Yes, the 686 is a fine shooter for sure.
As to the rosewood and other presentation grips, well they do look nice but I never realized what a difference having a good set of grips for actual SHOOTING instead of viewing would make.
My Ruger had a very nice set of wood inlays and I shot that gun quite nicely but put it away for awhile after getting the 686. One day I decided to bring it to the range during a practice session to see how much real difference there was between the two guns and I was floored when I picked up the smooth handled Ruger. The grip didn't feel right. The gun was moving around and I just couldn't get a consistent grip on it in rapid fire. I immediately ordered up a new grip set for it, got it installed (duplicate of the 686 grips) and now it feels 200% better.
Can't believe I shot the Ruger with those polished grips for so long and did good with them!!!
Anyway, here's the new Smith 686 four incher in action while I was videoing some slow motion testing and figuring out a way to avoid the holster moving 3" during the draw stroke. I solved that problem, got some nice slow motion in (the reload is slow motion but in full speed at the end) and kindly notice that EVERY shot hits the steel at 25 yards, thank you.
Still working on getting my shot to shot reloads consistently under 4 seconds. A Jerry Miculek I'm not!
AD (Get out there and shoot! Beat up on your buddy and use a revolver to do it!!)