The ghillie discussion

[Impulse]

ghillies not required to do that tho 

I get the feeling you're the kind of person who would argue that "well, you don't really need an airsoft gun to play airsoft" because at the end of the day you can run around with a rubber knife trying to sneak up on and knife kill everyone.

Nobody is saying "you need a ghillie to hide", we're saying it makes it easier and at least in my... 17(ish) years of playing as a ghillie in airsoft, I have a lot of first-hand experience of that being the case.

 

[Fatboy40]

you can move thru any area unseen , dont need a ghillie to accomplish that 

Umm... not if you're dressed in Adidas trackies and one of those CoD skull mask thingies, you stick out like a sore thumb and are begging to be hit.

Are you intentionally being a troll?

 

[Badgerlicious]

Umm... not if you're dressed in Adidas trackies and one of those CoD skull mask thingies, you stick out like a sore thumb and are begging to be hit.

Are you intentionally being a troll?

He's not entirely wrong. With careful movement you can move through most areas (with some vegetation) unseen. But a good ghillie really opens up your options for movement. It can also buy you time when someone knows roughly where you are. And it can get people to walk right past you when you're in otherwise incredibly obvious spots. 

 

[mrfoxhound]

I get the feeling you're the kind of person who would argue that "well, you don't really need an airsoft gun to play airsoft" because at the end of the day you can run around with a rubber knife trying to sneak up on and knife kill everyone.

Nobody is saying "you need a ghillie to hide", we're saying it makes it easier and at least in my... 17(ish) years of playing as a ghillie in airsoft, I have a lot of first-hand experience of that being the case.

in my 17 years of softing across all aspects of the hobby running a ghillie on sat/sun skirmish is worthless 

 

[Fatboy40]

camouflage is not used to hide you, its to disrupt the outline of the human shape...

Damn, if only I knew this sooner, I'd just slip a few carboard boxes from Aldi over my body parts and I'd be invisible ?

 

[mrfoxhound]

He's not entirely wrong. With careful movement you can move through most areas (with some vegetation) unseen. But a good ghillie really opens up your options for movement. It can also buy you time when someone knows roughly where you are. And it can get people to walk right past you when you're in otherwise incredibly obvious spots. 

this is true. its the movement that will give you away more then what you are wearing 

 

[strykerles]

Also that they can put team bands on their legs where they can't be seen, makes it very difficult to find them

 

[mrfoxhound]

Also that they can put team bands on their legs where they can't be seen, makes it very difficult to find them

thats a ''site rules'' problem 

 

[PhantomTMA]

I've been using leaf suit ghillies since 2004 and made the very first Chinese leaf suit ghillie. So I was using what is seen everywhere now, long ago.

Back then it gave massive advantage to our group as we were playing a different games type to everyone else and no one was used to looking for well crafted ghillies. You went unnoticed more often.

Things have changed, just as my group said they would if our suits became mainstream. We said , it would change the game.

You see we had already changed the game and all players used these light mesh leaf suits and played  total Stealth game. Our game, called hunteering had evolved from our hard-core airsoft club that had run since 1991 and all our events were based around Stealth and fieldcraft. 

We developed better suits than traditional heavy designs and made a game where every player used a bolt action and Pistol and handfull of ammo that lasted several days, by yourself. It was the pinnacle of what we love the most ....  the stalk ..... being hunted ..  navigation ..... hard routine and total immersion in nature. 

Anyway, we said it would change skirmish/airsoft if aspects of our game and equipment became mainstream.

However I agree that ghillies should be limited to only bolt action snipers, in the interest of gameplay. Why? For the reasons you give at the top.

Bolt action is the most disadvantaged airsoft gun on the field ..... long MED ...no follow up shot.. small mags ...... expensive ..... most technical to setup well....... have to be stationary to stand a chance of hitting someone..... that's why we play with them. They provide the hardest challenge. My group don't do DMRs as we kind of see them as too high a rate of fire to provide the same experience ... you can walk fore onto targets etc lay down rounds while moving .... big mags .... hi semi auto rof..... etc etc 

I guess we see it as cheating tbh lol

So make a bolty player more specialised as a Sniper by allowing him a full ghillie. 

