Thresholds of Human Action Potentals and Debouce Times

[Butterfingers]

also the pull of a trigger requires a pull and a release before the second finger can even actuate the trigger... so 2 potentals need to be fired sequentially one for the pull the other for the release. This equals 14ms...

Even if you could get another finger in there staggering it even neglecting the action potentials needed to coordinate actions the fastest you could move the trigger using 2 fingers would still be 7 ms.

[Miscue]

Well, if you're raking it or catching the edge of the trigger... you don't have to let go for the trigger to release because you scraped by it. Look at a roller trigger, for instance... you don't really release it in the normal way.

[Butterfingers]

you have an intresting point it would be feasable if there were 2 lumps on your finger and it actuated the trigger like a cam using one stroke and only one action potential. But then that violates the NPPL definition of a trigger pull. One shot fired per pull and release...

[Kaiser Bob]

a multi bumpped trigger like a gator that you can rake will fire off 3 or 4 shots per stroke, up or down while remaining legal under the rules, physical contact with the trigger pulling it past the point of fire and then moving the finger so the trigger goes back to starting point, 1 pull 1 shot, just in extremely rapid succession. Basically a more efficent use of a finger movement, thereby increasing the human max ROF by up to eight times, 4 shots per stroke, 8 on a motion similar to a pull and release, just vertically.

[TheTramp]

Originally posted by Miscue
But that is only if you have one arm... or one finger. You have the second finger to get in there right after the first. You cannot sustain this, of course. I'm talking a 2 round burst.

Now obviously when you walk a trigger you can shoot faster than when just pulling with one finger. My questions is (and this is the tie in to the nerve idea): when walking, do you shoot twice as fast as you would when just pulling with one finger? My ideas on this are:

1) yes, twice as fast
2) no, 1.5 times as fast (I made up this number. It means faster than one finger but not twice as fast) because you lose at least some speed due to cordinating two finger monvent
3) yes but more than twice as fast. Could be that when walking you can get a repetative motion going that allows your fingers to move faster than they would with just one twitching.

[TheTramp]

Originally posted by Miscue
Well, if you're raking it or catching the edge of the trigger... you don't have to let go for the trigger to release because you scraped by it. Look at a roller trigger, for instance... you don't really release it in the normal way.

I think the idea of raking is getting away from the point.

I think we've seen that:

1) most people shooting with debounce on 0 shoot faster than when they set it on 7.
2) if we accept that even the nerve impulses take at least 7ms you shouldn't shoot any faster by setting the debounce lower than this because you couldn't possible be beating the 7ms.


Now, I've seen a lot of people who shoot faster at 1 then they do at 7. If they had one of those trigger that's made specificly for raking I can understand this as they can give you more than one shot per finger motion (notice I didn't say trigger pull because I understand that the trigger is ligitimatly moving back and forth). It's this more than one shot per movment that strays from the 7ms nerve idea.

It seems like raking a special bumpy triger can allow you to beat nature!

[Oddball]

well I like the thread, but I don't really understand the point of it. Basically Butters, you are saying that the limit of the nerve impulses is 7/1000 of a sec, which equals the therorectical limit of 143 shots/sec. You said that this does not include the muscles moving and what not. This is like saying that my '85 Sentra, with 70 horse power and a gear ratio of x:y means my car can, in theory, go 700 mph, not including the mass of the car, wind resistance, ect. Lord knows I have a hard time breaking 90 mph.

I do think that most of the electro guns out must "help" people get a higher rate of fire, and not just with a short, light trigger pull. what would be neat would be to give person whom has never played paintball an WAS timmy and let them hammer a way. should they be able to get 15 bps after a few minutes with the gun? i don't think so but I beat most could.

The little trick that I always think about whenever bps comes up is the dollar bill trick, where one person holds a bill vertical from the top while a second person places a thumb and finger (open) around the bottom of the bill. The person holding the bill lets go of it and the person with the finger and thumb tries to grab it, or pinch it, as it falls. I don't know for sure how long it takes the bill to pass the 2nd persons hand but they can't grab it (from what I have seen) even though they know that they are suppose to. Maybe I will try the calculate it tomarrow. Now if humans can't grab a simple bill being dropped, how can they get 20 bps by moving their fingers alone and not have "help"?

Sorry for any spelling errors, it is late and I did just back from the bar

[MrWallen]

Originally posted by Kaiser Bob a multi bumpped trigger like a gator that you can rake will fire off 3 or 4 shots per stroke, up or down while remaining legal under the rules, physical contact with the trigger pulling it past the point of fire and then moving the finger so the trigger goes back to starting point, 1 pull 1 shot, just in extremely rapid succession. Basically a more efficent use of a finger movement, thereby increasing the human max ROF by up to eight times, 4 shots per stroke, 8 on a motion similar to a pull and release, just vertically.

No, this is illegal (I'm almost positive), since this "stroke" would count as the trigger pull, and multiples shots with a single stroke isn't allowed. You're moving your finger in one direction only (up or down), and getting more than one shot out of it.

