ROF and the future or paintball

[Farlow]

I do not play speed ball, but it is fun to watch. All the technology for the game is, in my opinion, going less towards skill and more towards rate of fire. If that is the case won't technology make the game obsolete. If eventually if you had guns that could shoot 60+ rounds a second, would not the game just become spray and pray. 60+ rounds may sound like a crazy number, but after seeing the other post with the gun shooting 45 rounds, 60+ may not be to far behind. I am afraid that in 5 years the game is going to become 4 man teams standing there with M60 looking machine guns just unloading thousands of rounds in one game with no need to run or move. Just curious what everyone elses opinions are.

[Spaceman613]

I think ~30 will be the reasonable limit for now. feeding becomes more dificult at that rate. And any faster, and loaders would need to increase in size (capacity).

I do think there will be a re-birth of pump play. I play pump, and know quite a few that also do, and it seems that more and more people are looking to it as a break from expensive days of high ROF semi.

Tourney ball will continue to go to crazy rates of fire, and until there is a death or serious injury because of it, it wont stop... There has to be a "breaking point" and that will probably happen with death and media coverage.

Long live mechanical guns, pump guns, and the fun that goes along with limited paint.

btw, if anyone wants to play a limited paint or pump tourney, EMAIL ME!! My team is hosting a couple of them.

[AcemanPB]

I honestly don't see ROF increasing much. I mean I think around 18bps is the fastest anyone will ever be able to pull a trigger and hit something. I don't know if loaders can feed much faster without crushing the paint.


In the future I hope to see paint prices drop even more.



I do agree with the re-birth of pump play. In the next few years I think pump games will be much more common. Some of the best games I've played have been pump games. With less paint in the air there is more moving. And since no one is trying to paint a small house with their markers pump play is MUCH cheaper on the paint bill.

[Animal Mother]

As long as the rules are 1 pull per shot I don't see it climing much anytime soon unless we clone new ultra fast fingers and attach them to our hands.

Full auto will never be allowed. Not because of any danger durring a game, it's the danger of some asshat dropping their gun on a tree branch or something, having it hit the trigger and go full auto, after so many shots the barrel cover will rip or just fly off and everyone will be in danger.

There is danger on the field with full auto.. I read about some jerk that shot someone in the back of the head at close range like 20 times at a tournament (he has been banned for life), but mainly the ban on full auto is what I said above.

Anyways, I already spend more time reloading than shooting, my e-mag is pretty fast, so much of throwping paint before I gotta hit the deck and reload, which gives time for the other team to advance. People said the same thing when semi's first came out, then they said it again when the Angel first came out.. blah blah.. part of the game and you just have to play a little different.

[845]

It doesnt really matter how fast you can shoot your gun but the skillZZ you have behind the trigger.

[Evil Bob]

Look at tennis for a good example of how technology can ruin a sport.

50 years ago, a fast serve in tennis was 82 miles an hour. Due to advancements in racket design, even a novice can break the 100 mph barrier. We saw many players at Wimbledon this past weekend hit 130+ mph, some in the 140's, that's almost as fast as we shoot paintballs (200 mph).

How did racket advancements change tennis? It has became a game of serving instead of tactics and working your opponent. Back in the 50's, aces were seldom, now they're common place. A guy with a fast and accurate serve can go far without an ounce of skill anywhere else. Same thing holds true with paintball, some dweeb with a fast trigger finger can do well when he has zero tactical sense and no clue how to move.

Since paintballs behave essentially like water ballons once they hit the open air, there is an element of randomness in their flight pattern. The best way to ensure that you hit a target is to overcome that random factor with volume, hence the "accuracy through volume" or "spray and pray" quotes you see through the forums.

That random factor works both ways, someone less accurate can get lucky and score a hit, someone more accurate and get unlucky and keep missing, the more paint you put into the air, the greater your odds of getting that one lucky shot in. Of course, the more accurate you can shoot, the few shots will be required to hit your mark.

Here's another way to put it... if you have "mad skillZZs", why do you fire more then one shot to eliminate someone?

Think about that next time you go out and play and you get shot out by a n00b with a rental gun who happens to be playing for the first time. Was it their awesome skill or was it just plain luck?

-Evil Bob

[GT]

i dont see a rebirth in turbo modes or anyother trigger pull enhancments so i think the next big things to hit the scene will be.......


1. weight
2. shot eff
3. data logging

Trust me, this is what is comming down the pipe.

jb

[Evil Bob]

Data logging and ingame statistics would be really cool.

Can you imagine watching X-Ball on TV with the everyone's markers sending this data through some sort of wireless link?

Commentator 1: "Yeah, Rico was really pounding on the trigger here, you can see by the readout he was hitting 17bps consistantly when he shot out Miles on the break to the 50."
Commentator 2: "Most definitely, the All Stars have always had a fast fingered lineup."

Statistics of rounds fired per player/team, speed rates, air consumption, etc., definitely coming in the future.

-Evil Bob

[Jeffy-CanCon]

If X-ball lasts, and gets onto TV, that sort of telemetry might come. It would be cool to see those stats, and it is do-able.

