There are techniques that allow people to come up with their own solution that do not involve randomness or secrets. Some examples:
- A freestyle course in which the shooter is told to "solve the problem" but not where to shoot from. You can set up a stage where, for example, a shooter may engage all targets from 2 positions or 3 positions - but engagement from only 2 positions involves a longer shot; shots at a target partially obscured by hard cover or a no-shoot when shot from 2 positions but fully visible if the shooter uses a third position, or perhaps allow the shooter to save some movement if he is confident enough to engage that mini-popper positioned right in front of a no-shoot unless the shooter goes to an extra position which allows engagement without the noshoot directly behind the popper.
- Use movers creatively. Consider a popper that causes a target to be temporarily exposed and them mostly covered by a noshoot, and which has several exposed targets nearby. The shooter has a couple of choices:
a. Do I attempt to engage the pop up target while it is fully exposed before the no-shoot exposes all but a small part of the target, or make the tight shot after the movement has ceased?
b. When I shoot the steel, do I use the time while the moving target pops up to go engage other targets or do I have the gun pointed and waiting for the popup?
Done properly, such choices will not be "obvious" and you'll see all sorts of different choices. A stage at the recent BUAS match in Boston provided 5 shooting positions (3 ports, around the left wall and around the right wall). I saw people engage in using anywhere from 1 to 4 of the shooting positions - and even the top shooters did not all use the same strategy.
I love stages with risk reward tradeoffs and choices. That's one of the key factors in a good stage, IMO. Regarding the BUAS stage you mention, what about 1.2.1.2?
The IDPA guys up in Pelham, NH do some cool things.
In one pit they led you in blindfolded and set up barrels 2 high so that you could not see the stage. The SO was behind you and you had to engage targets as they presented to you, and they were very vocal about calling you for cover. It was a slow but very meaningful stage.
Blind stages are cool, but I'm not sure they have a place in matches. It's really hard to administer them fairly.
I've done both. I've had fun at both. However, I found IDPA to have more subjectivity in the SOing. IDPA scoring is simpler and quicker to grasp yet I feel like I can read more out of a USPSA hit factor score sheet. There's more data there. Time plus vs Hit factor shooting is just plain different for the average shooter.
Something I've observed, you walk away from a USPSA match and you talk about the shooting. You walk away from an IDPA match and you talk about the rules.
Yeah, it's a lot easier to call a foot fault than cover. I agree that there's more info on USPSA score sheets. Since I started shooting both, I hate that IDPA results generally don't break out individual stages.
Before I shot USPSA, I derided their huge complicated 'rulebook by committee'. Then I went to a couple matches, and there were NO ARGUMENTS ABOUT RULES. IDPA's rulebook could use some work with input from competitors.
That brings me to another big difference between the two. USPSA is run by the shooters via an elected board. The rulebook is updated on a regular schedule and there's a process for making suggestions. IDPA is run by Bill Wilson. The rulebook hasn't been updated in 5 years. I definitely worry about a future rulebook pissing off enough shooters to fracture IDPA.