Someone fill me in...

[slateman]

I have been out of paintball for a couple years, but after relocating to a new area I am thinking about picking it up again. As I have started looking to buy a new marker I am amazed by how cheap guns are! Cockers are commonly 100-200 dollars, impulses and others are under 250 with considerable modifications, and many other (to me) "high end" electronics are 400 and 500 bucks. When did this come about, and why? For the years I did play paintball prices never changed so much...


j

thats cus cockers are still annoying to fix and impulses pretty much stink. Trust me, there is still some great stuff to break the bank on

[Pneumagger]

jaco... the best advice I can offer is to look for 1-2 year old high ends that aren't "AGG". AGG is like a term for cool or "the in thing". The kids over look these and often sell them cheap. You can really get a great bang for your buck. I picked up a used viking for $300 that can absolutly outshoot anything on the field any given day in any mode while still being more reliable and efficient. But apparently I'm informed by kids they are "old" and "worthless".

Non-AGG Nice Guns to look into:
Vikings/Excaliburs - Used around $250-$350 <--- Fast, extremely rugged, Fast, and really fast
Mech RTP Mags - $250-$450+ <--- Reliable and Ageless
E-Cockers- $250 <--- If you know how to service them... you can find unbelievable deals
"Older" Angels - $200-$400 <--- Still just as fast and reliable as any current high end
Used Intimidators $300 <--- Bob long comes out with a "new" timmy every weekend killing resale.

Basically, look for a "previous edition" gun as the AGG kiddies avoid these like the plague. For example, a used '06 ego runs about $1000 while the used '05 ego is $600.

[warbeak2099]

Look into an 04 or 05 Borg too. They are of comparable quality and performance to Vikings. In fact, alot of Borg owners used to be Viking owners and vice-versa. You can pick those up for $350-500. And the 06's will come down that low after the 07 Borgs come out.

[gus13]

I bought an ICD Promaster (my first ever electro) for $375 last month (basically a wanna-be Timmy) you look now and they're going for about $250, next month I'm betting they'll be even less!! so far though it has been a decent marker for the cost although it didn't come w/ an ASA and the stock reg is a little bulkier than I prefer it to be.

[jacojone]

Basically these guys have it explained.

About four or five years ago, we started seeing more and more Spyder clones- basically the same gun, but made by a different company, or made by the same company for a different retailer, etc. So you ended up with ten or fifteen cheap blowback copies available.

They started adding what can really only be called "bling" to them in an effort to improve sales- chrome parts, fancy milling, gauges, add on trinkets like sight rails, etc.

Shortly thereafter, we saw a huge wave of E-frames appear. Same blowback gun and cheap construction, but now it had an electronic sear, and of course the requisite cheater modes like full auto and ramping. Prices, however, continued to drop.

So for a while there, you could get a decent, but not great, electronic blowback for under $150. Also keep in mind that all this time, places like Wal-Mart, K-Mart and other big-box stores started carrying not only guns, but masks and paint, and you could start getting prepackaged kits (gun, loader, tank, mask, etc.) for dirt cheap.

Then, two years ago or so, Smart Parts released the Ion, a sort of "poor man's" '03 Shocker, designed from the get-go to be cheap (plastic body, die-cast grip frame, cheap parts) but also quite functional (it had built-in anti-chop eyes, a decent rate of fire, pretty good efficiency, and generally works pretty well) available at the beginning for about $250. Not much more than the better cheap E-blowbacks.

The Spyder clones were already selling by the supertankerloads, and the Ion was seen as a step up from those. Kids sold off the cheap Spyder clones to buy Ions, and even players with better or more expensive guns would buy Ions to have a cheap "beater" gun for either backup or for play on really nasty days (lots of dust, muddy/rainy, etc.)

The price on the Ion has come down at least twice since then, and can now be had brand new for something like $180 retail.

And, as the other fellows pointed out, that cut the knees out from under the resale market. A used Ion is worth maybe $100 if it works, and you can buy parts junkers all day long for $50 a pop. Used Spyder clones, even ones with E-frames, and working, are about the same- $50 to $100, tops, depending on how many goodies you throw in.

