The 'How Did Your Airsoft Day Go? Thread

[Cannonfodder]

The 3 games before lunch I mentioned above were 2 45 minute games and one of about half an hour so roughly 2 hours. Blackstone in Huntington guarantee 8 games of 20 minutes per session

I agree some site really do take the piss and is the main reason I don't bother with the Epsom tunnels anymore. I pay to play not spend 50% of my time sat in the safe zone waiting around

 

[Impulse]

The 3 games before lunch I mentioned above were 2 45 minute games and one of about half an hour so roughly 2 hours. Blackstone in Huntington guarantee 8 games of 20 minutes per session

I agree some site really do take the piss and is the main reason I don't bother with the Epsom tunnels anymore. I pay to play not spend 50% of my time sat in the safe zone waiting around

Click to shrink...

Yeah, Worthing Airsoft is about the same. The three games we played in the morning on Sunday were two 30 min games, then the third game ran until lunch.

 

[Baser]

Play Apoc in Kent. Morning is usually one longer game 1h30 to 2h then lunch followed by 2 or 3 shorter 45 min to 1h games depending on light, weather and numbers.

Find this to be pretty good blend but for me it could do with shorter breaks as I can load mags and be ready to go again in 10mins but other players like to have a chat between games.

 

[Colin Allen]

I tend to feel that game days at most sites involve too much time in the safe zone and too little time in the field. I carry enough ammo and CO2 on the field for a full day and only really need to return to the safe zone to change rifles at lunchtime, which I only have to do because I have too many guns so use two each day.

Splatoon is truly awful with regard to this and even Airsoft Plantation’s breaks can sometimes drag on a bit.

 

[Cannonfodder]

I'd say 10 minutes between games is enough. This is plenty of time to refill mags and grab a drink or a cigarette. If you want to chat you can do it at the same time

 

[The_Lord_Poncho]

There is probably a very big difference to the clientele who attend an average skirmish day. I tend to go alone, so whilst i enjoy exchanging a few pleasantries with those set up around me, i am very much there to play. Whereas I might suppose those who attend with 5 or 6 mates are happier for an 'airsoft themed' social, with less time actually playing? And of course, the less game time there is, the easier it is on the sites and marshals. But as paying customers really I think both camps should be catered for - longer game times would still allow for those that want to chat to hang about at re-spawn or spend as much time as they want in the safe zone nattering or tinkering with kit.

 

[A_Stoat]

Down at a very sunny Skirmish Budby on Sunday. I'd told myself I wasn't going to play this month (saving the pennies before a quick trip over to Europe next weekend), but the weather was gorgeous and I couldn't resist. Ran my summer RusFor kit to test the KLMK suit, with the trusty E&L AKS-74U.

Advertised as a sell-out day, although the car park looked suspiciously quiet when we arrived. The safe zone was packed out though, and it seemed like a solid group with quite a few regulars, fewer than ten rentals (including a really chill family who we ended up sharing a bay with), and plenty of new faces. Not too much HPA, a decent spread of bushwookies, couple of LMGs, and of course a million ARs.

Game 1 was the standard domination on the tanks field, to allow the marshals to gauge team balance. We had the pick of ends to attack from, and unfortunately the consensus was 'attack downhill', which meant I had to play against my absolute favourite bunker on the entire site. Predictably, the other team locked it down, and I ended up pinned down opposite it. For some reason I was playing massively conservatively, and that meant I ended game 1 with less than a mag used, and no hits scored or taken. Literally just vibing in cover. It wasn't conscious, and I didn't realise until I went to bomb up and realised I didn't need to. I always like to get my first kill and get hit myself as early as possible to get me into the flow of the game - maybe it was the sun making me sleepy, or just cobwebs from not having played in a few weeks.

We then went up to the Fort for some back-and-forth CQB. We started off defending, and a whole bunch of us decided to strongpoint one of the 'fatal funnel' entrances to try and delay their assaulters. Predictably, after about 30 seconds the world's largest thunderflash landed at my feet. No point running, and six of us were wiped with one of the most effective 'nades I've seen in a long time. Back to the deadzone, still no BB hits made or taken. I actually don't remember the run-back as an attacker very much, and I don't think I saw a single live enemy all game as I was mostly no. 3 or 4 in a very effective stack. Just a weird first few games, and I was beginning to become aware that I couldn't get my game on. We then went to an attacker-defender on one of the compound maps, and with defenders being allowed outside the compound I set up in some bushes and finally got some good battles in (and got properly, honestly shot) which made me feel a lot better.

