Limited optics strong early showing

[RJH]

46 minutes ago, davsco said:

counting to ten isn't a big deal for the RO nor for the shooter reloading his mags.  20 is a bigger deal for both and easy to lose count or get it wrong.   am i at 18 or 19 in the mag, crap, empty the mag and start over.  yeah, shot timers have counters but we don't always catch every shot on the timer.  and for guys that reload before running dry (as it should be of course...), no one is going to be 'caught' unless we're counting the rounds in the discarded mags.  having a mag length rule and not a round count rule is way easier for both the shooter and the RO.

 

Was it 18 or 19, if not sure load to 23 and take 3 off..... 

 

Plus plenty of new mags that hold 20.....

 

This is not that complicated 

[RJH]

18 minutes ago, rishii said:

I’d be happy with major/minor in LO and a 140 mag limit

40 major, higher points for shooting for C/D hits, a few less rounds n the mag

9 minor, less point for C/D hit, but more ammo in the mag

similar to SS  major/ minor

 

 

 

Yeah, but no reason to tie a new division to a dead horse. And we've beaten this one pretty much to death

[shred]

18 minutes ago, RJH said:

 

Was it 18 or 19, if not sure load to 23 and take 3 off..... 

 

Plus plenty of new mags that hold 20.....

 

This is not that complicated 

Or drill a witness hole.  Most come with them already too.  Might be off by one if you use super-slim jam-prone followers, but why do that when you don't have to fight to stuff in the last round with an Oopaloopa and barging-hammer?

 

[davsco]

9 hours ago, RJH said:

 

Was it 18 or 19, if not sure load to 23 and take 3 off..... 

 

Plus plenty of new mags that hold 20.....

 

This is not that complicated 

What you said is not as easy as just a mag length rule.  That BTW seems to work well for ltd, open, etc.

[shred]

That works for Lim and Open because there is only one competitive case size.  The game here is to make two calibers/case-sizes competitive with each other.  Preferably with at least somewhat-practical mags.

 

That's either a major-minor count mix 6/8 in Revo, 8/10 Single Stack (shocking ROs can keep up with all that on the fly ) or another number like 10 in Production & L10 unless you want two different length mags for each, single-stack-can-use-170-style, but both sets of candidate shooters have a lot of 141mm mags.

 

A number may be a bit more annoying to enforce but it's a whole lot easier to implement.

 

 

[davsco]

31 minutes ago, shred said:

That works for Lim and Open because there is only one competitive case size.  The game here is to make two calibers/case-sizes competitive with each other.  Preferably with at least somewhat-practical mags.

 

That's either a major-minor count mix 6/8 in Revo, 8/10 Single Stack (shocking ROs can keep up with all that on the fly ) or another number like 10 in Production & L10 unless you want two different length mags for each, single-stack-can-use-170-style, but both sets of candidate shooters have a lot of 141mm mags.

 

A number may be a bit more annoying to enforce but it's a whole lot easier to implement.

 

 

implementing a rule is a one time thing.  enforcing it is an every-shooter, every-stage, every-match thing.  folks can shoot 9 or 40 iin limited now and choose between a round or two less or more capacity vs a scoring advantage or disadvantage and that has worked fine for years if not decades.  why change what works and why go to a method that introduces less enforcement consistency?

[BMSMB]

2 hours ago, davsco said:

implementing a rule is a one time thing.  enforcing it is an every-shooter, every-stage, every-match thing.  folks can shoot 9 or 40 iin limited now and choose between a round or two less or more capacity vs a scoring advantage or disadvantage and that has worked fine for years if not decades.  why change what works and why go to a method that introduces less enforcement consistency?

The difference between 8 and 10 rounds is much larger than 20 and 23 rounds.

 

Who actually shoots A fudgecicle nobody but a few crayon chewers and winder likkers want as their main division/power factor? Anyone taking the division seriously has invested into shooting it with a major power factor.

That was a bad argument.

[Boomstick303]

10 minutes ago, BMSMB said:

That was a bad argument.

