When it comes to going out to meet new women, there are two general schools of thought among successful players – the Shotgun approach and the Sniper approach.
Just like the names imply, Shotgun game is more of a scattershot approach where you just cast a wide net and see who is receptive whereas Sniper game is a much more targeted approach where you look for exactly the type of girl who will be interested in taking things further with you.
Both methods have distinct advantages and benefits over the other, and they also have a lot to do with a player’s particular style. The consummate player though needs to be able to use either approach for meeting women and know exactly when, where, and how to apply them well.
The Shotgun Approach
The shotgun approach to meeting women simply involves approaching as many women as possible in as short a time as possible and quickly gauging their reactions and their willingness to take the interaction forward.
The shotgun approach is one favored by day gamers as well as outgoing guys with beginner to mid-level game. This type of approach is almost exactly what I described when I told you guys about how to meet women on the subway.
This style of approach has several advantages and disadvantages: Low personal cost, high volume, and lots of numbers, but also low overall return and high flake potential.
- Low Personal Cost
These interactions are very easy to start since you’re not really trying to get much of a conversation going. You’re mostly just trying to take the temperature of a girl and see if she’s available and open to meeting someone new.
Because of this low cost to begin, it’s also very easy to bail if it isn’t going well and you don’t get a strong feeling of rejection because you’ve invested so little of your time and energy into the interaction.
This also makes it easy to jump from one woman to another without ever really losing momentum, which leads us to point 2.
- High Volume
The shotgun approach naturally lends itself to running through a very high volume of women in a short time. This makes it ideal for filling out a roster of potential women when you need to replenish or if you’re new to the area. It can also be very helpful if you’re trying to field test some lines or a particular new style or look.
The high volume and low personal cost to each approach also makes it a great starting place for beginners who are trying to get past approach anxiety or who don’t have good banter down yet.
Another time this method can be helpful is for guys who are new to Korea and looking for girls who speak English well. Despite the fact that all Koreans learn English in school and most of them can carry on a basic conversation, they are very shy about it. The ones who speak English well will make it quite clear early on, so this approach can be used to sort through the deck until you find what you’re looking for.
Once you find a girl (or a few) that are interested and fit your desires, you will be getting…
- Lots of Numbers
Because each interaction will be relatively short (probably 2 minutes average, 5 minutes maximum), you will be able to quickly end it with a number close.
While a number by itself doesn’t mean anything, gathering 6 to 10 numbers from girls who are available and in your area is a great place to start.
The quantity and quality of these numbers will depend heavily on your level of game, but no matter your level you will be getting exactly what you deserve, and more importantly, you won’t be living a life of sad celibacy in Korea.
- Low Overall Return
Shotgunning relies on as many interactions as possible in as short a time as possible. While momentum can help carry you through each successive approach, it does take its toll on your mind and energy levels.
For the amount of energy it takes to go out, get started, and carry through with a minimum of 20 approaches, you will get a statistically low return on investment in terms of interactions that carry all the way through to sex at some point.
While this method of approaching can help you to sort out the girls who are DTF from the ones who aren’t, it will take a lot of effort and repetition to find the one girl who is around at the exact moment and also looking for sex.
The real benefit to the shotgun approach is that is gives a lot of leads in a short amount of time, but because there are so many of them with such little investment in each…
- You Will Have a Lot of Flakes
The sad truth in this day and age of Tinder, Facebook, and other forms of instant gratification is that if you meet a girl and only talk to her for a few minutes, chances are good that you were just a blip in the radar.
If you get lucky, you’ll meet a girl who doesn’t attention whore and fish for Facebook likes, but that is increasingly rare. More likely, she will enjoy her conversation with you and think, what a lovely guy he was, then go on about her day trying for hours to get the perfect selfie.
This means that when you do message her a few days later, she will have all but forgotten you. There are ways to forestall this, such as completely redefining the 3-day rule or quickly creating an inside joke, but the best way to do it is to set a date and time to meet again before you leave the interaction.