The next game was attacker-defender in the village, which is a great map. We attacked first, and played it from a totally different angle than usual, which changed all the geometry in a really fun way. Theoretically, we couldn't open fire (due to a risk of imagined civilians) until we were either fired upon, or we saw a clearly armed enemy. This was supposed to let the defenders spring some sort of ambush, but for some reason they just... set up pointing weapons out of windows, so we called 'contact front' as soon as we heard 'game-on' and merrily blazed away from the start. We pushed one flank aggressively while applying suppressing fire from the centre, and cleaned up reasonably handily. I thought I played pretty well, which was nice, and definitely a step up from the rest of the morning.

After lunch, we went out onto Berlin Wall, my absolute least favourite map. I resolved to do what I always do - post up in one of the tunnels, and see if I could get a few good gunfights, rather than trying to particularly play the objectives. This turned out to be one of my better ideas, and after a couple of false starts I managed to get a commanding position where I was able to mow down players trying to push up to the wall itself. Post-lunch departures also turned into a string of team re-balances which saw me and a couple others move teams multiple times as numbers dipped during the day. I was extremely flattered to hear the head marshal say 'given the players we've moved, I think the difference in numbers will be fine'. Of course, he could well have meant that I was a dead weight equivalent to negative players, and just offsetting the other guys!

During the afternoon we ran back the games from the morning that we hadn't already flipped. The compound attack was reasonably decent, but the village defence was really excellent. We had a little team chat and decided to actually try and use the 'ambush' rules and hit the attackers as they stacked up to clear the first buildings. This went well, and myself and another player had a really good angle on the centre, letting us clean up until they finally managed to get enough shots into our position that a couple found their way to us. We then dropped onto the hyperball/paintball field and ran a 'pyramid' game, where each team started with two players active. Whenever a player was hit, they went back to respawn and tagged another player to join them, until the whole team was on the field, at which point it became one-life TDM. We were possibly a little cruel in putting a site regular and paintball player out alongside my buddy H with his Krytac LMG. H proceeded to demonstrate exactly what a machine gun is for, mowing down the opposition with comical abandon. At one point it was about 7 or 8 vs our 2. Absolute highlight has to be watching H drain his battery to many groans and boos from the peanut gallery behind him, then flip out a spare from his kit and do a battery change under fire to raucous applause. I got a nice little run down the snake and got a good few flanking kills towards the end, but that was mostly because H was suppressing the entire team. Bless him, he kept apologising afterwards and worrying he'd spoiled people's afternoon! Sadly, the absolute muppet had had his GoPro on all day, and this was the round he'd not turned it on for, so you'll just have to take my word for how well he did.

We finished with a couple of rounds of Infected, which is probably my least favourite game type. They didn't go too badly, and the banter was excellent as it had been all day long. I took the only chunky hit of the day, with a BB from a sniper shattering on my eyepro (cue an immediate trip to the marshal to get the lenses checked while doing a passable pirate impression - the Bolles stood up fine, but I don't think I'm a fan of watching a BB shatter a centimetre from my eyeball, and I've got a bit of a bruise from where the lens bottom dug into my cheek). Still, better than last time out where my face was apparently an HVT.

The day absolutely flew by, and I couldn't believe the time when we came in after the last game. A cracking crowd, perfect weather, some really good gameplay, and Skirmish's usual high standards of marshalling made for a grand day out, and I was glad I could play myself into the day after a slow start. The E&L ran flawlessly as ever - never anything special, but always more than good enough to get the job done - and the kit held up well. 9/10 just a really honest, fun day of airsoft, the kind you wish you could have every weekend.

The only drama I even heard about all day was someone with an HPA + binary trigger setup apparently being aggy about perceived non-hit-taking, and threatening to just turn his regulator up if people weren't taking. Happily, I was able to avoid getting involved, and it was dealt with by a quick word to all from the head marshal, and the instatement of random chrono checks for the next few rounds to keep people honest. I thought hit-taking was generally really good, and the overall atmosphere was friendly, with plenty of banter flying and a generally good vibe!

Roll on the next one after the hols!

 

[Impulse]

Me and one of my friends headed to Driver Wood this weekend. He also wants to test out his kit for Shift Your RIFT next month, including radio setups so we were on comms for... some of the day (I didn't charge my radio and the battery that showed 3/3 bars in the morning then showed 2/3 after the first game and died half way through the second game). The good news was that our comms setup worked well.