 

Maybe I am wrong, but I do not think his argument was equating the 8-10 rounds with 20-23 rounds as much as trying to enforce the rule itself.  It is much different for an RO to keep track of 8-10 shots versus trying to count 20 shots.  

 

 

 

[BMSMB]

1 minute ago, Boomstick303 said:

 

Maybe I am wrong, but I do not think his argument was equating the 8-10 rounds with 20-23 rounds as much as trying to enforce the rule itself.  It is much different for an RO to keep track of 8-10 shots versus trying to count 20 shots.  

 

 

 

The argument I'm talking about:

"folks can shoot 9 or 40 iin limited now and choose between a round or two less or more capacity vs a scoring advantage or disadvantage and that has worked fine for years if not decades."

[Schutzenmeister]

2 hours ago, davsco said:

implementing a rule is a one time thing.  enforcing it is an every-shooter, every-stage, every-match thing.  folks can shoot 9 or 40 iin limited now and choose between a round or two less or more capacity vs a scoring advantage or disadvantage and that has worked fine for years if not decades.  why change what works and why go to a method that introduces less enforcement consistency?

 

Badda bing, badda boom!

 

[shred]

Because few people believe USPSA is going to make Limited Optics major-minor, so, assuming it stays minor-only, how do you even it out for the 40 folks? (or, I suppose, if they do make it Major-minor, how to even it out for the minor peeps)  That's the discussion topic that I suggested capacity limits for, not lim-minor or whatever derails came in.

 

Nobody is enforcing mag lengths at local matches, nor are they chronoing or weighing or fitting the box or checking all the safeties work or looking for illegal modifications, measuring dust cover length, flashlight functionality, holster cut below the ejection port or any one of the dozens of other equipment rules.   I've shot hundreds and hundreds of locals over the years.  

 

Funny enough, the one thing that I have seen policed at the local level is 10-rounds in production.... by the other production shooters.   Amazing!  

 

A huge portion of the sport relies on the honor system.  At the majors there are policies to check and ROs do, so this is not new. 

 

[motosapiens]

39 minutes ago, shred said:

Because few people believe USPSA is going to make Limited Optics major-minor, so, assuming it stays minor-only, how do you even it out for the 40 folks? (or, I suppose, if they do make it Major-minor, how to even it out for the minor peeps) 

 

I have several suggestions:

1. 170mm for minor, 140mm for major

2. 40 guys can just shoot limited with iron sights which is a much more interesting division.

3. 40 guys can buy open guns.

4. 40 guys can shoot 20-round 40 minor and spend 10 mins/wk practicing reloads so they're not at a significant disadvantage.

5. 40 guys can buy open guns and run with the big boys instead of the hiders.... 

 

Note that my input should not be taken overly seriously because I'll never shoot the division if it stays minor. I have guns that perfectly into sensible and popular divisions.

[whan]

In general it's going to be interesting to see what they do with the LO and to some extent CO rulesets over the next year or two. As it stands there's pretty minimal functional difference between the two divisions. But perhaps that's fine - when I shot single stack minor it was pretty much the same as production. At least here there's enough demand to support both of the divisions easily. It's just the broader question of whether divisions should be designed to create distinctly different strategies

 

I'd honestly be open to seeing CO dropped down to 15 rounds to better match IPSC production optics. That would make it a distinct game from LO. Wouldn't require anyone to buy any different equipment (can just load current CO mags to 15 or CO shooters can move to LO). Also would be interesting if IPSC ends up creating a Standard Optics division to mirror our current LO ruleset

Edited June 20, 2023 by whan

[BritinUSA]

If IPSC does a Standard-Optics division it will most likely follow the same strategy as Production/Production Optics. Basically the same rule-set as Standard is now, but with a red-dot.

 

The question of whether they will keep .40 Major is another issue.

 

IPSC has a box for Standard and it has to fit with a magazine inserted. So there will be fewer rounds available with .40 compared to 9mm.

