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SSlav

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Posts posted by SSlav

  1. Posted

    I am interested in the procedure we are going to follow in data collection/evaluation. Obviously it is not going to be possible to do this as a blind study - which would have been the best approach(actually double blind would be the best). However we should strive to do what we can. As I recall there were a couple of assertions:

     

    1. Gun games can instill bad habits that will kill in "real world scenarios".

    2. Certain gun games are better than others specifically IDPA is better than USPSA

    3. Training classes are better than gun games.

     

    So it would seem that we need 3 types of "contestants".

     

    1. Experience is limited to USPSA (Vlad and I qualify I think between the two of us we may have five IDPA matches, no training classes and no airsoft experience).

    2. Experience is limited to IDPA - not sure who will represent this group.

    3. Experience is limited to training classes - same as above.

     

    All three types of contestants should go through the same scenarios several times each. Ideally the "referees" should have no knowledge as to which group is which.

  2. Posted

    S&W 686. It will never break or wear out in your lifetime unless you shoot ALOT. You can put light .38 loads in it and its super super accurate for training, great for ladies too. Then you can stoke it with .357 magnum for defense or blowing sh!t up. It really is the ultimate do-everything gun. If you get an auto like a glock 19, it does not fit the target pistol job very well (but is the ultimate for defense/carry)

     

    Have you ever detail stripped a 686? I have. It has an awful lot of small moving parts and springs. BnTW, the reason I was detail stripping it was because one of those little springs broke and needed to be replaced. Everything breaks. Everything.

  6. Posted

    Well I like to bang my girl friend so keeping things in that area protected from simunitions is a priorty for me.

     

     

    This is really directed to those in the previous thread but come on out.

     

    I'll be there. I have all the other crap, but what type of eye protection do you need? For airsoft I would use my normal shooting glasses. Do simunitions require something more robust?

     

     

    What is the address for USANA?

  7. Posted

    Ruger MK III 22/45.

     

    Inexpensive - check

    Accurate - check

    Reliable - check

     

    It is a little tricky to break down/re-assemble. By tricky I mean that you kinda have to use the manual when you do it. At least I do and I never have to look at a manual for any of my other guns. Then again I rarely clean it. It runs for several Remington Thunderbolt 500 round bricks before it needs cleaning. It eats all the crappiest POS ammo I feed it. It occasionally misfeeds HP ammo.

  8. Posted

    I would recommend a type of martial arts myself. Being able to pull a trigger is great and all, but it doesn't seem to prioritize the mindset of having to defend one's life and/or others by tapping into a potential that we're all capable.

     

    Been there, done that. But then I feel that USPSA/IDPA etc...are also martial arts.

  9. Posted

    Vlad, I am not accusing you of being a liar of cheater.

     

    However, when I shot a 3 gun match in PA last year I was squaded with team Noveske and I watched them attempt to cheat/streatch the rules on a stage, be penalized for it, and then one of their members argued and cried like a little **** when the match staff called them on it. This did not leave me with a high opinion of some competitors integrity.

     

    I do not know the Noveske shooters personally though I know that they are pretty strong. Not knowing the actual facts in this case I will play a devil's advocate.

     

    What you need to understand is that you are participating in a competition based on "free style". What that means is that anything not explicitly defined by the rules is left to shooter's discretion. Generally that translates into - "shoot them if you see them" approach. If you can see a target you can shoot at it. If a different behavior is desired it is a responsibility of a stage designer to either physically make that happen - by placing walls and vision barriers or by explicitly writing a limitation into the stage description. This differs from IDPA where they are big on "intent" of the stage. In the core of this is the idea of "equitable shooting challenge" - the idea that the same challenge is presented to all shooters. If the game is played strictly by the rules as written, the "equitable shooting challenge" is preserved. If on the other hand an RO has some ideas as to the "intent" there is no guarantee that a different RO who takes over later in the day will not have a different idea as to "intent". That could place one group of shooters at a competitive disadvantage compared to another group of shooters. I'll give two specific examples that happened at the recent NY Stare Rifle Match.

     

    1. Shoot house. Upon entering shooter can see a couple of targets straight ahead and one to the right. The the target to the right is presented at an extreme angle, but is clearly visible. It can also be seen at a much better angle from another locations in the house but that forces an extra stop and costs extra time. A shooter on the squad engages that target from the entrance and completes the course of fire. He is told that the hits on the target will not count because he "was not supposed to shoot them from there". Is that shooter supposed to accept that ruling? Is he a whiny biatch if he demands that the rules are enforced as written? The shooter argues and is supported by the rules. The hits are accepted. But ROs then turn the target slightly to make it unavailable from the entrance? Is this fair to other shooters? Doesn't it break the "equitable shooting challenge" premise? Should the other shooters "cry like biatches" or accept it?

     

    2. A stage has a Texas star. At the walk through, the RO explains that one of the plates on the star sticks occasionally and if that happens they will call a hit on it and the shooter should just continue. A shooter objects by stating that if it is one of the top plates, the star will be unbalanced and will behave more erratically. Is this whining like a biatch? Or is it an attempt to make sure that the idea of "equitable shooting challenge" is preserved? BTW the rules as written state that if a plate is hit and does not fall, it is considered a range equipment failure and the shooter gets a re-shoot.

