At what cost?

[ButcherBill]

Just an idle thought on my day off, I'm fully aware of the cost of my collection & even I find it embarassing at times but...

 

After seeing NVG in the classifieds for £4000.00 & over £4000.00 worth of clothing from one seller last week my question is basically how much you willing to pay for 'THE' right kit for your loadout?

 

I think the most I've paid is a shade over £600 for my L86A2 & around £300 for my ACU Molle II (much of that was postage from US & EU), at the same time I'm happy to pay £10 - £20 odd for boneyard items. I know quality outshines quantity but what are your thoughts on kit you have?

[Chev Chelios]

I really hope this thread dies and my Mrs never sees it . 

 

 

[Cannonfodder]

One of my biggest fears is that when I die the missus will sell my kit for what I told her I paid

[hitmanNo2]

It's best not to think about it.

[JinxDuh]

I go back to my plate carrier costing me just over £1k alone and thinking "Wow I spent a lot of money", but then when I factor in some of the cost for my upgraded pews £1k ends up being cheap... Scary stuff. As Hitman said, best to not think about it and just enjoy all the shiny new pews on the wall!

[GiantKiwi]

Probably made worse by having optics on things which are as expensive as what they're mounted to.

 

I'm still technically well inside of what the prices could have been had I bought things new - working on the principle of had I bought them new, I would be significantly worse off.

 

KWA was a trade, so no extra expenditure.

RATech M4 was £400 with 7 WE PMags (the rifle new before shipping and taxes is over £1000 and each of the 6 extra mags were about £40-50, so lower end of £1300ish)

DE N4 cost me £150.

 

Even with the other crap i've bought since for each of them, I'm still in my (convoluted) mind, something like negative £5-600 👀

[Tackle]

While I try to be frugal when buying gats & all the associated kit, if I think of a conservative figure, maybe 1.5 to 2k per year, but then times it by years playing (23ish), that's just mad😱

[RostokMcSpoons]

I have managed to be very frugal over the years, but I think the amount of time I've actually spent playing means it works out as tremendously expensive.
I've got much better value for money from my two £400-500 guitars than I have with any of my boneyard specials.

However, I get a certain level of intangible joy from having toy guns knocking around... I was running around my garden with cheapo plastic guns at an embarrassing late stage of my teenage years, and now I get to do it all over again with much higher quality and more fun versions of the same thing 

Edited 11 hours ago by RostokMcSpoons

[Krisz]

I don't spend money on gear because I don't see the point. What I mean is that I don't need a Sordin for 300 quid or gucci plate carrier because I don't go to war and it doesn't matter one bit if it's branded Viper Tactical or Agilite. Majority of the people you meet don't care what's on you regardless if you try to impress others or not.

 

Hardcore mil-sim events are obviously different but in that case you know exactly what you signed up for.

There is obviously some truth to "the buy once cry once" motto regarding gear. Can be a good investment as long as you don't end up in the classifieds trying to get rid of it for a small fortune and no one buys it. 🤣

Edited 11 hours ago by Krisz

[Cannonfodder]

Like others I try not to spend too much on kit. Partly because I'm tight (I must have Scottish ancestry) and partly because I don't see the point in spending extra for Gucci gear when the cheaper options will do for running around for a few hours once a month.

 

My biggest expense is probably travelling to games as I don't drive. Often the price of a train ticket is the same, if not more than, the green fees

1 hour ago, RostokMcSpoons said:

I was running around my garden with cheapo plastic guns at an embarrassing late stage of my teenage years, and now I get to do it all over again with much higher quality and more fun versions of the same thing 

I'm glad I'm not the only one

[The_Lord_Poncho]

I do my best to achieve cost neutrality with my Airsoft expenditure... Well, kind of. I relentlessly hammer my train company for delay repay, and all the compensation is paid into my PayPal account (cough, toy fund), which is then spent on the next Airsoft purchase once it builds to the requisite amount. It makes all those waits on overcrowded trains just that little bit more bearable...

[ruskitseller]

Well lads, you can't take it with you and there's no use crying over spilt milk! Consume and be merry. 

[TrooperX]

I’m not short of a penny but I’m as tight as they come so I’ve mostly done airsofting on a budget over the years.  I was an early adopter of Chinasoft replicas and loved the fact I could import reasonably decent RIFs for a fraction of the premium brands you’d buy in the UK.  I’ve also never held on to stuff that doesn’t get used enough.  It gets sold on so I never have that many RIFs at any one time.

 

I did treat myself once to a 2nd hand Systema PTW that cost me around £1k.  That was an amazing bit of kit and a lot of fun to use.  But when I stopped playing as much I sold that on.  I’m just as happy these days with my CYMA M14 that cost me less than £100 🤣

 

There was a guy at a site I played at recently who had a £2k thermal scope on his rifle.  It was bloody amazing but not something I’d personally spend out on.

 

 

[Impulse]

I'm more prone to spend a lot on guns, so doing a £2k MTW build including all the real-steel external bits isn't a stretch but it is my most expensive build for sure; most of my gun builds tend to be under just under £1000ish, maybe just over if a GBBR because those mags are expensive, and pistols tend to be around £300 - £400 as I tend to obsess over my guns and tweak them as perfectly as I can.

 

But when it comes to other gear I don't have any night vision or thermal stuff, I tend to buy scopes from Aliexpress (expensive ones there for £250ish, but nothing like real-steel optics as I don't think they're needed), my ghillies are all crafted for cheap and while I like to buy decent quality load bearing kit (and have to because cheap stuff just isn't designed for 6'5 people), my Warrior Assault Systems stuff isn't too expensive in the grand scheme of things. I think my plate carrier setup probably totals to just over £300ish, belt kits were probably about £150 each as I have one for standalone and one for with a plate carrier or chest rig. Outside of that, my two split chest rigs were definitely sub £100 each as they're Condor with mostly 8fields pouches.

 

That said, I am considering selling just over half of my gun collection since I don't use a lot of it... I counted up today and it turns out I have 41 guns including pistols, and I think I actually use about 19 of them, 7 of which are pistols because most of my other guns that I use regularly have MEDs

[LMKipper]

It's interesting the things that people justify to themselves - myself included. I was a PTW owner my first time around and I am again now for when it's too cold for my GBBRs. Dry firing is a big mood killer for me, can't quite explain why.

 

I've always seen the value in RS optics (or the posh repro ones now available) as cheapo airsoft ones seem to lose zero instantly and it does my head in. Same for holsters (they're cheap compared to replacing pistols), ear defenders (cheap compared to ears) and eye pro (cheap compared to eyes). But lots on plate carriers/helmets etc has always gone over my head.

 

Ps. If you think you might trim down @Impulse let me know if a gas sniper rifle is on the cards. I've wanted a nice one since I played alongside Doc and his Tanaka at LFU.