The 'How Did Your Airsoft Day Go? Thread

[Impulse]

I just got home from... a different site for once. Me and my friend headed to Driver Wood, as we haven't played in over a month and he really wanted to see what the site was like. It was only my 2nd time there, and the last time I went was a while ago so it was basically both of our first times since so much has changed. I made the best decision of the day and when I saw it was 5 celcius this morning, I popped the thermals on. Since we wouldn't be able to leave anything locked in a car, we both only took 1 rifle and 1 pistol each; I chose my pre-ban Tanaka m24 and my TM HK45, though part of me did wish I brought my SRS or MTW-308 instead, as it was very, very cold this morning and it took a bit of doing to get my m24 shooting where I wanted. I stuck with orange gas in the m24 to try and ensure it was still consistent through the cold temperatures, but green gas went in the HK45 as that was cycling okay on green. If it was going to be 5 celcius all day, I'd have gone with red gas in the m24 and orange in the HK45.

There were over 120 people on site today and it didn't feel like it. The site never felt over-crowded, and people weren't bunching up behind barricades. I can't give a detailed breakdown of each game, as I didn't pay any attention to the objectives. They would say where the objectives were, but me as a new player to the site had no idea where most of those places were. The only one I remember was the card game, where they hid a bunch of giant playing cards around the site and I remember that because some of the players moaned it was boring and I think they basically always play that game; I didn't mind it though. I spent most of the day trying to learn the site, learning the landmarks, learning some nice angles etc, and I would say I had a very successful day. I spent a lot of the day fighting around Oxford Street, finding a nasty little angle onto a helicopter that the other team consistently used and using my scrim net to essentially be invisible in one of the shipping containers as I shot out of the window. At one point, I had 4 people looking right at me while I was trying to reload and they didn't see me thanks to the dark interior, no silhouetting as there was a wall behind me, and the scrim net draped over me and my rifle to break up my silhouette and be less head-and-shoulders-shaped.

Best part of the day for me was the 105m shot. For those who have played at Driver Wood, it was from the double decker bus on Oxford street all the way to the tower on the corner down the road. I had used my rangefinder in the previous game from that tower to see how far the bus was and it was just over 100m, and in this game after we had switched sides, I was sitting a few metres back in the bus to make sure that I wasn't visible to anyone close below, and also so that the other snipers in the tower couldn't drop shots onto me as I had a roof over my head. My celebration was short lived as my friend got taken out when someone sprayed full auto into the bus and I had to bug out, but still... 105m shot is always a nice one to hit. It was true airsoft archery though, as I had to aim at a significant angle and try and walk it in. Probably took about 10 shots to finally get the hit. There were a lot of long range shots today, with a lot of shots being 70m+, but the 105m shot was the stand out moment.

So, my overall opinions of the site were very positive, but nothing's perfect and Driver Wood definitely has its issues. Hit taking was fine, though there were a few people taking the piss; however I saw the marshalls hit-checking players all day which was really great to see. The games weren't inspired, but they worked and did the job for a skirmish day. The site itself plays well, with no one way of playing feeling overpowered; there are plenty of long sight lines for a good sniper to take advantage of (which I enjoyed every moment of because Worthing is crap for sniping), but I never felt too dominant or untouchable and aggressive plays were often well-rewarded from what I saw (because I certainly wasn't doing it with my bolt action sniper rifle and 10rd mags!). The marshalling seemed decent from what I could see, and I didn't really have any issues there. Where I did have issues was after lunch there was a bit of spawn-camping (and I even overheard a player in the safe zone bragging about doing it...). In one game, we ended up just turning our roaming spawn (a spawn that can be attacked) into our hard respawn because the enemy team was all around our hard respawn and it was impossible to spawn there. Also, the team balance was abysmal. It feels like a lot of the regulars all stick together on one side (and I heard someone behind me in the safety brief saying that too), and our team lost literally every game through the day, though I don't mind that too much; I actually quite enjoy being on the weaker team and seeing how much damage I can do. The only thing for me was the spawn-camping; I hate spawn-campers. Oh, and the fact we go back to the safe zone after every game. That got really annoying too, but not the end of the world.

Also, my LBE + backpack setup worked wonders. Carried everything I needed and really didn't feel heavy at all. Had it on for the whole day, fully loaded, and really didn't feel it because the weight was distributed so well. I might swap the right-side pistol mag pouch for a holster though and just run a pistol without a suppressor or flashlight. At that height, it'd be far too unwieldy with a suppressor, and my Warrior Assault Systems holster doesn't accept a flashlight, but I really didn't need the 4 spare pistol mags as I barely used my pistol. 2 spare mags would've been more than enough.

