange to look again, or shoot and deliberately miss to not get the FTE penalties.

I'm not sure drawing colors to determine which targets to shoot would be legal in a USPSA match.

[Poppa Bear]

<drift alert>

One shot would satisfy the FTE requirements for both targets unless that one shot hit the target. Now they need to engage the second target to avoid a FTE.

Huh?

How does one shot manage to "engage" two different targets?

The one target disappears if neither is taken. There is no FTE penalty on a disappearing target. If the one is taken off then the second plate becomes visible so it would now need to be engaged.

[rpd]

<drift alert>

One shot would satisfy the FTE requirements for both targets unless that one shot hit the target. Now they need to engage the second target to avoid a FTE.

Huh?

How does one shot manage to "engage" two different targets?

My interpretation,

You only need to engage one of the targets.

Assuming that there are two targets on the star to begin with and set up so that at rest (with both plates still on it), one plate comes to rest behind hard cover and is a disappearing target and the other plate remains visible. If you didn't engage the star at all you would be assessed an FTE for the one plate that is non-disappearing, but couldn't be assessed an FTE on the disappearing plate. Hence one shot would be required to avoid FTE.

My initial thoughts on constructing the array in the original post would require a barrier that went all the way to the ground in order to block the plates from being shot before activation. I may have a work-around for that now in the form of a steel no-shoot on a stand that wouldn't block either plate at rest.

[BillChunn]

Our "engineering" staff calculated the minimum height of a vision barrier so that no matter what plates were knocked off the 5 position star, the remaining plate(s) would still be visible. We color coded the back of the plates so they were always put back on the same "leg" and the star was started in the same position for each shooter. The barrier only allowed visibility to the lower three plates. That stage also had a 6 plate rack, 8 other pieces of steel and four paper targets.

Needles to say, it became the bottleneck of the match with shooters taking 20+ seconds to shoot. Resetting the stage was also time consuming.

Live and learn. But it was fun....

BC

[bikerburgess]

If the popper activates the star making the plates visible and hitting one of those plates makes the other one visible then I say non are disappearing. I think disappearing means the target is gone with no possible way to be able to shoot it.

Mike

[GuildSF4]

I believe you are correct in this analysis. If the plate shows at rest by itself it is not a disappearing target. It doesn't matter if both plates are on and only one shows, if the one that shows is shot and then the other one shows = not disappearing. (Am I missing a rule here?)

Edited March 29, 2013 by GuildSF4