This is a guide to what to buy for noobs on a tight budget, but much of it applies to anyone just starting out. As has been said, your eye protection (eyepro) is the most important thing you'll need and yeah, it can be very difficult to find just the right thing that fits your face, style of play, and level of fitness, so be prepared to go through several types before you find something which you're happy with. My advice is that regardless of what you end up with, a comfy set of mesh eyepro will mean that you always have some which will not fog and, if you later choose something else, they will be good to keep as back up for times when it is very hot/humid, you are exerting yourself more than usual, or you want to lend them to a mate without their own gear.
These may not look cool but trust me, the mesh in them provides the best see-through-ability of any of the commercially available types. The same goggles can come with an eyeshade brim like
this, or as part of a modular mask like
this. The same mesh can be found in smaller goggles like
this, however IMO the smaller goggles cannot be trusted 100% to withstand full auto fire from anything less than 10m, since at that range it is just possible that enough BB's could hit the exact same spot and since the smaller amount of mesh means that there are fewer points where the wires cross each other (and it is the friction between the woven wires which provides its strength), it is just possible that 4 wires could be deformed enough to allow a BB to penetrate.
Now, there is a considerable body of opinion which states that you get what you pay for and thus anything cheap is crap - well, perhaps it is true in some areas of business, but take the horror with which we on AF-UK view the websites justbbguns.co.uk and onlybbguns.co.uk as an example - both of them do sell some cheap crap, but they also sell some pretty expensive items, which are nonetheless crap (although the main reason for our horror is their track record on customer service, particularly when something they've sold breaks 1st or 2nd time out and the victim wants a refund) - there is a whole sector of business devoted to scamming noob airsofters by lying about the performance and/or usefulness of guns and gear, but there are also a lot of companies whose products are made in China who then add a premium to the price simply for their company name and the generic products, known by the acronym ACM (All Chinese Manufacture / All China Made) often made in exactly the same factory, by the same people, are just as good. Here is a pic of most of my eye and face protection:
...as you can see, despite plenty of choice, I still have 2 examples of that mesh in use
(I also have 1 of those ski-mask type goggles somewhere - probably still in my bag)
If you combine one of those ski-mask goggles with a mask like
this with 2 straps to hold it stable on your head as opposed to the type with a single strap, you will have a winning combination. The best way of preventing the mesh from irritating your skin is to make it sit mostly off your skin and the best way of doing that is to add pads to the cheekbone areas. You can glue and stitch foam to them like this:
...but that makes them difficult to clean.
On these I made the pads with covers and velcro hooks:
...then stitched the velcro loops to the mask so they come out for cleaning easily.
Next thing is boots, even if you plan to/are play/ing in an urban setting, to run around confidently when there are trip hazards or even just loose BB's on a hard floor (which get stuck in the tread of your footwear and can cause you to slip), you need boots which support your ankles and obviously the tougher they are, the harder they can be on your feet, so you'd be best to try a few before you buy. I would suggest that boots which are completely waterproof rather than just water resistant are best, because cold wet feet makes for real misery! Bear in mind that military boots may well feel a bit uncomfy when you first try them on, but so long as they aren't too tight, you can add gel insoles and/or pads which prevent them from slipping about on your feet causing blisters and reduce the shock to your feet when you run in them, like
these. You'll probably find that buying boots from military surplus shops is more expensive than buying them online, but you can always try them on at a shop and if you find some you like, take a note of the make and look for them online later...
Even a good make of bolt action sniper rifle (BASR) is usually not very good compared to an AEG assault rifle when brand new - it is the upgrades which allow good accuracy at extended range and those upgrades can cost anything from £150-250 just to make it possible for you to compete on the field. Bear in mind that the max effective range of most AEG's is about 50m and a minimally upgraded BASR's is about 80m - so if you miss your 1st shot (which is quite common for noob snipers) then the target could approach you in order to get a shot - they could cover that 30m in just over 3 seconds: how many shots can you take in that time and how likely are you to hit a moving target? The answers are that anyone may well cock the BASR very quickly, less than a 10th of a sec, but doing it and then reacquiring the moving target could easily take 2 seconds, so that's only 1 shot before they are in range to put fire on you - it doesn't matter that their first shots are likely to miss, they will be able to fire full-auto - they'll get you with quantity not quality...
As said above - get used to shooting, to the way cover and camouflage works at the ranges at which we engage each other, to the way different weights of BB fly and how they behave in various wind conditions (because ultimately air movement is the biggest hurdle to accuracy we face with BB guns), before you consider sniping. It'd only be natural if you imagine that what sniping involves is being completely hidden from your target, placing the cross hairs of your scope on him/her, pulling the trigger and watching them yelp then call "Hit!" without ever seeing you... the truth is very different.
There are rules which most airsoft sites apply to eye and face protection depending on your age, so it'd help us to advise you if we know how old you are. It will also help if we know how much experience of airsofting you have, what town you live in so we can advise on where to play, what action/adventure sports you have done before and what, if any, outdoor gear and/or equipment you already have. It'd also be helpful for us to know if you have any idea what kind of gear you see yourself wearing...