 

[Austeyr]

decent site but the team did not seem to know how to use it effectively

Hit the nail on the head there, unfortunately… Majority of the games are overly convoluted in the briefing whilst in essence the actual gameplay is simple.
Briefings take a long time too which loses people’s attention rapidly and then it leads to the inevitable “What are we doing?” 
 

As I mentioned in our DM, more often than not lately we’ve been going more just to see friends than actually for the Airsoft which isn’t ideal. It used to be a cracking site when the old marshal was running it (who’s name escapes me now) as it was a quick brief of what to do, gear up and out to play within 5 minutes. Now briefs take 10+ minutes (Literally… I timed it once out of boredom ) and another half an hour before you’re on the field, which then usually incurs another 10 minutes before game on is called

 

[Punisher3990]

Just got home from Ambush Activities in Southampton. 

Having previously been mainly to CQB sites, the open woodland was an interesting experience. My workmates were meant to come, but they all bailed, so I was there on my own. First time being a lone wolf, but it was fun to just support my team by myself

After just buying and upgrading a Cybergun P90, it was a good challenge and was very fun to be able to sneak around and even flank some enemies. 

It was a bit wet and muddy today after a day of rain beforehand, but that just meant they weren't expecting people to be prone on the floor >

Decent objectives that were actually achievable. A few places I have been before (Ironsight Airsoft) have crazy objectives that are near impossible. So it was nice for the objective to be possible. A few of them even required 2-4 teammates to carry an objective into an enemy base.

Other random info from the day: I lost a pistol mag , there was a dude who had a camera RIF (yes, an adapted old style camera with a "press" outfit), I found and handed in someone's car keys I found in some mud by a tree. I got shot in the face by a HPA M249 by a teammate within 10m (ouch)

All in all, a good Sunday skirmish. Will likely return to test out my Specna Arms LVOA

 

[Colin Allen]

Hit the nail on the head there, unfortunately… Majority of the games are overly convoluted in the briefing whilst in essence the actual gameplay is simple.
Briefings take a long time too which loses people’s attention rapidly and then it leads to the inevitable “What are we doing?” 
 

As I mentioned in our DM, more often than not lately we’ve been going more just to see friends than actually for the Airsoft which isn’t ideal. It used to be a cracking site when the old marshal was running it (who’s name escapes me now) as it was a quick brief of what to do, gear up and out to play within 5 minutes. Now briefs take 10+ minutes (Literally… I timed it once out of boredom ) and another half an hour before you’re on the field, which then usually incurs another 10 minutes before game on is called

It was almost the exact opposite today.  The chap doing the briefings, who I had not seen before, reduced the briefings to such an extent that key parts of the briefing were left out or passed over without clarification.  For example, the briefing for the fallback game took less than a minute, during which he showed where the two teams would start, which was ok, and then showed that the next stage would be in the container field with a wave of his hand and a few mumbled words that did not specify whether that would be one stage or two; given that there were a fair number of players who were new to the site, this led to some confusion when the fighting moved there.

 

[EvilMonkee]

First session at Blackstone, impressive site, superb layout and facilities.  A few stupid players though, lots of team killing (which I didn't mind as their rule is if you TK then you are dead not the person you shot, which I like).  Too many HPA users for my tastes, and whilst they do chrono and tournament lock the guns, at the range of engagements being so short there were a number of nasty bleeders, including one I caught in the ear and my mate took on in the cheek despite wearing full face.  HPA just  retains its energy too well for such short range.  

Biggest issue I had all day was some twat thinking that a 'Knife Kill' was waiting around a corner at the bottom of the spiral stairs then shoving me in the chest as I came round the corner.  He did it twice, he was told in no uncertain terms there would not be a third and I reported it to the Marshall team.  Got loads of kills just by keeping moving through bottlenecks and getting behind the enemy. MP9 ran brilliantly.  Will deffo go back maybe on a week day when its not as busy.