EDIT:
Oddball, someone already posted a similar experiment, but with a ruler instead of a dollar bill. This situation is a little different I think. If YOU were the one dropping AND catching the dollar bill, you would have no problem because you knew when it was going to happen. With a marker, there is no outside force causing you to have to react. I don't think reaction time is the issue at hand here.

[Kaiser Bob]

Originally posted by MrWallen


No, this is illegal (I'm almost positive), since this "stroke" would count as the trigger pull, and multiples shots with a single stroke isn't allowed. You're moving your finger in one direction only (up or down), and getting more than one shot out of it.

EDIT:
Oddball, someone already posted a similar experiment, but with a ruler instead of a dollar bill. This situation is a little different I think. If YOU were the one dropping AND catching the dollar bill, you would have no problem because you knew when it was going to happen. With a marker, there is no outside force causing you to have to react. I don't think reaction time is the issue at hand here.

Nope, because if you analyze it, the motion of your finger from the top of the bump pushes the trigger to activate, then you move your finger lower to release the trigger to start, then move further down to pull the trigger again. That is 1 shot per pull, trigger going back, firing and going forward and that is all the rule requires, it dosent say 1 per pull except for when you are trying to get more then 1 shot out of a finger stroke by moving your finger up and down instead of back and forth.

[lord1234]

ok smart bio boys....
now..build me a contraption that would send pulses to my finger muscles every 10 milliseconds without causing extreme pain...can it be done?

--lord

[Furby]

I'd volunteer to have a neural network installed to allow me to fire my marker via direct neural impulse...just have to figure out where to put the jack...

[davidb]

I'm going to get away from the physiological aspects of the discussion for a tick and get to the reason it was brought up in the first place - cheater boards.

We've all seen those posts on other forums where people show the pic of the LCD on their Intimidator reading "30-something BPS", or however high that got. I think I remember one at 34, or around there. They achieved these numbers by putting the debounce all the way down, turning the marker upside down, sacrificing a goat, and praying to Jesus, Allah, Buddah, Vishnu, and the patron saint of electronics. Basically, in the most absolutely favorable conditions they could come up with, PLUS electronic assistance (which even they themselves acknowledged), they still were just able to break 30 CPS, or at least closer to 30 than 40.

With that said, why should anyone feel any need to set their debounce settings any lower than, say, 20 ms? Or, for the sake of argument, why don't we just say 15? The only way, according to what I've caught from Butters' posts, to exceed that limit would be to:

Have both fingers (which have near zero mass but near infinite force to accelerate them) in position ready to fire the trigger, order the first finger to pull, count in your head for eight or nine milliseconds, and then simultaneously order your first finger to return, and your second finger to begin travel. Your first finger, with luck and superb timing, will succeed in reversing its stroke just as it completes the trigger pull, allowing the second finger to pull the trigger just as it is released.

After doing some quick calculations in my head, I conclude that setting a minimum debounce time of 15 ms for any marker with the setting available would cause each player using said markers to miss shots on an average of one time every 58 years, 8 months, 23 days, 4 hours, and 13 minutes, assuming a 365 and 1/4 day year. Much as I would feel sorry for their loss, I for one believe that it is not too steep a price to pay to make the game that much more fair.

[MrWallen]

Originally posted by Kaiser Bob


Nope, because if you analyze it, the motion of your finger from the top of the bump pushes the trigger to activate, then you move your finger lower to release the trigger to start, then move further down to pull the trigger again. That is 1 shot per pull, trigger going back, firing and going forward and that is all the rule requires, it dosent say 1 per pull except for when you are trying to get more then 1 shot out of a finger stroke by moving your finger up and down instead of back and forth.

I'm gonna stand by my statement: I think it's illegal. That's why not everyone is using roller triggers right now, they aren't allowed.

davidb: Did your friend have a WAS board in his marker? If so, I think there was a recent post in one of the forums here in which Budd Orr (I think) and one other guy got a device to measure bps, and it turned out the WAS board was inflating results, by only taking the BPS of the fastest two shots in a string, and then like adding 10 bps to that number , or something like that.
And how would turning the gun upside down help? Without paint, there is more recoil in the marker, making it more difficult to walk. With this in mind I've always gone under the assumption that however fast you can shoo dryfiring, you can shoot a little faster with paint.

[epterry]

Hmmm very interesting. I love the few smart people on AO (not that I am one of them). I really wish you had more time to post Butter. Oh well I guess I will just have to wait until I get to collage at MIT to be with lots of other smart people. Sigh. I remember that when I first joined more of the people/threads on AO were worth listening to/reading. Now it seems like more of the threads are just “if u putt moor then 1 sticker on ur gun it shots farther.” I said all of this in hopes to encourage you to post more. Thanks

[Kaiser Bob]

Check the NPPL rules man, the paragragh on trigger legality is like 2 lines. All it says is the trigger is to be pulled to firing point and only 1 shot comes out. Thats it. To make ridged triggers illegal would require either an inference to something in the rules that isnt there, or a revision of the rules