ROF will top out somewhere in the 20's, I figure. Not many people can do better than 15, anyway.

I play rec almost exclusively, and I've seen a lot of rec-ballers deride tourney players as being all about the amount of paint you can throw downfield. Poeple have been saying that for ten years, and it's still not true. More balls in the air does help your chances, but it's just one facet of the game. Knowing when and how to move, communicating with your teammates, snap-shooting, and presenting the smallest possible target profile are all important skills. But really, tourneys are all about sales promotion. The paint companies want to sell more paint, so they will continue pushing the maximum amount of shooting.

Pump play may come back for serious rec-ballers. It is cheaper, and (IMO) much more fun & challenging. Stock play has made a resurgence in the last few years, so maybe pump is next. We can only hope.

[AcemanPB]

Originally posted by Evil Bob
Look at tennis for a good example of how technology can ruin a sport.

50 years ago, a fast serve in tennis was 82 miles an hour. Due to advancements in racket design, even a novice can break the 100 mph barrier. We saw many players at Wimbledon this past weekend hit 130+ mph, some in the 140's, that's almost as fast as we shoot paintballs (200 mph).

How did racket advancements change tennis? It has became a game of serving instead of tactics and working your opponent. Back in the 50's, aces were seldom, now they're common place. A guy with a fast and accurate serve can go far without an ounce of skill anywhere else. Same thing holds true with paintball, some dweeb with a fast trigger finger can do well when he has zero tactical sense and no clue how to move.

Since paintballs behave essentially like water ballons once they hit the open air, there is an element of randomness in their flight pattern. The best way to ensure that you hit a target is to overcome that random factor with volume, hence the "accuracy through volume" or "spray and pray" quotes you see through the forums.

That random factor works both ways, someone less accurate can get lucky and score a hit, someone more accurate and get unlucky and keep missing, the more paint you put into the air, the greater your odds of getting that one lucky shot in. Of course, the more accurate you can shoot, the few shots will be required to hit your mark.

Here's another way to put it... if you have "mad skillZZs", why do you fire more then one shot to eliminate someone?

Think about that next time you go out and play and you get shot out by a n00b with a rental gun who happens to be playing for the first time. Was it their awesome skill or was it just plain luck?

-Evil Bob

This is where the re-birth of pump play would come in :)

[CayleG]

pro ball isn't ever going to allow full auto, so the puny reflexes of the human being will limit the rate by itsself.. regardless of the possible rof.

[rathbaster]

Originally posted by Farlow
I do not play speed ball, but it is fun to watch. All the technology for the game is, in my opinion, going less towards skill and more towards rate of fire. If that is the case won't technology make the game obsolete. If eventually if you had guns that could shoot 60+ rounds a second, would not the game just become spray and pray. 60+ rounds may sound like a crazy number, but after seeing the other post with the gun shooting 45 rounds, 60+ may not be to far behind. I am afraid that in 5 years the game is going to become 4 man teams standing there with M60 looking machine guns just unloading thousands of rounds in one game with no need to run or move. Just curious what everyone elses opinions are.

Hmmmm....I think you're looking at this from a somewhat narrow perspective. On the tourney scene, where fields are flat with regular bunkers, this may be true. (But I doubt it will come to pass.)

Out in the woods, where the fields make their money, ROF is less of an issue. I'm one of those Stock Class Guys. When I have good cover and a good approach, it doesn't matter how fast someone can shoot. If they don't see me, they can't hit me. My game is about stealth. Sure I've been wacked by new guys with a fast trigger finger. I've also taken out paint-hose firing electros who thought they had me.

I've never seen a tourney, let alone played one, but the guys I play against who are tourney players are hardly paint-hosers. I give them a square inch of my arm or shoulder they take it with 2, maybe 3 shots. They're disiplined, often good team players and communicate very well. (Sometimes to well and to loudly for the woods but thats better than no communication.)

It seems that this question of ROF has been around since someone put a pump on a gun and increased their firepower to a stunning 1 bps. I expect the question will remain current for some time. Just my $0.02.

[Paintmonkey]

I think we have already started down a splitting path.
On one side you have the extreme sports side of paintball, kind of resembling snowboaring, skateboarding or any other type of sport where the word "dude" is used all too often.

The other side consists of the woods folk. These are the capture the flag buffs, the ones in it for the hunt, the people that are into the tactics and the camoflauge and other things associated with the average redneck.

Of course this is only a bias based on my observation, and there are some mixed people, but this is what our sport is like and it will continue to split.

The speedball side will rely on new technology, higher rate of fire, and other technoligical advances in a less tactical environment. It seems to be the faster growing one too, as most paintball related things have shifted their focus more on tournaments and such.

As woodsball is pushed aside as a wargame and a terrorist training plot. Speedball will be the abridged, more clean cut and politically correct version of paintball.

That's what speedball is, condensed. It takes woodsball, eliminates concealment, deception, and most things that make up the mental side of the sport. The guns will do that for the player, no need to trick him, you can just hurl buckets of paint at him. Thus the neccessisity of better technology and the 'fastest' gun.

That's what technology is doing to the sport. Killing it.