That isn’t always possible though, especially if you’re running subway game. On top of that, even if you do set a date and time there’s still a very good chance she will flake out entirely. You have to accept this fact early on and learn to always stack your dates. It’s much better for you to cancel on her because someone better came along than for her to do it to you.
And don’t underestimate her by thinking she’s “different” or “special.” Your cute little snowflake with the doe eyes absolutely will flake on you if something better comes up.
The Sniper Approach
Where the Shotgun approach is a street dog peeing on everything he sees, the Sniper approach is a tiger stalking his prey and taking it out in one perfect strike.
The Sniper approach is favored by experienced player who knows exactly what he wants and how to get it.
This approach is significantly more difficult than the Shotgun approach because it requires a very strong banter game as well as a thorough understanding of the Types of Korean Women. It also helps a lot if you can speak Korean well enough to carry on a basic conversation, though this isn’t 100% necessary.
Consider for a moment the difference between an amateur poker player and a professional poker player. The amateur bets erratically and emotionally, throwing his chips around based on his ‘gut’ or a ‘good feeling’ about this or that hand. The professional knows better. He plays prudently, betting on the odds and making judgment calls about the other players. He pays close attention to the other men at the table because they reveal more than they intend, and the professional uses this information to his advantage.
The player uses these same tells to make calls in the field. Rather than taking a shotgun approach which may yield some results, the sniper chooses his specific target and feels it out. He may even spend a little time observing her just to see what kind of behavior and mannerisms he’s dealing with. He can then adjust his game to fit her type, mood, and the atmosphere of the location.
Sniper game has several upsides over Shotgun, but it also has some drawbacks.
Perfect Choice, Longer Interactions, Higher Overall Success, High Cost = Harder Rejections, Go Home Alone
- The Perfect Choice
Sniper game allows you to choose exactly the type of girl you want, which is much better for you if you’re being honest with yourself.
If you’re out looking to meet a Prude who is potential relationship material, you will know what she looks like and the places to meet her. You will also be able to find the type of girl you like with the looks and style that you prefer.
Read More: The Prude
If instead you are looking for a skanky bar slut who’s open to a one night stand, you will be able to apply the same principles to find exactly what you want. You can scan the bar or club (because let’s be honest, the Slut isn’t going to Saturday night mass) for the girl who is dressed like she’s looking for the D.
One of the drawbacks to Shotgun game is that in order to maintain your momentum, you basically have to keep approaching nonstop. This is even true on apps like Tinder, because you can’t really get a feel for the girl unless she is on a stripper pole or has a slut face.
Sniper game on the other hand affords you downtime while you search for the ideal match. However this also means a higher energy cost in terms of startup for each interaction.
- Longer Interactions
You’re out looking for something specific, so you will only approach girls who fit your specific criteria. This will lead to longer interactions with each girl, which is a two-fold benefit.
The first is that you have an extra filter layer to make sure that the girl is actually what you want and that you weren’t mistaken about her. One distinct problem with shotgun approaches is that a girl can seem open upon first approaching but then come meet you later only to reveal that she has a boyfriend or is a total bitch thereby wasting a lot of your precious time and energy.
Instead of the 2 to 5 minute shotgun interactions, you should be able to talk with this girl for a minimum of 10 minutes in a day setting and about half an hour in a night setting. Of course you can always eject early if she doesn’t meet your standards upon closer inspection, but this increased interaction time can also help you to determine whether or not this is a girl you have any legitimate interest in.
These longer interactions will lead to…
- Higher Overall Success Rate
One of the basic tenets of game is that the longer your interaction with a girl, the higher your chances of sleeping with her at some point.
For day game, 10 or 15 minutes will get you about as far as an hour of night game. This has to do with a multitude of factors, but overall the reasons are not as important as the facts and results.
Shotgun game relies on a girl to not be flakey, which is never a good bet to make. That’s why you hedge your bets by getting as many numbers in as short a time as possible. Sniper game conversely relies on your ability to interest and charm a girl in the first few minutes of meeting her so that she feels invested in talking with you and is less likely to flake.
