The lost decade of Paintball

[Patron God of Pirates]

We're getting into a lot of personal preference now. The idea of a half hour + single game sounds like a nightmare to me. I can't imagine new players would enjoy sneaking around for 20 minutes then getting one balled by a guy they never saw would be more fun than being out early in a 10 minute game, then getting to play again very soon.

[BigEvil]

Speedball was what we were told we needed - but it frankly it never served anyone other than short sighted, greedy manufacturers and field owners with no business acumen or vision. It is obvious that speedball wasn't what was needed nor what sold (at least sustainability) - as this fact can be observed by the current miserable, static state of the industry.

I started in paintball literally around the time organized, legitimate fields first started opening on the east coast. There were 3 guns in those days - Nelspots, Splatmasters, and PGPs. Pumps were a relatively *new* thing and premium "stock class" markers (Like Bushmasters) were still a few years away. I saw walk-on crowds just as big, just as excited and just as *potentially* profitable then as any other time in the history of the sport.

The issue is that very few men like Tom Kaye (who brought HPA to the sport, then gave it away in "open source" fashion - for the betterment and growth of the industry) had any sort of vision about the future and most only were reaping what they could in the moment - usually at the expense of everyone else. Field owners were no better. Instead of creating awesome fields with amenities that drew players back, and charging for EXPERIENCE, they instead went the easy route and tried to make profits solely off of paint sales. It was OBIVIOUS over the years, as fields shrank (from acres to yards), game time limits became fractions of hours (from over an hour or more to 15 minutes or less...) that it all was a contrived effort only to induce more paint sales. The manufacturers whole heartedly threw into this paradigm, and created silly "air games" around the sole principal of generating the most volume of paint use possible.

If paintball had stayed true to its roots (the present game formats resemble NOTHING of what the first 10 years did, nor the direction...) and business men with vision had led things, we 'd have amazing fields that, just like other places we pay lots of money to visit, we'd be happy to pay a profitable field fee to play. Instead things got off to slow but steady start, then the entire playing format was changed (not evolved - but literally replaced) with a version to support revenue and nothing more. Now all are reaping the logical repercussions of poor strategic planning and vision.

Don't even get me started on the "it needs to be in a format that can be on TV" - the manufacturers drove this silliness too. There are a TON of sports that sell LOTS and LOTS of very expensive equipment that is not on TV at all, or only in a very limited , not very exciting format. Two that easily come to mind are cycling and golf - both are *extremely* equipment driven and both are horrible to watch on TV yet have outstanding participation regardless. NO ONE would suggest watching golf is interesting - yet its sales of equipment crushes paintball. Why? They don't charge by the stroke, or spend all their energy developing equipment that is LESS efficient (ie requires MORE stokes to achieve the same result) they do the opposite and create equipment that *works better* and they charge the participant for the EXPERINCE, not for their handicap.

First strike and other ACCURATE shaped projectiles are the future of the sport, along with the experience associated milsim games. The days of running around on AstroTurf, dressed like a clown, dumping a half a case of paint or more per elimination are dead, they just haven't stopped twitching yet. If manufacturers had spent the last 20 years or so going the original direction, I think they'd be much further ahead. Instead the pie must now be split with airsoft and other emerging competitors...

It will be interesting to see where things go, but right now it is not looking good. There seems to be a doubling down on paint sales as the life blood of the sport - leading the incestuous industry to attempt through multiple means (insurance, producing non-FSR compatible markers) to quash what is likely the only avenue forward if paintball is to exist in 10 more years.

-Calvin

POW!

..and there we have the end of the thread right there.

Besides, anyone who really was into the game other than trying to fleece people out of money would never have lost an entire decade of playing. "Players" come and go all the time. It's the industry people who have FUBAR'd the game. From the manufacturers to incompetent field owners who can't draw new customers or keep the ones they do.

[Patron God of Pirates]

Looking at it from a slightly different perspective, there is a case to be made that the fields, players, and manufacturers are all the victims of poor game design. In game development there's a 'Twinkie' known as 'single best strategy'. The most commonly used example is pistol sniping in HALO. It's a way of playing so effective that the only options are to use it, or lose and ***** about it. The strategy employed in speed-ball is the logical outcome of the rules of single elimination center flag. The equipment evolved to best serve that strategy. The field type almost doesn't matter. If there is a single best strategy the players will always find it.