 

[Jez_Armstrong]

Did the NVG course with JBG on Saturday at Epsom tunnels 

Great day, lots of experience gained, even got a sexy photo 

View attachment 156557

 

[tside]

Got to my first game for a month yesterday. Now the weather is nice and cold I busted out my full rusfor kit including the portable sauna that passes for 6b45 body armour and despite the lowest temp hitting 6 degrees I still had to strip a layer to avoid feeling totally roasted. Played the first game with my new pp19 from the classifieds and after dropping a m100 spring in it ran absolutely fantastically and I now look at my old ak sliding hop ups with disdain! There was a bit of variety to the usual mission types at Dirty dog which was much appreciated. Best of the day was each team being given a dummy VIP to guard while trying to capture the opposing teams VIP. I played the game as a medic and despite only shooting off one round I had a brilliant time moving the dummy from safe spot to safe spot and sprinting to revive other players. We eventually ran out of time having only briefly captured and then lost the opposing dummy but it was definitely one of the funner game modes I've tried recently. Highlight of the day was another player keeping the Halloween spirit alive and running around as Doctor Zoidberg.

 

[Impulse]

Me and my friend made it down to Worthing Airsoft this weekend just passed for... what turned out to be a pretty phenomenal day of airsoft. I really wanted to go so I could make an accurate comparison between Driver Wood and Worthing from a sniper's perspective. It was absolutely tipping it down on Saturday evening, night and into Sunday morning when I woke up, but fortunately it had pretty much stopped by the time I was getting into the car, and by the time we got to the site it had completely stopped. With the heavy rain we've been having, the site was pretty muddy, but at least it wasn't raining on us while we played! As we had no car to store stuff in, I only brought 1 rifle and 1 pistol, so the trusty pre-ban Tanaka m24 came out, but I took a huge gamble and used my TM M&P9L that I've never fielded since I won it in a raffle a number of years ago. I put in my standard hop configuration (Flamingo 50 degree rubber + Hadron H plate) to make sure it'd hop the .32s I would put through it, but otherwise hadn't touched it. Fortunately it worked really well, though I didn't need it during the day. I also used my lightest weight loadout with only a very lightweight belt kit that I usually pair with a chest rig, but didn't need to because the m24 magazines are small and I only have 4 of them at the moment.

Anyway, first game was a basic king of the hill style game around one of the bases. I got into a position where I could peel players off the back of the base in question. I actually planned to take a really strong position a little further forward, but a large group of rentals went to the same area me and were making a lot of noise. Plus, the foliage is a lot thinner than it was last time I played (because winter is a thing), and I was wearing a flannel shirt so I wasn't too confident on staying hidden from that angle. I started racking up a stupid amount of kills though, since a lot of enemy players were using the back of the base to try and fight the rest of my team, blissfully unaware that I was about 70m off to their side with an angle on them. I did eventually get knife killed by a ghillie who went all the way around the site to get to me (took him the entire game to get there), but he immediately got taken out afterwards, so 90 seconds later I had respawned and was right back where I was before. However this time I did go slightly further forward as we had a good presence on one of the structures to my side that would help protect me from the vulnerable side, so I got into my originally intended position for the last 5 mins of the game. I had already got a lot of kills that game from the previous position, but that paled in comparison to my intended spot, as it watches the main pathway from their respawn back to the base that everyone uses (far from the only pathway back, but definitely the most used one), through a very small gap where there's no chance in hell of them spotting me. I went through all 4 of my mags in this last 5 minutes, which is only 40 shots, but that's a hell of a lot of shots for me, and pretty much every shot was a kill. A very good start to the day...

Second game we swapped ends and I went to a spot I like from the other side. It wasn't anywhere near as fruitful as my spots in the first game as it's a bit more expected, and I did get taken out once while I was there because someone pushed up to the base aggressively and unfortunately flannel isn't great camo (I would've gone unnoticed if I was in my usual m81 woodland camo, let alone one of my ghillie setups). However, it's super easy to get back into so I left my backpack there and took a light jog back to spawn and then back to my spot. Really feeling the benefits of 8 weeks of couch to 5k, as I'm able to jog about the site with ease and have really quick recovery now. Can't recommend it enough for people who want to get fitter, as I am the opposite of a natural runner with my build and it has worked wonders for me (large and tall Dutch build that had me on the school rugby team as a teenager as number 8, even though I really didn't like playing rugby...)