A funny thing happens in our egotistical minds when we talk with someone for a while – we retroactively decide that we liked them, no matter what we actually felt at the time. We believe ourselves to be intelligent and rational with a good sense of judgment, so if we talk to someone for an extended period of time when we had the choice to leave, we must have enjoyed their company.
You can easily see an example of this with crappy TV shows like The Big Bang Theory. They’re objectively bad, but people spend time watching them and are told when to laugh, so they retroactively determine they ‘like’ it. Don’t believe me? Watch it without the laugh track.
At least that’s how our brains justify us spending that time. You can use this to your advantage by prolonging the conversation as long as possible and running basic banter and clown game that makes her feel like she’s having fun.
This will lead to each connection having a much lower chance of flaking after the fact, which will give you a higher overall success rate than the shotgun approach that relies on high numbers with a low success rate.
However due to these longer interactions, you will also find that…
- Rejections Hurt Much More
Just as we use longer interactions to make a girl feel more attached to the conversation, we also find ourselves becoming more attached and invested in each particular interaction.
This makes it much more frustrating and painful when a girl flakes on us completely.
Just the other night, I was talking with this girl at a local bar for about 4 hours total. When I messaged her later to link up again, I got zero response. It’s hard to swallow that she just didn’t like me after that long. My brain is able to rationalize it out saying that she dropped her phone or secretly had a jealous boyfriend, but no matter what, the end result is that she flaked. And it sucked.
Flakes or even outright rejections when running this type of game knock you down much more than being next’ed by some random girl on the street when you’re shotgunning. It can make it harder to get up and keep going for the next approach, which is why this style of game is not recommended for beginners or those with fragile egos.
If you choose to run Sniper game, you will develop a thick skin and a strong sense of self, but you may also develop a few hand callouses because…
- You Will Go Home Alone Often
Especially when you first get started, your chances of using this style of game to get a same night lay will be exceedingly low. You will likely go out and get a girl interested, but before you can seal the deal the interaction will somehow end.
The high investment way of approaching girls is good for getting them into bed at some point but it’s not as effective for taking them home the same day.
The good news though is that if you get her interested enough that she doesn’t flake, the first time you meet up after that will likely lead to sex.
If you’re trying to get a same night lay with a sniper game, you have to set your filters heavily skewed to the girls who look most promising to that end. In my experience though, these types of girls respond better to direct shotgun game because they don’t need to be convinced. They are already out looking for the D, so if you’ve got some to offer and you meet her minimum standard of attractiveness, your chances are solid of penetrating poosy paradise. You’ll know if she’s down within the first 15 minutes of talking, so don’t worry too much about excessive banter or showing off language skills.
Conclusion
At the end of the day, both methods of approaching are very effective for meeting women and getting laid but they have very different applications.
Shotgun game is going to be ideal for subway or street approaches, whether day or night, as well as if you’re at a crowded bar or night club. This method offers the smallest amount of energy expenditure for the highest rewards in terms of collecting numbers and generating wider interest. This is a lot like Twitter as you can reach the widest audience possible with the smallest amount of effort, but overall return and engagement is very low as a percentage.
Sniper game is more like sending an email. If you send a direct personal email to someone, the chances of them responding are much higher as a percentage, but you also need to have some pertinent content that they care about in the body of the message. You get a higher engagement rate at the cost of more energy put forth on your part.
Similarly, if someone doesn’t respond to a tweet you put out, you probably won’t even notice or remember. However if you spend an hour writing a great email to someone and they don’t answer you, you will feel a lot shittier about it. These are the risks and rewards of the different types of game.
Ideally you will be adept in both styles of approach and be able to seamlessly switch between them as each situation dictates. You could go do some warmup sets on the street using a shotgun approach and then step into a mixer or rooftop party and carry your shotgun momentum into a highly effective sniper game.
This is the ultimate goal of the player – a veritable pussy hunter’s OODA loop. Always be aware of your exact situation at the time and act accordingly to maximize your chances of success.
Happy hunting, players!
-JN
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