Tournament Advice thread

[Carbon]

this will be an on going thread. please help out.

Aside from the obvious "dont get shot" some of tehse should be obvious. Most of tehse generally fall under networking skill and ability.

Respect the refs. say "thank you" "please" or "sir" or whatever the situation dictates. It may not mean much, but if you continue this behavior you will devlop a rep as a classy team. And you'de be surprised what that will do for you.

Controll your equipment. Having a hot gun is inexcusable. Having an ramping/bouncing/illegal gun is inexcusable, (unless ramping or wahtever is ok duh) Why risk a DQ or 1 gun short situation, that technological edge it is not worth the points lost.

get plenty of rest the night before.

always ahve a 2 minute turnaround time mentality. Always be ready sometimes a different team in a diff. bracket will want to sub you. Hey its more playing time, get your moneys worth.

make sure you know your schedule. so you know who to watchout for.

more as they come...

its all about the points. in the prelims, in the semis and in the finals. Points points points.

have fun.

be cuerteous to the staff members of the field.

you represent your team. wther you like it or not.

thank your sponsors.

invite other teams to scrim your team when you get a chance, especially when you take top place.

[Enemy]

watch other teams in your division noting how they like to break out.

look for unusaul bunkers on the feild ie open area where only one bunker has the angle!! sid of a layed down x those will suck you in very well!!

snap and always talk..duh!!


always have gun up when your looking around you may only have one open shot dont waste it!!


be prepared for something to break it always does make sure your team knows that you are having an issue and get it resolved asap! if you cant chill call out positions throw paint if its centerflag grab the flag in all but nxl thats big points!!

screw drilling with teams in your div. drill with teams in the next up div you can learn alot from these guys!!

some of these are no brainers but hey why not list them anyway

oh and lastly always have 3-4 spare guns ready with paint just incase something does go wrong before the game starts!!

[Python14]

Some may call it unethical, I call it using your resources. Don't setup away from the other teams tables. Be as "in the group" as possible. The reason is you can pick up on other teams plans from time to time. Players are notorious, myself included, for being quite proud of a unique gameplan and with pride comes confidence and complacency. Take advantage of that and listen to what's going on in the staging area.

A mid-day nap can do wonders. I always eat a good, high calorie lunch then take a 20 minute nap. Any longer and it messes things up. DO NOT NAP DURING GAMES THOUGH! If their are players on the field, watch them.

Get some lil brothers or sisters or GFs or BFs or whatever together to be pod-fillers. If theirs one thing that you shouldn't be concerned with, it's filling pods. If worse comes to worse, buy alot of pods and have them filled for atleast 3 or 4 games worth. It's not the cheapest way, but filling pods is just something you shouldn't be doing while you are trying to watch a game.

No energy drinks. Drink water and limit yourself to maybe one gatorade/sport drink later in the day, or around lunch time. Water is the important thing.

Front guys: Use your back guys as starting blocks. They aren't going anywhere fast anyway. Plus if you practice it a little bit, they can sorta give you that push/burst you'll need off the break

Back guys: Take notes. When you walk the fields, write info down and study it. When you watch games, make profiles of each team. Figure out their habits, their favorite bunkers, their weakspots. You are the key to your teams success on and off the field. Your front guys are nothing more than tools (I'm a front guy btw).....use them.

Captains: Relax. If theirs one thing that can hurt a team drastically, it's seeing the head of the team freaking out. Morale is important, especially when you have newer players on the team/field. Radiate confidence, even if you don't feel like it.

If traveling out of town, bring your own pillow and if needed be, sheets. One thing I've learned from traveling all over is that hotel pillows tend to be hard, and sheets tend to be rough. As a result, I toss and turn at night trying to find a comfortable spot. If you have a good nights rest, you'll play better.


Eat fruit. It's quick, easy, cheap, and best of all.....a fantastic source of alot of the nutrients and vitamins you will need during the day. Apples and Bananas are my personal favorite, but oranges are good too.