The fields also followed suit. 'Cheep to come, expensive to compete' is definitely short sighted, but getting businesses to value what is best for an industry over the long haul vs what is best for themselves right now is a tough sell.

[cledford]

I have to respectfully agree and disagree with this. [Disagree] Paintball always has been, and (absent shaped projectiles) always will be a sub-50 yard game. With 3 gram roundball projectiles, at =>300 FPS - the maximum effective range will always be ~30 yards. This is less HALO and more muskets on the village green :-) It the old days, players moved while other players pumped. Now, players move when the other player reloads. The game hasn't really changed, only the volume of paint shot before reloading (permitting movement) has changed. So, to be truthful, evolution has occurred to serve a different purpose - selling more paint, not to advance the game. [Players did not "find" best style - they were given something not discernably different then it had ever been, just more efficient at wasting paint)

On the other side [Agree] Until tech comes along that doesn't more entrench the present playing style, one which opens up movement or/and engagement distances (without changing the limitations of 3 grams at ~300fps), paintball is exactly the same game that simple wastes more paint. The game format is stale and boring. it has no "game" to it and is about nothing more than twitchy fingers and how fast markers can be shot and how fast they can then be reloaded. The game is constrained by the equipment, not by how fast it shoots, but by what it shoots and the fact that for the most part all guns and players are equal leading to enormous games of "tic-tac-toe" - in other words, games of perpetual stalemates - at least until a chance elimination, or someone runs out of paint... The ONLY thing that can change this is disparity in equipment. Shaped projectiles are expensive, markers are generally slower, and hold much lower volumes of ammo before requiring reload. This leads to low ROF, with high accuracy. Engagement distances are also opened up. Roundball guns we already understand. mixing both would provide a randomness dynamic that would breath life into the sport. [New game design]

-Calvin

Looking at it from a slightly different perspective, there is a case to be made that the fields, players, and manufacturers are all the victims of poor game design. In game development there's a 'Twinkie' known as 'single best strategy'. The most commonly used example is pistol sniping in HALO. It's a way of playing so effective that the only options are to use it, or lose and ***** about it. The strategy employed in speed-ball is the logical outcome of the rules of single elimination center flag. The equipment evolved to best serve that strategy. The field type almost doesn't matter. If there is a single best strategy the players will always find it.

The fields also followed suit. 'Cheep to come, expensive to compete' is definitely short sighted, but getting businesses to value what is best for an industry over the long haul vs what is best for themselves right now is a tough sell.

[Patron God of Pirates]

Good points. Additional variables would add more dynamism to the game. If first strike and technologies like it ever make significant inroads, how long before we see fast feeding FS loaders? I also doubt those inroads will materialize unless/until the average player starts seeing the FS player as having a gross advantage. Like how they assume they are losing to the space guns because of their RoF. "If I had that, I could win too".

I'm hoping to be proven wrong, but my suspicion is that FS will remain a novelty enjoyed by a minority of diehards just like the Flatline and Apex barrels. Which I find rather funny because new players often buy mil-sim markers on the basis that they look like they have greater range.

[Nobody]

Speedball was what we were told we needed - but it frankly it never served anyone other than short sighted, greedy manufacturers and field owners with no business acumen or vision. It is obvious that speedball wasn't what was needed nor what sold (at least sustainability) - as this fact can be observed by the current miserable, static state of the industry.

No one in my area told me what to play. I did tournaments and back some 16 years ago, doing big games with my team. The speedball was a personal choice, and the big games because of my friends at the time, because it was an event for me. Anyway, maybe i was ina better area, maybe i happened upon great fields, cause it seemed that you had horrible fields. But the horrible fields that i went to, i onky went once. And when i found my good fields, i stuck to them.

But, what speedball represented is a format that you didn't need acres of space, (space that costs money). It also allowed quick turnaround of games, it allowed lower overhead costs for staff, and easier containment of the players.

