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Merion: more pin locations?

• borntobesting 9,701 Posts

  Sat, Jun 22 2013 1:38 AM

  donsprintr:

  MBaggese:

  Unsure when SA and BPB started moving some pins.

  Bethpage was less than a year, but I don't know about any of the others. BPB had a second set of pins before April 2010. 

   

  St. Andrews was 5 or 6 months. They brought the front side in February 2010 and the the back side a few months later. We got the second set of pins for The Open in July.  

• andyson 6,415 Posts

  Sat, Jun 22 2013 11:30 AM

  alosso:

  No information here, but I'm quite sure that they have at least two sets for OLY and MEC.

  I'll go further than that.  I'm quite sure they have three sets of pins for BPB, STA,  OAK, Cong, RSG, OLY, and MER.  I think we're stuck with one pin on the TruGolf courses, there were lots of complaints about specific pin locations on both and we never got a change.

  I say 3 because.  A) There was a post I can't find saying photos for the 2nd Kiawah pins were not available due to some miscommunication.  So they had multiple pins in Kiawah plans.  B) The video "The Making of World Golf Tour" showed Chad Nelson standing by a green with all kinds of stakes, cones, and flags on it.  There was a thread speculation it showed 3 or 4 possible hole locations.  C) In Practice Mode we get to choose Easy, Medium, Hard pin locations.  It follows they would shoot an Easy, a Medium, and a Hard pin location.

  I'd bet my house they have three pins on the above courses and WGT has been rationing them out to us at a very slow pace.  Spoon feeding us so to speak.  Even when players are screaming for more pins.

  You might find this post I just made interesting.   WGT Full Course Roll Out History

   

• alosso 21,070 Posts

  Sat, Jun 22 2013 1:32 PM

  I concur:

  A) 2nd set in KIA was carved from old wood - ehm, pictures - quite a few imperfections, no 3rd imaginable.

  B) The video scene at 4:00 apparently shows one of the RSG Par3s with a two-tiered green, and I see two "pins", a blue one and a red one. Other pins or cones may mark the green boundary. I'm too "young" here for that discussion, but there's no proof on the first view.

  It makes clear though that RSG has two pin sets, one unshown until now...

  C) Easy, Medium and Hard are mixed combinations of the available pin sets, but not denoting three full sets. On the contrary, while testing "easy" and "hard" pin sets of KIA#9, the same pin appeared both times, after 8 wasted practice holes :)

  I won't bet my house though because I love my flat.

• andyson 6,415 Posts

  Sat, Jun 22 2013 6:12 PM

  You don't seem convinced alosso.  I was thinking on this a bit more and it dawned on me that WGT had already revealed it has three pins on St. Andrews!

  Hole 11, a par three

  Pin1: The 'normal' pin' up top in the center

  Pin2: The 'occasional pin' down low just over the pot bunker, may be the Hard pin.

  Pin3: From the first hole of one of the STA CTTH, left side, half way back.

  Replay from the STA CTTH using Pin3

  They look like this:

  

  There you have it.  WGT takes photos of 3 hole locations.  Possibly more?

• MBaggese 15,367 Posts

  Sat, Jun 22 2013 7:29 PM

  andyson:

  Pin3: From the first hole of one of the STA CTTH, left side, half way back.

  Replay from the STA CTTH using Pin3

  Thing is, it may only be mapped for CTTH, and not putting views?

• andyson 6,415 Posts

  Sun, Jun 23 2013 7:31 AM

  MBaggese:

  Thing is, it may only be mapped for CTTH, and not putting views?

  Interesting point.   Could happen I suppose.  I checked a BPB CTTH and each hole uses an existing pin.  On the St. Andys CTTH 4 of the 9 holes use an existing pin and 5 are different.

  I'll still bet my house they shoot 3 pins per hole though.

• MBaggese 15,367 Posts

  Sun, Jun 23 2013 9:12 AM

  andyson:

  I'll still bet my house they shoot 3 pins per hole though.

   

  You're probably right...just feed the fish when they start to eat each other;)

• mmikkeelee 591 Posts

  Sun, Jun 23 2013 12:58 PM

  if all this is true why wait so long to introduce new pins ?

  :)

• bhoese 679 Posts

  Mon, Jun 24 2013 4:52 PM

  It looks like they shot the St. Andrew's CTTH at a different time than the full 18.

  

  CTTH

  

  Stroke play

  It's not just the bloomin' gorse.  The fescue is longer and browner in the stroke play photos.  Even the field across the bay has turned from green to brown.  

  My guess is they never photographed the alternate CTTH pins for putting.

• petrik441 136 Posts

  Tue, Jun 25 2013 12:19 AM

  I don´t know much about programming these courses (never saw that famous video about it), but to me, adding new pin locations do not look like it should be that big of a deal. correct me if I´m wrong, but IMO they certainly do not have to shoot any new photos for tee shots nor approach shots, nor any aereal photos - everything is already done for existing pin locations and can be 100% used for any possible new pin location. they also already have complete green design - slopes, brakes, everything.
  so to me, it seems that what they need to do if they decided to add new pin locations, is "only" take couple of photos aiming at new pin location from different parts of green and nearby surroundings + couple of more aiming from the new pin location at all possible directions for reverse looks. I would assume up to 100 photos have to be enough for one new pin location on one hole (but I admit I can be awfuly wrong on this one).
  but if this assumption is true, then adding a new pin location should be relatively "low cost" issue, taking those cca 2000 photos for the whole course cannot take more than couple of days, also no need for aereal shots save a lot of $. then "just" couple of weeks programming and voila... or not? :)