Maybe DMR can use a jacket only?

AEG player can have a ghillie hat only? 

But that is if you want a balanced game .. which skirmish isn't.... its a pay to win environment due to lack of limits around equipment and ammo.

As is, there is no penalty for putting down 100 rounds at someone in 3 seconds. It's a fraction of a mag.

Our own game identifies all the limitations that we could use to create a better, more balanced/skillful environment. That is what our "underground sport" is about ...... getting what we want from the time/money invested in the activity. 

As is, airsofters are moving towards hose pipes you can quickly walk into target without even needing sights and liberally hose that area down till one bb hits.

Personally I want more from my game than that. 

Airsoft is essentially hide and seek ... and tag.

You can't blame people for finally realising that hiding is how you win. However, as you say would you rather skirmish is about hide and seek or more about tag? 

 

[Impulse]

So make a bolty player more specialised as a Sniper by allowing him a full ghillie. 

Maybe DMR can use a jacket only?

AEG player can have a ghillie hat only? 

First of all, that's a name I haven't seen since Arnies, but I know (I think?) I've picked your brain over Facebook over KJW m700 builds. You and your lot are the ones who got me into ghillie sniping back in 2007 - 2008ish   

Secondly, I wouldn't hate this either. The way my local site is going they're only allowing ghillies on bolt actions and DMRs, but regular AEG users can use a cobra hood, which is often more than enough and tends to be what I run during the summer anyway, paired with a crafted boonie. I don't tend to run trousers myself (gets caught too much for me, especially with how many brambles are at Worthing), so it wouldn't affect me so I'm likely a bit biased here too.

 

[Hatchet]

 I don't tend to run trousers myself (gets caught too much for me, especially with how many brambles are at Worthing),

Add this to the list of "Phrases you don't want to hear in Airsoft"...

 

[LMKipper]

First of all, that's a name I haven't seen since Arnies, but I know (I think?) I've picked your brain over Facebook over KJW m700 builds. You and your lot are the ones who got me into ghillie sniping back in 2007 - 2008ish   

Ha! Same. In fact, I bought my APS2 of one these guy as I remember the hunteering word.

 

[Tommikka]

Ah imagine before too long all Airsoft fields across the nation quiet and peaceful. Not because nobody goes Airsofting anymore, no, because everyone is a secret squirrel sniper and hiding in a bush or a tree in their KMCS. 
 

Make sure to bring a flask ?

We carefully curated the mission plans and game format at one event to cater for the preferences of multiple player types ……. This then descended into a few groups quietly circulating around the site deliberately and accidentally avoiding each other 

1) Objectives:

Set mission objectives to capture/hold/defend/destroy buildings, find/retrieve key objectives.

Rather than hold up players stuck all day waiting or battling, we would score the holding at set time points, allow access to props to detonate etc - and we wouldn’t have too many scoring time points, giving players time to move and to avoid factions digging in all day 

Players interested in these would focus on the scoring time point etc, capturing then moving on to the next one

2) Scavengers:

Things to find that would score or provide an advantage.  (Such as bombs to destroy objectives etc)

They were planted deliberately to draw opposing teams scavengers into each other or to cross over an objective - this intending to create skirmishes

Players interested in these chose not to get tied down into skirmishes at the risk of being eliminated and the need to find a spawn point / medic.

They either dodged and flanked around or fired off random shots then scattered to avoid and regroup 

3) Defenders:

Home bases could be attacked for bonuses, and many scavenged items needed to be stored at bases to score or combine them, thus were in danger of being captured

Neither team chose to place defenders, and relied on the natural flow of respawning, resting and scavenger drop off - there may have been the odd raid, but if I recall correctly neither chose to conduct ‘major’ raids 

4) Gun fighters:

We had curated to manufacture ‘encounter points’ in the above, but whilst travelling around the site I found two groups - one from each side.  These were the players who wanted a good battle, but they both decided to ‘patrol’ in a clockwise direction - and were circulating around the middle of the site not encountering each other.