I started in paintball literally around the time organized, legitimate fields first started opening on the east coast. There were 3 guns in those days - Nelspots, Splatmasters, and PGPs. Pumps were a relatively *new* thing and premium "stock class" markers (Like Bushmasters) were still a few years away. I saw walk-on crowds just as big, just as excited and just as *potentially* profitable then as any other time in the history of the sport.

I started 20 years ago. Electro guns were just coming in and the revy was still king of the loader. But no matter what the time, paintball always allows you to play your style. You want to take a SC gun with you 10x 10rnd tubes and 12vies on the field as a i have an penumag. Perfectly acceptable in an open play game. But each and every period shows that, potential. It boomed more on the fact that people had disposable income and people were buying. You can not fault the aport for trying to cash in, its just those people who only wanted to make a buck are truly bad.

The issue is that very few men like Tom Kaye (who brought HPA to the sport, then gave it away in "open source" fashion - for the betterment and growth of the industry) had any sort of vision about the future and most only were reaping what they could in the moment - usually at the expense of everyone else. Field owners were no better. Instead of creating awesome fields with amenities that drew players back, and charging for EXPERIENCE, they instead went the easy route and tried to make profits solely off of paint sales. It was OBIVIOUS over the years, as fields shrank (from acres to yards), game time limits became fractions of hours (from over an hour or more to 15 minutes or less...) that it all was a contrived effort only to induce more paint sales. The manufacturers whole heartedly threw into this paradigm, and created silly "air games" around the sole principal of generating the most volume of paint use possible.

If paintball had stayed true to its roots (the present game formats resemble NOTHING of what the first 10 years did, nor the direction...) and business men with vision had led things, we 'd have amazing fields that, just like other places we pay lots of money to visit, we'd be happy to pay a profitable field fee to play. Instead things got off to slow but steady start, then the entire playing format was changed (not evolved - but literally replaced) with a version to support revenue and nothing more. Now all are reaping the logical repercussions of poor strategic planning and vision.

The field did evolve. Tournaments were played in the woods, they were played with pumps. The players wanted more, the players brought change to it. I do not know where you are at, but i am kinda in a hub. 4-6 hours i can be at EMR for the castle games. 4-6 hours i can be at Skirmish for their big game. In 2 hrs i can be at Top Gun for my home field. All of those fields are in the woods, but when the time comes will host speedball. Again, there is no basis for your accusations.

Don't even get me started on the "it needs to be in a format that can be on TV" - the manufacturers drove this silliness too. There are a TON of sports that sell LOTS and LOTS of very expensive equipment that is not on TV at all, or only in a very limited , not very exciting format. Two that easily come to mind are cycling and golf - both are *extremely* equipment driven and both are horrible to watch on TV yet have outstanding participation regardless. NO ONE would suggest watching golf is interesting - yet its sales of equipment crushes paintball. Why? They don't charge by the stroke, or spend all their energy developing equipment that is LESS efficient (ie requires MORE stokes to achieve the same result) they do the opposite and create equipment that *works better* and they charge the participant for the EXPERINCE, not for their handicap.

Ok, there is an entire CHANNEL dedicated to golf. It is boring to watch, if you don't play golf. I can't swing a dead cat for 10 miles without hitting 8 golf courses one even hosting a LPGA event i believe. And you can go out and play on the weekend and not be sore from running, or bruised from getting hit. But the golf and cycling industry has plenty of dedicated clothing lines (you have to look the part) and you can do it by yourself or as a group. But the key to those sports compared to paintball is, you can watch and know who is winning, you can see the person with the yellow or red jersey (in the Tour de France) or in golf, how the cameras focus in on that player playing a round that is moving them up the leader board. Paintball is way to fast and frentic for that.

But your logic is flawed, as TV would give legitimacy in the world, when compared to things like skateboarding. Which went from weird flatlander competitions to vert ramp and street type courses in the late 70s to the 80s. But even Skateboarding can focus on one individual, who is the focus, not a team of 5-7 going against a like team.

First strike and other ACCURATE shaped projectiles are the future of the sport, along with the experience associated milsim games. The days of running around on AstroTurf, dressed like a clown, dumping a half a case of paint or more per elimination are dead, they just haven't stopped twitching yet. If manufacturers had spent the last 20 years or so going the original direction, I think they'd be much further ahead. Instead the pie must now be split with airsoft and other emerging competitors...

