I’m LOMFL over this! Just go shoot w/ your buddies & tell everyone how badass & OAF y’all are because you got impacts at 1,400 yards. Forget the fact that it took you fifteen rounds to ear “Impact!” the first time.
FWIW, my friends & I actually break out the shot timer, shoot over obstacles & set ground rules for different types of stages such as no dialing for different ranges, etc. Live a little.
You still haven’t came up w/ a solution to your own problem. I challenged you to show me your value as an engineer; you’re not impressing me.
Did I say I was bragging? You all are king of strawmen here.
I'm happy that you and your friends shoot in the way that makes you happy. You are not helping me engage the people I'm trying to engage to entice them to get better. You are being the smug asshole telling them that if they don't shoot the way you shoot, well, it's just not real shooting.
If you were a guitar player, you'd be this dickwad:
I just meant that at some point you are going to progress as shooters and you'll be doing good at 1,000 to 1,200 yards but your previous dope won't work or you'll be very spotty out further or some days good and other days bad. Your "data" in this case is your dope and your ballistic calculator and at some point you will wonder how you managed early success and suffer frustrating disappointment after you feel you have developed some skills and knowledge. At this point you will discover the vast amount of knowledge and experience here on the Hide. Just ask me how I know...
Oh, I know that. My one friend and I are learning proper form/shooting/etc. When just the two of us go shooting, we are constantly challenging each other to get better, using what we read online.
This is just so the others that go with us can have a friendly competition that might entice them into proper form/shooting etc.
If left to their own devices, they would be happy to just treat them like fireworks: pretty bang, but easily forgotten. I'm trying to be very subtle in how I am encouraging them to get better.
Hate is a pretty strong word for someone you have never met. You don’t know what type of sales I do and have only digested a few of my sentences in a thread. I like many on this thread was trying to give you good advice and like many instantly regretted it. Hahaha
Wild guess here but I imagine you are difficult to work with in noninternet life as well. I have been laughing to tears imagining working with you. Hilarious.
In my line of work we work with the general public...I warn my team when they are selling to engineers. Keep it simple and keep telling them they are really smart and you will close the sale.
When this makes the legendary threads post I nominate the title to be:
“Engineers doing engineering things”
Any salesman who takes clients out for something other than a reasonably priced meal is suspect in our office. If that is your definition of "difficult", then you'd find our whole office "difficult."
We are high-end researchers, and we get salespeople sucking up to us constantly because of our need for test equipment/RF cabling/shielding/etc. at the very limits of what is possible both in terms of technology and budget.
To the point that it is ridiculous. Our LT has told companies that they are free to drop off slick sheets and respond to questions, but cannot contact our engineers individually or they will risk losing our business.
We had one engineer that was given season tickets for the LA kings on the ice. Another was offered tickets to the world series.
Actually, in my mid-year review, I consistently get high marks for "easy to work with."
When people tell me something can't be done, I generally ignore them. We do the impossible in our office on a daily basis.
You have your solution. Take them out and shoot...natural competition will form. Just like I mentioned a few posts back.
What you are attempting to do is the aggressive parent making their kids play something they never did well. Eventually the kid will hate the sport and the parent.
Taking newer shooters out and coming up with some super complex scoring system with absolutely no base in reality is about the quickest way to turn them off the sport.
Lighten up Francis.
Oh, natural competition does form up. But it's not useful because there is no structure. I'll paraphrase a sample of what happened the last time we went out:
"Well, I'm the best shot because I hit at 1200 yards."
"What? No. f*ck you. That was pure luck. it took you 13 shots to hit it."
"distance is distance. I win."
"B*llsh*t. I hit it consistently at 800. That means I'm a better shot than you."
"Guys, you both suck. I hit 900 my first time."
"Yeah, but you couldn't hit it past that."
etc. etc. etc.
Then they forget about shooting until the next time we bring it up.
As I stated before, none of the people going want to be limited in shots, wait for someone else, or be timed. They have stated they would just rather not go if that was the case. The WHOLE POINT of this thread was to see if there was already some rules that would allow them to "plink" but be measured. This entire thing could have been avoided if someone said, "no, so far, there is no set rules for a casual competition of that kind." At that point, we could run off and make our own, and you could go have your little pissing contests in some other thread.
This is funny, as a degreed engineer, who has developed and led large scale teams and projects. The past 20 years leading sales engineers who support other engineers world wide. His comments on this topic are as ignorant as his threads on shooting long distance.
Yeah, I don't think you and I are in the same industry. At all. But, I'll let you keep your same sense of smug superiority.
I'll make an attempt to contribute something useful.
@joelinux I have the same friends/coworkers/family situation. Almost everyone I associate with owns guns and enjoys shooting to some degree. Quite a few of them have said that competition looks cool, and a small number actually wanted to try it.
Over the last few years I've invested considerable amounts of time, energy, ammo, gear and even a little money into jump starting peoples entry into shooting sports. I've even hosted several super laid back competitions at my house, both 3 gun and precision rifle, with very generous target sizes, round counts, distances and time limits.
And what I've learned is that all you can do is show someone some match footage. They're either hooked right there or it's never gonna happen. No amount of your help or even trying to ambush them with a casual scoring system/match like you are trying is going to work. All you can do is show that horse the water, they either self motivate to drink or they don't.
Most people say they want to improve, but very few actually mean it. The second you have some sort of scoring system to show them how bad they are they're done. Some are just destined to a lifetime of having fun throwing lead with no purpose, and thats fine, just let them be.
I hear what you are saying, and you could very well be right.
They got excited to invent a scoring system, which I took as a good sign?
We are going to try next time we go to the range (not for awhile. Some big proposal awards and year-end TIMs are coming up).
It could be that it shows how bad they are, they get discouraged, and quit. But at least it will separate the causals from those who are destined to be serious.