Using abstract targets to pretend you're shooting anything other than imaginary bad guys makes you look like dorky hypocrites with corporate sponsorship jerseys. Tam - Why Fruity Targets? Because racegun! May 24, 2012 [I find it doubly ironic that the bickering exists considering the P in USPSA and IPSC stands for practical. More practically odds are you're going to be shooting a two legged varmint than a flying oddly shaped octogon. Which oddly enough is labeled the "classic target" while the practical target still used in USPSA is the "metric" target. Does it really matter the shape of the target, not really though it does make for much more interesting problems with how you can cover the targets. Having a separate A zone leaves a choice to the shooter for solving the problem. He can try and hit the bigger A zone while risking clipping the no-shoot, or he can aim for the smaller A zone and just risk getting a B hit instead. As I'm learning while creating new stages, the fun part about medium and long strings of fire is creating a stage which provides numerous trade offs and different paths to solve the problem. Doing that is difficult, but it's what makes a course fun to shoot. Pulling those targets to me pulls something I can use to add extra trade offs for the shooter. Yes the upper AB zone happens to resemble a head, with the lower zones being a body but this is practical shooting, not bullseye. I understand Caleb's concern and it's reasonable. We all want to grow the sport and different targets make some feel better. But let's not kid ourselves, even the hovering octogon is a bad guy, it's shape doesn't really matter when you're running a stage to resemble a house. Doubly so when the stage description leads off with: You have just arrived on the scene of a call about a home invasion robbery. The door is closed and you cannot see through the windows. Starting position is hand on the door knob... Do you need to create a scene for a stage. No, but it can also be really fun, especially if there's a prop involved. Why do I care about the briefcase and getting it to the end of the course of fire? The answer, nuclear launch codes! Why do I have this pizza box? The answer, you're delivering a pizza in Detriot a post apocalyptic waste land, delivery failure means they get it for free. If I spend time designing a stage and coming up with a solid course of fire and spend time making sure someone's not going to drive a tank through it, I'm going to spend some extra time polishing it! It's fun and this is a game, but it does seem very silly and hypocritical to throw "metric" targets out consider in the end it's still the same thing mentally but with a differently shaped target. I need to post my 30 minutes or less stage. About everyone who saw it at the end said, I want to shoot that! -B] Continue reading →