Third game had one of the marshalls acting as a blind guy guarding his moonshine at the bottom of the site. He was invincible, but would only shoot at noises, so you had to creep in and grab one of his barrels and then creep out without getting shot by him or any enemy players. We absolutely rinsed this game, because the yellow team kept shooting at the marshall (leading to him shooting back at them), and they tried pushing heavily towards our spawn near the top of the site, which was fine by me because I took a position in this overgrown fallen tree that even my flannel shirt remained hidden in and kept picking people off. Meanwhile, at the bottom of the site, blue team had one guy with a support gun who... put his gun down, took the box mag out, hid behind a tree and would occasionally shake it to make a bunch of noise and draw the marshall's attention, while others on the team slowly and silently tip toed up to grab a barrel.

This game ended sooner than expected because blue team grabbed all of the barrels, so fourth game before lunch was a 3 base domination. Didn't get too much done in this one, but hit one of my favoured spots again. Worthing is very overgrown and even in the winter when the leaves are gone, there's still a hell of a lot of twiggy bits, brambles and evergreen foliage that make it hard to shoot long distance so there are only a handful of good positions to snipe from. I definitely think I will DMR more at Worthing in the future and maybe bolt action more at Driver Wood once I have my car and my license (counting down the days to my test in December...)

After lunch we played a rolling assault, where blue team had to take a stretcher with a dummy on it to a bunch of bases. It was a really hard slog, but this game had some really great points for me. I couldn't use any of my usual sniping positions, so I had to try some far less than ideal positions. At the first base, I ended up lying prone off to the side where I could draw line of sight to the side of one of the structures but there was absolutely loads of foliage in the way and posting shots through it was as much luck as it was skill. However, if I moved forward at all, I would get taken out as a number of blues tried it and got taken out by someone further ahead who couldn't see me where I was (and couldn't hear me as my m24 is nice and quiet). However, I managed to take out about 5 defenders from this spot, posting shots through all the foliage and twigs but it wasn't exactly a one shot one kill deal. Second base we captured before I could get into a spot where I could make much of an impact, but third base I managed to get to a barricade under what is normally a holly bush in the summer where I could see a bunch of players near and inside the base. The shots were really difficult, as I had to get them over the barricade, under the bush, and also under a bunch of twiggy bits further down, but I managed to take out two defenders outside, and then two defenders in the top of the base. Then by the fourth base I managed to get into another spot where I could see the back of the base we needed to take. I got spotted by one guy, but I was out of his range so it wasn't too hard to take him out and three more from the back of the base, but time ran out before we could get the stretcher to that base.

Final game was a classic. There was a box with a blue button and a yellow button and all you had to do was hold down your team's button to increase the time on the clock. The challenge was not getting shot while you do so. The first half of this game I was milling about and not really sure what to do, but eventually I pushed up to a tree where there was a part of our team watching the flank to the left, but I realised I had a perfect view into the base where the box was located. I initially was helping the team watch the flank, taking one guy out and calling out movement, but they had that under control and I soon saw a lot of the enemy team pushing into the base to push the button. Fortunately, they didn't spot me leaning against the tree in my goddamn flannel shirt, and I was able to just post shots constantly into the base, cracking a few shots off the side of the rental facemasks that kept popping up. Much like the first game, I burned through all four mags before the game ended, with a lot of those shots being kills, despite there only being about 15 yellow players left (against our 13 blue players. A lot of people had left before this last game)

Overall, it was a really really good day, probably one of the better ones I've had in a while. Hit calling was mostly fine, though the marshalls said they got a lot of reports of people not taking their hits, however I didn't really see all that much of it myself (a few instances of it, but it was really uncommon). Game modes and objectives are definitely more well thought out than Driver Wood, the games are also definitely more inventive and fun, and the general vibe and community feel is definitely better. Also, not going back to the safe zone between games is a massive advantage at Worthing, as I hated having to go back every time at Driver Wood as I carry everything I need on me to play the whole day; however where Worthing really falls short is how awful it is for any sort of long distance shooting. The gameplay area at Driver Wood is definitely better (and I'd say the strongest part of that site), but on basically every other point I feel like Worthing is the better site.

 

[Jaylordofwaargh]

The only note i'll add on the Driver Wood (foodgate) is that the 'own food' rule is very much aimed at the many parties they host.... 

The rest, not been in a while, plan to get there again probably around March....

 

[Gunboat Diplomat]

Third game had one of the marshalls acting as a blind guy guarding his moonshine at the bottom of the site.

Love this, might suggest it at my local site. 

 

[Impulse]

Love this, might suggest it at my local site. 

