Each club make/model has a value listed in the Pro Shop called Precision.
That value of Precision defines the size of a circle. The more Precision a club has the smaller the circle is.
If you ding a shot the ball will land somewhere in that circle. The ball can land at the top of or the bottom of the circle.
In other words, with no wind, no elevation change, same spin setting and a static aiming point, if you ding 10 shots the ball can land in 10 different places inside that circle that is centered on the aiming point.
WGTniv:The game is pretty simple.
Precision controls your accuracy.
Imagine it's like a circle that surrounds the flagstick when you
aim at it. The size of that circle is related to the precision
rating. The higher the rating the smaller the circle.
Your ball can land anywhere in the circle on a dinged shot (left
or right, long or short).
It will ALWAYS land in the
circle on a ding shot, though sometimes it may land in the center of the circle
and sometimes it may land on the very outer edge or anywhere in between those
two points. When it lands on the outer edge this is what you guys have
come to know as "the beast".
Was the shot pre-programmed? Does it know you're standing on the
17th hole at Kiawah?
No, it's just unfortunate timing.
The result you see is the logical spread dictated by the precision
rating of the club over 100 or 1,000 or 10,000 shots taken on the site.
No matter how big or small the sample it's amazingly consistent
because it is after all only a simple mathematical formula.
The shot data is spread out amongst all users, so there will be
times when you run into a lot of "edge cases" (aka deviations, aka
outside edge of the precision circle) and times where you seemingly can't miss
the center (even when you mishit).
This is the ebb and flow of the game and it's always been
there. In the short term you will have "bad" days and
"good" days. In the long term (providing they are using the
same clubs) any one player will see the same amount of "edge cases"
or "deviations" that the rest of the players do.