Never saw the appeal of airsoft, but i can see the advantages. But you again failed to see the big picture. Tppmann made forays into tournament style but never could shake the stigma of low end, woods ball beginner equipment. CCI Phantom in some 30 years only ever made slight changes. The pump market is as strong as it has ever been, even Inception Designs has made a dead gun cool again with the Ressurection and cocker parts and guns. I see more of those in the woods and big games than tournaments, but even mech only tournaments are trying to get started.

It will be interesting to see where things go, but right now it is not looking good. There seems to be a doubling down on paint sales as the life blood of the sport - leading the incestuous industry to attempt through multiple means (insurance, producing non-FSR compatible markers) to quash what is likely the only avenue forward if paintball is to exist in 10 more years.

-Calvin

No one ever tells you how to play paintball. You want to shoot a pump, go ahead. You want to dump 3 cases on a walk on day, be my guest. You want to shoot 20 year old mags, go for it. But i for one, won't stop playing. I love shooting people.i enjoy talking about paintball with friends. The game has changed because of technology (the semi, HPA, FSR-when you can use them), geographically, format (woods to hyperball, to airball, to buildings/castles), to however you want to play (pump, pistol, semi, electro). It is only up to you on whether the game changes with you or you change with the game. Don't like the field prices, go to a different field. Don't kike the field's refs, go some place else. Work with paintball, do not sit back and moan about ilthe "good ole'days".

[uv_halo]

uv_halo: i only stress to protect the walkons in that, when you have a birthday partt group or some preteens that have rentals and a hopper, they need protection from those that will dump half a case a game. No one wants that or needs to bunker a kid in a pickup game for nothing more than saying they did that. So yes, they need protecting because if you leave it up to the players, then you will have rental players not ahowing up because they will get murdered. Constantly slaughtering them does not foster an atmosphere of nurturing development in the sport. Picking on 12y/o children is not fun, and it should be up to the field to make sure they come back again, not only for their financial benefit but to build upon their player base.

Now, you must understand that in the 90s, paintball as a sport, wanted to get mainatream, to get into the realm of X-games. You can not do that in the woods. How else can you bring the sport to the spectator? You need to get out of the woods for that. You need to be able to present the game to the viewer. Being held in the woods, though part of where the game started l, does not lend itself to that. Remote woods means its hard to get to. So they did need to do speedball.

Also, speedball is what sold. Whether it was the Rate of Fire wars, where everyone was trying to hold the fastest gun, or the simple fact. In that era, you had guns of the month, proshops having the latest and greatest new guns, some by manufacturer, some by what was hot. Why, because that is what sold.by selling someone a $1200 gun, you know they where going to spend money on new packs, loaders barrels, etc. With that, they were good for cases of paint. You can only, normally sell one gun to a person, but you can sell hundreds of cases of paint to that 1 person. The faster the gun was , the more paint he ahot, the more money you make. Paintball economics.

Now, you did have a movement away from mil-sim in the beginning. It only made sense. Even if the field banned camo, it was because they wanted to sell you something. Do you realize why camo was used because it was cheap and it worked well in the woods. So, why not look like a paintballer? Its not a bad thing, becUse that proshop, that field want to make money off you.

Speedball is not what was, or what is selling now.

I agree!

We're getting into a lot of personal preference now. The idea of a half hour + single game sounds like a nightmare to me. I can't imagine new players would enjoy sneaking around for 20 minutes then getting one balled by a guy they never saw would be more fun than being out early in a 10 minute game, then getting to play again very soon.

Looking at it from a slightly different perspective, there is a case to be made that the fields, players, and manufacturers are all the victims of poor game design. In game development there's a 'Twinkie' known as 'single best strategy'. The most commonly used example is pistol sniping in HALO. It's a way of playing so effective that the only options are to use it, or lose and ***** about it. The strategy employed in speed-ball is the logical outcome of the rules of single elimination center flag. The equipment evolved to best serve that strategy. The field type almost doesn't matter. If there is a single best strategy the players will always find it.