I've helped in this game before when he ran it with a few of us acting as blind defenders and it's good fun. You need the right people to do it as if you're too accurate it ruins the game, but it's a great laugh watching what players come up with and do to try and get the objectives.

 

[Colin Allen]

Following the rather less than wonderful experience last time out, I set out on a cold and foggy morning for Airsoft Plantation.  The site was not quite as busy as usual, with probably only about 100-120 players present.

For once, I didn't have any guns to test and set up, so my pre-game experience was rather more relaxed than it generally has been of late, leaving me time to chat with other regulars, the site owner and Luke, one of the marshals, who was also at Splatoon last time out.

The first game of the day was a fallback.  Starting at Swaziland, we had to drive the enemy out of the DEA base and then push on to get five players onto the bus located at the back of the mortar pits.  We had infinite buddy regens after a 30m fallback, while the defenders had three lives to take wherever they chose after a 30m fallback.

I started off on our right flank, pushing up along the site boundary with a group of players and flanking the DEA base; we managed to take out a lot of defenders to our left, although our advance was slowed by a couple of very annoying snipers.  Having cleared the DEA base and after an impeccably observed two minutes silence starting at 11:00, we pushed on to the mortar pits, where everything bogged down a bit. We slowly fought our way in against tough resistance; I was particularly pleased with a flashbang that I lobbed over some bushes which I thought a couple of the enemy were hiding behind; after a shout of "Oh, fuck!" and a loud bang, seven of them walked out with their hands up.  As we moved forward, I used the SR47's range and accuracy to help neutralise the defenders on the bus by making it too dangerous for them to appear at the open windows.  Eventually, five of our players made it onto the bus.  Huzzah!

After the usual short break to reload, the game was turned around; suspecting that some of the enemy might try to sneak through the scrubland along the edge of the firebreak, a small group of us took up position in and around the fort.  They did indeed do so and we had a great set of firefights, along with more lobbing of some of the 16 flashbangs that I won in one of AP's raffles a few weeks ago.  Inevitably, I was eventually hit and retreated to a position behind one of the berms, from where I picked off enemy players who showed their heads above the fort's crenellations and those trying to force their way around by the comms truck.  Being hit again, I was falling back when there was a shout that the enemy were attacking in force from the other side of the mortar pits.  Moving over there, I found a spot behind a car from where I was able to interdict their movements across my front until a couple of snipers appeared, one of whom potted me.  The enemy completed their mission.

After luncheon, which as usual, was delivered delivered very efficiently, we walked out to the mortar pits for our own commemoration of WWI, a very short game with the two teams lurking behind facing berms and, after the application of copious amounts of pyro by the marshals, having to "go over the top" towards each other.  It could have been trivial, but it was actually quite thought provoking.

After that, we played another fallback game; we started at the border, with infinite regens on a marshal, while the defenders had one life  in each of the village and the mortar pits.  Our objective was to clear the village and then capture the bridge in the mortar pits.  We pressed forward against a stiff resistance, which involved me making multiple trips back to regen on Luke, which is always a somewhat disturbing experience.  After a hard fight, we pushed into the village and cleared it; myself and another player then swept the village, making sure that no defenders had been left behind.  Having done that, we followed our colleagues towards the mortar pits and were moving into the fort, which rather dominates the bridge, when an enemy player popped up and shot a load of us in the back; clearly, our sweeping of the village was not as effective as it could have been!  Having regened again, we joined the push towards the bridge, which was duly taken.

This game was duly reversed and I found myself on our extreme left, lurking behind the hut in front of the still dried up pond; in the pond were a sniper and a couple of other players.  It was a great position, from which I was able to slow down the attack by sending a large number of attackers back to find a marshal to regen on.  As the pressure grew, the players in the pond bugged out; I was unable to do so, so I sold my life dearly.

Crossing the firebreak, I moved into the brushland with a few comrades in case some of the enemy swept through that way; quite a few of them did and we had a running fight with them, engaging them to slow them down before pulling back to new positions.  We held them at bay, but another group to our right eventually pushed through to the bridge, ending the game.

It was a typical AP day of well thought out games which engaged both the experienced players and the fairly large number of rentals, played in a good spirit apart from the couple of typical tiny tantrums that seem to happen whenever grown men play with toy guns.

Weapons used:
Hurricane Kit SR47
Golden Eagle AMD-65
ASG XP18 Commander (CO2)

 

[Enid_Puceflange]

WET

 

[Baser]

Not played for a few weeks due to general life busyness so really enjoyed stretching the legs at Apocalypse yesterday. 

