Another one of those days...

[Stingrayman42]

I have got to play paintball about three times in the last month. For the most part they have been frustrating experiences. I have been breaking balls in my ULE Custom with Y-Grip left and right even with level ten. Fortunately I found other people with my problem and it seems bad paint is the culprit. Despite all of this I had an experience yesterday that made me smile (and cry).

I was out playing woodsball at my local field dressed in my full "speedball" apparel. After playing a few games a couple kids with ions (this is not a SP bash I am just noting the marker they had so please don't turn it in to one) came up to me and asked what kind of gun I was shooting because they couldn't believe that I was only going on to the field with just my hopper and no pods, "So and so went through three pods and a hopper last game!".

I know that this is just preaching to the choir, but it is surprising how much the entry level of the game has changed with the invention of cheap electronic markers. Before newbies would be on a budget watching how much they shot, now they throw paint like there is no tomorrow. I think these kids were shocked to see a "good player" using a gun they didn't recognize playing without pods. It wasn't even in their vocabulary (because good players use this or that gun and shoot this amount).

Anyway, it just seems that new players are not learning fundamental skills that were once required. I am not gonna lie, I love fast guns, but I think they should be something to be grown in to. This may be cliche, but with great power comes great responsibility. We have forgotten responsibility and are handing out speed (power) left and right.

[sandfreestyle]

Back when I first started playing paintball with my classic mag, I would only use between 500 and a thousand rounds a day. I saw it as throwing nickles at people and I didn't have that much money at the time. I think that alone is what helped me grow into the player I am today, make the shot count, don't waste your money.

[going_home]

It could be bad paint or it could be your loader isnt feeding the paint fast enough.
The same loader I use on my paint slinger Viking ( Empire B ) is the same force fed
loader I use on my Phoenix mag. Chopping is a thing of the far distant past.

[aqua_scummm]

I've gotten unnecessarily lit up and shot by my own team soo many damn times because of the cheap electros with the super sensitive triggers

There's no need to lay 15 balls into my back if you outflanked us and snuck up behind me jerkwad!

[Ninjeff]

i have always found it more interesting to learn HOW to play paintball, rather than learn about the guns we play it with.

Ask any teammate, i HATE teching guns, i cant stand it. I give up after about 5 minutes and make Groovychicken do it.....but i will spend hours trying to figure out what the best way to approch a bunker is, or the best snap-shooting technique, of how to be smaller, or faster, or a better shot.

I was always told the player makes the gun, but most kids now think the gun makes the player.

[SkinnyHare]

i've got an older friend, more of a mentor i suppose, that works at Cabela's in their hunting/firearms section. there was one thing he told me that i won't ever forget and that i think fits nicely here.

"all this expensive, high-end stuff i've got here... i don't sell anything you actually need. the only thing i sell is dreams."

you can buy all the high performance equipment in the world, but until you learn how to use it, the only thing you really have is a fantasy. the gun doesn't make the player. i play with a small group of ROTC cadets that are scared to death of me and my 'Mags... they look mean, they sound mean, they ARE mean. all these kids are using the department's Pro-Carbines, and Mod 98s. however, just to prove a point i'll go a couple rounds using nothing but but one of my old Tippmann Pro-Lites with only what i can fit in my VL200 hopper (yes, i said 200, with only two 0s, the old gravity only hoppers).

i still stomp on these kids with just that stuff.

the reason i use those old Pro-Lites is to show them it's the skill, not the gun that makes the player scary on the field. those Pro-Lites of mine were the first two markers i ever had, going on 13ish years now. they're even older than what these cadets get to use. they're slow, they're loud, the bolt springs are heavier, and the trigger pulls much stiffer than what they use. it just throws these kids for a loop when they realise i've been using those things over and over since they were still in kindergarten.

i didn't own my first mag until sometime around 2001. i've gone through it all, the old Trracer 68s and Pro-Ams that i had to rent or borrow for the first year and a half i played, the Pro-Lite and Mini-Lite i bought at 15, the Mod98/Flatline (which i quickly turned around and dumped), a couple models of autocockers, and a few other markers i can't even recall at the moment. i never just jumped right into some RT-electro-1000bps paintgun from hell, i grew into the arsenal i've got now... and i'm convinced i'm a much better player for it.





