Colin Allen

When I went, we played the worst fallback game ever. In one section of it, all 30 or so of us had to defend a small circular area with virtually no cover against an enemy who could go wherever they wanted and attack from any direction; it didn't last long. In another section of the same game, the same number of us had to defend the world's smallest killhouse; there was barely room to breathe, let alone move. In another game in the CQB maze thing, we had to pretend that we could not see our opponents through the rather large gaps in the walls. The safezone was good and had WiFi.

It is a strange site. I used to play and marshal there at one time; while it has some great terrain, with large numbers it becomes massively channeled, while with small numbers if turns into hiking with guns. The old safe zone was great, with the interior and exterior space in use and much larger marquees outside. However, as a marshal, clearing up all the mud and crap indoors after everyone had gone home was a pain. I went there a couple of years ago and was somewhat disappointed by the safezone and the gameplay.

I went there once; it was enough.

This morning, the lad and I went to one of our regular sites, Airsoft Plantation, over in Essex, along with 228 other players. Fortunately, the safe zone and the site are big enough to cope with such a large number of players and the marshals ensured that turn around times between games were as short as possible. We started off with an extraction game. The other team (Blue) had 14 forward operatives in seven vehicles in the mortar pits; they had to extract as many of them as possible and get them back to their start point on the edge of the village, which was also their regen point. We (Red) had to prevent them doing so by shooting the forward operatives and generally delaying the Blues. Our start point and regen were at the DEA Base. This was a fast and furious game with engagements all through the scrubland and across the mortar pits, with the initiative swinging to and fro. Eventually, the Blues managed to get eight live forward operatives back to their regen, with six being killed. After a short break to refill mags, the game was turned around, with us taking our turn to try to extract 14 forward operatives, one of whom was the lad, who was in the back of the Bedford; he died very quickly and regened as a regular player, while I was fighting in the scrubland with a group who were trying to cut the Blues' route between the DEA Base and the mortar pits. We got news that seven of our forward operatives had made it to the village, along with six dead ones; one was still in play and, if we could get him out in time, we would win. He was successfully extracted and made it back to the village in a time that was four minutes and thirty six seconds shorter than the blues had managed for the same number of live operatives; victory! After another short break, we headed into the woods to start a fallback came; as defenders, we had two lives in the woods, two in and around the village and two in the scrubland. The enemy had infinite regens on a marshal and had to get one of 14 players with yellow armbands into the plane in the DEA Base. I took up a position on the left of our first defensive position and we had a super fight with the enemy, holding them up for a very long time before finally being overrun and pushed back to a second defensive position where we did the same thing again. Being hit again there, I, along with many of my colleagues, fell back to the village, where we held up the enemy until the game ended with them far from achieving their objective. After lunch, we played a game where we, as the attackers, had to fight our way into the village from the firebreak, capture 14 players with yellow armbands (is anyone seeing a pattern here?) and get them back to our our marshal on the firebreak within a specified time. I missed the beginning of this game due to a couple of annoying but minor gun issues and only managed to join in while we were pushing into the village. After a hard fight, the 14 players were captured and delivered within the specified time. Victory again! Then came the reverse of the fallback game; we soon discovered how difficult it was to push through such a large enemy force and found ourselves bogged down. The lad and I joined a group on our far right and, massively assisted by the lad's controlled aggression and training, forced our way forward along the site boundary, opening up the enemy's flank and helping push them back to the environs of the village, where our attack stalled somewhat and we ran out of time, as had the Blues earlier. Thus, fallback ended as a draw. Overall, it was one of the best days that we have had at Airsoft Plantation, with the games being played hard but fairly, with some great play on both sides. Weapons used: Me: Ares L1A1 Real Sword QBZ97 ASG Commander XP18 (CO2) The lad: LCT AKMS G&G AK47/AKM hybrid ASG Commander XP18 (CO2) Dynatex grenade (x2)

I believe that Imperium have gone even further with only bolt action wielding snipers being allowed to wear ghillie suits and DMR users being restricted to a snood. I agree that it is a good rule.

I am right over the other side of London, almost in Kent. Ambush Airsoft in Cobham is still open. Before buying your first rifle, play your three games at the same site in not less than 56 days and get your UKARA registration, so that you don't have to buy a two toned gun. Try to get your hands on as many guns as you can to see what suits you and what you like; as others have said, most airsofters are more than happy to bore you to death with information about their guns. If you want to make a safe first purchase, the Specna and Double Eagle M4 style guns are decent.

The gun is available for £229.99 from JD, so the asking price is very close to the retail price for the package.

It is a Vorsk; they have terrible quality control and a range of problems. If it is new, return it for a refund and buy a TM.

Welcome to the money pit! Rent a gun and kit first to get a feel for the hobby and make sure you want to invest in it. Make sure you have good boots that give ankle support and wear clothing that you don't mind getting wet and filthy. Where in London are you based?

Ah, it was double feeding before you fitted the Maxx hop unit! That did not seem to be the case based on your original post: "Hi guys iv got an ICS split gearbox M4 with newish maxx hop unit new hop rubber and new internal barrell and it's now double feeding..." When you say "double feeding", what do you actually mean? Is it pushing out two BBs at the same time or is it cycling twice, giving two separate shots. If the former: If your sector gear has a delayer chip, take it off and see if that makes a difference. If that does not work, one thing you could try is to use a 4mm drill to make a small indentation in the "roof" of the hop unit, directly above the feed tube. This seems to help prevent double feeding by giving the BB somewhere to sit rather than trying to follow its friend through the hop lips. If the latter: Try fitting an Auto Braking mosfet.

This! The same rules apply to them as to everyone else.