I took my mk12 MWS and m40a5, with my hi-capa, p226 and HK45 as sidearms. Initially I only brought the hi-capa to test after getting it to cycle again on Saturday, but after I saw it was shooting really nicely on the range, I decided to just use it. I also made sure to chrono both the m40 and mk12 at the start of the day so that if I had issues, I could easily just swap over. One thing about Driver Wood that is becoming apparent is that they have... perhaps too many players. Getting through chrono right now is painful and the queue for it gets huge. I think there's an element of fault on both sides here though, as an uncomfortable number of players show up to chrono without being ready to chrono. However, it also doesn't help when the marshalls don't know how a chrono works or how to set one up. I ended up offering to help the marshall who was chronoing me, only for it to be ignored; it took ages for me to get chrono'd, both because the queue was pretty huge (and I got in early. It was even bigger later on) and because when I finally got through the queue I ended up waiting for the marshall to work out how to set the chrono up for my BB weights. Why one of their "sniper" chronos was only pre-set up for up to .4s does boggle the mind...

I will admit, I can't quite remember the specifics of the objectives for the first two games (it was the same game, but sides swapped). One team had an assassin, one team had a VIP. The assassin had to take out the VIP and then extract, while the VIP team had to capture the assassin and take him somewhere. Neither team managed their objectives in the first two games, and the second game was fairly uneventful for me and my friend, but the first game was great for us. We played properly as a sniper pair, with me essentially acting as spotter and him as the shooter. We started by going up into the corner tower and I took out the rangefinder while he took the shots. He managed to get two shots at just over 100m (probably 102m and 103m, it was two players who were standing next to each other), and this assisted in our team pushing up as it seemed like those players were being difficult for our team to remove; they looked rather bewildered at the hits. We then pushed forward and took positions along that path. He was in one of the single decker buses watching down one angle, while I was in the helicopter across the path, watching the other side. Between us I shudder to think how many kills we racked up, but we did eventually have to fall back as the other team were getting worryingly close, and they had noticed where I was and were full auto spraying at where I was. They were going all over the place as they were having to angle it, but it was only a matter of time before one would slip through and hit me, so I opted to fall back instead.

After lunch we played a game where one player was the assassin from the morning and was now rogue and under semi-juggernaut rules. The objective was to capture him, with one team needing to bring him to one location and the other team needing to bring him to a different location. I opted to float around the middle of the area this time, but eventually took a spot against a boat that I've used before. For some reason, people just don't see me when I'm in this spot, and once again I racked up a huge number of kills from this spot. Until my team came over and got me killed. By this point I had gone through almost all my mags and there wasn't too long left of the game, so I got into a bush to watch a flank, but also be able to post shots into the side of the enemy push if they decided to make a final ditch effort. It was amusing when I baited someone into peeking me, as he clearly saw me, was trying to get me to shoot by popping out and instantly going back into cover. All I did was watch until he committed, trying to shoot me (but dropping short, it was probably a 70 - 75m shot), and then I simply hit him in return thanks to having a DMR.

Last game was a simple one. King of the hill on the central six-wheeler, with close spawns for both teams. It was fairly action packed, again with some nice long shots across the middle and then down the large path towards the end. I said to my friend I'd play until I ran out of ammo, but I managed to make my mags last the whole game. Just about. I was down to my pistol by the end, so I was happy that the hi-capa was performing well!

All in all it was a really good day, outside of the chrono debacle in the morning. The marshalls were hit-testing people all day, and outside of one or two instances I found that hit-taking was pretty good all day long. Plus the weather was fantastic for airsoft. It was warm, I think around 18c for most of the day, with very low wind. I'm also really liking the leafy boonie + cobra hood combo, as it's incredibly lightweight, but does the job more than adequately for keeping me concealed, and I don't think I can ever go back to non-GBBR DMRs now; I tested my MTW-308 last weekend and it just... wasn't fun. The only non-gas gun that is now in my "guns I use" list is my SRS; it's always good to have something reliable, especially when it's something short and easy to pack that can fit in a smaller rifle bag or pocket on a larger rifle bag.

Anyway, roll on the next one. Going to be using my setup for SYR next month up until the event to make sure it all works, but so far I'm liking it. At the moment I'm trying to build up the muscle memory to actually use my dump pouch to help me with reloads as unless I'm dropping mags on the floor, my reloads have been painfully slow. Not a problem when passively sniping, but since I'm trying to play more aggressively it does come up more often now.

 

[Baser]

Played the Apocalypse site in Kent on Sunday with a couple of mates. Weather was lovely, sunny but not to warm and the ground has fully dried out now which is a real benefit. Around 120 players joined, a little less than usual.

Took my freshly cleaned and modified LCT RPK 16, not an especially fast rate of fire or snappy trigger response but will run a sustained 200-300 BB onslaught from a single trigger pull so epic for keeping heads down, had a few comments on how mean it looked so its doing its job! Also had my trusty WE Sig 226 on my belt for when something a little less brute force is required.