     

    In some case whining is whining. And in some cases what is seen as an attempt to "stretch the rules" is in fact an insistence on strict adherence to those very rules.

  10. Posted

    it has been proven time and time again that when under stress you revert back to your most instinctive skills..

     

    The most instinctive skill instilled in USPSA is "looking" bullets on target.

     

    spend 5,000 hours dumping rounds from your race gun from an uncovered position

     

    That is funny for so many reasons. First the two main "gamers" in this argument shoot in production division (division which places severe limits on modifications to the firearms) the vast majority of the time. And second the idea of uncovered position. USPSA does not require you to take cover. That does not mean by any stretch that you do not shoot from cover. Course designs frequently force you to shoot around corners in a way that severly limits your exposure.

     

     

    but there are certainly better options for training if self defense is the ultimate goal..

     

     

    What are they?

  11. Posted

    For all of you unwilling to "test non-shooting skills" what the F*%k do you think a violent criminal encounter in NJ is going to test?

     

    Did I write anywhere that I was unwilling? I simply stated that the skills that would be tested have nothing to do with USPSA. As it happens I actually do have some relevant skills that I would not mind testing. However that has nothing to do with the conversation at hand - bad habits taught in USPSA - which have been summarized as a grand total of two - 1. Not using cover and 2. Dropping mags on the ground. Neither of which are relevant in the case of a knife attack.

     

    I will agree that a lot of classes in NJ suck, and some are good. At best, as James Yeager says, a class is your down payment on a skill, and it is your responsibility to make the monthly payments after that.

     

    IMHO handgun shooting is an extremely perishable skill. Your "payments" need to be at worst weekly.

     

    As far as what matches I have tried, it has been a variety of IDPA, local steel matches, 3 gun, 2 gun (Tosser's USANA matches), and I've won some, done OK in some, but never finished in the lower half in anything.

     

    I am not familiar with the specific matches you are writing about. However they are not the larger ones of what is locally available. There is a danger in thinking of yourself as a big fish when you are playing in a small pond. That is the only reason why I travel to some regional matches. My chances of winning are nill, but it helps to put things in perspective.

     

    Like I said before, whatever match the group picks I will play. That said, while I will play your game, it seems that everyone is scrambling to avoid playing my (reality based) game.

     

    Again, do not recall refusing to participate in any simulation - on the contrary. Simply pointing out its irrelevance to the initial assertion of this thread.

     

    As to the "reality" based scenarios - as someone who has had a bit of actual first hand exposure to street crime I can tell you that the knife wielding maniac jumping out of nowhere to attack you for no apparent reason is pretty f-ing far from reality.

  12. Posted

    As usual your off the mark. No one ever said that gun games are a substitute for training. No one made that claim.

     

    Indeed, so why are you bringing it up?

     

    Skill HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH IT.

     

    I suppose we shall know soon.

     

    My very frst match I got squadded with Bruce Piatt and Doug Keonig(Im sure you know the names).

     

    Was that supposed to be impressive? I can pull out a couple of big names as well that I have shot with. In this sport it is not uncommon.

     

     

    2010 decided to compete again. Chose IDPA for the afformentioned reasons.

     

    Your reasons are flawed...because...

     

    Got Marksman classification on my second match.

     

    Shot my first and only IDPA match as a mid-C class shooter. Shot it with a 1911 - which is a gun I never competed with up till that point, with a holster setup I never used before. Practiced reloads with retention the night before the match. Came in second overall in CDP right behind an Expert whom I beat on two stages out of seven. Shooting from cover did not bother me. Shooting on the move did not bother me - I actually shot on the move instead of doing an "IDPA shuffle". Got dinged with three procedurals in the match - one for not bending low enough in RO's opinion, one for engaging two targets that looked equidistant to me in the order other than intended by the course designer, one for dropping an empty mag on the ground with a gun not in a slide lock (difference between life and death in the "real world" I am sure). If not for the tree procedurals would have come in first. So where is that fabled IDPA "real world" advantage that you think is so important? IDPA as a game is no better or worse than USPSA in teaching gun skills. I choose USPSA because - 1. On the local level USPSA matches have a better caliber of shooters and a lot more shooters to measure up against. 2. Higher round counts are more fun and give you more trigger time. 3. Stages are more challenging - more movers, more steel, longer and tighter shots. Thats it.

     

     

     

    I dont consider myself a great shooter by any stretch. This is not bragging in any way.

     

    I did not see anything worthy of bragging. Most days Vlad and I used to fight it out for the first and second in B-Class Production (until he was stupid enough to move up to A). That is a meaningless fact. A few times I came in first overall in production - another meaningless fact. They are meaningless because without of context of the total number of shooters and the overall level of competition there is no information to be imparted there.