It was quieter than usual with around 100-120 players but weather was foggy and cold to start and it was Remembrance Sunday so a few regulars and Marshalls had other duties.  2 min silence at the game brief which was very respectful. 

Took the G3 DMR, MP5 and SIG 226 and had issues from the start.  

• Trigger on the G3 was intermittent following its MOSFET upgrade, apparently the optical trigger sticker doesn't like the shiny white LCT plastic sector switch plate, one day I will play a full game with this gun and bring it home working but its not this day!
  
• Switched to the trusty MP5, unusually for me I took the electric drum mag.  I usually carry a few mid caps but I'm trying to decide if I need a LMG so I thought I would play a limited support gunner role (2 second bursts, etc etc) Drum worked fine for the first hour then stopped winding.  I changed the batteries and messed around but I couldn't get it working so ran the 2x mid caps I found in the bottom of my bag for the rest of the day. 
  
• Second hand £50 WE Sig 226 shot perfectly.
  

First game was fall back and we were defending, started in the village which we held for a long time.  I parked in the centre of the village with a couple of mates and we held our building for what felt like a long time.  I stayed low and in the shadows and held the attacking team back from my doorway while the guys covered the windows.  Eventually they found a sight line we couldn't cover and we had a grenade come through the window.  After the walk back to spawn we held the edge of the village but got pushed back to no mans land.   Lost no mans land quite quickly as there's limited cover and we were snipper/DMR picked off.  Had a magical LMG moment when 5 guys tried to flank us to the right and I took them all down on full auto.  I missed the final fall back to stockade as the drum mag stopped feeding but heard it was an epic fight with the attacking team winning in the last minute. 

A few players on our team were a bit salty about loosing, I don't think my cosplay soldiers with toy guns enthusiasm helped.  

Second game was rescue the downed pilot, he was our 'hostage' to start and we got ripped apart.  The reds snipping team did an epic job of picking us off.  I had limited ammo 200 ish rounds in the MP5 and 60/70 in my pistol so hid up and played a stealthy game. I thought I did well until they called the end of game and 6 red players stood up right on top of me, I recon I had another 2/3 minutes before they filled me full of lead or plastic? 

After a second defeat half our team up and left, to be fair we were spanked in the second game but hey at least I was having fun. 

Third game started with a team rebalance,  I think we were down to about 15 players at this point vs 30 or so reds.  Given the limited numbers we went back to village for a CQB domination game.  I tried to get back to the building from the first game but was to slow and we held for a while but were pushed back, it was fast and frantic with lots of up close and personal kills, a brilliant run from one of the reds with only his Pit Viper cleared our building out.  When we got back from re spawn we were grenade killed quickly and that was that. 

Forth game was a re run of the third with the winning team being the one with their flag in the oil drum.  We got their first and held for a while but eventually got pushed back.  When it got to around 4pm it was getting dark and teams were down to around 10 on each side so they called it. 

Personally had a great day, lots of contact and a few different game styles which I really enjoyed.  I am annoyed by the gun gremlins and will get to the point where I take the G3 to a game and have it work all day.  

 

[Mtemprell]

after an impeccably observed two minutes silence starting at 11:00

It's great to see this being observed. I always say that 2 minutes is important, it's 2 minutes the fallen will never have and for 1 Sunday a year 2 minutes isn't asking much from people. 

 

[Gunboat Diplomat]

This one is a week late as it was last Sunday that me and the boy visited the Gaol in Oakham.  With news of their precarious future I rushed to get a booking in for November, fortunate that I did since most (if not all by now) of their remaining dates for 2025 are full.

It has always been on our list, but the common refrain of ‘we should go there one day’ meant we never got round to it.

We arrived later than planned due to bad planning and the place was packed as it was a sell out day.   Nonetheless we found a space to set up and the staging area (in what I assume are the old administrative buildings of the prison) are well equipped, even if they do look like the backdrop to a public information film from the 80s.

The games started with by far the longest briefing of any airsoft site I’ve been to.  As it was my first visit I didn’t mind too much but I could imagine as a regular it would drag.  Still it must work for them as the general conduct of play was some of the best I’ve experienced and everyone whether new or regular knew what they were doing.  I’m not a snooty mil-simmer, but everyone knowing the basics of cover, movement and controlled fire really helped to sell the immersion when sweeping through corridors and clearing rooms.