1st game was standard fall back but with a funky electronically activated remote bomb thing. We defended and the other team had to push us back to get the code for the bomb. We started in village which we held for about 45 mins before we fell. Moved back to no mans land and held that for about 45 mins. I ran out of ammo so had to take 5 mins to grab some more BB's and rejoined at stockade. By this point the blue team were organised and pushed hard but they ran out of time, another 5 mins and they would have taken it.

2nd game after lunch doesn't have a name yet but with the hills involved we decided 'F**k off Doug' (the Marshall who came up with it) was a suitable name. Each team starts at the top of an opposing hill next to their flag with a very open valley in between. Each team has a box under their flag at the top of the hill, to win you have to grab the other teams box and get it back to your flag. The hills are steep and cover fairly limited making the slog back to respawn hard work. We fought hard but the other team had youth on their side and won. I caught up with a couple of lads from their team after the game to congratulate them on their excellent cardio work.

A pause between the 3rd and 4th game saw the usual birthday run, the dad of the lad doing the run joined in and they took it very well, must sting like a B when around 70 players shoot at you while running away. (semi only and DMR/sniper MED's are enforced)

3rd games always a player vote and the simple capture the flag was the game chosen but the numbers had fallen to 30-35 players a team and the map chosen was large so no flags were captured. Started off parked off the right side of the village and the blues arrived far quicker than expected, some more epic cardio work. After we picked them off and sent them back to spawn it went quiet with sporadic gun fights opening up but it was very spread out.

Had a great day all in with only a few minor bruises so need to try harder next time. Gratuitous photo of the RPK as I wasn't pap'ed brandishing it.

 

[The_Lord_Poncho]

As mentioned in another thread, a superb Sunday was had at Battle Lakes, Kent. My first time there- I usually frequent Driver Wood, with its 100-150 players at every game. After the games at DW had recently been getting shorter and shorter, and the high numbers often making play a little attritional, I fancied a change.

So, with the Cyma M16 A1, Specna AK74, and a backup G36c, I drove through the leafy lanes of Kent to get to Battle Lakes. On arrival, it became very clear this was a different operation to my usual site. Driver Woods' automated announcement to fill in a disclaimer form before you set foot in the safe zone, piped music, and sea of players was swapped for a grassy area with picnic tables, a small shop/reception, and a warm friendly greeting from the head marshal. The signage at Driver Wood declaring no home brought food and drink to be consumed on the premises was replaced by a little lean-to with free tea and coffee, and a reminder to get an advance order in for a collection from the local cafe at lunch.

After an engaging and entertaining brief, we headed out for the first game- a two hour point domination game, with three flags located at key locations within the game area- to be raised by one team, or dropped by the other. Very much a learning session for me as I had no idea where I was going, but it was a good one. Once I got into the swing of things, I started taking out the enemy with the M16, with some memorable flanks around behind them.

The day was billed as a 'film sim'- the theory being a slightly slower pace, more structured game play. In practice, this essentially meant an ammo limit (600 for the standard 'rifle class'- albeit you could reload back at your spawn if you needed to) and semi only. I also found the player ethos on site- and possibly the style of play - leant itself to much more cooperation with fellow team mates- people naturally linked up, patrolled together, came up with plans to assault particular positions etc. This was all organic, but made the play quite engaging- and very much appreciated by myself, as I tend to turn up to game days on my own. A new one for me was also the medic rule- if you are hit, you can call out for a medic, and tie a bandage around a limb, with the second hit sending you back to respawn. This added a new dimension, allowed for some entertaining theatrics, and also meant fewer lengthy walks to respawn.

After just under an hour for lunch, during which it was nice to see all gas powered guns being re-chrono'd as the day had warmed up, we played a game of fall back. We were on the attacking side with unlimited lives, having to clear the defenders out of a series of key structures around the site. Defenders having only two lives, before needing to fall back and defend the next objective. This really helped me learn the site - consisting a series of-as advertised small lakes, plenty of undulations, areas of open woodland, mixed with very thick rhododendron. There are a fair amount of structures built around the site too- including a large 'kill house'. Definitely a site for greener cam patterns (certainly in the summer)- my tiger stripe worked incredibly well.

After around an hour and a half we managed to clear the defenders out of all the objectives, and after a quick reload, went into a couple of entertaining games of zombie/infected to finish off. The uninfected wearing arms bands and defending a structure, removing the bands once hit by a zombie before joining their ranks.

Overall, a really great day. The site is interesting, the game play was adapted (and spawns suitably located) to suit the numbers (circa 26), and the banter and spirit amongst everyone there was the best that I've come across. The tone for this was very much set by the marshals themselves. As an example, a member of the opposition managed a superb shot as I bobbed my head briefly over a barricade - hitting me in the face. He sent a Marshall over to me to check I was ok - a really nice gesture by the player, and commendable for the marshal to bother jogging across the site to check on me too. If I was pushed to think of any negatives, it might be that the safe zone could become a little challenging on a wet day- there is a large tent, but shelter could be at a premium.

