I know plenty of C masters, and a few C++ masters. If you want to meet C++ masters, go to cppcon or get a job writing systems software at a respectable C++ shop.

I’d say I had a working knowledge of C++ after about a year ramping up on a codebase based on a mature C++ framework.

That was after years of writing reliable, performant C code. My C++ is now significantly better than the C I can produce, on both fronts, and at the same time.

I’m also much more productive as a side effect of that.