Armbands; the name sort of gives away where they should be. Putting them on the plate carrier also causes issues if everyone is looking for them on the arms. I cannot see why people won't have them clearly displayed on their arms, unless they are trying to gain an unfair advantage, which is otherwise known as cheating.

Using green armbands at an outdoor site seems wrong as it does confer an advantage for that team; the same, of course, applies to sites that give one team armbands but not the other. In my opinion, armbands should be worn either on both arms or on different arms by the two teams. Players who put them on their plate carriers and Bush Wookies who wear them on their ankles are cheating and should be ritually disemboweled.

I remember the discussion and have been trying to use this site's pretty useless search function to track it down, with no joy.

This morning, the lad and I set out for Splatoon in Essex. On this occasion, we were accompanied by the lad's girlfriend, Charlie, whose first taste of airsoft this was to be, although she has been shooting real guns since the age of eight. The safe zone was a little less busy than usual, probably due to people having family commitments, with probably around 70 players in attendance. After getting everything ready and showing Charlie how airsoft guns work, which involved her shooting the lad a few times, we set off for the first game, with me using the Ares VZ58. This involved each team collecting as many as possible of a number of bombs that were spread across the site and transporting them to their helicopter; we had the grey helicopter and the yellow team had the black helicopter. Teams could also raid their opponents' helicopter and steal their bombs. Everyone had infinite regens on their start point. Setting off into the middle field, I very quickly found a bomb, which I transported to the helicopter. Returning to the middle field, I found another, while a visit to the lower field yielded yet another bomb! Round about this time, I encountered the lad and Charlie, who were heading back to the safe zone as the goggles he had bought for her were steaming up. I offered my spare Bolle Tracker goggles, which proved to be much better, with even the prescription inserts being ok for her. At this point, we had quite a few bombs, so I decided to join my colleagues in the container village between the two helicopters, who were attempting to both prevent the enemy stealing our bombs while, at the same time, attempting to steal theirs. This turned into a really good fight between and in the buildings, with us eventually pushing the yellow players back to their helicopter, although a stout defence prevented us stealing any of their bombs. When the whistle went, we had eleven bombs and the yellow team had a mighty...two. After bombing up, we started a fallback game, in which we were the attackers, with rolling regens on a marshal, while the defenders had a single life in each of the four zones that we were playing through. We cleared the first zone rather handily, but lost a bit of time checking for concealed yellow players (each defending player in the zone after the attackers calls it clear adds a 30 second time penalty). The same thing happened in the second zone and we then pushed into the first half of the container village field, which is usually very hard to break into. It proved to be so again, but a determined rush and some good suppressive fire saw us reach the black helicopter and begin to push into the structures. We reached the mid point fairly quickly and called it clear, only for an opponent to pop up from the middle of a stack of tractor tyres. Breaking through the final section proved to be rather tricky, until one of the UK Airsoft Ladies made a daring run for the grey helicopter, which she reached, ending the game. At some point in this zone, I was shot in the back by my own team. After taking luncheon (cold pizza; yum!) this game was reversed. In the first zone, now using the Umarex/S&T ARX160, I took up an advanced defensive position on the right, from where I amassed a number of kills before again being shot in the back by one of my teammates. Falling back to the second zone, I took up a slightly less advanced position in the hope that would prevent me being team killed again; it worked! After taking out a number of enemy players, I was shot by an attacker who I am certain I hit as well; however, he did not seem to agree. The final two zones were hard fought and my final position on the edge of the woods was lost when a grenade aimed at my colleagues behind the blue car went off within 5m of me. The yellow team reached the grey helicopter in a time that was about two minutes faster than our attempt. Boo! After bombing up, we played a game where the attackers (the yellow team) attacking from the far end of the site, initially had to get a bomb to one of the helicopters; they had infinite regens on a marshal. As the defenders, we could deploy in the two zones of the container village and had three lives. Once they had achieved this, the game reset, with everyone having one life and the attackers needing to transport the bomb to the other helicopter. It has to be said that our defence was awesome! We held the attackers away from both helicopters for the duration of the game, although they made several bold incursions into the container village, almost splitting our team apart a couple of times. I went through five and a half magazines in this game, which is very unusual for me, and was dropping back to the regen to load up when the game timed out. A fair number of yellow players left after this game, so the sides were rebalanced and we took our turn as the attackers. It is very difficult to break into the container village from the middle field but, after what seemed like a rather long time, we managed to do so, whittling down the enemy and seizing the black helicopter. However, our bomb carrier was nowhere to be found! After about five minutes, we finally tracked him down and got the bomb to the black helicopter. Unfortunately, only 14 seconds were left on the clock, so the game ended at that point as a win for us. Overall, it was a very good day, with some excellent play by both sides and well designed games. Charlie loved it and wants to get a pair of Revision Sawflys with prescription inserts so that she can play again; she has become an airsofter! Weapons used: Me: Ares VZ58 (No! It isn't an AK!) Umarex/S&T ARX160 ASG Commander XP18 (CO2) The lad: E&L AK74MN CYMA AKS74U ASG Commander XP18 (CO2) Dynatex grenade (x2) Charlie: G&G GR4 G26 (Well, it used to be, but it has transitioned into something else)

Jesus wept!

This! Start by taking the Maxx hop unit out and refitting the original unit. If it feeds normally, which I suspect it will, you have found the problem. If it doesn't, do the same with the other parts you have changed until you identify the problem. Maxx hop units are notoriously finicky about which guns they will work in.

The worrying element of this is that these people get to vote and reproduce.

Ouch! Please keep us updated on how it plays out.

I have played at their Anzio Camp site, which has the same rule; chrono stations are staffed.

Low profile bushings may well be the best answer to the shimming issue; they are pretty simple to change.