The 'How Did Your Airsoft Day Go? Thread

[Skara]

Last weekend we took part to the National Finals...

 

A 26h nonstop game that lasted from 8 AM on Saturday to 10 AM on Sunday. 1200-1700m above sea level elevation.

 

Overall performance wasn't the best but we didn't really care, we went for the experience, in any case we ended up 15th out of the 20 strongest teams in country..

 

Few things learned (kinda, some I already knew):

 

- the right clothing is crucial to not end up like a popsicle, in particular it got VERY cold Saturday night/early Sunday morning with temperatures just above 0°. I had packed a puffy jacket just in case and it turned out to be a lifesaver during pauses from marching/playing. Started with just my combat shirt on, added my thermal baselayer and windshirt at dusk and kept it this way throughout the night. A beanie was used too, whereas my gloves stayed in the backpack at all times.

 

- thermal sights are OP, in fact combat objectives went so much better at night than during the day.. NV would have been nice in some instances, but we made do without.

 

- I need a lighter poncho, the one I have is so heavy I left it in the car (took the gore-tex shell instead), on Saturday morning we had rain so heavy it felt like I had jumped in a pool in full kit  luckily it was windy too, so I dried up pretty quickly..

 

- with these temperatures I only drank 3 litres of water in total.

 

- Proper boots do make the difference, I don't think I would have been able to get to the end with my old Crispis... The new La Sportivas are much lighter, much softer on road/paths and definitely more breathable.

 

- I barely ate anything, just one energy bar and some dried fruit along with a hot dog at our own objective (sort of a one-use safe space)..

 

- New backpack is awesome, it's the right size for these events (15 litres) while being mega comfortable.

 

We still have plenty of room for improvement, should we qualify next time we'll try to be more motivated and more prepared, both physically and mentally.

[Jacob Wright]

1 hour ago, mrfoxhound said:

what team where you on bands or non bands?

Bands 👍🏼

[LMKipper]

Nice day at Gunman Battle Lakes today - it was one of their 'filmsim' games, so slightly restricted ammo limits and semi only unless it's a support weapon. Lots of players were using GBBRs, so the whole day was low on the trigger spam/overshooting.

 

We played two domination games - raise the flags to your teams colour. Team with the most flags raised at endex wins the game. Gameplay both morning and afternoon was great. About half the site was in play, which was perfect for the numbers on the day (about 30). There was enough room to roam around/do sneaky stuff if you wanted to without wandering around for hours without seeing anyone. I had a few nice assaults and defends over the course of the day, and I'm pretty sure it was one of the few days where I ended up hitting more people than times I was hit. 

 

Two minor negatives - they didn't have enough bands for everyone to have one of a different colour, so it ended up being bands vs non-bands. This makes target ID really difficult if you're on the team with bands and I know a few times I saw half a player, waited and got hit before I could work out if they were on my team or not. It was also unfortunate that there were three ghillies, and all on the non-banded team, which resulted in some whinging later in the day. 

 

I also don't think their medic rule quite works; if you're hit you have to wait 30 seconds after which you can slowly shuffle to another play to get mediced. This caused a lot of confusion, some over shooting and a bit of cheat accusation. If the rule was standstill when shot unless a team member gets to you, it would make things a little simpler. 

 

I'm nitpicking here though. Game quality was excellent and I'd definitely return. 

Edited October 5 by LMKipper

[GiantKiwi]

Went and tried out Players of War today, as its actually easier for me to get to than S8. 

 

Entrance was a bit difficult to spot from one direction, but once in its got a decent proper hard standing with no dubious drops or quagmires to get stuck in.

 

Safezone is well cordoned with what must be close to 20ft high netting to prevent stray fliers entering it. Canteen was a nice surprise for me, but alas I'm on restricted diet, so kind of moot point. Sign in process for a first timer was nice and clear with segregated sections for sign in, the shop and chrono (other sites could really take note on this bit).

 

Game areas are similar vein to S8 (Only so much you can do with a planned forest after all) but a little less treacherous in places. Lots of multitiered cover, which is especially important for vertically challenged folk like myself. Once I got my bearings, the games were pretty good and there wasn't any point where I was dreading a long slog back to a spawn.

 

Critically the laying down the law on things in the safety brief, I saw no dubious play all day - which is a rarity these days - certainly wasn't any teflon warriors floating about. It's also the first site in a while where those with sniper rifles were actually consistently observing MED's well - probably because they don't let just anyone rock up with one immediately on day one, which was absolutely fantastic.