If you are within a sensible travel time, and fancy a great day of airsofting, possibly as an antidote to larger sites with a more 'detached' atmosphere, I would whole heartedly recommend you give Battle Lakes a try.

 

[Baser]

Played Apocalypse Kent on Sunday and for the first time I didn't enjoy it.

Packed my relatively new LCT AK12 and WE Sig 226 with my trusty Cyma MP5K as a backup, left in the car incase of any mechanical mishaps.

Day started well with a friendly player offering me a lift up the hill in his 4x4 a truly epic gentlemen who was there with his son. Site was busy with around 140/150 players so fairly typical Sunday. Guns all chrono'd well, shooting BB's flat and far. I had a quick wander around the safe zone to find I was truly alone for this one. Mates were all busy with other things but I play this site a couple of times a month so there's usually someone I can tag along with but other than the Marshalls I didn't recognise anyone.

First game was rescue the downed pilot, the pilot had crashed in enemy territory with 20 of our players for protecting and the rest of us had to fight our way to them to rescue the pilot and bring him/her back to our base. I joined a small group and at first we tried to flank around the other team but a few well placed snipers and assume DMR's held the advantage so we tried another way. I got separated from the group and came across 3 lads from the opposing team standing about having a laugh, snuck up on them and double tapped them, one called his hit the other two turned around and full auto'd me. As I was on my own I had a walk back to spawn. Came back the same way and got picked off from the shadows somewhere, decided to head to the other spawn point to see if I could find better luck. But couldn't find any as the other team were intrenched and I just couldn't find my grove.

After time was called we went for lunch only to find the three lads who shot me were on the tables behind happily laughing away about how they weren't taking hits and full auto'ing anyone they came across so I went home. I am a firm believer in if you aren't having fun don't do it, so I went home and tinkered with my RPK (hop rubber, nub, barrel and spring) for a few hours then did a few jobs around the house. Mods to the RPK took well so have a few more guns to sort out in the coming weeks.

On Monday I went to the airsoft boot fair at Splatoon in Essex with a mate. Looking for a classic wooden AK (preferably LCT) to add to the collection but only found one and it was a bit short for my tastes, more CQB than woodland. Had a couple of coffees and bumped into a couple of people I recognised. Bootfair was small but well attended and it's always good to have a look and chat with other likeminded people. Didn't buy anything, my mate picked up a few accessories torches, tracers etc to dress up his kit.

 

[Colin Allen]

As mentioned in another thread, a superb Sunday was had at Battle Lakes, in Kent. My first time there- I usually frequent Driver Wood, with its 100-150 players in every game. After the games at DW had been recently getting shorter and shorter, and the high numbers often making play a little attritional, I fancied a change.

So, with the Cyma M16 A1, Specna AK74, and a backup G36c, I drove through the leafy lanes of Kent to get to Battle Lakes. On arrival, it became very clear this was a different operation to my usual site. Driver Woods' automated announcement to fill in a disclaimer form before you set foot in the safe zone, piped music, and sea of players was swapped for a grassy area with picnic tables, a small shop/reception, and a warm friendly greeting from the head marshal. The signage at Driver Wood declaring no home brought food and drink to be consumed on the premises was replaced by a little lean- to with free tea and coffee, and a reminder to get an advance order in for a collection from the local cafe at lunch.

After an engaging and entertaining brief, we headed out for the first game- a two hour point domination game, with three flags located at key locations within the game are- to be raised by one team, or dropped by the other. Very much a learning session for me as I had no idea where I was going, but it was a good one. Once I got into the swing of things, I started taking out the enemy with the M16, with some memorable flanks around behind the enemy.

The day was billed as a 'film sim'- the theory being a slightly slower pace, more structured game play. In practice, this essentially meant an ammo limit (600 for the standard 'rifle class'- albeit you could reload back at your spawn if you needed to) and semi only. I also found the player ethos on site- and possibly the style of play - leant itself to much more cooperation with fellow team mates- people naturally linked up, patrolled together, came up with plans to assault particular positions etc. This was all organic, but made the play quite engaging- and very much appreciated by myself, as I tend to turn up to game days on my own. A new one for me was also the medic rule- if you are hit, you can calm out for a medic, and tie a bandage around a limb, withe the second hit sending you back to respawn. This added a new dimension, allowed for some entertaining theatrics, and also meant less lengthy walks to respawn.