as for the paint... what's up with that??? i've had nothing but bad luck lately in that department as well. i know i'm not chopping it because i can hear the lvl10 do it's job and the mess left behind isn't in the right spot for a chopped ball. all the paint i've gotten is either brittle and explodes in the barrel when the gas smacks it, or the seam separates right after leaving the barrel.

what happened to the good old stuff like the yellowbellies/slamball paint? you could let that stuff sit for a couple years and it'd still be good, just so long as you turned the case over every couple months. it wouldn't dimple or shrink... just kinda gets... hard... like shooting bouncy balls. i used up my last bit of it a few months back (a good 3 years old at least) and not a single round busted in the barrel, in flight, or went astray on its way to target. i miss that stuff badly.

[magmonkey]

there should be a newbie probation period of one year that they only can use pump markers.
they should have to pay their dues, and learn the game for what it should be.

[Nick E]

Back when I first started playing paintball with my classic mag, I would only use between 500 and a thousand rounds a day. I saw it as throwing nickles at people and I didn't have that much money at the time.

I know what you mean, I still see it like that. Throwing nickels at 15 bps, no thanks.
Of course I love to own fast guns. But I still have yet to actually use a pod in a speedball game.

[MournBlade]

I've owned a mag since the early nineties. Before that, it was the smg60, a rapide comp and you were throwing dimes instead of nickels. I've been playing a lot with my E-Mag since the warden said not to spend any more on paintball until the roof is fixed. I Q-Loaded my markers, because I didn't want any rattle in the woods. I usually can go through a game on a single pod, although sometimes, when I'm really popular I'll have to change pods.

[robnix]

Anyway, it just seems that new players are not learning fundamental skills that were once required. I am not gonna lie, I love fast guns, but I think they should be something to be grown in to. This may be cliche, but with great power comes great responsibility. We have forgotten responsibility and are handing out speed (power) left and right.

The field I'm going to on Sunday is hopperball or pump only on that day. I can't wait, it's most likely going to be the most fun I've had in a while.

[marked74]

The field I'm going to on Sunday is hopperball or pump only on that day. I can't wait, it's most likely going to be the most fun I've had in a while.

No doubt! I got started way back when the few kids with the semi autos had an annoying advantage over the rest of us, and me with my Piranha LB and 12OZ 'constant air' CO2 bottle and gravity feed hopper had an advantage over the kids with PGPs and KP2s and their 12 grams and 10 round tubes. The pump guys went up against the 'high tech' mechanical semi autos the old fashioned way - tactics, and making shots count. Not by going kamikaze and spraying more paint per second than the next guy. I remember buying paint from the shop in quantities of 100, in ziploc bags. There was no purchasing of cases, none of us could afford it.

I'll never forget this one time - entrenching myself in some bushes near a trail, seeing one of the other team coming down the trail, taking aim slowly and quietly, pulling the trigger and - nothing. I didn't have the gun cocked! I knew pulling that pump was going to give my position away, but I had no choice. I ended up winning the ensuing firefight only because he didn't see exactly where I was quick enough, and that LB is accurate as anything.

I'm fortunate in that the only field I've played on in a long while had kids using rental guns like myself and the old timers I was with. I shoulda gone pump on em, looking back on it now The rest of my playing is 5 acres of woods behind one of the guys' house, complete with trails and obstacles. And free CO2 fills, and paint at cost from a guy that plays with us who owns a shop. Oh and it'll be with my RT, as soon as I get the lvl 10 tuned.

[SR_matt]

i was breaking paint and it was that the paint was breaking on the bolt but not chopping. i need to swap the spring to a harder one and that should fix my issue, but i was only getting the breaks during R/Ting not when walking the trigger. not sure if that may help you or not.

-matt

[thefool]

I know what you mean, I still see it like that. Throwing nickels at 15 bps, no thanks.
Of course I love to own fast guns. But I still have yet to actually use a pod in a speedball game.

just for the record, i believe that its nps, not bps