The 'How Did Your Airsoft Day Go? Thread

[RebelScum]

Is that an Iraqi Fedayeen helmet or do you also cosplay as Dark Helmet?

Neither. I made it for the event. It's a Fast helmet from eBay with polypropylene stuck around the edge and finished with car trim. The code discs are from eBay as well. It's based on the Imperial helmets from the Andor series.

View attachment 130322

 

[Cannonfodder]

Bloody good work, I wouldn't have guessed it's home made

 

[Emergencychimps]

Went to AWA Herts today. It wasn't a great day and I won't be back (at least not for a fair while!). It just wasn't good and frankly, there didn't seem like the potential it would ever be good. 

1. Timings, they were late starting and then finished early for lunch. Lunch was almost 1 hour 45 minutes. Between each game it was a trek back to the safe zone for more time wasting. End of the day, there wasn't enough people with bbs to have another game before the day ran out....so they ended it early. 

2. The games were very funnelled and limited ability to do anything other than a full frontal attach, the game zones aren't marked or explained before games, but when you've been hunkered down for ages and you're 3 metres outside the zone you'll get told. 

3. Hit taking (for me) wasn't bad (for a member of my group doing his first game, it was terrible), but it wasn't great either. 

4. The site has a few set piece areas, they're a trek from the safe zone and frankly either not used well or it's just a dull woodland site. 

5. Swamp like mud and water. I get its very hard to manage drainage on a site, but they've been going at least 13 years and everywhere was like a swamp with little to nothing to prevent players having to go through 7-8 inch deep streams/ditches (3-4 feet wide) between the safe zone and game areas (and in game areas). No sign of bridges, anything on the paths to improve drainage etc. 

The staff were all friendly enough, took feedback etc but I got the impression nothing will change. I just can't see how I could justify going there when much better is available for similar money. 

It wasn't terrible, such as arsey marshalls. But there just wasn't anything really positive. 

 

[Colin Allen]

Went to AWA Herts today. It wasn't a great day and I won't be back (at least not for a fair while!). It just wasn't good and frankly, there didn't seem like the potential it would ever be good. 

1. Timings, they were late starting and then finished early for lunch. Lunch was almost 1 hour 45 minutes. Between each game it was a trek back to the safe zone for more time wasting. End of the day, there was enough people with bbs to have another game before the day ran out....so they ended it early. 

2. The games were very funnelled and limited ability to do anything other than a full frontal attach, the game zones aren't marked or explained before games, but when you've been hunkered down for ages and you're 3 metres outside the zone you'll get told. 

3. Hit taking (for me) wasn't bad (for a member of my group doing his first game, it was terrible), but it wasn't great either. 

4. The site has a few set piece areas, they're a trek from the safe zone and frankly either not used well or it's just a dull woodland site. 

5. Swamp like mud and water. I get its very hard to manage drainage on a site, but they've been going at least 13 years and everywhere was like a swamp with little to nothing to prevent players having to go through 7-8 inch deep streams/ditches (3-4 feet wide) between the safe zone and game areas (and in game areas). No sign of bridges, anything on the paths to improve drainage etc. 

The staff were all friendly enough, took feedback etc but I got the impression nothing will change. I just can't see how I could justify going there when much better is available for similar money. 

It wasn't terrible, such as arsey marshalls. But there just wasn't anything really positive. 

That is a shame; too many sites are not delivering what they should.  I think there are some AWA regulars on here; if there are, it will be interesting to see their responses.

 

[Galvatron]

My Saturday was at Redcon-2 in Dalton Barracks near Abingdon, Oxfordshire for the "Shift Your RIFTs 2024" weekender organised by RIFT Airsoft.

Getting registered and booked in was quick. Along with the wristband to distinguish between weekenders or one day only, we got a goodie bag with a site map, a raffle ticket for a RIFT game pass, flyers for some of the retailers at SYR, a little plastic wallet from Empire Airsoft (containing a company sticker and patch along with a 50-degree Flamingo VSR/GBB hop bucking) and a few other little bits.

Chrono testing flowed quite quickly as at least 4 marshals were at the testing range ahead of the safety briefing and anything we planned to shoot with (including pistols) was tested and tagged if it within the limits. HPA players were apparently required to be tournament locked.