Be quiet in the staging area. Listening is more important. Plus, you don't want to be the team that everyone can predict because their mouthy back center tells the whole gameplan to some kid from the team two tables over. But that doesn't mean don't be friendly. Be as friendly as you want, just know whats good conversation and whats spilling the beans. Being friendly also grants you brownie points with other teams. I don't know how many times I've gotten help from other teams, teams I'm playing against mind you, because I introduced myself earlier.

Lose your shame. If it's hot out, I lay down in the grass with my jersey over my head and pants lossened. Being comfortable for the next game is good.

Stay warm at the cold tournaments. If they are allowed, bring a heater of some kind.

Oh yeah, Don't get shot. It tends to mean you are out.

[abunkerer]

make sure everyone knows what their job is before they go on the field...as you set up on the starting block you dont want to hear anyone saying "where should I go, what do you want me to do" they should know that before hitting the field.

[ben-afficial]

never argue with the ref....it has dier consiquenses.....i mean...i got pulled for being low on paint...seriously...the ref said that.... and it was just me and 1 opponent

[68magOwner]

our team generally goes into a tourney really chill/relaxed, the first BS call or game we get, we dont ***** about it then, we just take that to the next game, by semi's we are usally ready to tear peoples heads off (we have yet to lose a game in the semi's this season). Our problem is that sometimes (first tourney this season) we got happy after not dropping a single player in any of the semi games, so, sucked in finals. Second tourney, shaped up, held onto first.

So- relax, instead of yelling at refs/players, take it out on the next team, dont let down, dont be stupid, talk alot, dont have multiple people reloading at once, coordinate runs before game, dont get shot, shoot people, dont shoot teammates.

[Carbon]

Look for blind shots. Not blind firing but, shots that land on a bunker without an obvious line of sight.

[Carbon]

assign a field captain. the guy who makes the plans for the game.

[Ack]

No matter how bad the wheels fall off the bus, don't come back screaming about who's fault it was. Discuss what happend and how to change it.

Talk to teams that have played the squad your going to play next, usually (esp. if they were on the losing end) they may give you a different perspective on the other teams break/habits

chrono chrono chrono -- hot guns kill

try to have more than one guy have a clue about fixing markers (preferably one who isn't playing)

Batteries... buy em.. use em.. toss em (Don't know how many times I've seen ppls halos/reloaders go down cuz they didn't put in new batteries)

Watch games (I know it was said before but..) your great game plan may have been tried 10x before you get to the box and each time it was blown up... doesn't mean you will... but the odds are good

Find the lanes and figure out how to run them.. a straight line may be quickest.. but it may also get you smoked

Look at the angles past the 50.. if your pushing them off the field you don't want it to be a suprise when you get to their 40

Tha's all the none technique things I got off the top of my head... g'luck

[Athius]

Have fun with your teammates hell get drunk too. I know is not sporty to get drunk but what the hell it ease the pain of the shots lol



Oh and never ever bring your girlfriend or wife to the tourney. She will get bored and will start *****in around.

[Blazestorm]

Always respect the other team and play them as if you were playing the best team in the league, as hard as you could.

Even if they haven't won a game, play as hard as you can, not to "own" them, but to show them they weren't ready and need to spend more time practicing before they should enter another event. Kind of a hard-*** way, but it does get the point across to them.

[ben-afficial]

thats a good plan of action unless you meet a team thats making the point

[mandatory]

thanks for all the advice. Im a new player to the torunament world and appreciate all the info. Im starting out playing all the 3-man tournays at my local fields so do you have any 3-man specific advice. i.e....breakout setups that work best and what to do when you go one man down as well as what you do when you go one man up? hopefully i can graduate to 5-man/ 7-man and jump on a fun team. I also hane little expierence playing with air bunkers. i mostly played on a hyperball coarse but am playing on air bll fields more often. what are the little seacreats to playin air bunkers?

[Jerhew]

first secret...there are NO A's in the word secret

only other thing i can think of...
people generally run longer barrels 14"+ on sup-air bunkers...so you can lean into the bunker and not have it bulge in front of your barrel
kind of good to know for people like me...who love 10" barrels

[Automaggot68]

When in Doubt, Pull a Jeremy Salm.

When in doubt, Pull a Chris Lasoya