SpecOps’ Action Ghillie Hood

SpecOps’ Action Ghillie Hood Kit:
There are bonuses and drawbacks. It’s easy to put together, but a couple of things to watch out for.

First off, the bottom-front of the hood velcroes across itself, forming a double-layer of mesh. The first time, I put AG on both layers…a small bit on the underside, and quite a bit more on the outer layer. Bad idea! I had a Spaceballs “Dark Helmet” moment…gasping for breath and exclaiming “How do you BREATHE in this thing?”
I clipped off all the AG from both layers, rolled up the underside flap, and zip-tied it right up against the velcro strip. This let me only have a single flap to cover the mask’s mouth portion. I didn’t go quite as overboard on the AG on the outer portion of the flap this time and the results helped tremendously. I can actually breathe without needing a snorkel.

Second, humidity more than heat will affect whether or not you should even wear the thing. I tried playing with it on during a game not long ago and almost hyperventilated from the heat. The density of the AG greatly affects how much insulation your head gets. If you’ve played in hot, humid weather, you know that it doesn’t take much for you to start breathing hard and fogging up your mask. It’s even worse with the AG hood on.

My suggestion would be to not go all-out and try to use every scrap of AG they provide. It’s just too much for playing in hot, humid weather. Your head needs to breathe, so keep the AG application as light as you can. I’m in the process of lightening my initial application of AG mesh which will hopefully make the heat issue bearable.

You don’t have to look like a Wookie with a perm for the concealment & breakup factor to work…so keep it as light as you can around the top and rear of your head…a bit more on the front sides won’t hurt though.

Blood and Honor, The Journal of a 9th MID Soldier- Chapter 2

Blood and Honor, The Journal of a 9th MID Soldier

Chapter 2: Parting With The Permafrost

(Round 2 of the BFCL 9th MID vs. TAW League)

“Proph, you’re bleeding.”

Still coming down from my adrenaline rush, I glanced over at Hidus. He was pointing at my left arm and shuffling his Baur onto his shoulder in order to get to his medpack. It’s like when someone points out that you’re not wearing pants to your wedding…once you know, it hits you like a ton of bricks.

The throbbing pain pulsed with the beat of my heart. Moving my arm didn’t hurt. Having it attached to my body did. Thankfully, it was still attached. As my old squadleader used to say, “If it’s still attached, use it. If not, pick it up and throw it at ‘em.” Crux taught me a lot before he got promoted. I hear he’s been given control of his own unit now. The Third Something-or-other. Good for him. Some of us are cut out to lead, and some of us are cut out to bleed. Apparently, I am the latter.

Staunching the slow but steady flow of crimson, Hidus had me bandaged up in no time. Brandishing an aerosol injector, he started to pop some painkillers straight through my skin. AI’s hurt like hell. Sure, they’re always sterile and no needles are involved, but I’d rather have a double-ought gauge needle jabbed into my vein than have an AI dosage. I grimaced and yanked the aerosol injector out of his hands.

“No way Hidus. I’ll deal with the pain I’ve got before I deal with the extra pain that this damn thing will cause.”

“Suit yourself Proph…why don’t you take the whole kit and I’ll hold on to your shotgun for you?”

I couldn’t tell if he was being sarcastic or condescending, but to tell you the truth, my kit was getting a bit heavy.

“Good for me bro,” I said, handing over my shotgun. Hidus went to grip it by the pump, and saw a gobbet of leftover brain matter from when I killed that young punk that took out my beloved Lucy. Using a steriwipe, he reluctantly took possession of my weapon.

After switching kits, we packed up from our hydro-break and continued our sweep of the area. The further we moved from the front line outpost into the surrounding terrain, the less easy I felt. As our squads moved in a line sweep, I got this prickly feeling in the back of my neck.

“Hey Pfeil, you’re sure we wiped out all of their beacons, right?” I asked.

“Well, we didn’t find any at all, Proph,” was his reply. The prickly feeling turned into a full-blown need to scratch a ticklish spot. I hate it when this happens. Sometimes, my hunch is correct, other times, it’s way off.