Tony's brief was the stuff of legends and we all survived it! The main gameplay went quite smoothly where hit taking was pretty good though there was the odd squabble and a few tellings off by other players that "hit players don't talk" (other than saying they're hit) but it didn't escalate. We were allowed to call for a medic's help (any player able to put a coiled wristband over the hit player's wrist without being hit) if we were hit by a BB (melee and grenade kills didn't count). The medic was only practical for players in groups and certainly not for lone wolves. The morning session did become somewhat unbalanced as a lot of Red Team returned to the safe zone well ahead of the lunch break so Blue Team did become more dominant, especially as we pinned Red Team to their spawn location. In the interest of sportsmanship, Blue Team voluntarily fell back to allow Red Team to spread out and return something of a fight. In the afternoon gameplay, there was some team rebalancing as some players had taken a break. During the morning and afternoon sessions, convoys of military vehicles, including Sntach Land Rovers, were at our disposal to board and be driven along predetermined routes and dropped off at certain points.

There were a few additional activities players could take part in off the main gameplay field including a 4v4 Arena Tournament, a Bunker Bash, a Revolver Duel (lots of laughs) and a Target Maze time trial.

Food and drink options were plentiful. Breakfast rolls were available prior to the morning brief, hot savoury pastries, chocolate bars, water and canned drinks were available all day. Lunch on Saturday had hot dogs and chilli dogs (the chilli was homemade). In the evening, the MoD fired up the BBQ and served burgers and RIFT opened up its bar for beer and cider to round off the evening. Queues did get long during the lunch break but they moved quickly thanks to the catering staff being so efficient.

RIFT's White Sphere Tactical partner store for RIF and accessory sales ran raffles across the weekend. Saturday had an 11-prize raffle with items including a Nuprol (I can't remember if it was large or XL) hard carry case, a tactical vest kit, several RIFs, a lifetime RIFT Airsoft membership. Sunday had 10 prizes available for the raffle. The weekend raffle was for a Tokyo Marui NGRS Mk 18. In addition to the raffles, there were promotional items for the event including t-shirts and morale patches. White Sphere Tactical also offered a 20% discount on Deadly Customs and Viper Tactical gear and they had the TM MP7 GBB available in limited quantities at £250 - they sold out by lunchtime. Charity donation buckets were around the shop and in RIFT's own shop (selling ammo, gas, merchandise and memberships) raising money for blood donor services.

As the name of the event suggests, players could sell their unwanted RIFs, parts, gear, etc so there were a few bargains to be had. In addition to the private sellers, there were retailers selling RIFs, parts and gear, including the likes of BZ Tactical, Only Airsoft/Combat UK, Empire Airsoft (joined by Big Steve's Builds), Two Four Delta Surplus, Second Summit Surplus, Finch Embroidery, Viper Tactical and a few more.

In terms of staffing and facilities, the event was well covered. As there were a lot more people attending than normal days/weekends at Redcon-2, everything had to be scaled up. There were 30 or so marshals to cover 500+ people on the gaming area, safe zone and camping area. As the event was open to the public for the boot sales, there was security patrolling the site also. I had no cause to fault any of the staff so if you got any grief from them, I would assume you had behaved like genitals and probably for the second time. There was no drinking water for the campsite - you'd have to either bring along your own or buy it at the site. For showers or bathrooms, none were available so it's up to your imagination for cleaning yourself if you stayed overnight. There were lots of portaloos about the site, some of which were turned around intentionally on Saturday so there would be "fresh" ones for those attending on Sunday. Inside White Sphere's shop leads to plumbed toilets but it was reserved for ladies only for this weekend.

I had a brilliant time again at SYR and will certainly go back next year. The atmosphere was really good, helped by either catching up with friends to play alongside or making new acquaintances as we were all there for the same reason.

 

[rj1986]

My Saturday was at Redcon-2 in Dalton Barracks near Abingdon, Oxfordshire for the "Shift Your RIFTs 2024" weekender organised by RIFT Airsoft.

Getting registered and booked in was quick. Along with the wristband to distinguish between weekenders or one day only, we got a goodie bag with a site map, a raffle ticket for a RIFT game pass, flyers for some of the retailers at SYR, a little plastic wallet from Empire Airsoft (containing a company sticker and patch along with a 50-degree Flamingo VSR/GBB hop bucking) and a few other little bits.

Chrono testing flowed quite quickly as at least 4 marshals were at the testing range ahead of the safety briefing and anything we planned to shoot with (including pistols) was tested and tagged if it within the limits. HPA players were apparently required to be tournament locked.