 

Definitely a site i'll be headed back to, as the vibe in general was excellent, and balancing of teams was done at sign in, so there wasn't any clique-y grouping up BS at the start of the day.

 

 

[Colin Allen]

Today, I went to Airsoft Plantation in deepest Essex, near the very strange town of Billericay.

Around 200 people were present, which meant that the safe zone was busy but not crowded.

After the usual rituals, we set off for the first game, which was a simple attack and defend.  The attackers (the dastardly blue team) had to break into the village, which we were defending, get two fuel cans to each Landrover and a large amount of money to the Town Hall.  They had infinite buddy regens while we had two lives with a 30m fallback after the first life.  I started at the front of the village with what was, to put it mildly, a target rich environment, taking out a number of enemies trying to break into one of the buildings before being hit.  Falling back, I deployed to the right flank of the village and took out a group of the enemy who were sneaking through the woods.  Redeploying, I was hit by a single shot from an unexpected angle; as I put my hand up and called the hit, the shooter apologised as he had thought I was a blue player.  Eventually, the blue team achieved their objectives after what seemed a very long time.

After a quick break to mag up, we set out for the reverse of the game; I took one of the fuel cans towards the left hand jeep, but was hit, so had to hand it over to the chap who buddy regened me; our assault seemed much more organised and aggressive, so it was no surprise that we completed the objective rather more rapidly than our opponents.

The next game was a bit different from the usual airsoft game.  Each team had three objectives to achieve across the very large playing area.  The catch was that we did not initially know what they were.  Regens were on on a buddy after a 30m fallback.  When the game began, we were handed an ammo box which contained a map showing our first objective; it was the bus in the mortar pits.  The team split into three groups and set off, the group that I was with flanking around the far right of the site; we had no idea what the blue team's objective was but we bumped into a few of them near and in the mortar pits.  In the bus was another ammo box, which contained another map informing us that our next objective was the high building in the village.  We pushed rapidly into the environs of the village, where a chaotic set of firefights ensued, with players from both sides moving around the same area and popping up in unexpected locations, including behind their opponents.  After a while, the blue team seemed to fade away and we secured our objective where we found, guess what, another ammo box, this one telling us that our final objective was the kill house in the woods.  However, the enemy had achieved their second objective well before we did and had already set off for their final objective, which was also in the woods, leaving a strong force to hold us off.  In a well organised assault with great comms, which drew praise from the marshals, we fought through the border area, which is really difficult to do in that direction, and stormed into the woods, pushing forward until we ran out of time.  It was a well earned victory for the blue team.

After lunch, which saw the catering team serve a vast number of players, we went to play in the mortar pits.  The attackers, who were the blue team in the first game, had to plant explosives in four designated vehicles; we had no idea which they were.  They could attack over a wide arc and had infinite regens on a marshal, while we had two lives with a 30m fallback..  A couple of us set up in the fort, which is very near the mortar pits, from where we had great fun picking off enemy players as they moved through the woods and open areas until we were eventually swarmed and went down in a hail of BBs.  Falling back, I took up a position inside the mortar pits; we fought off multiple attacks but were gradually whittled down.  Rather than going back to the safe zone when I was hit, I stayed in the "dead zone" behind the mortar pits watching the fun as our few remaining defenders held on for as long as they could.  One of our players used a minigun to great effect providing suppressive fire, while a handful of others fought hard.  Eventually, the blue team blew up the final vehicle.

This game was then reversed.  Again, our attack was well organised and aggressive, pushing into the mortar pits and blowing up our four target vehicles rather more rapidly than the blue team had managed.

With only a short time remaining, the last game was Last Man Standing in the village; as this did not appeal, I decided to leave after what was an excellent day of airsoft, with well designed games played in a good spirit and well marshalled.

I don't like the idea of having a "home site" but, if I had one, it would be AP.  The site is very large, has a wide variety of terrain, great structures and well designed and marshalled games.  It also seems to attract a good group of players.

Weapons used:

LCT PP-19-01 (shooting a bit low so will need opening up)
APS UAR
ASG XP18 Commander (CO2)

[LMKipper]

Funnily enough @Colin Allen I was there too, although I only played the morning as I had to dash off. 