The fields also followed suit. 'Cheep to come, expensive to compete' is definitely short sighted, but getting businesses to value what is best for an industry over the long haul vs what is best for themselves right now is a tough sell.

Again, I agree!

Good points. Additional variables would add more dynamism to the game. If first strike and technologies like it ever make significant inroads, how long before we see fast feeding FS loaders? I also doubt those inroads will materialize unless/until the average player starts seeing the FS player as having a gross advantage. Like how they assume they are losing to the space guns because of their RoF. "If I had that, I could win too".

I'm hoping to be proven wrong, but my suspicion is that FS will remain a novelty enjoyed by a minority of diehards just like the Flatline and Apex barrels. Which I find rather funny because new players often buy mil-sim markers on the basis that they look like they have greater range.

No one in my area told me what to play. I did tournaments and back some 16 years ago, doing big games with my team. The speedball was a personal choice, and the big games because of my friends at the time, because it was an event for me. Anyway, maybe i was ina better area, maybe i happened upon great fields, cause it seemed that you had horrible fields. But the horrible fields that i went to, i onky went once. And when i found my good fields, i stuck to them.

But, what speedball represented is a format that you didn't need acres of space, (space that costs money). It also allowed quick turnaround of games, it allowed lower overhead costs for staff, and easier containment of the players.

The field did evolve. Tournaments were played in the woods, they were played with pumps. The players wanted more, the players brought change to it. I do not know where you are at, but i am kinda in a hub. 4-6 hours i can be at EMR for the castle games. 4-6 hours i can be at Skirmish for their big game. In 2 hrs i can be at Top Gun for my home field. All of those fields are in the woods, but when the time comes will host speedball. Again, there is no basis for your accusations.

Ok, there is an entire CHANNEL dedicated to golf. It is boring to watch, if you don't play golf. I can't swing a dead cat for 10 miles without hitting 8 golf courses one even hosting a LPGA event i believe. And you can go out and play on the weekend and not be sore from running, or bruised from getting hit. But the golf and cycling industry has plenty of dedicated clothing lines (you have to look the part) and you can do it by yourself or as a group. But the key to those sports compared to paintball is, you can watch and know who is winning, you can see the person with the yellow or red jersey (in the Tour de France) or in golf, how the cameras focus in on that player playing a round that is moving them up the leader board. Paintball is way to fast and frentic for that.

But your logic is flawed, as TV would give legitimacy in the world, when compared to things like skateboarding. Which went from weird flatlander competitions to vert ramp and street type courses in the late 70s to the 80s. But even Skateboarding can focus on one individual, who is the focus, not a team of 5-7 going against a like team.

Never saw the appeal of airsoft, but i can see the advantages. But you again failed to see the big picture. Tppmann made forays into tournament style but never could shake the stigma of low end, woods ball beginner equipment. CCI Phantom in some 30 years only ever made slight changes. The pump market is as strong as it has ever been, even Inception Designs has made a dead gun cool again with the Ressurection and cocker parts and guns. I see more of those in the woods and big games than tournaments, but even mech only tournaments are trying to get started.



No one ever tells you how to play paintball. You want to shoot a pump, go ahead. You want to dump 3 cases on a walk on day, be my guest. You want to shoot 20 year old mags, go for it. But i for one, won't stop playing. I love shooting people.i enjoy talking about paintball with friends. The game has changed because of technology (the semi, HPA, FSR-when you can use them), geographically, format (woods to hyperball, to airball, to buildings/castles), to however you want to play (pump, pistol, semi, electro). It is only up to you on whether the game changes with you or you change with the game. Don't like the field prices, go to a different field. Don't kike the field's refs, go some place else. Work with paintball, do not sit back and moan about ilthe "good ole'days".