After just under an hour for lunch, during which it was nice to see all gas powered guns being re-chrono'd as the day had warmed up, we played a game of fall back. We were on the attacking side with unlimited lives, having to clear the defenders out of a series of key structures around the site. Defenders having only two lives, before needing to fall back and defend the next objective. This really helped me learn the site, consisting a series of-as advertised- small lakes, plenty of undulations, areas of open woodland, mixed with very thick rhododendron. There are a fair amount of structures built around the site too- including a large 'kill house'. Definitely a site for greener cam patterns (certainly in the summer)- my tiger stripe worked incredibly well.

After around an hour and a half we managed to clear the defenders out of all the objectives, and after a quick reload, went into a couple of entertaining games of zombie/infected to finish off. The uninfected wearing arms bands and defending a structure, removing the bands once hit by a zombie before joining their ranks.

Overall, a really great day. The site is interesting, the game play was adapted (and spawns suitably located) to suit the numbers (circa 26), and the banter and spirit amongst everyone there was the best that I've come across. The tone for this was very much set by the marshals themselves. As an example, a member of the opposition managed a superb shot as I bobbed my head briefly over a barricade - hitting me in the face. He sent a Marshall over to me to check I was ok - a really nice gesture by the player, and commendable for the marshal to bother jogging across the site to check on me too. if I was pushed to think of any negatives, it might be that the safe zone could become a little challenging on a wet day- there is a large tent, but shelter could be at a premium.

If you are within a sensible travel time, and fancy a great day of airsofting, possibly as an antidote to larger sites with a more 'detached' atmosphere, I would whole heartedly recommend you give Battle Lakes a try.

Click to shrink...

It sounds like a cracking day. The safe zone is a bit of a concern; last time I went there were two tents and it did rain quite heavily. I came back at lunchtime to find that the cat had decided that my gun bag was its new home. Back in the day, there were a number of large gazebos and also the large room inside the main building.

 

[The_Lord_Poncho]

It sounds like a cracking day. The safe zone is a bit of a concern; last time I went there were two tents and it did rain quite heavily. I came back at lunchtime to find that the cat had decided that my gun bag was its new home. Back in the day, there were a number of large gazebos and also the large room inside the main building.

Click to shrink...

I'll probably take a tarp and a few poles with me next time if its looking like poor weather I reckon.

 

[Colin Allen]

I'll probably take a tarp and a few poles with me next time if its looking like poor weather I reckon.

Click to shrink...

That is a plan! I will probably do the same.

 

[Cannonfodder]

I came back at lunchtime to find that the cat had decided that my gun bag was its new home.

Click to shrink...

Sounds like the feline distribution system is working.

 

[Colin Allen]

Sounds like the feline distribution system is working.

Click to shrink...

There seems to always have been at least one cat at Battle Lakes; the one that was there when I was marshalling was a very friendly little chap.

 

[LMKipper]

It sounds like a cracking day. The safe zone is a bit of a concern; last time I went there were two tents and it did rain quite heavily. I came back at lunchtime to find that the cat had decided that my gun bag was its new home. Back in the day, there were a number of large gazebos and also the large room inside the main building.

Click to shrink...

On this note, I know Val is very aware the safe zone needs some updating. Plans are afoot!

 

[Impulse]

Great day at Driver Wood today, despite the goddamn rain (been lovely all week, but of course because it's airsoft day it meant that it was time for rain). I decided to use my Tanaka AICS + p226 combo today, and the AICS was performing phenomenally all day. Always tickles me when I'm using a gun that's older than a bunch of the players (double the age of some players!). I also tried my webbing setup, but... it wasn't good. Still being overweight (but getting smaller day by day now!), I found that rather than sitting the weight on my hips, it was just massively pulling on my back and shoulders, which really sapped me all day and I think I'm going to ache tomorrow. Back to the D3CRH + slim belt kit next game and for Shift Your RIFT.

Most games were the standard fare at Driver Wood. First game had us capture an objective, the objective being a rogue player who counted to 10 when hit. If nobody got to him in those 10 seconds he went rogue again, but if anyone got to him then they captured him and had to keep a hand on him. We actually managed to capture him super fast and get him to our base, which was where I was sniping from and so that brought a lot of attention to where I was. Thankfully, my AICS uses the longer 25rd magazines, so I had plenty of ammo to last with the enemy team hitting us hard. I had a lot of people trying to hit me with AEGs at 70m+, while I also had the high ground and it was amusing watching all the BBs drop short, only for me to be able to hit them with ease with a bolt action + elevation.