 

The only thing I wanted to add was that I was almost bowled over by the amount of young players there today. All super enthusiastic and excited to be there, as well as a whole family of rentals (mum, dad and three kids) on the blue team. Clearly AP do an amazing job of attracting new people to airsoft, which I think other sites struggle with. A really lovely thing to see.

[Colin Allen]

5 minutes ago, LMKipper said:

Funnily enough @Colin Allen I was there too, although I only played the morning as I had to dash off. 

 

The only thing I wanted to add was that I was almost bowled over by the amount of young players there today. All super enthusiastic and excited to be there, as well as a whole family of rentals (mum, dad and three kids) on the blue team. Clearly AP do an amazing job of attracting new people to airsoft, which I think other sites struggle with. A really lovely thing to see.

Yes; that was notable.  It was great to see so many youngsters and that family enjoying airsoft.

Edited October 6 by Colin Allen

[Colin Allen]

Having originally intended to try Mayhem near Romford, I made a late night decision to go to Splatoon instead, partly because I needed to test two guns that had been on the work table and partly because what I have seen of Mayhem just does not appeal.

51 players were present, again well below previous numbers.

The briefing for the first game was build around the site's brand new acquisition, a rather odd looking double decker bus in the container field.  The defenders (us) had two lives, one within a certain distance of the bus and the other in the bus, while the attackers had infinite regens on a fixed point.  They pushed hard and our outer defence was whittled away, partly because were in such a small area.  I got a few hits before taking one myself; falling back into the bus, I took out a couple more attackers before being hit and making the walk of shame to the safe zone.  The enemy took the bus reasonably rapidly.

The game was then turned around; entering the container field, we were somewhat disconcerted to find that the defenders had been allowed to deploy much further away from the bus, providing them with better cover and us with a less target rich environment.  This slowed our advance and, combined with a degree of hesitancy on the part of some of our team, prevented us taking the bus.

 

After less than an hour's play, an early lunch was called in order to allow longer games in the afternoon, which did not really happen.

After the long lunch break, we set off for a fallback game; this was played in a different direction from the usual Splatoon fallback games, starting with the barrel zone, into the barrier zone, then into the grey helicopter area of the container field and ending in the area where the bus was.  Attackers regened on a marshal behind them, while the defenders had one life in each zone.  It took us ages to get into the barrel zone, mainly because a fair proportion of our team were not willing to cross the beaten zone, which was awash with flying BBs.  At this point, after several attempts to break in and massive BB use, my PDW, which I only finished building yesterday, decided to die.  Convinced that I had killed the Perun Hybrid, I trudged disconsolately back to the safe zone, before realising that I had been using the uncharged LiFe battery that I had brought along with the intention of setting up the PDW's hop and chronoing it.  Dropping a fully charged battery into the PDW revived it and I went back to the war, only to find that we still had not broken into the barrel zone.  Eventually we pushed in and then made a semi-decent job of clearing the barrier zone.  Breaking into the grey helicopter area was hard work and we timed out before getting near the bus.

After another break, we set up to defend the barrel zone; the other team's attack was fast and aggressive and their hit taking dubious; they quickly broken into the zone and cleared it, doing the same again in the barrier zone.  Once this fell, I took up a position in the grey helicopter area's rubbish dump, where I had good cover and a good line of sight on where the enemy had to enter the area.  The ARX160 did its job well, taking a toll of the enemy.  At one point, an enemy player ran past me at a range of about 6m; I put several rounds into him, but he just carried on regardless.  Eventually, I was hit and fell back to the final zone to defend the new bus.  Three of us took up positions in the old single decker bus, covering against a wide sweep around the edge of the field, only to be informed that the entire team had to be in the new bus!  So, 25 of us got into the new bus, from which far fewer could actually shoot.  Fortunately, I was shot fairly early on and went back to the safe zone.

There was another game afterwards; along with a number of other players, I decided not to partake, so packed up my gear and left.

Talking with other players, there seemed to be a general agreement that the addition of the new bus had not been entirely positive, with the same being felt about how it was used, especially the entire team having to be in it, which was ridiculous.  Hopefully, game design around it will improve.  It will also be interesting to see how it impacts other games that are not focussed on it.

Overall, it was, at best, an average day of airsoft, with a marked lack of actual game time and too much hanging around.

To end on a positive note, I shared a table with an affable chap called Kevin and bumped into the young chap who bought my Classic Army ISSC MK22 at Splatoon's bootfair in May of this year; he is very pleased with it.

