What is the best way to make courses challenging for the DGPT?

[DavidSauls]

I don't think hate is involved.

A monkey who knows what grapes taste like does not hate celery, but gets upset when the celery treat isn't a grape.

Fair enough. Someone who doesn't like the fairways or the upshots or the greens; doesn't like the targets or trees or sloped terrain or obstacles or limits on landing area (OB); doesn't necessarily hate disc golf. There's something left that he loves, enough to watch an awful lot of it.

 

[DavidSauls]

The biggest problem with the ease of the current basket is that it doesn't adequately punish poor upshots. Every round I throw a couple that at best should have resulted in a difficult putt, but instead they end up in the 95% range. We need to put more pressure on upshots as well as drive-able baskets and the smaller basket is the ticket.

As a rule I dislike putting baskets in super protected coves that can't really be reached from the tee, that result in only low % throw ins for birdie and the whole field basically throwing short upshots. Not fun to play or spectate.
.

That's a false choice. What about hole designs where poor upshots don't end up in the 95% range, but good drives/upshots still end up in the 50-80% range?

Regardless of the target, we should be able to design holes well. Having beaten the basket size to death, might we get back to the thread drift on how that might be done?

 

[oldmandiscer]

The biggest problem with the ease of the current basket is that it doesn't adequately punish poor upshots. Every round I throw a couple that at best should have resulted in a difficult putt, but instead they end up in the 95% range. We need to put more pressure on upshots as well as drive-able baskets and the smaller basket is the ticket.

As a rule I dislike putting baskets in super protected coves that can't really be reached from the tee, that result in only low % throw ins for birdie and the whole field basically throwing short upshots. Not fun to play or spectate.

Got a basket for XMAS that I plan of turning into a smaller basket prototype.Be patient or I won't share it here when completed.

The holes leave long "putts" in the 50-60 foot range but I agree I've also seen ones where it's 100 feet or so as well. Just really goofy hole designs. I guess when I say I don't like a hole that leaves me at best 50 feet, it's simply not fun or enjoyable to play. Having a chance to park a hole is fun, maybe ace it, even better.

I'm also not big into heavily tree'd greens either.

If you throw a shot to 15 feet do you not deserve an open look? It's got to a point where putting is so easy that we have to create gimmicks like trees next to baskets just so players don't just make everything.

I definitely agree with you on upshots and in general the Non-Punishment of poor upshots.

Does it really matter if Ricky throws his upshot to 5 feet or 25 feet? It's the same score like 95% of the time. There is no point to throwing a good upshot or a bad one. You just get relatively close. Very little skill necessary.

 

[oldmandiscer]

Fair enough. Someone who doesn't like the fairways or the upshots or the greens; doesn't like the targets or trees or sloped terrain or obstacles or limits on landing area (OB); doesn't necessarily hate disc golf. There's something left that he loves, enough to watch an awful lot of it.

Most of the crappy designs come from the easiness of putting. Tricking up the course to make birdies "not so" easy.

It's completely fair to blame a basket.

You shouldn't have to add miles of ropes or raise the basket 8 feet high to add some challenge. The game should be tough enough on it's own. It's not.

 

[BuiltTooLong]

I'm also not big into heavily tree'd greens either.

If you throw a shot to 15 feet do you not deserve an open look? It's got to a point where putting is so easy that we have to create gimmicks like trees next to baskets just so players don't just make everything.

I definitely agree with you on upshots and in general the Non-Punishment of poor upshots.

Does it really matter if Ricky throws his upshot to 5 feet or 25 feet? It's the same score like 95% of the time. There is no point to throwing a good upshot or a bad one. You just get relatively close. Very little skill necessary.

You even contradict yourself within the confines of one post. If you throw your upshot behind a tree on the green, you threw a bad upshot, and don't deserve an open look. You want upshots to matter, but then don't like when they do? Hmmmm.

 

[oldmandiscer]

You even contradict yourself within the confines of one post. If you throw your upshot behind a tree on the green, you threw a bad upshot, and don't deserve an open look. You want upshots to matter, but then don't like when they do? Hmmmm.

First of all I didn't say upshot to 15 feet. It could be a 350-400 foot hole.

What I call an "upshot" is a second or third shot on a hole that "upshot" is relatively short in distance.

I wouldn't call the teeshot from 400 to 15 feet behind some trees an upshot or poor shot. You deserve a clean look for getting within 15 feet from 400 out.

A poor upshot is from closer range, and not close enough to be a tap in. The point being that a 5 footer and 25 footer are essentially the same thing for the top player. Tap in range.

 

[DavidSauls]

Another attempt, on the concept of designs that result in longer, more uncertain putts:

The more you can prevent players from hyzering/fading to the basket, the better the chance that they don't park it, and leave themselves a missable putt. This is true for reachable holes from the tee, and upshots on higher-par holes.