Add to that the big retailers' "gun of the week" programs, where they release some "new" version of a marker by giving it different milling or a different anno pattern (IE, the Angel A4, A4 Fly, A4 Rasta, etc. and the twenty different versions of Intimidator that were functionally identical, but had different milling.) This essentially trained the average player that any marker that came before the latest version, was old and slow and obsolete, so there was- and continues to be- a huge amount of turnover during the spring and summer.

Players buy the newest/latest and sell their old one- which might only be four or six months old by that point- typically fora big loss. A gun that started out at $1,200 might barely fetch $600 or $700, and two or three months later, when sold a third time, might be down to $400 or $500.

Look around- you can get Angels for $500, or even "old" LCDs for $250, fully functional. You can get Intimidators that started out at $1,200, for less than $300 today, with relatively little wear and years of life left.

Doc.

Money money than sense? Seems so for many of these kiddies...


Thank you all so much for these replies, it has really given me a good feelling of what is going on in paintball.

Despite many of the anti SP sentiments, which I agree with, the Impulse may be had for very cheap. I am currently looking at a number of those, along with some cheap mechanical cockers, vikings, and other guns I once hoped of owning...


j

[warbeak2099]

There's no reason to get an Impulse when you can get a nice Viking for the same price.

[Lenny]

Despite many of the anti SP sentiments, which I agree with, the Impulse may be had for very cheap. I am currently looking at a number of those, along with some cheap mechanical cockers, vikings, and other guns I once hoped of owning...


j

Shoebox Shockers FTW! Old, bulky, and slow, but I just can't over how they shoot! I love it.

(Did I really just say "FTW"? Dang...)

[jacojone]

There's no reason to get an Impulse when you can get a nice Viking for the same price.

...except imp is 200ish, vikings I see are 300-400?

[BD_Paintball]

if you are looking for a very good gun for around 500 start looking for pm6's with a UL frame. i have seen several get sold for 500.

[Sir_Brass]

heck man, stay mech! PPS Blazer or any of AGD's mech mag lines.

Thing is that the mech mags are stupidly fast. So much so that it boggles the mind

[jenarelJAM]

You guys keep menioning that Vikings and Excals are rediculously cheap. Last I checked, the 03 vikes were around 350-450, and the 04 vikes about 400-500. Then if they have upgrades, add a little bit.
Mine, with a barrel kit, was $585 shipped, but it had tadao, new trigger, new feedneck, unimount, barrel kit like I said, and it was an 04. I love it. It was worth every penny.

[Chaos_Theory!]

'Mags are still the best, though. AGD quality hasn't changed.

Ignorance is bliss. I thought most mag owners were beyond the "my marker is bettere then any othyer marker" phase.

[pump]

i bought a non functional B2K for 50 bucks....hey it was 1200 retail 4 or so years ago.....for people like me that love to fix things and own that super cocker, now is the golden era.

[Lenny]

Ignorance is bliss. I thought most mag owners were beyond the "my marker is bettere then any othyer marker" phase.

Well, we are AO for a reason...

You must remember, that's just my opinion. I love my 'Mag. It's upgradable, reliable, easy to maintain, and very easy to modify and customize (though pricey at times). That's why I love it. There are plenty of other great guns out there, I know that. But no other gun I've ever owned can compare to my Automag (well, semi-auto wise). It just has something the others don't, at least to me. I recommend it over all.

But then, I do love Shoebox Shockers, my '03 Shocker, Gen-E Matrixes, a handful of 'Cockers, etc. I'm on my way to being a gun whore.

Semi wise for me, it's the Automag. Pump wise, Sheridan all the way!

[mobsterboy]

...except imp is 200ish, vikings I see are 300-400?

200. WHAT? unless its got everythign aftermarket and is a sweet 1 of 1 milling and anno, I wouldnt pay 200 for an impulse. All the ones i've picked up in the last couple months have been in the 150 range. Rat, Toxic, Ton Ton...Had a deal for a sweet Strange but i bailed on account of I ran out of money to be a Imp whore