[cledford]

But your logic is flawed, as TV would give legitimacy in the world, when compared to things like skateboarding

Ok, there is an entire CHANNEL dedicated to golf. It is boring to watch, if you don't play golf. I can't swing a dead cat for 10 miles without hitting 8 golf courses one even hosting a LPGA event i believe. And you can go out and play on the weekend and not be sore from running, or bruised from getting hit. But the golf and cycling industry has plenty of dedicated clothing lines (you have to look the part) and you can do it by yourself or as a group. But the key to those sports compared to paintball is, you can watch and know who is winning, you can see the person with the yellow or red jersey (in the Tour de France) or in golf, how the cameras focus in on that player playing a round that is moving them up the leader board. Paintball is way to fast and frentic for that.
But your logic is flawed, as TV would give legitimacy in the world, when compared to things like skateboarding. Which went from weird flatlander competitions to vert ramp and street type courses in the late 70s to the 80s. But even Skateboarding can focus on one individual, who is the focus, not a team of 5-7 going against a like team.

BINGO!

Perfectly stated!!!!

(and I remember that issue too!)

As for working with paintball- I did my part, I joined the ASTM and voted on shaped projectiles and other standards. Even behind the scenes there are folks demonstrating their entrenchment in the speedball business model. Fortunately, there were just enough folks involved to get a consensus on the notion that shaped projectiles will be a good thing for the game.

Thank you for your efforts on this - I think they will pay off!

PS. Just noticed we both own FN303s :-)

[Menace_AO]

One good wall of text deserves another.

Calvin,

Your length of time in the sport and thoughtfulness here are well and good, but your posts make a number of questionable assumptions.

1. First, you seem to assume that paintball has had plenty of time to get its act together, as though 20 or 30 years is anything. It isn't. We are still spanking new, and there is plenty of settling yet to do before we even properly begin as a sport.

2. Second, you seem to assume that the modern format is just manufacturer driven, and it isn't, entirely. yes, they have a hand, but they also have to have something in hand.

Case in point: I absolute despise woodsball, in all of its forms, and always have. I hated it back in the 90s when I played competitively in the woods, and I will always hate it, because it is (to me) irritating and inferior in every respect.

No one plays golf, or tennis, or football, or soccer, or baseball, or most any other sport in the woods, because the trees get in the way. They make horrible bunkers, more horrible obstacles, and represent tripping hazards and all manner of other irritants.

The first time I played speedball I thought I'd died and gone to heaven, and I knew someone, somewhere, had finally begun to be rational about paintball.

3. Third, you assume that paintball needs to get back to its roots, as though that is somehow more pure or superior to the modern format. The roots of paintball are both unknown and irrelevant to almost every player on planet earth, as well they should be.

I'd bet money that less than a percent of a percent of people even know the roots of paintball, and less than a percent of that fraction care.

Twelve guys settling a city boy v. country boy bet with lousy equipment, silly objectives, and unsafe conditions doesn't sound like a good time, or anything noble to which to aspire.

And speaking of the roots of paintball, how 'bout that gear? You talk of modern gear as clownish, which is your taste-claim. You are welcome to it.

For my part, I think wearing camo and doing anything remotely milsim is clownish. I want to die, or weep, of pity and embarrassment every time I see anyone wearing camo, or sporting anything remotely military-seeming, because it is both silly to look at (opinion) and demonstrably wretched in terms of every measurable performance aspect on the paintball field (fact).

It gives me the shivers, and I say that as someone who used to wear (and hate) that junk back when it was the fashion of the day.

I like clown ball gear, because it is more comfortable and weather-friendly, infinitely more durable, it actually improves play, doesn't take itself seriously, and it doesn't pretend to be something it isn't.

We are shooting bath beads at one another in a glorified children's game of tag. That's it. Nothing more. It's pretty silly and undignified when you think about it, and that's a good thing.

It isn't war, it isn't a blood sport, it's just fun, even when it is competitive.

4. Fourth, you assume that manufacturers wanted viewable ball simply to make money. To a degree, of course. What else is there? Every manufacturer had better want to make money, or get out of business. But that isn't why they did it. They did it because they wanted the sport to grow (more money and fun for everyone), and as I'm sure you remember, paintball had a huge public image problem because of the assumption that it was a bunch of idiot hayseed paramilitary wannabes.

In other words, mil-sim was bad for the sport.

Bringing it out into the open did more than just make it watchable for entertainment. It made it more visible to scrutiny and hence more respectable.

And in my opinion, it made it a billion times more fun to play than it had ever been in those wretched woods.

Finally, you assume that shaped projectiles are the way of the future, or that people should use them, simply because they make 'better' projectiles. Shaped projectiles are fine, if that's what you like to shoot. Go in peace, and shoot all you like.

