There are various ways to set up a Layout for printing blank staves, they require several steps and various clicking around, customizing the Layout for the task, etc.
Ideally I would like 1 single button on the Print tab, perhaps as a new Destination modifier, which can be toggled,
“[x] Output as BLANK Systems”
Probably this would only be an option in the Graphics destination, but I don’t know, maybe it could apply direct to Printer as well, which saves another separate step of dealing with printing the outputted PDF.
This would Output the selected Layout, but without: music notes, page numbers, rehearsal marks, bar lines, section lines, system text, …ie… blank staves but with the same Staves and Page Format/Orientation/Size as the Layout.
Even more interesting, could be an option to allow printing Chord Symbols (but nothing else), with everything else blanked out, thus creating a perfect Jazz Lead Sheet manuscript template, from an existing Jazz chart. This would be absolutely perfect for composing a contrafact. (Many now-famous jazz tunes began as Contrafact exercises.)
Then the only other clicking for making manuscript paper, would be to set the Page range to print (i.e. to skip the First Page, if desired, to print the typical templated pages) or set the page formating type (ie. 2-up is also great for manuscript paper! It is nice to sketch forms or growth with the ‘broad view’ of the staves).
There are various ways I like my manuscript paper. Sometimes I want just paper with blank lines on it (no brackets). Sometimes I want blank grand staff. Sometimes I want blank ensemble staff (i.e. brackets + instrument names + clefs). Sometimes I want blank Part. Sometimes I want Landscape mode, sometimes Portrait… Sometimes I want the blank ensemble with Condensing… I haven’t yet written Guitar in Dorico but when that happens I’ll want blank Guitar Staff+Tab, etc… I don’t want bar lines, bar numbers, page numbers, or time sigs.
Special bonus if there is a feature to provide graph paper-style grid in the Output somehow, along with staves (maybe as a graphic item in a Page Template?). I don’t know why musicians, including instructors, write words, explanations, instructions, on staff paper while making text notes. It is always (and I mean: always) unreadable. Staff paper should never be used for writing words. That’s what ‘ruled paper’ (also called ‘college ruled paper’) or ‘graph paper’ (grid paper) is for: writing text, where lines are less dense. In the unlikely case that musicians begin taking proper text notes on paper, rather than scribbling, then it would be ideal to do this on graph grid under the staves.
And I might as well add in an additional request for a Drum Tab Key. Somewhere on the Print panel, or inside the Page Template as a graphic box, allow Outputing or graphically inserting, a Drum Notation Key, from the drum instruments used in the Layout (i.e. Drum Kit tablature key).