Originally posted by rabidchihauhau
Paintball72 - there's no 'pie' to steal; all I wanted was a piece...
Roguefactor - oy...
why did people feel threatened?
let's see. in 1992 I took away the paint manufacturer's ability to host national events that were Tournament Paint Only when we introed NPPL. The teams wanted it and all the smaller mfgs who couldn't afford to host their own national events were at least a little positively inclined, but it left others with money po-ed. They had pretty much had a guaranteed bully pulpit for their chosen teams/product up till then.
The NPPL made others feel threatened because I was on a 'mission from god' to bring fairness to the game and some people wanted the ability to promote themselves, their teams and their products without having to bother with 'winning'. Up till that point, events were pretty much a foregone conclusion as to who was going to win. It started with 'promoters' not even posting the scores, making it eminently easy to 'fix' the outcome. Later, as things tightened up, the fixing became much more subtle - selecting the fields/stations teams started from, putting a particular reffing crew on a field, manipulating the prelim schedule, assessing or not assessing major penalties outside of the rulebook, etc.
I insisted on higher standards at every event I did. Instead of one or two basic portajohns, I brought in ten or 12, set some aside for women, and rented the wedding ones, with sinks and larger areas. Instead of 'a field out in the middle of nowhere', we went to fairgrounds that were less expensive and had better facilities. Instead of the minimum number of refs per field, I added two to four more bodies. I gave the teams their entire schedule of games up front, before the event. Instead of working with hotels to UP the room rate so I could pocket a few extra dollars, I booked blocks of rooms and passed the savings on to the teams. To keep teams from using hotel linen and toilet paper to clean their gear, we purchased thousands of shop rags and gave them to the hotels to hand out. Instead of paper certificates that 'might' be redeemable for product, we had all the prizes physically on hand.
In other words, when I put on an event, all the other promoters knew they were going to have to take more dollars out of their pockets for their next event if they wanted to keep up with the joneses.
Why steal instead of working with me? Probably two 'good' reasons. One - its cheaper since you won't have to cut Davidson in for a piece and Two - I was being messianic and not accepting anything less than perfection, whereas most everyone else just wanted to do enough to get the teams to attend. They probably didn't want to have to deal with that 'unreasonablness.
All I know is that if you strive for perfection, you won't get there, but you might come close. If you work towards less than perfection, that's what you'll get.
What's corrupt? The game doesn't work. If you think about the format as it is today, if a team didn't 'want' to look aggressive, all they have to learn is a really good defensive strategy, sit on their butts and shoot out the other team that is making foolish, risky advances down the field. The rules emphasize defense. How boring.
It wastes way too much paint. It can't be effectively taped. It passes nothing on to an audience that isn't already familiar with the game. Its uncontrollable on the part of the referees, which essentially means that its not a sport, its a potential cheat-fest.
The ability to stop the game to assess penalties is critical. It makes it a sport. It gives the audience and the commentators a chance to catch-up.
Simplification is a MUST for anything to succeed as a spectator sport. We color-coded and numbered our bunkers AND they were all the exact same type of bunker, set up in the same way. The PaintFest field has been called one of the greatest tournament layouts ever made by many top players. The color-coding and numbering is a simple idea, but works wonders for understanding and following the game. The same bunker everywhere means less confusion AND, since they were all laydowns, makes it much easier for the camera.
I bet that no one playing the 'other' format knows why the field length is 200 feet? Its so that the back end of the field is far enough away from the other team at the beginning to allow for cross-field movement - but still being close enough to allow for some hits. In other words, the teams START the game just inside effective engagement range. My field was 120 feet wide - again because of gun ranges: A(sqr)+B(sqr)=C(sqr), right? The field's diagonal is therefore 233 feet - just barely, conceivably within 'annoyance' range - PREVENTING truly effective firing from corner to corner. THIS is key in promoting manueverability.
I didn't just make some stuff up - I studied this crap hard for ten years. Shooting cross field (tape to tape) is a minimum of 120 feet - not an easy shot, which breaks the field into at least two alleys for lengthwise manueverability.
PLUS, 200 x 120 (playin field, actual dimensions 220 x 140) just fits inside a football field, meaning that there are tens of thousands of potential locations for playing the format already available across the country.
What I realized about all concept field tournament ball was that it sucked because it put all the emphasis on shooting and none on coordinated movement - which was the essence of woodsball. I was bound and determined to find a way to bring movement back into the game and the play at PaintFest was proof positive that the theories were sound. The teams figured it out pretty quickly and we saw a lot of very exciting 'infiltration' play, with bursts of multiple bunkers when teams had manuevered into key positions. Any sports cameraman will tell you that 'movement is it' for the camera.
Play is faster and uses LESS paint. Play is more understandable. Eliminations, by virtue of the bunker layout and the rules are much cleaner. (We played over 60 games with the format at PaintFest and there WAS NOT ONE SINGLE TURN AND TAKE ONE WITH YOU when players bunkered each other.
The list goes on and on...