Tony's brief was the stuff of legends and we all survived it! The main gameplay went quite smoothly where hit taking was pretty good though there was the odd squabble and a few tellings off by other players that "hit players don't talk" (other than saying they're hit) but it didn't escalate. We were allowed to call for a medic's help (any player able to put a coiled wristband over the hit player's wrist without being hit) if we were hit by a BB (melee and grenade kills didn't count). The medic was only practical for players in groups and certainly not for lone wolves. The morning session did become somewhat unbalanced as a lot of Red Team returned to the safe zone well ahead of the lunch break so Blue Team did become more dominant, especially as we pinned Red Team to their spawn location. In the interest of sportsmanship, Blue Team voluntarily fell back to allow Red Team to spread out and return something of a fight. In the afternoon gameplay, there was some team rebalancing as some players had taken a break. During the morning and afternoon sessions, convoys of military vehicles, including Sntach Land Rovers, were at our disposal to board and be driven along predetermined routes and dropped off at certain points.

There were a few additional activities players could take part in off the main gameplay field including a 4v4 Arena Tournament, a Bunker Bash, a Revolver Duel (lots of laughs) and a Target Maze time trial.

Food and drink options were plentiful. Breakfast rolls were available prior to the morning brief, hot savoury pastries, chocolate bars, water and canned drinks were available all day. Lunch on Saturday had hot dogs and chilli dogs (the chilli was homemade). In the evening, the MoD fired up the BBQ and served burgers and RIFT opened up its bar for beer and cider to round off the evening. Queues did get long during the lunch break but they moved quickly thanks to the catering staff being so efficient.

RIFT's White Sphere Tactical partner store for RIF and accessory sales ran raffles across the weekend. Saturday had an 11-prize raffle with items including a Nuprol (I can't remember if it was large or XL) hard carry case, a tactical vest kit, several RIFs, a lifetime RIFT Airsoft membership. Sunday had 10 prizes available for the raffle. The weekend raffle was for a Tokyo Marui NGRS Mk 18. In addition to the raffles, there were promotional items for the event including t-shirts and morale patches. White Sphere Tactical also offered a 20% discount on Deadly Customs and Viper Tactical gear and they had the TM MP7 GBB available in limited quantities at £250 - they sold out by lunchtime. Charity donation buckets were around the shop and in RIFT's own shop (selling ammo, gas, merchandise and memberships) raising money for blood donor services.

As the name of the event suggests, players could sell their unwanted RIFs, parts, gear, etc so there were a few bargains to be had. In addition to the private sellers, there were retailers selling RIFs, parts and gear, including the likes of BZ Tactical, Only Airsoft/Combat UK, Empire Airsoft (joined by Big Steve's Builds), Two Four Delta Surplus, Second Summit Surplus, Finch Embroidery, Viper Tactical and a few more.

In terms of staffing and facilities, the event was well covered. As there were a lot more people attending than normal days/weekends at Redcon-2, everything had to be scaled up. There were 30 or so marshals to cover 500+ people on the gaming area, safe zone and camping area. As the event was open to the public for the boot sales, there was security patrolling the site also. I had no cause to fault any of the staff so if you got any grief from them, I would assume you had behaved like genitals and probably for the second time. There was no drinking water for the campsite - you'd have to either bring along your own or buy it at the site. For showers or bathrooms, none were available so it's up to your imagination for cleaning yourself if you stayed overnight. There were lots of portaloos about the site, some of which were turned around intentionally on Saturday so there would be "fresh" ones for those attending on Sunday. Inside White Sphere's shop leads to plumbed toilets but it was reserved for ladies only for this weekend.

I had a brilliant time again at SYR and will certainly go back next year. The atmosphere was really good, helped by either catching up with friends to play alongside or making new acquaintances as we were all there for the same reason.

I was boot selling for both days for this ( i was the guy with the RE2 lightning hawk for sale)

Lots of pink arms and faces on saturday. Lots and lots of people.

Sunday was noticeably quieter (considering both days were sold out player wise) - i suspect the ever changing but always pessimistic weather forecast had something to do with that. In the end, apart from a bit of a breeze and the odd spitting shower, it wasn't too bad at all. But myself and a few of the suppliers and boot sellers packed up around the end of lunch. It's a long weekend with early starts for most.

 

[Impulse]

I was also at Redcon-2 for Shift Your RIFTs, but was there for the whole weekend; a very warm Saturday followed by a very warm, then very wet Sunday! I packed my m700, AAP-01 and p226 as a backup pistol in case I had issues with the AAP.