Which is, of course, trickier to do than to say. Low ceilings and tight tunnels force straight approaches, with more chance for error. Turnovers are even harder, but if you can have a shot that must turn early and then straighten out, you might take away the standard fade shot.

None of which works on the open, golf course venues. But for wooded and semi-wooded courses, it might be a concept to create more YIP putts.

 

[oldmandiscer]

Just go read the 100 pages of the smaller basket thread--Particularly the first pages. There was plenty of effort to engage in a legitimate discussion that was rebuffed.

With regard to course design, 2013 isn't exactly horse and buggy era, also note, the thread is still active even though it was lasted posted in in 2020. Of the 7876 courses listed on DGCR, how many do you think were originated after 2013?

That said, OMD likes to create a trolling "disc golf sucks thread until we have pros missing 15' putts" every so often. It's rinse and repeat.

I don't think we can create high level courses and have both drama and excitement without addressing the target. Even New London, IronHill and WR Jackson are not where I think we could be. (those are some of the best designs IMO).

 

[txmxer]

I don't think we can create high level courses and have both drama and excitement without addressing the target. Even New London, IronHill and WR Jackson are not where I think we could be. (those are some of the best designs IMO).

and this has been acknowledged as a reasonable opinion--just an opinion though.

Your supporting arguments are where you lose people. I and many others find the sport quite compelling as it is--particularly I like putting as it is. I don't think the sport would be better off if the "drama" was in 15'-20' putts. As Steve West has attempted to explain, the drama exists, it's just at a different distance than you think is appropriate.

 

[ballgolfconvert]

and this has been acknowledged as a reasonable opinion--just an opinion though.

Your supporting arguments are where you lose people. I and many others find the sport quite compelling as it is--particularly I like putting as it is. I don't think the sport would be better off if the "drama" was in 15'-20' putts. As Steve West has attempted to explain, the drama exists, it's just at a different distance than you think is appropriate.

There is no drama in getting up and down from 100-150' for better players because of the size of the target.

 

[BogeyNoMore]

and this has been acknowledged as a reasonable opinion--just an opinion though.

Your supporting arguments are where you lose people. I and many others find the sport quite compelling as it is--particularly I like putting as it is. I don't think the sport would be better off if the "drama" was in 15'-20' putts. As Steve West has attempted to explain, the drama exists, it's just at a different distance than you think is appropriate.

Bing-freakin-O.

 

[oldmandiscer]

and this has been acknowledged as a reasonable opinion--just an opinion though.

Your supporting arguments are where you lose people. I and many others find the sport quite compelling as it is--particularly I like putting as it is. I don't think the sport would be better off if the "drama" was in 15'-20' putts. As Steve West has attempted to explain, the drama exists, it's just at a different distance than you think is appropriate.

I never said 15 footers wouldn't still be extremely high percentage. They would still be.

We can't go from 75% (say 28-30 footer for top pro which is a guess) putts to being ball golf and they are now 10%. The disc is going to need to fly by a certain distance and you would need that putt to still be very high percentage, otherwise players are going to layup.

But we can go from extremely easy to just moderately easy and make a big improvement as well. See roughly another 3-4 putts per round missed. Not drastic but still an improvement.

 

[oldmandiscer]

There is no drama in getting up and down from 100-150' for better players because of the size of the target.

Try 300-350 open shot really barring high winds.

 

[davetherocketguy]

So what OMD and BGC wants is basically crappy MA3 putting for the pros. They want more challenging putting from inside the circle. Basically they want to watch ME putt.

I donno dudes, not sure I'd refer to that as more dramatic...I'm thinking the better word here is tedious. But hey, you do you.

And for the love of Steady Ed please stop comparing DG to golf. THEY ARE NOT THE SAME.

 

[Three Putt]

That's an important question, David, and I'd bet there are people here up for a serious discussion. To me, there are two parts to it: what's a good percentage of people missing C2, and what happens to the people who do miss it?

I don't have a percentage in mind, but it seems clear that if everyone hits C2 (and not C1) in regulation, then we're now just looking at a putting competition.

And if most of the people who miss C2 wind up 65' to 200' from the pin, then we have a problem with the dreaded NAGS*. No fun for players, and no fun for spectators.

Sticking with the two holes I used as examples (Harmony Bends #14 and #11), I hadn't seen it yet, so I looked at the finals of the Selinske from this summer.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UFgRcz5lePQ

These guys are using the "regular" pins from the Blue tees, but watching them gives us a good indication what happens on the Gold layout. On #14, which is a par three, there are three gaps, all pretty close to the tee, so people who miss a gap will have some serious scrambling to do, and most people who hit a gap will get to at least C2.

