Favorite type of stage for monthly local match? Poll

[Collecting A's]

Just to get an idea of what people prefer.

I have my opinions but when setting up I would like to make it good for everyone not just me

I may have missed a few options in the poll but I think this will help out a lot.

[Avezorak]

at our club we are limited as to what we can set up because we have tires for side berms. All our shots must go straight down range. For a long time all the club set up was a couple standards style courses with the classifier and then put everything together for a long run and gun stage. Now some of us newer guys are doing stage design and trying to make things more interesting so we have to use more props and do " run downrange " type stages.

I love designing stages and wish i could go all out. But I gotta work with what i got.

[Jadeslade]

I like wide transitions, options-shoot it long or shoot it short, and movement with the opportunity to shoot on the move.

[ShooterSteve]

I like longer courses where you can have some variety and have some fun. That's what shooting should be about in my opinion. That doesn't mean that every stage has to be big, just put some creativity into it. I mean, I know this is a game, and people want to compete, but we want to have fun. When you show up at a match, and someone has put in a lot of thought to props and targets and makes it interesting it is a lot more fun. Anybody can go to an indoor range and stand in one place and shoot downrange..that is boring to me.

[BayouSlide]

I think the best monthly matches offer a variety of courses, without undue emphasis on any in particular. A couple of fun free style field courses, medium and long, a barn burner stand-and-shoot or two, one real devilish challenge, with stages offer everything from in your face to accuracy challenges...it's variety that makes a good monthly match, IMO.

Curtis

[JThompson]

I like to build them they same as one might see at any area or sectional match.

JT

[JimmyZip]

I like to come in Saturday afternoon with the idea of a carnival type stage with people doing all sorts of things that are totally unnecesary, and having Jeff (pbmagnet) bring me down to earth and get the jist of the idea down to a simpe yet effective stage. then I watch all the gamers take it apart and shoot it far better than I!

Happens every month! One of these months I will not only shoot it better, but shoot theirs better too! And I won't be subtle of low-key about it either!

So to answer your question, I like the stages that Jeff helps me build. They are the ones I am learning the most on from all angles, both designer and participant.

JZ

[bikerburgess]

My favorite ones are stages with multiple solutions. I love it when you see three or four guys in front of you all shoot the stage a different way it let's you be creative and try your own solution.

[PaulW]

I would like to add that a favorite type of stage does not make up a favorite type of match. You can have a great mixture of stand-and-shoots and field courses to make up a great match. A great make IMO will have a good balance of stages WITHOUT to many gimmicks. Carnaval Matches sounds great on paper but seldom are the best matches and or stages....again just my opinion.

[Flexmoney]

Well said, Paul. Though I do like a little bit of the "distraction from the shooting". It needs to work well. A little can go a long way.

[PaulW]

Flex, you are correct, it is always fun to keep the shooter on his toes and through a little something out of the norm at them, as long as it is safe and not to over-the-top.

[LPatterson]

I like the long (32) round courses because I have to drive so far to get there. But I do understand that the competition committee needs to pick COF's that will keep bringing back the members we have and hopefully bring back new shooters who show up. The real problems come up at set up time where the decision has to be made as to how difficult a shot has to be. Should it be a long shot, should it be a shorter shot with hard cover or no shoot? For a match where a lot of us old codgers show up close open targets with hard cover works best. A MD needs to be able to balance the difficulty level of the shots with the expected levels of participation at the match. A match I like might be boring to a master class open or limited shooter but what about that older revo/L10 shooter who can't do a 10 sec El Prez. I wouldn't like to see 6 classifiers each match nor a 50 yard standard at any time but what ever is selected needs multiple methods of engagement to accommodate the various divisions and classes of people attending.

Might have trouble getting people to come back if you had a stage a match that sent several people for ice cream.

[PaulW]

We had a recent match where they took classic targets and made the lower half hard cover and you had to shoot them from about 20-30 yrds. This IMO was a little to much. So many people try and setup stages to "slow down" the GM/M classes and it back fires on them. A GM/M will take the time and have the discipline to make the shot and some of the newer shooters and C/D shooters will struggle and have misses. So a GM/M will just do a straight forward stage faster and a really hard stage they will figure out and make sure they get their hits. I try and make sure that a stage is setup whereas an average shooter could shot it fairly easily and a GM/M will just to it faster. Don't get me wrong I like the Standards and really hard shots but you don't want to frusturate the masses to much. Again just my opinion.

[XD Niner]

I have a definite preference for long COF's with challenging shots and multiple ways of shooting it. I hate stages that really can only be shot one way and with all of the targets at 10 yards or less.

[VegasOPM]

The best part of level 1 matches is that you can have stages of over 32 rounds. Lots of rounds, lots of movement, more than one way to shoot it. Half the fun is seeing how other folks shoot it and figuring out which way is faster. I also prefer stages that have a movement element, a speed section and some real challenging shots- all rolled into one stage... oh and LOTS of steel- preferably with a star or 2.

[h2osport]

I love the long courses, but the touble at a local level match is set up. I will shoot any course no matter how it is set up.

Randy

[bluenite]

I dislike shooting boxes, but with the ranges we have here they must be used a lot to control the shooting direction. But the worst is when they pull a target from a 4 target array to make it revolver friendly (I like 4 target arrays). At a lot of the matches I am the only revolver shooter (some times we get 2 or 3 though). High round count and difficult stages are sweet.

[wide45]

I like stages that are not made of arrays.

[Ohioguy]

I like the longer stages, with movement. Ports are good (high and low), along with the risk/reward of be able to take long shots. Carnival shoots, while fun, get to be a little much if they make up an entire match.

For what its worth, I have been to three matches. My likes and dislikes are going to change the more I shoot.