We booked in on the Friday and it was incredibly smooth. Plenty of staff were around to direct people who were camping and those of us who were just there to sign in. Got my wristband and goodie bag and then hung out with my friends for a while as there were quite a few of us there. Gates closed at 8pm, so we left at about 7pm to go get dinner at the pub a few of us were staying at and got a good night's sleep for the next day... or at least it would've if my heart didn't decide to act up that night. Anxiety around it made it worse too, but it wasn't so bad I had to take myself off to a hospital, so I popped one of my pills and powered through it.

Anyway, next day was glorious. Weather on Saturday was incredibly warm at around 20 celcius pretty much all day! I had a similar experience to @Galvatron; chrono was really efficient with 4 marshalls on them and then another 3 or 4 marshalls after them with cable ties to tag guns that had passed. There was a long queue when I got there, but it moved very quickly and I got through very easily. I did have an issue crop up here though, as I noticed two of my AAP magazines had lost the o-rings in the fill valves, so I decided to use my p226 that I brought as a backup pistol. Everything passed chrono nice and easy and so that was that.

We then hung about until the legendary brief and it wasn't as bad as I thought it'd be. It was long, probably clocking in at about 1 hour in length, but it covered everything that the players needed to know. Also, I heard last year that people on the weekend had to listen to the brief on both Saturday and Sunday, but this weekend we only had to attend the Saturday and could just chill on the Sunday in the safe / camping zone during the briefing, so that was nice.

I decided to try and play as much as possible while the weather was good, as the forecast was bad for Sunday. The site itself was a breath of fresh air for me; where Worthing Airsoft is fairly small and quite close-up, basically woodland CQB during the summer, Redcon-2 was huge with a lot of very open areas, though there were also plenty of close-up areas and dedicated CQB areas so when the marshalls said "any gun you have will find a use out there", they weren't lying. I went out with my new under £100 ghillie setup and my m700, p226 and my belt kit; no chest rig as I packed light. We were on blue in the morning and for the first hour I was a bit useless. I had no idea where anything was and bumbled about the site as I tried to work out how I wanted to play it. Fortunately I quickly got into my groove after we took a respawn on the far side of the map and started pushing along the boundary. I managed to tuck into a bush to cover the advance and had a great time plinking at the reds, though some of them were really well dug in! I eventually got taken out, so I went back to the respawn we captured, but as I was returning I saw the other blues who were with me also walking back, so I opted to set up in a position to intercept the reds if they pushed up after us. I took a few out that did, but then I saw some reds coming from the other direction as they must've captured the respawn from the other side, so I laid low and waited for them to pass, before shooting them both in the back. I love moments like that  

It was then lunch that I was about 10 mins late to, because none of the marshalls called that it was lunch over where I was and I had recently taken out a red from my position; I only went back because I heard one of the vehicles and poked out to ask if it was lunch yet. They had said that they couldn't have tap water to drink due to MoD regulations (as it's an MoD site), so I was expecting some extortionate food and drink prices, but I was pleasantly surprised. I spent £7 on a massive double jumbo chilli dog that was very welcome after the morning games, as well as two bottles of water.

After lunch our entire group got balanced onto red team as apparently the morning was pretty one-sided in blue team's favour. This time, I decided to just stick to the massive runway area that the teams spawned at (one at each end, it was really quite long!). There were a number of bushes and some lovely tall grass that worked wonders for concealment, though due to how airsoft guns worked I had to poke my rifle barrel through the grass, which made it a little bit visible, but oh well. I managed to rack up an impressive number of kills from here and completely denied a fairly strong position at a corner as I had it totally dialed in with my bolt action. During quiet moments I found myself hand-loading my magazines as otherwise I would've run out of ammo pretty fast and I was very pleased to discover that my magazines will easily shoot three full magazines on a single fill of gas if it's a warm day. Photographers got some great shots of me too, so that was a nice bonus as I rarely get caught on camera! Towards the end, most people had given up it seemed as I ended up getting hit from behind and having to respawn in to hold the flank pretty much by myself, however due to the tall grass I was able to easily get into a concealed position to do so.

The Sunday I wanted to play in the morning as while the forecast said it would pour with rain all day the sun was out and it was nice and warm (a bit windy though!), but most of my kit was locked in the car and the guy with the key was out in the gameplay area. Most of my kit included my hat, so I have a bit of sunburn on my head, and also my armband so I couldn't go and play. I instead opted to have a good wander around to see what people were selling and I picked up the exact TM hi-capa 5.1 that I wanted for £80 and I had a long chat with the guys at Empire Airsoft, so it was nice to put a face to a name there as I order from them quite a lot and have asked Kenny to get me some niche m700 parts from Europe a few times! I also had a long chat with Big Steve Builds about my AAP build and picked up a bunch of parts for that too; only bit I'm missing now is the hammer set as that sold out on the Saturday, but I have a really good idea what I want to do with mine now. Also going to experiment with the flamingo buckings as I hadn't used them yet and he seemed to be very impressed with them in his builds.

