Pros:
A mix of boring park-style holes, nice designs, and a wide gully.
-Amenities: Concrete tees, signs with info and good maps but no pin position indicators, DD Veteran baskets, practice basket.
-Multi-Tees: Short tees natural and marked by a beam. There are also some champion tees that look seriously challenging, which IIRC were half-buried turf marked with beams.
-Multi-Pins: Lots of different pin positions, which can vary the shots significantly. I wish there were indicators on the signs to help with this, but the feature is nice.
-Environments: This course has several different environments. The first is wide open plains holes. The second is pretty normal park-style holes with stands of woods, sparse trees, and open space. The third is a kind of gully or shallow canyon from (4)-(7) I believe. These are matched by different styles of play, below.
-Shot Shaping/Gameplay: I would say the course has predominantly ho-hum holes, but there are definitely some winners out here and a couple fun shots in the canyon. The course starts off with a bang on (1), a long grassy downhill leading to a low ceiling approach. A couple of decent holes with guarded greens take you to the canyon section, where the elevation and scrubby trees present an entirely different challenge. By the time you're to the back half, most of the remaining holes are predominantly open, straight, park-style holes. (16)-(17) are nice downhill, protected green shots that end the round on a higher note. Mixed in are some decent downhills where you can enjoy watching the disc fall to earth, and a number of trickier uphills to match. Wind is a factor on the open holes.
Cons:
Not the pithiest design, plus some other things.
-Creativity: Other than the holes noted above, this course didn't give any surprises. The canyon holes by nature feel rather arbitrary (in a sea of bushes, what makes any bush a better guardian than another?). The open holes are just that, and very few greens present more than random tree obstacles. I was very surprised after playing that this course is considered one of the finer in DFW, as it just doesn't present the variety of shots I associate with great courses.
-Canyon Scrub: You can throw over the top. It's always an option, and not infrequently a good option. It takes the tact out of the sport.
-Guardians: A decent number of times, I thought the guardian trees were more luck than skill based.
-Footing: The canyon presents some awkward footing and loose soil.
-Blind Shots: A good number of holes play blind, a frustrating situation for this first-timer.
-Missing Amenities: As noted, pin position indicators would be really nice. Additionally, taped spokes or basic next tee signs would help with a couple of slightly confusing transitions.
Other Thoughts:
Veterans has a handful of cool holes thrown in to what is otherwise a bland course. Those holes make it worth playing and really feel like thrills, but as a whole this shouldn't be a destination. It rates solidly in my Good and no higher.
~Similar Courses: The canyon holes feel like a similar stretch on Flying Armadillo - Big (San Marcos, TX); the open holes remind me a bit of McCurry Park (Fayetteville, GA), open sections of Boundary Waters (Douglasville, GA), or Central Valley (Murfreesboro, TN).