Tom Kaye recognized and voiced many of the points you've already made about shaped projectiles, yet also pointed out that they are completely impractical and it's a lot more fun to just dump pods and shoot lots of paint at people.

He was a 'spray and pray', 'accuracy by volume' kind of guy, and I agree.

That's part of the reason why he developed the automag, and then updated it to be able to shoot even faster.

[Nobody]

[Patron God of Pirates]

A lot of this is still a discussion of personal preference. When I was younger I fell in love with speed ball mostly because most of my friends tried to play 'sniper' 'camper' style in the woods and I rolled them easily on an air field. Now I'm pushing 40 and I prefer to have a lot of different field types to mix things up. The only game types I don't enjoy are respawns or attack/defend games where movement is limited for one team. I'll play pump most days unless the competition level is high (or I had a crap week and just need a few cathartic games of squid farming).

The point of all of this is that this thread has drifted from OP's point. I'm wondering if anyone has any data to back up or disprove the assertion that paintball did have a lost decade. Sure lots of companies went under or were bought out, but that doesn't necessarily mean poor growth overall. What metric should we be using? Do we have any data that's non anecdotal?

[uv_halo]

First, I want to say I appreciate the civil discourse. Second, in the hopes of reducing walls of text, I’m not going to reply point by point but rather cover some themes that I see as key.

I can’t speak for Calvin but, when I say Industry I’m not talking strictly about manufacturers. They had a part to play but, the bigger problem were the tournament promoters and the media types.

I’m not against speedball- what I’m getting at is that when paintball distilled itself down to the point of where nearly every game is speedball, it became unsustainable. It’s what keeps most folks from continuing to play after their first couple outtings- it doesn’t take very long before they realize that it’s all the same, they get bored, and they quit. Some folks really like the format- they appreciate the subtleties in gameplay but, PGOP put it well when he talked about ‘single best strategy’ as it pertains to speedball.

I’m not looking at paintball (as it exists today) and saying that I wish it was like the old days. What I’m really getting at re-aligning the game to the new players expectations (like it or not, they are thinking of a more combat-tilted activity than ‘long range tag’) and that the industry took a big wrong turn towards speedball and that an alternative path could have been taken and it should be considered now. IMHO, fields should really focus on providing an experience bigger than ‘long range tag’.

As for clothing quality it is entirely driven by where the money is expected to come from. Special Ops paintball produced excellent woodsball clothing and effectively opened the market for quality, durable camo playing gear. Speedball gear got a jump start as tournament players needed something to play in when they banned camo, and the manufacturers and media types figured they could leverage tournament player usage in advertising.

As for a type of roundball gun necessitating a certain change of style- I would argue that any such change of tactics associated with a gun (stock class, pump, semi, full) are much more subtler than when you change projectiles in a mixed-projectile environment. The way I played did not significantly change from when I was playing pump, to semi, to full auto. When I started shooting First Strikes at $.75 a shot out of an 8rd mag on fields verses double-finger semi, and full auto, I had to change drastically to have the same/similar success ratio without spending excessive amounts of money.

The final theme that I’ve noticed is that several folksarguing for speedball refer to paintball as a sport. This could be a fundamental source of disagreement. I don’t think paintball is really a sport like the NFL, NBA, or even Dodgeball or Kickball. It’s a game certainly but, I think the industry (again to include the media and others) turned to speedball, they were also pushing for this to be a sport and they made changes to the game to make it more sports like. Again, I think this was misguided. If paintball was a sport, I imagine that it would be more like a First Person Shooter in e-sports. It’s too hard to run that (scoring, reffing, etc) in real life though without a serious technological investment. Imagine what it would take to start with a modern simunition activity (force on force encounter in the woods or, a building clearing scenario) and turning that into a competitive sports league. It’d be very, very strange in my opinion if it’d be possible at all.

As for the OP’s post. I would say no, there is no evidence that significant numbers of folks stopped coming when SP started enforcing its patents. In my observations, the tournament scene imploded well after this largely because the limits of the game (technological and game format) were reached and the economy turned downwards.