Went out in the afternoon after lunch and the heavens opened up. It absolutely chucked it down and I got really wet. Didn't play for as long here, playing around the runway again. I managed to crawl into a very forward position and started sniping blues in the tank graveyard from the side; the m700 is so quiet I managed to basically burn through all of my ammo doing this before I was finally taken out by a stray shot just as I was going to shoot someone colour checking me. I was soaking wet and out of ammo and I didn't want to open my ammo bags in this weather as water + bio BBs is not the best combination. Emptied the rest of my pistol mags as I wasn't putting those BBs back in the bag either for the same reason and headed in.

All in all, I thoroughly enjoyed the weekend and will be going back next year. I will, however, bring a DMR next time. I was planning on doing so this year, but my MWS was not happy at all lifting heavy BBs, so more tinkering is needed there. The site itself with all the long distance areas combined with the 2.32J DMR limit makes the site very, very good for DMRs. Usually I use my pistol a lot when using a bolt action rifle or a DMR, but I think this weekend I only got 2 - 3 pistol kills and burned though about a single magazine in total, whereas I got dozens and dozens across the weekend with my bolt action and went though many mags. Being able to engage at long distance is a definite advantage at Redcon-2 (as long as you avoid the CQB areas!). If someone is locking down an area with a DMR, it's very strong, but it's also possible to counter because the site itself is so damn big; you can simply go around them. I think the marshalling was top notch and I didn't come up against any issues all weekend with the singular exception of one guy who was blatantly not taking his hits as I took out the people around him, but then every time I hit him he'd look in my general direction and step back behind the bushes and every time he peeked out the same would happen. Everyone else without fail took their hits from what I saw and I didn't hear any complaints about it.

Going to be bold and say that Shift Your RIFTs is the best weekend event in the UK at the moment. The airsoft quality is better than AI500 and definitely better than the NAF, and for £85 you get a really solid weekend of airsoft at a great site with great marshalls. Food and drink isn't extortionately priced and there were lots of different retailers about who were more than happy to chat and cut deals you wouldn't get when you buy online. The whole atmosphere was really great across the entire weekend and I'll definitely be going back next year as I loved it!

 

[MrTea]

Going to be bold and say that Shift Your RIFTs is the best weekend event in the UK at the moment. The airsoft quality is better than AI500 and definitely better than the NAF, and for £85 you get a really solid weekend of airsoft at a great site with great marshalls. Food and drink isn't extortionately priced and there were lots of different retailers about who were more than happy to chat and cut deals you wouldn't get when you buy online. The whole atmosphere was really great across the entire weekend and I'll definitely be going back next year as I loved it!

Sounds like a quality weekend event. As someone who looks at NAF and sees negative feedback surrounding it relating to the quality of airsoft, thefts, dick-heads firing blanks in the camp, driving quads at night around the site at early hours, 2nd hand area being shrunk to nearly zero and prices being hiked for almost zero benefit, i'd much rather go to this event by the sounds of it.

 

[Impulse]

Sounds like a quality weekend event. As someone who looks at NAF and sees negative feedback surrounding it relating to the quality of airsoft, thefts, dick-heads firing blanks in the camp, driving quads at night around the site at early hours, 2nd hand area being shrunk to nearly zero and prices being hiked for almost zero benefit, i'd much rather go to this event by the sounds of it.

I wasn't camping so I can't speak to how the campsite is late at night or early in the morning, but there are marshalls patrolling around it during the day time on a motorised scooter thing. I didn't hear any horror stories from the guys who were camping on site, so I reckon it's okay. Also didn't hear of any thefts, though we were all warned that it's an open event and anyone could be in attendance and so were advised to keep things locked in cars, which is a sensible thing to do at any event anyway. They had plenty of staff to make sure the weekend played well, including a paramedic in case of any accidents. It was my first time going and honestly I was pretty impressed with the whole thing.