Roguefactor - oy...
why did people feel threatened?
let's see. in 1992 I took away the paint manufacturer's ability to host national events that were Tournament Paint Only when we introed NPPL. The teams wanted it and all the smaller mfgs who couldn't afford to host their own national events were at least a little positively inclined, but it left others with money po-ed. They had pretty much had a guaranteed bully pulpit for their chosen teams/product up till then.
The NPPL made others feel threatened because I was on a 'mission from god' to bring fairness to the game and some people wanted the ability to promote themselves, their teams and their products without having to bother with 'winning'. Up till that point, events were pretty much a foregone conclusion as to who was going to win. It started with 'promoters' not even posting the scores, making it eminently easy to 'fix' the outcome. Later, as things tightened up, the fixing became much more subtle - selecting the fields/stations teams started from, putting a particular reffing crew on a field, manipulating the prelim schedule, assessing or not assessing major penalties outside of the rulebook, etc.
I insisted on higher standards at every event I did. Instead of one or two basic portajohns, I brought in ten or 12, set some aside for women, and rented the wedding ones, with sinks and larger areas. Instead of 'a field out in the middle of nowhere', we went to fairgrounds that were less expensive and had better facilities. Instead of the minimum number of refs per field, I added two to four more bodies. I gave the teams their entire schedule of games up front, before the event. Instead of working with hotels to UP the room rate so I could pocket a few extra dollars, I booked blocks of rooms and passed the savings on to the teams. To keep teams from using hotel linen and toilet paper to clean their gear, we purchased thousands of shop rags and gave them to the hotels to hand out. Instead of paper certificates that 'might' be redeemable for product, we had all the prizes physically on hand.
In other words, when I put on an event, all the other promoters knew they were going to have to take more dollars out of their pockets for their next event if they wanted to keep up with the joneses.
Why steal instead of working with me? Probably two 'good' reasons. One - its cheaper since you won't have to cut Davidson in for a piece and Two - I was being messianic and not accepting anything less than perfection, whereas most everyone else just wanted to do enough to get the teams to attend. They probably didn't want to have to deal with that 'unreasonablness.
All I know is that if you strive for perfection, you won't get there, but you might come close. If you work towards less than perfection, that's what you'll get.
What's corrupt? The game doesn't work. If you think about the format as it is today, if a team didn't 'want' to look aggressive, all they have to learn is a really good defensive strategy, sit on their butts and shoot out the other team that is making foolish, risky advances down the field. The rules emphasize defense. How boring.
It wastes way too much paint. It can't be effectively taped. It passes nothing on to an audience that isn't already familiar with the game. Its uncontrollable on the part of the referees, which essentially means that its not a sport, its a potential cheat-fest.
The ability to stop the game to assess penalties is critical. It makes it a sport. It gives the audience and the commentators a chance to catch-up.
Simplification is a MUST for anything to succeed as a spectator sport. We color-coded and numbered our bunkers AND they were all the exact same type of bunker, set up in the same way. The PaintFest field has been called one of the greatest tournament layouts ever made by many top players. The color-coding and numbering is a simple idea, but works wonders for understanding and following the game. The same bunker everywhere means less confusion AND, since they were all laydowns, makes it much easier for the camera.
I bet that no one playing the 'other' format knows why the field length is 200 feet? Its so that the back end of the field is far enough away from the other team at the beginning to allow for cross-field movement - but still being close enough to allow for some hits. In other words, the teams START the game just inside effective engagement range. My field was 120 feet wide - again because of gun ranges: A(sqr)+B(sqr)=C(sqr), right? The field's diagonal is therefore 233 feet - just barely, conceivably within 'annoyance' range - PREVENTING truly effective firing from corner to corner. THIS is key in promoting manueverability.
I didn't just make some stuff up - I studied this crap hard for ten years. Shooting cross field (tape to tape) is a minimum of 120 feet - not an easy shot, which breaks the field into at least two alleys for lengthwise manueverability.
PLUS, 200 x 120 (playin field, actual dimensions 220 x 140) just fits inside a football field, meaning that there are tens of thousands of potential locations for playing the format already available across the country.
What I realized about all concept field tournament ball was that it sucked because it put all the emphasis on shooting and none on coordinated movement - which was the essence of woodsball. I was bound and determined to find a way to bring movement back into the game and the play at PaintFest was proof positive that the theories were sound. The teams figured it out pretty quickly and we saw a lot of very exciting 'infiltration' play, with bursts of multiple bunkers when teams had manuevered into key positions. Any sports cameraman will tell you that 'movement is it' for the camera.
Play is faster and uses LESS paint. Play is more understandable. Eliminations, by virtue of the bunker layout and the rules are much cleaner. (We played over 60 games with the format at PaintFest and there WAS NOT ONE SINGLE TURN AND TAKE ONE WITH YOU when players bunkered each other.
The list goes on and on...
crap - I didn't mean to quote myself...I thought I hit the edit button, but I guess I hit the reply instead...
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