Guns used:
Ares VZ58
Double Bell KAC PDW
S&T/Umarex ARX160
ASG XP18 Commander

 

Edited October 13 by Colin Allen

[GruntInfantry]

Today was quite a good day at Ambush Activities down by Southampton,
As normal my polish army camouflage was an absolute menace in dark bushes, and several defences left my heart racing as I hid in a bush alone with my AK.. 
One of those times a nice toad came hopping next to me, had to take a second to admire it
In the second of these defences I had a bit of time so decided to move some logs around in front of the bush for extra cover, it worked brilliantly surprisingly, but then the advantage of wearing Wz.93 is that it blends in freakishly well. Annoyingly later my small bush position was used by the enemy and my team got stuck on it for a while...
By the time we were performing our attacking run, my mags were running dry, I was basically out of gas, my rifle was falling apart, so during the final maybe 20 mins of the attack, I figure its a good time to use one of my signature tactics
Dump everything but my rifle and perform Banzai charges
I did four of these, each time got lit up entirely by the other team and falling to the ground at the end of several of them.
But there's always something magical about screaming "BANZAI! BANZAI! TENNO HEIKA BANZAI!" at the top of your lungs while running headfirst into the entire enemy team...
But anyway if any of you were there thank you for making it a good game day

[Impulse]

Going to be a long one, because...

 

I am finally back from the AI500 weekender this year, which was at Anzio Camp near Leek, and I am absolutely knackered. The weekend was great and I thoroughly enjoyed spending the weekend half way up the country with around 20 friends from Worthing Airsoft. Glad to be back now and showered and fed and I will probably head to bed fairly soon after writing this. It was also my first game in a few months after having (minor) heart surgery just over 7 weeks ago and being on blood thinners until next Friday, so it was definitely tough and there were definitely things with my kit that I didn't quite get along with. The guns performed well and I was really happy with the my 16" SRS performance, though my big bugbear with that was the bolt pull. I use gas powered bolt actions for most of the year, so moving to an SRS which is both a spring powered sniper rifle and also one of the worst bolt pulls because it's a bullpup was a bit of a shock. In terms of shooting it was fantastic and I was relieved as I've been trying to troubleshoot issues for about a month, so the fact that it all shot super nicely for the whole weekend was really good. My sidearms of choice were my Hi-capa on the Saturday, which performed flawlessly and felt great, and the AAP-01 on the Sunday, which while it did what I needed it to do, I was actually underwhelmed with it as I was expecting it to be more efficient with the ultra lightweight blowback unit, but it was actually no better than the hi-capa which has a metal slide (and admittedly a lightweight blowback unit too). I think it may be the Action Army magazines, but further testing over winter will be needed.

 

We got there on Friday and they chronoed every gun. I took all of my guns to chrono to get it out of the way and get tagged up as I didn't want to have to find a marshall mid-game if a gun went down and I still needed to have my backup gun chronoed. Everything passed, with both the SRS and backup gun of a co2 powered VSR at bang on 2.3J, and my three pistols (hi-capa, AAP and mk23) all coming in at just over 1J. Perfect. They've definitely learned from previous mistakes here and it went smoothly from what I could see. Had to get a takeaway that night though because the local Wetherspoons was absolutely rammed and our whole team couldn't fit (which was definitely a better one and not like the city centre one where I live in Brighton which is awful!)

 

So, one burger and chips, a hot shower and a wonderful night's sleep later (I was in a hotel because I like my luxuries!) and we headed up to the site for Saturday. Briefing was short and probably could've been a bit longer to clarify a few things, however everyone was given the rules well ahead of time and seemed to understand what was going on. I've been at AI500s in the past where it's been a horrible mess and nobody knows what's going on, but this wasn't one of those AIs. We had a bit of confusion on our team just because we're all used to playing at Worthing Airsoft with Worthing Airsoft rules, so we were taking gun hits like normal, but at this event gun hits didn't count; that was the sort of things that got confusing, but it was really minor and not due to any particular fault of the organisers, just us operating on muscle memory. One criticism I do have though is... it was cold and wet! We had rain through the morning, a patch of sun around lunch time and then more rain as the game was coming to a close. How dare Mother Nature give us rain on an airsoft day! 🤬

 