I probably won't be going to the NAF again unless there are changes. Shift Your RIFTs fills that social weekender-shaped hole with quality airsoft for £85 and I'll still head to AI500 for £75 (returning players get £10 off the £85 price there) for the interesting sites they tend to get a hold of, though the airsoft there isn't as good as Shift Your RIFTs which was just really enjoyable. Combine those with Vietnam filmsim weekenders and that's at least 4 per year for me which is a nice number  

 

[Egon_247]

Well, we're geared up and off to apocalypse 249 tomorrow, the boy seems happier about it and even the younger one is coming too. 

I best buy a lottery ticket ??

 

[Egon_247]

So....Saturday at Apocolypse 249. 

Geared up, all the kids in the car and off we went. Used the wifes motor as it has more room for stuff.

All set up in the safe zone and safety brief done, we head out for the first game. Noticed there was lots of rentals but they were enthusiastic and ready to go. 

10 shots in, i realise the AUG is not being as awesome as normal and is double feeding, resulting in "brewers droop". walk back and swap out to the M14- its first time on the field. Damn they're heavy things, aren't they? almost need a wheel barrow to push it around on!!

Blue team got destroyed on the first game, we needed coffee and bacon to regroup and get into the swing of it.

Coffee and bacon consumed and we were off again, some over complicated dead, fall back, this bit is yours, this bit is theirs, blah blah KILL REDS etc. 

So we did. few non hit takers were introduced to the "I'm going to keep shooting until you actually call it" section of my brain, but otherwise a really good mix of maniacs and strategy users.

One guy had to be escorted off site due to being a complete bell end and i genuinely hope he had a car crash on his way home after non hit taking, losing his rag and turning the M4 around to use it like a cricket bat ?

I dunno. i don't understand it. 

Went through more rounds than normal, but had a really great day, especially after the day at dogtag we had, the boys needed a good day to get their heads back into it. We did. Loved it.

So other than a poorly AUG and "angry man" we had a great day. Im back at work today and i ache like a bastard but hey. it was fun.

 

 

[Shamal]

Sounds like a quality weekend event. As someone who looks at NAF and sees negative feedback surrounding it relating to the quality of airsoft, thefts, dick-heads firing blanks in the camp, driving quads at night around the site at early hours, 2nd hand area being shrunk to nearly zero and prices being hiked for almost zero benefit, i'd much rather go to this event by the sounds of it.

Hi bud 

Have you been to the national Airsoft festival?

I've been going for years and have not really been aware of any thefts.where did you get that info from?

Regarding the quality of Airsoft well it's Airsoft. Just think how often we all moan on here about badly run sites but remember that the nae has 3000 players some will moan but the vast majority will be happy.

Quads at night. yes driven sensibly and slowly by staff or security keeping an eye out for the dickheads you mention

Last year the second hand area was as big as in past years so certainly had not shrunk to nearly zero.

Yes the price has gone up but so has my shopping bill and a lot of other things

Regards 

 

[Rogerborg]

Pretty good day at Area-66, with some well thought out games.  Helpful, friendly marshalling, but too friendly, with far too much tolerance for non-hit-takers, over-shooters, and my new bête noire, dry firing in the (not so) safe zone.

Bloody airsofters, we need to ban them all to make airsoft great for airsofters. ?

 

[Impulse]

Just got home from Worthing where I didn't play. Well, I did, but not as a player and I had a lot of fun. First game of the day was a marshall and two of us playing blind hillbillies defending barrels of moonshine. We had juggernaut rules, but we also had to pretend to be blind (drunk too much moonshine!), so we were patrolling around yelling things in overly exaggerated American accents and only shooting in peoples direction of they made noise. It was hilarious seeing the players trying to be as quiet as possible when there was a lot of crunchy dry leaves on the ground and sticks that go snap and then shooting purposefully just past them or over their heads. It was a proper laugh yelling about commies and the government and rich city folks and the damn squirrels stealin' my goddamn moonshine!

As for the gameplay, I think it worked well but the teams weren't well balanced. We had a single blue player make it to where the objectives were and, to his credit, he held up the yellow team all by himself for a really long time. He eventually got shot in the back because yellows wrapped around, because what had happened is the yellows had captured the blue team's base and weren't allowing them to get to the bottom of the site where we were protecting the barrels. All I saw were yellow players and they eventually managed to get all 13 barrels thanks to a very sneaky kid who crept all the way up multiple times very slowly and very quietly; we were all quite impressed with how quiet he was, as obviously we could all see him, but he made no noise so we didn't shoot him. He managed to ferry most of the cans out to pass them to his team and combined with the yellows taking the blue team base, this meant that the yellows absolutely stomped. After this game they did some team balancing, moving some of the more experienced players over from yellow to blue, but I can't comment on how the rest of the games went as I headed back to the safe zone afterwards; I had a lot of guns to test and make sure were working for the Vietnam filmsim weekend next weekend at Gunman Eversley, so I wanted to make sure the m700 was set, the AKM was set and the MWS was set. Also, the local tech was bringing two of my guns he was working on, so I wanted to have a fiddle with those as he tends to leave fine tuning the hop to me (at my request though, as I'm more than happy to dial in my hop and scopes myself).