Second game was the best though. This time, there was a squad of players who basically had instant medic rules, but were the target of both teams. Again, we had to shoot them, then get a hand on them to capture them and get them on our team, but with their instant medic rules it basically meant they had to all get taken out rapidly. We then had to get them to the tower in the middle of the thick foliage. So instead of going for the players, a bunch of us made for that tower to hold and wait for the enemy team to do the hard work. I continued flanking around with a pair of ghillies, but split off from them to hug the very edge of the site. I finally got into a spot to shoot, taking one player out, but as soon as I did that, I then saw an absolute stampede of legs heading in my direction, as about 10 enemy players started moving in my direction. I... decided to bug out, running away and occasionally turning to fire a shot into the masses. This was an incredible series of play, as despite carrying way more gear than almost, if not everyone else since I carry all the same sustainment kit as I would in a 24h milsim, I managed to keep my distance from the horde, leading them on a wild goose chase back to my team who were dug in around the tower and alerting them to the incoming tide of enemies. I do wish I had a DMR though, or a spotter with a regular rifle, as being able to just put more rounds down than a single shot would've been helpful in slowing my pursuers down. I basically just led them all the way back, running, taking a quick hide position, taking out a player as they chased me, then fell back again to the next position to do the same again, repeating it until I got back to my team. I was absolutely gassed by the end of it, but holy hell was it fun, and a massive adrenaline high, and I didn't get hit once. Couch to 5k over the winter, and now all the swimming is starting to pay off.

It's passages of play like that that don't come around all the time, but it's the absolute best fun when sniping. Some people will say it's the hiding in a bush and letting players go past you, which is the other part that is incredibly fun, but in that instance if I went to ground instead of fleeing, I think I would've eventually been taken out. This way I managed to stay alive, while being a pain in the arse all the way back.

After lunch was when the rain started, and I saw some of my shots hit raindrops. When you're watching your shot go perfectly straight for 40m and then violently ping off course at a 70 degree angle all of a sudden with nothing in the way... yeah, that's rain. The first game after lunch saw the other team need to get to a helicopter, grab a stretcher from it, take it to a casualty that was by the fallen plane, then extract the casualty to another base. I partnered up with some other snipers and we, along with a bunch of other players, completely denied the helicopter to the enemy team so they couldn't get the stretcher.

Final game was a very close king of the hill game. Spawns were close, to the point where I could probably snipe onto the hill from my spawn if I could weave it through some foliage. I managed to get myself into one of the helicopters and started posting shots down one of the main paths and into the various shipping container buildings that I had line of sight to. A sneaky enemy ghillie flanked all the way around and knife killed a player just outside the helicopter, but he didn't clear me so I managed to nip that in the bud before he could do some real damage as none of our team knew he was there. It did feel like the enemy team gave up in this game though. I saw a large number going back to the safe zone mid-game, and by the end our team had pushed up too far and were basically spawn camping them. I stayed back, because I can't stand spawn camping and know how far my rifles can shoot, which meant that outside of denying the giga-flank, the 2nd half of this game was pretty quiet for me. Until the end where 3 enemy players pushed aggressively, but were shooting at people at a completely different angle to me, leaving themselves totally open from where I was. I only got one of them in the last 10 seconds, then the game was over.

So yeah, great day at Driver Wood today. But I think I'm going to be DMRing for now over bolt actions. I want to play a bit more aggressively, and bolt actions are... just not great for that. 2nd game day in a row where I've wanted to use a DMR, but have gone with a bolt action to make sure they're shooting well.

 

[tside]

Went out to my local site (dirtydog) yesterday. Finally had the rpk up and running and a new drum mag to make the extra weight worthwhile over my normal range of AKs. Absolutely top notch day minus being mouth shot hard enough to dent my mouthpro. Backed it up with my acturus pp19 which as usual ran flawlessly but I definitely need more mags as with my eyesight 90 rounds a mag runs out in no time.

 

[A_Stoat]

Back at the old stomping grounds (Skirmish Budby) with my buddies M and H, ostensibly running our RusFor kit as a test for the Battle Stations Boston 12hr coming up next month. I nearly went up to Anzio instead, but decided not to try and mess around convincing my lift to change plans the day before. Really for me it was mostly a "can I hack the Gorka in hot weather?" test - the answer is yes, but I was a SWEATY human by the end of it. Ran the E&L AKS-74U all day, because it just works. H has recently gotten his hands on the new VFC Krink because he's a lucky sod, so got to have a play with that during chrono. I was surprised by how light it felt in the hand compared to my E&L, but good LORD is it fun to shoot. My bank account is currently cringing in anticipation of me making poor life choices...

Onto the actual day - we had about 50-odd on site, which is a decently busy day for the site, with a mix of mostly new faces and a small group of rentals. It felt like the day started quite late, mostly because a second group of rentals turned up about 5 minutes before we were supposed to go out. Game 1 was the usual TDM on the tank field, and for the second weekend in a row we ended up attacking downhill, which... yeah, kinda mid, but that's mostly on me for enjoying one specific orientation and part of that map. Next time we get on there, I'm going to force myself to play the other side of the field to see how I get on. Teams felt pretty balanced, which was nice.

