playing in the mud (paintball)

Darxus at paintball Mon Dec 10 00:35:46 EST 2001

Playing in the mud.

I got to play paintball for the second time today. It is good. We played at skirmish, and had 32 people. I think our Judge's name was Jeremy, he was cool.

I was told to be there before 8:30am. The previous day I had woken up around 5pm. I laid in bed with the lights out and my eyes closed for about 3 hours overnight, but failed to actually sleep.

I wore long underwear, woodlands camo BDUs (pants and shirt), Matterhorn all weather boots, and GI glove shells, with an M-65 field jacket with removable liner, and the GI glove liners in my backpack. I brought this insulation because the forecast called for there being 1-3" of snow on the ground, and temperatures in the low 40s. I did not think I would wear all the insulation I brought - I intended to come over-prepared. All of it turned out to be necessary, and was worn from moments after I arrived. I wore my pants tucked into my boots, and tied the top as tightly as I could within reason, added a knot as usual, then tucked the laces into the top to avoid snagging. This worked good.

I feel it is important to wear camouflage - either bring your own or pay the $6. In the two times I've played, everyone wore camo. I noticed vividly last time that it really works. I was looking in a particular direction for people, then, maybe twenty feet in front of me, someone moved. I didn't notice them until they moved. It really helps to break up the edges.

A couple people were excited to have me along, since I have some experience shooting. I explained to them that this basically did not apply, because of how horribly inaccurate paintball guns are. There is no rifling, because it would destroy the paintballs, so the effect, instead of being accurate like any real gun, is more like a knuckle ball or curve ball, selected at random for each shot. I really would like to see all paintball guns list their accuracy, preferably in MOA at given reasonable distances. There's got to be a way to improve this.

As I said, I was told to be there by 8:30am. I left my house around 6:15, and got there around 8. We didn't start our first game until about noon. I consider that rather unacceptable. It was half price day, so it was apparently significantly more crazy than usual. The delays were due to this, and our own disorganization.

I really like paintball, and hope to play a lot. I think there is a good chance that I will play enough to justify purchasing my own gun. This would be fun because it's nice to own my own nice things, and I can take better care of it. But if I have my own gun and it malfunctions at Skirmish, it's my problem. If I use one of their's (same cost as if I used my own), and a gun has problems, they will replace it for me. I also don't think that I could get a gun with enough of an improvement in accuracy to justify it alone. Having my own gun could also possibly lead to playing somewhere less regulated / expensive.

By far the most horrible part of the day was my goggles fogging. I will never play paintball again without my own goggles that will not fog. I believe the solution is goggles with the word "thermal" in their name. A couple people were wearing goggles that were not fogging by JT USA. At this moment I'm thinking about Scott Bad Boy II Thermal Goggles.

Something else I need to look into is ski pants. I have no idea what they are like, beyond that they are waterproof and can reasonably be worn under clothing. This would be a wonderful benefit, as my lower body spent a significant amount of time in mud/water. It wasn't bad with just the extra layer of thermal underwear, but in cold weather, I think a thin waterproof layer would be absolutely wonderful.

My Matterhorn all weather boots made me very happy. Through all the snow and mud and water, my toes remained toasty warm and dry.

I was generally rather happy with what I wore, but my neck was uncomfortable a lot of the time. I traced this to the seam that attached the collar to my shirt. I could say that it chaffed a lot, but it would be more accurate to say that it ground. I'm thinking about using some sandpaper. Shesh. I lost one button off of my field jacket (lower right liner button). I was really pleased with the jacket, especially when I was thinking about buying a hat there (because of the dripping melting snow everywhere), and remembered that my jacket had a built in hood.

Teams were identified by colored tape around the arm. In the future, I would suggest putting tape around both arms (and putting tape on both teams, - no "skins"), so that it is easier to identify friend or foe. There was a point where I saw two people who did not see me who I could have shot easily, but I still do not know who's team they were on. While I was watching and hoping for a clue, I got shot.

I meant to pack my rollerblading knee and elbow pads, but forgot. I'm definitely bringing them next time - at least the knee pads. My knees had a lot of contact with the ground, and although I didn't hit any, I noticed there were a lot of rocks in the area.

I also think we need to figure out a better way to meet up, and coordinate buying paint. That caused the majority of our delay.

I heard a number of times "keep your balls dry". If a little water gets on a paintball, it can dissolve a hole in its shell, causing it to leak its contents onto neighboring balls, dissolving their shells. Thus it is very bad to get moisture in your gun. And cases of paint should be treated very gently.

There was food available during our lunch break - hotdogs, hamburgers, soda, and a couple other things like that. I believe the hotdogs were $1.50 a piece. I had brought 3 peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, a bottle of gator-aid, and a bottle of water. I bought 2 hotdogs and ended up eating all 3 sandwiches, drinking the gator-aid, and half of the water during the day (not all during the lunch break). It is a long day with a lot of exercise.. food is good.

I think we left around 6pm. I just made it through the tunnel before needing to pull over to the side of the road, where I had a very productive 4 hour nap.

Paintball packing list:

I'm going to go hose off my boots.
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