But the main reason I stopped was because the new gun I was using stopped working very well. Predictably, to be fair, but I think the hop rubber just turned to dust as it stopped hopping. I bought a PPS kar98 as the guy who runs a kit shop and sells at Worthing bought a bunch of Dadio's guns (a fairly well known WW2 airsofter from a few years ago) as I think he's getting out of the hobby and this was one of them. Got the kar98 and 4 magazines for £250; 1 was leaking so I'll get that sealed up, but I reckon it's been sitting for 4 years and needs a clean and a new hop rubber, but it's set for 1J (with an adjustable bolt, so I can tweak it if needed) and I'll get it set up for .32s. That's coming to next weekend's Vietnam filmsim weekend! The other new gun I was using was the hicapa I bought last weekend at Shift Your RIFTs and with a few upgrades it was shooting phenomenally (parts I had lying about mostly, as I'll do a proper build next month)

Then I collected my m14 DMR (ironically not set up as a DMR) and SR-25. First I tested the m14 and... it went back to the tech. As I went to set the hop, the motor completely died so it needs a new one. Not entirely surprised as it's a stock G&P motor and is probably about 12 years old or something, but that went back to him. The SR-25 however... that was brutal and I'm probably going to be using it a bunch in the future. He's left it to me to do a lot of testing (as I said there's no point me paying him to spend hours testing out springs and hop rubbers when I can do that myself), so I'll be finding a spring for 1.1J on .32s and a spring for 1.88J on .43s, as well as a hop setup that will lift them (might already be able to!). Didn't have my long screwdriver with me so couldn't experiment there, but with the spring currently in it it was 0.9J and hitting the 60m target accurately with every shot so I'm bloody happy about that. Really snappy too! It's been properly locked to semi-auto with a perun mosfet that has been programmed to be semi-only but then also had the full-auto sensor covered with electric tape so it's definitely locked to semi!

 

[gavinkempsell]

dry firing in the (not so) safe zone

Yeah, sorry about that... my bad.

 

[Colin Allen]

Today, the armed forces of Atropia (me) went to a rather warm Airsoft Plantation in the much maligned county of Essex.  As usual, the place was busy, with possibly about 200 players in attendance.

The first game of the day was simple; in its first iteration the attackers (Red Team) had to transport five crates from Swaziland to the Hill Fort ("If you don't know what it is, it's a fort. On a hill") and get them inside it.  They had unlimited regens on eight medics while we, as the defenders, had two lives each.  We started at the back of the Mortar Pits and had a 30 second head start to get into position, which we did rather well.  Most of the fighting was in the scrubland, where the maze of paths between dense bushes added to the complexity of the combat, with small opposing groups bumping into each other.  I took up a position in a bush and potted three attackers before their colleagues worked out where I was and potted me.  As I fell back the required 30m to regen, I noticed that the Reds were working around our right flank via the Village; I slithered into a small and heavily overgrown bunker that covers one of the exits from the Village and was surprised to find a teammate already in there.  We put up a good fight, taking out a number of attackers before the defence behind us collapsed and we were shot in the back at close range.

With mags reloaded, the game was turned around; I volunteered to be a medic and moved forward with one of the attacking groups, keeping about 4-5m behind them so that any casualties could quickly return to the fray.  However, as a rather heavily armed medic (rifle, pistol, pyro and poison gas), I couldn't resist taking out a few targets of opportunity that presented themselves.  Unfortunately, we took two minutes longer to complete the mission than the Reds.