On #11, all four of these guys played it great and had pretty much tap-in birdies. But the Gold pin is 104' longer and is much closer to the creek. The stats I posted previously show that getting to C2 is an achievement, and with all the trouble available, I'm guessing NAGS isn't a big issue. When I have more time, I'll watch MPO coverage from the Mid-America Open and see what we can learn from that.

I'm definitely interested in hearing any ideas anyone has about where we'd want the C2 percentage to be, and how we prevent NAGS problems. Looking forward to the discussion.

*Not A Golf Shot

If I understand the issue that gets brought back up here over and over, the scenario is in the video linked. On hole 18, Dave Feldberg blows his upshot long. Brad Schick then makes an iffy approach and leaves himself with a long, edge of C1 putt. The thinking here is that there was no drama in that ending, everybody knew Schick would make that putt.

Did they, though? Did the crowd check out and yawn as Schick's disc slid in, or did people go "Oh, that's not good" and keep watching? I certainly was watching all the way to the end. It was far enough that Schick could miss it.

Also there was a reason to watch Feldberg; long putts in disc golf are possible. He wasn't finished when that disc landed long, he could have made that putt. The putt was complicated by some trees that limited what he could do, but he still got close.

Would there have been more drama if there was no chance for Feldberg to make the putt, so he layed up an upshot and waited for Schick to miss his putt? I mean there would have been a playoff so maybe? FPO40 had a playoff that stole the show that weekend.

I mean it stole the show because Jennifer Allen threw in a putt from 145', which was a lot farther out than Feldberg was.

Also there is the issue of the fact that on hole 18, Dave Feldberg did manage to screw up an upshot. I thought we had already determined those were automatic? Harmony Bends seemed to be able to throw enough at them that nothing was automatic.

So what is the goal here? Is the goal to keep Paul McBeth at E for the weekend so that we score like golf? Do we have to score like golf? Did it matter that James Conrad was -39 for five rounds when his throw in landed? Would that shot have been better if he needed that shot to end up even for the event?

Basically is there something fundamentally wrong with disc golf that needs to be changed, or do we already have the know-how to create great disc golf and just need to be scheduling DGPT events on better courses? To me the best way to make courses challenging for the DGPT is to stop using boring open golf course temp courses and put some resources into how to provide coverage from real disc golf courses. That's just me, though.

NAGS mystifies me, mostly because I'm a blunt guy so when you soften things sometimes I don't understand. Basically what I see on courses sometimes are shots that are hard, but they are dumb and somewhat random. Like a hole I'm responsible for and play twice a week where the pin is literally on the creek bank, so you can throw a 5' park shot into the creek and take an OB stroke. I thought I was really onto something and that would be great, and after a couple of years of testing my waterproof shoes I realized I'm an idiot and that pin punishes good shots. Did I make the hole score harder? Well, yeah. In a random and stupid kinda way, though. Is that basically the NAGS idea, that you increased the difficulty in a stupid way?

 

[DavidSauls]

NAGS is the opposite. It's a shot with little challenge, and almost always the same result -- like long approaches where you're virtually never going to miss the shot, but you'll almost always park it. "Not A Golf Shot", just a boring one.

 

[Three Putt]

NAGS is the opposite. It's a shot with little challenge, and almost always the same result -- like long approaches where you're virtually never going to miss the shot, but you'll almost always park it. "Not A Golf Shot", just a boring one.

So like a shot where you don't get a direct line to the basket from the tee so you have to throw to a spot to get a look, but once you are in that spot you just have to pitch up 60-100' to an unobstructed basket? Something like that?

 

[DavidSauls]

I'd say so. It's John's acronym, so I'll let him be the judge. But I think that's the general idea -- a shot that doesn't require much disc golf skill.

In our early days building a private course, we created a number of NAGS in places that looked cool, but didn't play that way. Sometimes, the flaw was just getting the distance wrong. Over time, we got better about it.

 

[txmxer]

I'd say so. It's John's acronym, so I'll let him be the judge. But I think that's the general idea -- a shot that doesn't require much disc golf skill.

In our early days building a private course, we created a number of NAGS in places that looked cool, but didn't play that way. Sometimes, the flaw was just getting the distance wrong. Over time, we got better about it.

I wish everyone had the opportunity or challenge of looking at a field or forest and designing a hole. A blank page is hard to fill

 

[Hampstead]

So what OMD and BGC wants is basically crappy MA3 putting for the pros. They want more challenging putting from inside the circle. Basically they want to watch ME putt.

I donno dudes, not sure I'd refer to that as more dramatic...I'm thinking the better word here is tedious. But hey, you do you.

And for the love of Steady Ed please stop comparing DG to golf. THEY ARE NOT THE SAME.

BM/OMD's argument is basically Tom Brady and Patrick Mahomes make football look too easy. We need more QB's like Mark Sanchez and Mitch Trubisky to keep the NFL interesting.

Big yawn.