Hey Greg,

It kinda depends. Lets say, you are going to setup in a location or a tree stand. What I do is don't prime untill I'm setup, either in a blind, tree stand, or just sitting in the woods. Then I prime the pan. The problem I have is when I'm sitting there, I want the pan powder sitting near the touch hole so I have the gun tilted in that direction. But sometime you need to do something, get a drink, pee, use some scent, etc. it get's knocked and I reprime.

Now if I were walking slowly through the woods, in a sense stalking, than I may prime, but would have the trigger on half cock or safety, so it won't go off. When I see deer, pull back on trigger and hopefully ka boom.

I had a time where I was standing near my tree stand, and 3 deer came running in. I had just been up to the house to check on the kids, and walked back. I had previously primed the gun.
When I bent down dehind a tree, and aimed, the biggest deer just stood behind another small pine. I aimed, fired, and nothing, I had knocked the powder around too much. Anyway, I quickly, reprimed, aimed and fired again, the deer had not moved during that time, KABOOM. The 3 deer took off and I thought I had missed. No blood or hair in the spot I shot her. So I walked through the snow in the direction the deer had ran and there was a doe lying in the snow. What a feeling, she was a 3 or 4 year old.

So it depends is the answer I can give you.

Tom