After once again reloading mags, we set off for a fallback game.  As the defenders, we had one life at each of the Kill House (deploy within 30m of it), the Border and the Village.  The attackers had infinite marshal regens and had to set off a siren at each location.  As usual, I positioned myself on the left (known as "doing a Corbyn") along with a few other colleagues, with the aim of holding off any flanking attack from that side.  The Red's main attack came through the centre and our right, but we did our bit for what felt like ages, sending lots of the enemy back to find a marshal while the sounds of conflict grew massively to our right .  My highlight of this part of the game was taking out two snipers with the trusty MPiKM.  When I was eventually hit, I fell back to the pill box at the Border, which is actually just three low wooden walls with large rectangular holes in them.  Once the siren in the Kill House had been set off, our surviving players were given an opportunity to fall back and dig in before the Reds were unleashed.  This turned out to be something akin to what U-Boat crews called the "Happy Time"; I had a superb field of fire and took out every enemy player who entered it, which they kept doing.  When I was eventually taken out, I turned around to find the site owner behind me, who congratulated me on what I had been doing.  I fell back to the Village, taking up a position on the left (again!) but only seeing limited action before enemy players on the other side of the Village reached the well and set off the siren.

We then retired to the safe zone and took luncheon which, for me, consisted of a bottle of water.

After refreshing ourselves the fallback game was reversed, albeit with a twist.  We would have to set off the siren in the Village first, before moving on to the Border and finally into the woods to set off the one in the Kill House.  This was a daunting prospect as taking the Village from our start point is rather tricky and assaulting the Border from the Village is a huge challenge as the large bushes and the barricades channel the attacks down two paths which are easily covered by the defenders.  We slowly fought our way into the Village, with some of us flanking around to the left while the main force pinned the enemy frontally.  After a very hard fight, the siren was sounded and we regrouped to attack the Border.  As the site owner commented, this was one of the hardest fought actions he had seen as we gradually whittled down the enemy and pushed forward down what were perfect killing zones.  However, working in small teams, we eventually cleared most of the enemy out and one of our players made it into the hut to set off the siren.  After the defenders had regrouped, we moved into the woods and seemed to eliminate the defenders rather rapidly; however, it turned out that most of them had deployed very close to the Kill House, where they put up a ferocious defence until they were eventually overrun and the siren was sounded.

Having reloaded again, we went out to the Mortar Pits to play an infected game; to nobody's surprise, this ended with everyone being infected.

It was a great day of airsoft; the games were well designed and the site easily absorbed the large number of players present.  From my perspective, the gameplay was really good, although there were the usual accusations around hit taking, which always seem more numerous after lunch at every site I have been to.  I saw one possible incident of non-hit taking; the marshals reacted to it quickly and appropriately.

Weapons used:
CYMA MPiKM (with genuine rubbish East German furniture)
Golden Eagle (JG) AMD65
ASG XP18 Commander (CO2)
 

 

[Hami]

First game back in about two years! Had so much fun ? tried a NGRS from a guy and now I’m contemplating getting one. Maybe I need a gbbr now 

 

[Skullchewer]

A couple of years ago I decided to put together an airsoft squad, with a group of people I enjoyed playing with. 

Our goal was never to be the best, or the winners. Our goal was to have a laugh playing toy soldiers in the woods. And we're succeeding at that! It's all about silly fun, and never taking ourselves seriously. 

Over time our little group has grown from 5 to 17 members, all with the same "Fun first" attitude.

We don't often get all of us together at the same time, but today we had a good strong group out on the field, and a lot of fun was had. 

Missing a few faces, including our Scottish contingent, but it was great to see so many Outcasts playing together again.

Unfortunately, with over 100 players on the field, and a shortage of volunteer marshals this week, I had to work. 

But the Outcasts did me proud. 

One of our squad did, unfortunately, manage to step in front of a friendly sniper hidden in a bush, at pretty much point blank range. If it wasn't for his goggle strap it could have been really nasty. 

We call him Iron Skull now. 

@GAMBLE @Smiling-Dutchman @Honey Badger 63

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View attachment 131026

turning the M4 around to use it like a cricket bat 

What the actual fuck?

 

[LMKipper]

I bought a PPS kar98 as the guy who runs a kit shop and sells at Worthing bought a bunch of Daddy-O's guns (a fairly well known WW2 airsofter from a few years ago) as I think he's getting out of the hobby and this was one of them.

 Ooh let me know how this goes. I've had my eye on one for a wee while.

 

[Impulse]

 Ooh let me know how this goes. I've had my eye on one for a wee while.

My opinion is likely to be a bit biased because I love gas bolt actions and have used a gas m700 for a year or so now. Initial impressions on it are great. It feels amazing to hold and shoot and for a gas gun it was consistent enough. When I was at chrono my lowest shot was 1J and my highest was 1.12J. The only issue was the hop rubber being ancient so I need to swap it out to get a good gauge on how it shoots, but my friend has one and his shoots great.

I'll be using it next weekend at a Vietnam filmsim and will have a new hop rubber in it, so will hopefully see then.