One time, my squad spent three days combing an urban district of Last Stop due to one of my hunches. I had it in my head that in this seedy area of an overall seedy planet, there were insurgents masquerading as prostitutes. Not that I’d touch a Last Stop “lady” with a long-range Pilum shot. Too much Rad-poisoning had turned most of the local populace into mutants. In those three days, we saw more twisted acts of debauchery as we burst into the red light district house-by-house, room-by-room than most of us could have imagined…and I can imagine quite a bit. By the time we called it quits, we were all swearing off a soldier’s favorite pastime forever. On the other hand, not a single soldier that was detailed for this search has ever once been diagnosed with Burn, Ghonna-herpa-siphylis, or HIV. Sure, HIV is curable, but why take the chance it’ll mutate again like it did back in ‘24?

Right then, the only thing that wasn’t curable for me was that itch on the back of my neck. I was checking my HUD’s minimap every five seconds. Then every two seconds. Then I stared at it, praying for a blip, but at the same time dreading it. I didn’t want to be right. I didn’t want to believe. The minimap consumed so much of my attention that I walked right into DaddyofThree’s back.

“Sorry Daddy, I was preoccupied.”

“About your hunch, right?”

“Yeah, what will you cure us of today, Proph? Frostbite?” DrakinClaw threw in to the discussion as he walked alongside us. He smiled good-naturedly. I knew he was just joking. After all, up until the incident on Last Stop, he was the biggest party-goer of us all.

“Sorry fellas, I just can’t seem to shake it.”

“Proph, if it’ll make you feel better, I’ll detail four other guys to backtrack to the forward outpost with you so you can be sure,” said Pfeil with all the cool of the icicle that was hanging from my helmet’s visor. Pfeil wouldn’t have offered if he didn’t hold his own suspicions.

“I dunno boss, you know how I get. It could be just my imagination playing with me.”

“Tell you what, I’ll go with you.”

Pfeil put his words into action. Me, Daddy, Lucky, Drakin, and Fatkid were detailed to follow Pfeil back to the outpost. I stared at my own bootprints in the icy surface of Minsk’s outlying terrain, hoping that I was wrong. Hoping that the only thing we’d return to was a frozen-over mug of LuckyStrike’s god-awful coffee.

An explosion from up ahead brought me out of my reverie. My head shot up just in time to see our comm tower disintegrate into so many flying shards of metal. The comms in my ear immediately turned to crackling static.

“We’ve been had!” shouted Pfeil. He pointed to Drakin and rattled off a series of commands. Drakin started a sprint to catch up with the other elements of our squads that were still out sweeping, and the rest of us began trotting towards our sabotaged base.

With the four of us remaining under Pfeil’s command, we rushed towards the northern approach of trenches that we had so recently defended against the enemy. It was a haphazard squad. Having no time to prepare, our squad was somewhat mismatched. Two assault kits and three engineers. With no time to reorganize with the other elements that Drakin would be bringing up from further behind us and no way to get to our magazine at the forward base, we were stuck with what we had.

Panic seized me. Lucy! She was left at the outpost so she could finish recharging and let the newly repaired armor settle into the cold temperature. With her electronics fried from the previous battle, her Bioscanner was on the fritz.

“Pfeil, Lucy Quipment…”

“I know Proph…we’ll put her down painlessly,” interrupted Pfeil. Suddenly, having three engineers didn’t seem like a bad idea. Hopefully, she wouldn’t hold too much of a grudge if I ever saw her again in one piece.

“Aim for her left leg,” I choked out, “She’s got a patchwork job there from when they hit us the first time. She should go down pretty quick.”

Nodding their understanding, Fatkid, Lucky, and Daddy moved forwards, unlimbering their Pilums and scanning the horizon for my poor baby’s buxom figure. Pfeil and I readied our assault rockets and began weaving inbetween bits of cover as we approached our recently deserted position.

“Movement, eleven-o-clock, second floor” murmured Fatkid. With no comms, we had to stick close to each other just to be heard.

Gazing in that direction, I saw him. He was crouched down in the eyrie of the multi-story bunker with an LMG sweeping back and forth, looking for targets. So far, we had managed to catch ‘em with their pants down. He was the only enemy in sight.

We advanced up through the system of trenches on the north, still littered with spent ammo casings, bloodstains, and worse from just that morning. The stench wasn’t too bad yet. Probably wouldn’t be bad at all. The freezing temperatures didn’t really give corpses a chance to rot here. They were frozen solid, locked in a rictus of their last moments.

Like some bad zombie movie, a corpse shifted in front of Daddy’s position not ten paces away from where I was standing. Knife in hand, the corpse approached Daddy from behind, stalking closer for the kill.