After that, we had a special treat - I finally got to play on Trenches, which I haven't done for about a decade due to a combination of it being out of action for ages, and then missing it in the rotation so far this year. I *adore* Trenches, it's a huge map with, well, trenches, which makes for some really immersive gameplay. Lots of crawling, lots of tight corner action, lots of schlepping back to respawn. I was absolutely knackered at the end of it, but it was well worth it. Kit held up perfectly after being dragged through the dirt, and I found my rig ergonomics worked just fine in tight spaces and when prone, so I could cross that off the checklist. A highlight here was a proper 'trench warfare' grenade kill with my cheapo springer BB shower, although I paid for it by getting shot in the little fingernail as I was letting go of the grenade. Who needs nails, anyway?

We then went onto village, using the newer orientation with one side attacking set-up defenders. Honestly, this game felt like a total miss. Just the wrong combination of slightly too many players, and too much of an open space between respawn and the first cover, plus a really weird restriction (only pistols allowed to shoot out of the church?) meant that the first ten minutes of the game was just walking into BBs without making any real progress. I try not to get too tilted about games, but I was honestly just getting frustrated and couldn't get anything going, so went and had a little sit down for five minutes to cool off, before jumping back into the end. Over lunch, I did feed back to the head marshal, and politely requested that maybe we could switch it up after lunch so the other team had more fun attacking than we did. All credit to him, he explained his rationale behind the game design as it was one of his own, which he didn't have to do. It made sense - I just didn't think it was super fun. We did end up running it back exactly the same after lunch, and fair play to the opposition, they played it a hell of a lot better than we did and absolutely smoked our time. This was sort of a theme throughout the day - the teams weren't unbalanced, they just had a slight but noticeable edge on us.

Lunch had run on a little longer than planned, and this meant we only ended up playing three more games on the day. Luckily, the next two were absolutely belting - two rounds of three-stage pushback from the tank field, through Barrels, to the fort. The attackers had a briefcase which had to first be filled with two blocks of 'C4' hidden on the field, and then taken to the centre of the fort, with infinite respawns, the defenders had one life on each field. Having seen how green the new bramble growth at the edge of the last two fields was, I threw on my KMCS ghillie bolero (which is pretty damn green), and took to the bushes on defence when we got pushed back to the barrel field. I then had one of those runs which makes you wish for a GoPro. From my position in the brambles, I went completely undetected as the opposition moved up. When they were in easy range, I popped up and had a great angle on a couple of their main barricades, and managed to mow down about a dozen players in succession before they finally clocked my location, suppressed me, and finally sent someone to get me. Just the perfect combination of the right position, the right camo, a gun running great, and a bit of patience, making me seem like a much better player than I actually am.

On the attacking side, I decided to see if anyone would copy me, and went and swept the bushes. Turns out I was right, but unfortunately the chap wasn't ghillie'd up and I got to feel a bit smug popping him before he could even start shooting. Our attack on the fort went in, and the rental player who'd been given the briefcase ended up attached to me. We tried for one entrance, and got instantly pinned by something 30rps+ and scary, snuck out the way we'd come, and tried the next entrance. I immediately got gunned down trying to pie the door, but on respawn began magdumping into the spot I'd been shot from, while 'gently encouraging' the briefcase-holder to make entry as he was looking understandably reluctant having seen me just get peppered. In fairness to him, he did, and managed to get the bomb to the required location. As it turned out, we managed to beat the opposition time by 16 seconds - our first win all day, and one that made us all feel a lot better. Kudos to that chap for volunteering to be at the pointy end, and for being speedy when it mattered.

For the final game, we played a bit of Pyramid on the Hyperball field. I love this mode (and may have suggested it to the marshals as a nice way to end the day), although a strong headwind made it a little comical. I'm pretty sure we saw H's BBs coming back over his shoulder at one point! Unfortunately it was a bit of a cursed day for guns, as M's LCT AKMS emitted a puff of magic smoke before the last game, and H had all of his guns misbehave at least once throughout the day. Luckily, he'd brought a small arsenal.

All in all, a good day out - a solid 7/10 in my book. I think all the things I didn't like are on me rather than the site, marshals, or players, so I can work on them myself. Crucially, the kit passed muster, and I'm feeling really good about running it out next month. I really enjoy Skirmish Budby - it's a good, honest site, with very few obnoxious players and a good mix of games. I don't think it's ever going to blow anyone away, but it's also not going to massively let anyone down, either.