Mix of games revolving around moving and static objectives were played.  I won’t describe them in detail as it never comes across as well in text, but I will say that the Gaol is a really challenging site.  

Most airsoft games tend to be won by force of will as much as by tactics, with the most aggressive play usually resulting in the win, but the Goal requires a lot more planning and coordination.  There are a myriad of routes around the site and in and out of buildings, some incredibly hard to breach defensive positions and a maze of corridors to navigate.  Ambush, flanking and friendly-fire are all likely, sometimes simultaneously.  

The skill ceiling is sometimes pretty low for airsoft sites, but I think the Goal would encourage you to become a much better player as a regular.

I took my Ghetto Blaster which ran flawlessly despite being chilly, switching to my backup M906 in the afternoon just because I’d charged the batteries I didn’t want to bring them home full.  The boy brought the £20 boneyard Double Eagle (that’s now 4 Double Eagle products we own!) shotgun I bought him a couple of days earlier - surprising it ran like a champ all day and now seems to be his new favourite.  

 

[Colin Allen]

It's great to see this being observed. I always say that 2 minutes is important, it's 2 minutes the fallen will never have and for 1 Sunday a year 2 minutes isn't asking much from people. 

Indeed!  It was rather impressive really.  As the site is so large, the beginning and end of the two minutes were each signalled by a single shot from a blank firing pistol so that everyone got the message at the same time.

I will be observing two minutes again tomorrow.

This one is a week late as it was last Sunday that me and the boy visited the Gaol in Oakham.  With news of their precarious future I rushed to get a booking in for November, fortunate that I did since most (if not all by now) of their remaining dates for 2025 are full.

It has always been on our list, but the common refrain of ‘we should go there one day’ meant we never got round to it.

We arrived later than planned due to bad planning and the place was packed as it was a sell out day.   Nonetheless we found a space to set up and the staging area (in what I assume are the old administrative buildings of the prison) are well equipped, even if they do look like the backdrop to a public information film from the 80s.

The games started with by far the longest briefing of any airsoft site I’ve been to.  As it was my first visit I didn’t mind too much but I could imagine as a regular it would drag.  Still it must work for them as the general conduct of play was some of the best I’ve experienced and everyone whether new or regular knew what they were doing.  I’m not a snooty mil-simmer, but everyone knowing the basics of cover, movement and controlled fire really helped to sell the immersion when sweeping through corridors and clearing rooms.

Mix of games revolving around moving and static objectives were played.  I won’t describe them in detail as it never comes across as well in text, but I will say that the Gaol is a really challenging site.  

Most airsoft games tend to be won by force of will as much as by tactics, with the most aggressive play usually resulting in the win, but the Goal requires a lot more planning and coordination.  There are a myriad of routes around the site and in and out of buildings, some incredibly hard to breach defensive positions and a maze of corridors to navigate.  Ambush, flanking and friendly-fire are all likely, sometimes simultaneously.  

The skill ceiling is sometimes pretty low for airsoft sites, but I think the Goal would encourage you to become a much better player as a regular.

I took my Ghetto Blaster which ran flawlessly despite being chilly, switching to my backup M906 in the afternoon just because I’d charged the batteries I didn’t want to bring them home full.  The boy brought the £20 boneyard Double Eagle (that’s now 4 Double Eagle products we own!) shotgun I bought him a couple of days earlier - surprising it ran like a champ all day and now seems to be his new favourite.  

Those cheap DE shotguns are surprisingly good.

 

[Cannonfodder]

So after fiddling with my AEGs earlier in the week I decided I needed a woodland game, rather than the cqb I've been playing for the past couple of years so I book a spot at Apocalypse near Royston.

The morning started off badly with trains being cancelled so I was late on site and missed the first game along with half of the second. Staff were very helpful with getting my hpa tank filled and guns chrono'd as quick as possible (but without feeling rushed).

Numbers were very low at only 18 thanks to quite a few no shows but as the site is quite small this wasn't really an issue, infact I think I prefer lower numbers games as it means more opportunities to sneaky. Hit taking was good, I did hear a few complaints but personally didn't see any myself. I guess that's the joys of running a shotgun, people notice when they've been hit.

I took my M4 out in the morning, but after lunch I was just using the 870 as I'd finally fitted the HPA tank and wanted to test it. It worked almost flawlessly but all issues were user related. While range wasn't as good as an AEG it was enough that I rarely felt it was a problem.