All jokes aside, the one criticism I had at this point was actually around numbers. Green team came out strong and had around 70-80ish players, but tan team only had 30-40ish. The organisers did lock the green team tickets so that only tan tickets were available a few weeks before the event, but it didn't even the numbers enough and so the tan team were outnumbered 2:1. This led to an uneven weekend and I have massive respect for the tans who stuck around, as a bunch went home after the Saturday because they didn't like being outnumbered (and it was cold and wet!), which led to the remaining tan team to being very undermanned. Fortunately a bunch of greens also did the same because they weren't getting the trigger time (and it was cold and wet!) so the numbers remained at roughly the same ratio of tans being outnumbered 2:1 through Sunday. I actually wish it was the other way around, as I quite enjoy being the underdog. At most Vietnam filmsim games I've played at, the NVA side have been outnumbered 1.5:1 or 2:1 and I really enjoy it, but it was also interesting to finally be on the outnumbering team, rather than the outnumbered. I still prefer being on the latter, but you have to try everything at least once!

 

Anyway, on the Saturday I found myself with the Authentic Ghillie Experience(tm) of sitting still in the rain and watching a path that snaked along the edge of the site to make sure none of the tan team could sneak around that flank. I shot not a single shot all morning outside of briefly moving to help snipe a few people out of a building so that our team had an easier time pushing in. I then went back to the fence and continued to sit in the rain while watching the flank. 10/10, would sit in a soggy bush again.

 

The afternoon picked up though and we had more activity on that side of the site, and I swapped out my earmors for an earpiece as my M32s were really annoying me trying to aim through my scope and they were getting in the way. I wasn't going into the buildings anyway and I wasn't being grenaded at all, so I ditched them in favour of a simpler earpiece and it made life a lot easier. Me and my friend set up watching a three way fork in a road that was just down from a base they were spawning at and denied that avenue of exit. We weren't spawncamping, as it was very easy to leave along the top of the hill, but some of the tan players just kept coming down that path and kept getting sniped by the two of us. They eventually worked it out and pushed through the thick foliage next to us which caused us to fall back and call in some help over the radio. We then pushed with more of our team after we heard another ghillie on our team radioing in that he had single-handedly crept into that base they were spawning from and flipped it to green team, so we pushed up to reinforce him. A few of us stayed to defend and the tans eventually counter attacked in force. We held them for a while, but eventually one of their players crept in behind and took out all the green defenders... apart from me. I was hiding right near the fence, holding the route into the base from the hillside so I went quiet. After I heard the player yelling that tans had captured it and the rest of the tans yelling to push up and running in, I leaned out and took out the entire attacking wave with my hi-capa and then popped over the top and shot the player who had crept in as well, retaining it for green team. A classic "this is why I love GBB pistols over mk23s as a sniper" moment, as if I was using my mk23 I doubt I would've been able to take out all of the tan players who were charging in.

 

Spent the rest of the Saturday game keeping an eye on that hillside, but eventually Saturday was done. Headed back to my hotel room and had another hot shower and then went to the Wetherspoons again as this time we had asked if we could reserve one of the little side rooms and they allowed us to, so our entire team crammed onto a few tables and had a very enjoyable team meal. Lots of alcohol was consumed, three of our guys joined up with 7 or 8 others from another team (within green team) and went clubbing, including our 1IC who was then not seen on the Sunday until the afternoon, but most of us headed back and crashed out to sleep. People often seem to wonder why I go back to AI500 every year, but this is a prime example as to why. Worthing Airsoft have been going to AI500 for as long as I can remember, and I started airsoft in 2005, and the social side of it is absolutely fantastic and a lot of the green team regulars are a wonderful bunch to hang out with. Maybe next year if the opportunity arises I will join the clubbing group, but crippling self-consciousness meant it was a no-go this year. I've only just been able to return to exercise, so let me shift this weight and feel good about myself before I go embarrass myself on a dance floor! 

 

