It might form a part of a matrix I would use to judge someone. But it would be fairly low on the list.
A well set-up gun with a roll-mark that doesn't impress me would generate a much more favourable response than a Colt with a grip-pod, a bushnell trophy 3-9 and a CAA stock.
It may be a result of the more limited (and much more expensive) Canadian market, but I rarely see people whose main issue stems from selecting equipment of insufficient quality.
What I generally see is people who own guns and don't shoot them much, or, when they do, shoot them in unstructured ways that don't result in increasing skill.
I would much rather see someone with a cheap Norinco AR and several crates of empty brass than someone with a Mag-Pul'd up Colt with a Centurion rail...who never shoots his prized possession.
That may be less common in the US where guns are cheap and ammo is still relatively cheap compared to what we pay up here...but it's very common in Canada.
It's not that I don't think there are objective, measurable advantages to the "tier one" guns...obviously there are. It's just that most of the people I encounter who are having issues, are having USER issues, not gun issues.
Full disclosure: I'm the editor of Calibre Magazine, which is Canada's gun magazine. In the past I've done consulting work for different manufacturers and OEM suppliers, but not currently. M4C's disclosure policy doesn't seem to cover me but we do have advertisers, although I don't handle that side of things and in general I do not know who is paying us at any given time.
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