[barkingspider]

+1 comment concerning the tone of civil discourse. There have been a lot of experienced individuals chime in where I feel they carry reputable stock in their comments. Interesting to hear the comments and encouraging more. Overall, I thing many can smile with the short evolution and adaptability the sport has sustained and mutated into for the sake of survival and prosperity. I was hooked back in the early nineties when the PMI tracer came out. Its funny to see the industry's perception when i got into in comparison to now. I've been trying to dig up my distribution catalogs, this is where I convinced my family to setup a dealers account and provide their FFL # so Davison and PMI would wholesale paintball items to their business. I pushed hard with my family since it was very hard paying $10 for 100 paintballs in a plastic ziplock bag from Pegleg.

[cledford]

Outstanding post! One comment, which is more of a nit-pic...

I made reference in an earlier post to the "incestuous" nature of the industry. Most of the manufacturers were/are also the tournament promoters. (if not officially, which often was the case too, even when unofficially they were still the main source of the funding and therefore had enormous influence) Heck most of the "manufacturers" started off as or became players and many also owned league teams! This influence also extended to the paintball "media". APG and the other sport rags existing not on sales/subscriptions, rather on advertising revenue. Considering that, who led who on the trends that steered things to the final destination?

Otherwise I agree with everything stated!

-Calvin

First, I want to say I appreciate the civil discourse. Second, in the hopes of reducing walls of text, I’m not going to reply point by point but rather cover some themes that I see as key.

I can’t speak for Calvin but, when I say Industry I’m not talking strictly about manufacturers. They had a part to play but, the bigger problem were the tournament promoters and the media types.

I’m not against speedball- what I’m getting at is that when paintball distilled itself down to the point of where nearly every game is speedball, it became unsustainable. It’s what keeps most folks from continuing to play after their first couple outtings- it doesn’t take very long before they realize that it’s all the same, they get bored, and they quit. Some folks really like the format- they appreciate the subtleties in gameplay but, PGOP put it well when he talked about ‘single best strategy’ as it pertains to speedball.

I’m not looking at paintball (as it exists today) and saying that I wish it was like the old days. What I’m really getting at re-aligning the game to the new players expectations (like it or not, they are thinking of a more combat-tilted activity than ‘long range tag’) and that the industry took a big wrong turn towards speedball and that an alternative path could have been taken and it should be considered now. IMHO, fields should really focus on providing an experience bigger than ‘long range tag’.

As for clothing quality it is entirely driven by where the money is expected to come from. Special Ops paintball produced excellent woodsball clothing and effectively opened the market for quality, durable camo playing gear. Speedball gear got a jump start as tournament players needed something to play in when they banned camo, and the manufacturers and media types figured they could leverage tournament player usage in advertising.

As for a type of roundball gun necessitating a certain change of style- I would argue that any such change of tactics associated with a gun (stock class, pump, semi, full) are much more subtler than when you change projectiles in a mixed-projectile environment. The way I played did not significantly change from when I was playing pump, to semi, to full auto. When I started shooting First Strikes at $.75 a shot out of an 8rd mag on fields verses double-finger semi, and full auto, I had to change drastically to have the same/similar success ratio without spending excessive amounts of money.

The final theme that I’ve noticed is that several folksarguing for speedball refer to paintball as a sport. This could be a fundamental source of disagreement. I don’t think paintball is really a sport like the NFL, NBA, or even Dodgeball or Kickball. It’s a game certainly but, I think the industry (again to include the media and others) turned to speedball, they were also pushing for this to be a sport and they made changes to the game to make it more sports like. Again, I think this was misguided. If paintball was a sport, I imagine that it would be more like a First Person Shooter in e-sports. It’s too hard to run that (scoring, reffing, etc) in real life though without a serious technological investment. Imagine what it would take to start with a modern simunition activity (force on force encounter in the woods or, a building clearing scenario) and turning that into a competitive sports league. It’d be very, very strange in my opinion if it’d be possible at all.

As for the OP’s post. I would say no, there is no evidence that significant numbers of folks stopped coming when SP started enforcing its patents. In my observations, the tournament scene imploded well after this largely because the limits of the game (technological and game format) were reached and the economy turned downwards.

[vintage]