Sunday came around and it was colder than Saturday, but it was at least dry. The site itself was incredibly muddy and some of the paths were rather boggy, but it wasn't raining at least! I swapped to the AAP as my sidearm due to this, but as I eluded to earlier I probably should've just stuck with the hi-capa. I had a lot more action on Sunday than Saturday though, as I pushed up on that same flank as I played on the Saturday because it was fantastic for sniping, while the other side of the site was quite overgrown and my MED made it harder to play over there. We pushed to the same base that I held on Saturday and took control of it again, so I dug in at the bottom of the hill this time as I found a lovely little spot under some heavy foliage that gave me a clear line of sight over the path and we were told that up the hill was out of bounds for both teams (as pushing along it would've put us right outside their spawn). After waiting for a little, a large element of tans pushed from up the hill and took us all out since nobody was watching up there. I managed to take out 6 out of 8 of them with my AAP as they tried to push past me and only got hit because one of them ran across spraying full auto at the bush and only called the hit after I called one that happened to hit me. I had already hit him about 6 or 7 times before this with the AAP as he was running, but I wasn't going to start an argument. I said they weren't supposed to go up there, but they said that two marshalls told them they could. Then as I was walking away the head marshall told me that was not the case, but maybe 30 mins later the head marshall then said that the top of the hill was back in play as it was easier than keeping it out of bounds. Could've been miscommunication between the marshalls, but we'll never know. Tans needed the help at this point, so I just shrugged it off. We retook the base after this and I helped by sniping a few from the side as they tried pushing along the top, but this was where I was really starting to notice that hit taking was starting to take a tumble. I got hit from a building behind me, took it and headed to the captured base to respawn. When I came back, I set up watching the windows where I got hit from and scored two hits on two separate targets with that satisfying and very audible thwack of BB hitting fabric as there wasn't any other shooting nearby, but neither called it. Oh well...

 

As Sunday was coming to a close we had to find 4 objectives that were supposed to be bomb making equipment that were set up in the buildings with the tans in control (green team got reset and we had to wait in spawn for them to set this up as we controlled most of the site at this point). Once we had them we then had to bring a bag of red smoke grenades to each building and let one off inside to signify that the building was "destroyed". We managed to swarm through the buildings quite effectively, and I teamed up with two of the other ghillies to protect flanks and snipe people out of 1st floor windows and it was good fun and I got some cracking shots, including one on a guy who I could not see at all as looking into darkened rooms from a bright outdoors was incredibly difficult, but I could see the light from inside his tracer unit in the darkness and just shot at the illuminated ring! We eventually got all four items and our team was tasked with destroying the buildings. As we destroyed the first one we saw the tan team trying to flank around that building so we just rushed the remaining buildings and kept the tan team at bay so they couldn't stop it. They just happened to choose the wrong flanking route at the wrong time, as we took out the buildings they could threaten before they could even really threaten them and then we could simply hold them back as we snaked through the rest of the site, "destroying" each of the buildings as we did.

 

One thing I will say is that I have massive respect for the tans who stayed the course. I've been in their shoes before and it can suck, but the few tans that stuck it out played hard and certainly made their presence known. If they had the appropriate numbers and they all played like the ones who stayed, then tans would've probably won. After everyone came in, they gave out a few awards they had for the event, which were best green player, best tan player and best support gunner for the weekend, judged based on attitude, sportsmanship, how effective they were, and were nominated by their team. On green team, Team Beans (our Worthing Airsoft team) was nominated for the best green player award collectively. We're all used to playing against each other, but it all came together this weekend fantastically. Comms were good, and our team was very well rounded, with some real aggressive door-kickers who love CQB and were able to clear building after building, and then also hold them against counterattack, and also basically all of the ghillies at the event who were happy to work outside the buildings, scout out the enemy positions and generally cause havoc. We then had a group photo with the entire green team:

 

And a sneaky little Team Beans photo

 

And then a picture of a shrubbery (by this point, most of my camo paint had come off my face. It looked better in game, I swear!):

 

All in all it was an absolutely amazing weekend and I had a lot of fun. This one was probably the best AI500 I have played at so far, as it was better than the last one at Ebbw Vale in Wales which was the previous best one (and was leagues better than the messy Rochdale shopping mall one!). Looking forward to the next one, but I think the next weekender I'll be at will probably be Shift Your RIFTs in 2025. I was really happy with how my £40 Aliexpress cobra hood build worked, but I do wish I brought my boonie + cape setup instead as I ended up not using my Earmors, and that was the main reason I went with the hood instead as M32s + ghillie boonie don't mix well.

 

Roll on next year! Actually, I'm about to roll onto my bed and collapse for the next 10 hours. See you in the morning! 😂

Edited October 13 by Impulse

[JinxDuh]

5 hours ago, Colin Allen said:

marked lack of actual game time and too much hanging around

Seems to be a reoccurring theme the past few months, sadly

[Colin Allen]

7 hours ago, JinxDuh said:

Seems to be a reoccurring theme the past few months, sadly

Indeed!