If they heard a noise they then headed towards it, but the noise they had heard were two sets of scavengers who had dispersed by the time the gunfighters had arrived 

It took some subtle adjusting to push players towards each other and set off some battles

 

[PhantomTMA]

Yeah I ran the SNIPER HAVEN in Annie's in the 2000's

Just went back underground to what we loved.... the long stalk 

Check out my historical airsoft ranty below.

If you ordered the APS2 MK2 SPORTER through the post it was probably mine. Some got sold face to face I believe. That was a great rifle for its era and I must have shot hundreds with it

 

[Jedi_Master]

Damn, if only I knew this sooner, I'd just slip a few carboard boxes from Aldi over my body parts and I'd be invisible ?

The art of camoflage and concealament

 

[Pseudotectonic]

It boils down to fairness and gameplay balance, which should be a balance of risk vs reward. Otherwise it becomes similar to blind firing: shooting without presenting yourself = risk free shooting = cheating.

And for a game that is played by untrained and unskilled civilians, the ghillie suit is in effect too OP because often it functions principally as an invisibility suit and gives too much advantage (aka pay-to-win).

If one day the invisibility suit is invented, it will become the new meta because it removes all risks of being seen and/or shot at, therefore is not balanced and probably not very fun, and not good for the sport either. That is not to say stealthcraft and clothing innovations should be removed, because it is of course very essential to the hobby, but for gameplay reasons it should be nerfed. Because this is not a war, this is a game, where balance matters.

I would suggest there should be a minimum visibility requirement, for A. capping the risk reduction achieved by clothing and B. team identification, similar to how EN ISO 20471 defines hi-vis clothing in amount of m2 of certain materials to be visible.

The exact amount of m2 of team colour / which colours / placement is up to debate. The usual armbands (or tapes) over the invisibility suit is a practical solution. But I would argue this rule could be expanded to both the shoulders and forearms/wrists should be taped. Because that is what is being brought forward when you present your weapon.

I would even go on to argue, as you present your weapon, you should also present a visible m2 equivalent to the C zones of a IPSC / USPSA target, so that your risk and reward is balanced against your opponent's, should you choose to engage.

The C zone of the USPSA target is about 0.15 m2 which is roughly equivalent to the requirements for reflective tape on a class 2 hi-vis vest, which I think if distributed across your arms and shoulders and head areas i.e. "the shooting stance silhouette" (because as you present your weapon your torso will be mostly shadowed by your RIF or carriers and so on) this should become a reasonable risk profile even for the best of ghillies. And this will future proof the sport for the invention of invisibility clothing, and will be a first step towards evolving into a spectator sport for Olympics.

 

[Cannonfodder]

Lots of interesting points and counter points being made here.

Personally I'm not a fan of telling people you can't wear x,y or z (unless it's a matter of player safety) as we've all paid to be there and nobody likes to be told how to play, but I can understand why sites would do it. If a game is grinding to a halt because one team can't get more than 10 yards from respawn before being hit then to me the site should be taking steps to change the game either by rearranging teams or by moving players back, eg by deploying smoke to simulate gas. Yes this can be frustrating if you're the one being moved but it's just as annoying being stuck in respawn and is likely to make people give up which then only snowballs and makes the game worse. Unfortunately this would require site staff to actually do some work which, as we all know, can be a rare thing 

 

[gavinkempsell]

I reckon a helium balloon tied to their ankles with a 6 foot string might even the odds up a bit, if the balloon gets burst they need to respawn and get another balloon if they want to bush wookie again.

 

[Dan Robinson]

 

[JVacation]

Think I made a topic on this a while ago. I still strongly believe that ghillies should be bolt action only. This would naturally limit the amount that are present in a game. I think the problem is that if a large percentage of players are wearing them it makes the games very slow and makes the games less exciting for everyone as it means more people are moving slower.