  14. Posted

    Whatever the game is, I will offer all the airsoft gas and ammo needed, 1 airsoft Glock 19, and 1 Glock 17t(Sims), all of the Simunitions ammo needed, and if we aren't being little bitches, rubber/training knives. If you really want to man up I will bring swine prod (like a cattle prod but shorter) to simulate knife wounds :vava:

     

    What are we going to use to simulate gunshot wounds?

  15. Posted

    Unless someone is shooting back at you, you will never induce the amount of stress needed to simulate it. There are things that can not be taught but must be experienced.

     

    I do not think anyone is arguing that. The argument is whether gun games are more harmful to your chances of survival than the "alternative". Though nobody has really clearly stated what the "alternative" is. Assuming that for most of us enlisting in the armed forces is out of the question.

  16. Posted

    I must also say that while you may say that "the average shooter will never attend a training class" you may be correct, as there are millions of "shooters", but I would be interested in seeing how many shooters attend training vs how many shooters compete. Are you interested in a bet of how many shooters have competed/how many shooters have attended a training class?

     

    I will play in any simulation. However anything involving contact will likely test non-shooting skills that I gained outside of USPSA.

     

    As for taking classes. A class can introduce you to some concepts and if it a good one - training methodologies. A class or any number of them will not make you proficient in any of the techniques that it introduces. That proficiency requires mind numbing repetition. Most sane people are not going to spend time to practice daily for a situation that will likely never happen. Without the regular repetition anything you learned in a class will evaporate the moment you encounter a stressful situation. Competitions provide an incentive to train. You are no longer training for a day that will likely never come. You are training for a match that is at most a couple of weeks away.

     

    A side question. Of those critical of gun games. Which ones have you ever tried? How did you do?

  17. Posted

    Slav, the only idiocy seems to be when you join the conversation. At least I get an honest sense from Vlad that he is giving consideration to the discussions presented. So what Rank is Athena Lee who was 2002 and 2007 USPSA National Open Women's Champion? And REMEMBER SLAV the comments about the stress of the show vs competition stress was from the competitors themselves, not something I pulled out of thin air! Im talking , as were thay, about their shooting performance on the show.

     

    Atheena Lee is a Master class shooter who came in 65th overall in last year's nationals. Not taking anything away from her accomplishments which are greater than mine, but she is by far not a Grand Master. She is also a tiny girl that was clearly handicapped when it came to the elimination challenge.

     

    Vlad has infinitely more patience than I when it comes to entertaining stupidity. In my experience people who tend to pontificate the most about non-tacticoolness of gun games are the same ones who get their rear end handed to them at a match and then feel the need to re-establish the lost macho self-image. Thus it is not enough to say that gun games do not provide combat training - something that nobody in the sport will ever argue. So it is not "I am not skilled enough to play this game" , its "the game sucks and is bad for you".

     

    Regardless there are enough volunteers for the proposed Pepsi challenge. So lets play.

  19. Posted

    Slav I disagree with your assertion but more importantly do you think that a competitor at that level is really stressed anymore by competition? I dont.

     

    Which assertion? That IDPA Master is equivalent to USPSA A/B Class?

     

    Are you kidding? Of course they are stressed. I shoot matches for fun. How I place is at most a matter of pride. For the top dogs winning and losing is a question of prize money, sponsorship, training contracts - basically making a living. You do not think they are stressed?

  20. Posted

    "Why do USPSA GMs win all the big IDPA matches? "

     

     

    UM Becaue they are IDPA Master shooters too. They also tend to win Bianchi cup, steel challange, Steel matches etc etc and they will likely win whatever comp gets invented tommorow.... Whats your point?

     

    IDPA Master is equivalent to around Low A/High B USPSA. Your premise is that USPSA teaches you bad habits that you can not overcome. My point is that USPSA guys rock IDPA which you seem to see as better training. IDPA is OK. It has rules that are too subjective for my liking, but aside from that it is fun. But ultimately IDPA is just a game no different from USPSA.

  21. Posted

    Slav, as usual your missing the point and clearly havent read all the posts. If its worth repeating several times, whats one more... No douubt gun handling and stress indoc are advantages gained by just about any competitive shooting as has been said repeatedly in this thread. The concern is if you only shoot a type of competition A LOT more than training or other types that it would likely be an issue because under real stress you will do what you did most. So if you shoot a metric ton of USPSA and your used to just popping out into the open, you might do that very same thing in a real situation. Or you might go out in the open while reloading or you might go through mags like water because your used to having 4......

     

    Just because I choose to ignore a stupid argument does not mean that I did not read it. Being able to look at a target and put bullets on that target a few tenths of a second later is the only ingrained reflex that USPSA teaches you. The rest of it are consciously chosen actions. Lets get together and shoot some airsoft.

  23. Posted

    Here is one thing every "gun games will get you killed" guy seems to miss. In the situation of real stress you will never perform better, only worse. If you can not hit a target fast, can't hit a target on the move, cant hit a target from an uncomfortable position, hit a target shooting with your weak hand - in the context of the game with the only stress provided by a timer - then what makes you think you will do any better if there are bullets coming the other way?

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