Between 10:00 and the end of the last game I took part in at around 15:00, we played for just under two hours.  The final game could not have lasted long as they had not started by 15:30 when I left the site.

[JinxDuh]

1 hour ago, Colin Allen said:

Indeed!

Between 10:00 and the end of the last game I took part in at around 15:00, we played for just under two hours.  The final game could not have lasted long as they had not started by 15:30 when I left the site.

 

That's rather sad, was it due to people not being ready in time or just not planned out?

 

The idea of cramming a whole team into a bus seems kind of... Silly? 

[Spartan09]

10 hours ago, Impulse said:

a long one

I was also at the AI500  on Tan team, and inwas one of the few who stuck to the end.

 

Mostly spent the event running my tippmann, but I did briefly run my VFC M249 with a KWA Skorpion as backup so I had a weapon I could use inside buildings, and was carrying my john wick hicapa, but only really drew it from it's holster once in a building to fire a couple of shots as i fell back into a room as other tans moved to cover a stairwell in building D3 to reload my tippmann that had run dry.

 

Got to site Friday for sign in, chronoed all my guns (if @Impulse spotted me, I had a yellow and black trolley loaded with a dozen guns to chrono, so I had backups and backups of backups to keep me in the fight)  one thing i found was that my VFC M249 doesnt like ASG Ultra air, which was the only green gas I could get in bulk in time for the event. FPS was all over the place and way down, huge clouds of gas chuffing from every orifice and internals would freeze over after a short burst...  something that never happens on vorsk gas, even in cold temperatures..   so I ran it on CO2..  while it worked, but more on that later.

 

I met with fellow members of Tan Alpha team, and as a group of us were staying at a team mates house down the road, we decided to turn my car into our armoury and loaf it up with all our guns to leave on site while we all piled into one car to leave site...   we were definately the loudest bunch there messing around, taking the pics out of each other and playing with a bunch of thunder snaps one of the team had brought with them while also trying to get mags loaded ready for the morning XD

 

Friday night was spent at our team mates house, where we threw a surprise birthday party for our 2IC. A fair amount of alcohol was consumed, and we later talked tactics but I retired earlier than the rest as I had been unable to get the Thursday night off work,  so I had been awake nearly 30 hours after a night shift...  Needless to say I was well rested for the morning.

 

Spent most of the event just trying to find where the most fighting was and getting stuck in, though I did have a few sneaky moments moving through the dense bushes to ambush some greens, or at the very least distract them while even sneakier tans got the drop on them.

 

At one point I was in a small squad trying to sneak round toward Pub when we spotted a Green take down one of our fellow tans.  After taking him out we crept out the bushes where we realised it was the green 1IC...  who we promptly captured and took back to our spawn.  After Marshall confirmed we had the HVT, the call went out that the green objective was to attack Tan spawn to recapture the HVT.  Due to comm issues we were unable to summon any other tans to defend respawn, so there were only about 8 of us from the capture squad and who were rearming when we arrived fighting off the entire green team...  but we put up a decent fight, with me laying down suppressing fire from the M249.  I also managed to get 4 kills with a TAG round during an assault on magazine at the top of the hill near our spawn, with many tans commenting on a beautiful shot.

 

Saturday night was bask to the house for more booze and pizza, with me supplying two bottles of flavoured mead which went down very well.

 

sunday we were outnumbered, starting the day with 27, and ending the day with 23, so inevitably greens were able to push our objectives hard and keep us bogged down,  so I resorted to hit and run tactics..   moving between positions trying to harrass the greens as much as I could, particularly in the afternoon,  though I did hold building D2 for a while with one other Tan and we were able to overhear some greens commenting that they thought there were at least 5 of us holding the top floor, and committing large numbers to try and swamp us..  but we held off the attacks long enough for reinforcements to arrive,  then running low on ammo, I took to sniping green defenders in D1 from the lower floor of D2 before falling back to reload

 

It wasn't all good though.

 

On the Saturday afternoon, the CO2 pipe on my M249 ruptured, meaning it was out of action, and I did try again with green gas after ended for the day, and it was still playing up on ASG Ultra air.  I was able to cut out the ruptured bit of pipe and rejoin it to the gas block,  but unfortunately it ruptured again on the sunday, so now I need to get a replacement, as well as some screws which have rattled loose and now gone missing.

 

Couple of my pistol mags have sprung leaks, so they need repairing too.