Edited June 21, 2023 by BritinUSA

[truespode]

I'd like to see Practicescore track and USPSA report on the gun people use as well. Just because it tracks minor doesn't show the true use of the division and options available. If someone is shooting 40 minor out of a 2011 with a dot in LO it isn't tracked so there is no real way to know how many 40 people are in the division.

Plus it would be nice for sponsors to see their gun by specific shooters. I am pretty sure a lot of them would pay me not to use their gun

[GigG]

19 hours ago, shred said:

assuming it stays minor-only, how do you even it out for the 40 folks? (or, I suppose, if they do make it Major-minor, how to even it out for the minor peeps) 

 

I keep hearing this "even out" argument and don't understand it at all.  The difference if it is minor only (which I don't think it should be) is you will have more speed in with a 9mm than a .40 because of mag capacity with little to nothing gained.  It isn't up to the sport to right rules to make the game even because someone uses the wrong caliber.

 

If it is major/minor then the rules have already balanced it. You get more points for other than A hits in exchange for losing some time due to mag capacity.

[motosapiens]

9 minutes ago, GigG said:

If it is major/minor then the rules have already balanced it. You get more points for other than A hits in exchange for losing some time due to mag capacity.

unless you truly suck at reloads, you're not going to lose any time because of the difference between 20 and 23 rounds. As shred mentioned earlier, if you watch elite open shooters, they reload more than noobs already, so they don't have to worry about it.

 

That's why the people pushing the LO division are so adamant about keeping major out. If allowed, major will almost certainly dominate, and they won't be able to sell expensive 9mm guns.

Edited June 21, 2023 by motosapiens

[shred]

This.  It would be far more interesting if it were balanced Major-Minor so shooters could pick what they wanted, but the people that want to sell 4lb, $4000 9mms don't want it that way.

 

But, as long as there are 22, 23 and 24 round speed stages (see: recent classifiers), nobody serious is going to shoot a 20-round LO pistol for the same points.  Yeah, the top guys do more reloads, but they do them in sane places. 

[GigG]

26 minutes ago, motosapiens said:

If allowed, major will almost certainly dominate

 

Just like it does in limited.  I will always think they screwed this up.  The Maj/Min is as far as I'm concerned the big difference between Carry Ops and what LO should have been and may still be.

[RJH]

24 minutes ago, shred said:

This.  It would be far more interesting if it were balanced Major-Minor so shooters could pick what they wanted, but the people that want to sell 4lb, $4000 9mms don't want it that way.

 

But, as long as there are 22, 23 and 24 round speed stages (see: recent classifiers), nobody serious is going to shoot a 20-round LO pistol for the same points.  Yeah, the top guys do more reloads, but they do them in sane places. 

 

 

Yeah, but nobody serious with pick anything other than major. So you can say there's a choice but we all know there's really not if you allow major scoring. But all this s*** has been hashed out about a million times, this thread is more about how is limited optics doing in your area

[Racinready300ex]

47 minutes ago, shred said:

This.  It would be far more interesting if it were balanced Major-Minor so shooters could pick what they wanted,

 

It might be interesting but I think it's impossible to really balance it.  

[Racinready300ex]

Roll LO into Limited. Major must use irons, minor gets a optic. 

 

 

[rishii]

On 6/19/2023 at 3:10 PM, RJH said:

 

 

Yeah, but no reason to tie a new division to a dead horse. And we've beaten this one pretty much to death

Except it’s still a provisional division and subject to change, it wouldn’t be the 1st time USPSA changed the rules and pissed people off.

locally there’s 1 guy with a prodigy, most of the LO shooters are either using their CO guns with magwells or putting dots on their old 40 limited guns

so in my small sample size if major was allowed, it would be popular 

[barry]

Only way I would shoot it is if major/minor. 

[motosapiens]

1 hour ago, Racinready300ex said:

Roll LO into Limited. Major must use irons, minor gets a optic. 

 

 

unless the stages are really hosey, CO shooters seem to always beat limited shooters of equivalent skill.