[Jacob Wright]

Went to the Defiant Battlesim on Saturday at Longmoor UTC. Had a really good day, only hampered by poor comms and a couple of autumn showers.

 

The teams seemed well balanced and the marshals/organisers were able to provide advice and deal with issues (not that I saw any) quickly and positively.

[Colin Allen]

3 hours ago, JinxDuh said:

 

That's rather sad, was it due to people not being ready in time or just not planned out?

 

The idea of cramming a whole team into a bus seems kind of... Silly? 

It felt more like poor planning; people seemed to be ready to go.

 

Very silly!

[Badgerlicious]

8 hours ago, Spartan09 said:

I also managed to get 4 kills with a TAG round during an assault on magazine at the top of the hill near our spawn, with many tans commenting on a beautiful shot.

You guys had some great pushes on magazine. Those were some really fun firefights to be a part of. 

 

20 hours ago, Impulse said:

After I heard the player yelling that tans had captured it and the rest of the tans yelling to push up and running in, I leaned out and took out the entire attacking wave with my hi-capa

We must have both shot those poor tans from both sides🤣 I had three walking out in front of the magazine in plain site announcing all greens were dead they now held it, shortly followed by "Hit." "Hit." "Hit." and knowing there was two more of our team directly to my left side. 

 

Great weekend though. Anzio is a fantastic site, and despite the player imbalances, everyone fought hard, many right to the end. Actually arriving on time on friday also meant the social was a lot more fun. Looking forward to the next one. Bring more tans, I need more kills! 😁

[Cannonfodder]

Yesterday took a trip to Incursion Airsoft at the Epsom tunnels and it was one of those days with ups and downs. Fortunately most of the negatives were nothing to do with the site as one was delayed trains and the second was that one of my post game cans of beer had a tiny hole in it so my plate carrier stank of Old Speckled Hen.

 

Games were varied with almost perfect hit taking. Unfortunately one rental was a little reluctant to call hits but a word from marshals (and maybe a couple of extra shots) soon sorted that. The only other slight negative was that some of the gaps between games could've been a few minutes shorter but they didn't feel excessively long

 

All in all I had a great evening and I'd certainly go back

 

Guns used:

GE 870 shotgun

WE P99

Edited Friday at 06:19 by Cannonfodder

[The_Lord_Poncho]

14 hours ago, Cannonfodder said:

Yesterday took a trip to Incursion Airsoft at the Epsom tunnels

I haven't been there for a while- I probably ought to give it another go. About an 80:20 cracking evening to very average evening ratio based on my past ten or so visits over a few years.

[Cannonfodder]

20 minutes ago, The_Lord_Poncho said:

I haven't been there for a while- I probably ought to give it another go. About an 80:20 cracking evening to very average evening ratio based on my past ten or so visits over a few years.

I've only played there 3 times over the past 18 months as it's a bit of a trek for me but I definitely recommend a visit

[Spartan09]

14 hours ago, Cannonfodder said:

Epsom tunnels

i thought that site shut down?

or am i thinking of a different airsoft site/ tunnel complex?

[Cannonfodder]

7 minutes ago, Spartan09 said:

i thought that site shut down?

or am i thinking of a different airsoft site/ tunnel complex?

It did but reopened again 

Edited Friday at 07:03 by Cannonfodder

[Spartan09]

13 minutes ago, Cannonfodder said:

It did but reopened again 

i may need to add it to my list of sites to visit...  before it shuts down again

 

[Cannonfodder]

1 hour ago, Spartan09 said:

i may need to add it to my list of sites to visit...  before it shuts down again

 

From what I've heard it's the same guys running the place, just under a different name. I don't think they'll be closing any time soon as it's a popular site. Compared to other mid week games I've been to elsewhere they had far higher numbers (23 IIRC).

[Nick G]

Fun day today . Horrid weather forcast on top of a week of insesant rain kept the numbers down to twenty something. But I like low numbers days 'cos the play is way more tactical . Good mix of games which were hard fought by both teams. I think the Blue team wone more than us in the end , but it was all fun . No agro or idiots, just fair and sensible play bt all. 

 

Went all gas as usual , the L119 A1 continues to be my main go to gun, but the new Apache MP5 was great . First shot in game got a kill 😂 Had feeding issues with the drum mag unfortunatly , but I've had a quick look and it's an easy fix. The 45 round mags worked flawlesly . Just took the 2 today , gave the M249 a day off. 

 

It was very muddy and slippery in the woods though, so no running !