One breath later, the reports from LuckyStrike’s SMG echoed off of the pass’ walls and the living “corpse” became one for sure this time. Well…we had officially announced our presence.

“It’s a trap!” yelled Pfeil.

Hell. That’s what this place is. That’s what it became in the next few moments. Hidden enemies popped out from the trenchworks, spraying our position with automatic fire. The LMG in the eyrie opened up on us. Worst of all, the lumbering form of my hijacked walker came into view from around the rear of the bunker.

“Luc…erm…walker at ten-o-clock” I reported half-heartedly. Like that old Terran movie about the dog Ole Yeller, I felt like I was about to kill my best friend. Three Pilum shots raced from the engineers in my squad and connected with Lucy’s left leg, shearing it off completely.

I watched Lucy Quipment fall out of sight behind the bunker, whispering to myself and to her, “It’ll be okay, gal. It’ll be okay.”

Numb from the neck up, my brain fogged over. Whether this was due to the wound in my arm taking its toll, or the sad remorse of watching my faithful walker fall I don’t know.

What I do know is that the enemy had the drop on us. They must’ve hidden a beacon somewhere, because we couldn’t raise any of the three defense lines we had within the Minsk control area. Cut off from supplies and reinforcements, we had about a hundred guys out on patrol. Most of them had begun to trickle back from the sweep in twos and threes. Across the way on the southern side, I could make out Drakin’s squad as they battled their way forwards against heavy opposition.

We died. We died in droves. Like the waves of the ocean, we broke against the solid wall of a towering cliff. I watched so many of my brothers die in those minutes, but what else could we do? The nearest point to fall back to was Belgrade, and that was a three-day march across inhospitable ground. Without supplies, we’d never make it across the frozen tundra. Supplies were in any of the three defense points we’d created inside of Minsk. We had to capture one of them just to ensure our survival during the retreat.

I used my defibs every chance I could, hitting a stunned comrade with a jolt, and helping him to his feet. I’d thrust his weapon against his chest and move on to the next body to check for vital signs as soon as the dazed soldier reflexively grasped the weapon I’d pushed into his hands.

There were some I could save. There were many others I could not. Gods, how I wish I’d kept my shotgun and left Hidus in charge of being the medico. I had a job to do though, and whether I was filling enemies full of Backblasting Buckshot, or my downed comrades with joules of life-starting electricity, I knew I was contributing to our chances of survival.

Drakin’s squad managed to grab one of our parked rabbits and press forwards to the western depot…our second line of defense in case we were overrun. I guess we were officially overrun, so they thought this was a natural progression.

As Drakin and his under-manned squad fought tooth-and-nail with the defenders of the secondary outpost, Pfeil led us through the trees, hightailing it towards Drakin’s beleaguered force.

We arrived in a blaze of small arms fire. Pushing the defenders back proved to be of no difficulty. Keeping them back was another story. We held out while a couple of troopers hurriedly threw supplies into the rabbit, filling the FAV so full that the shocks could no longer guarantee a smooth ride. That was fine with us though…our boys needed these supplies, and it was my fault for not following my instinct early enough.

Knowing that we were ensuring that the rest of the 9th would make it out alive, we put up one hell of a fight. It gave us strength. We repelled more waves of the enemy with fewer numbers than we had during the entirety of the morning attack. We were buying time at a high price though. First Daddy went down to a grazing hit across the thigh. Then Hidus took one to the shoulder so hard it spun him around twice before he hit the permafrost.

Squad Pfeil and Squad Drakin were the last ones out. We’d hung on long enough to gather the needed supplies into the rabbit, but now it was time to bug out. In good order, we melted into the trees, picking off the few pursuers that attempted to follow us. With the battle over, I turned my back on the bloody ground and started to file into my squad’s formation.

The heat hit me first. I watched blood and fragments of bone explode from my wounded arm. The report from the Zeller rifle happened two agonizingly long heartbeats later. I stumbled three steps forward before my body went into shock. My padded knees impacted with the frozen dirt. My face impacted next.

That’s about all I remember up until now. Acreo tells me I was in and out of consciousness…babbling on about whether Lucy would be okay and how evil the enemy was for deliberately aiming at my arm instead of my head.

I can’t help but think though, if I’d have paid attention to my gut feeling…or even told Pfeil about it earlier, this could have all been prevented. Not my injury…I could care less about losing an arm. I care about the scores of brothers that died to see the rest of us make it through. I honor their sacrifice and would gladly do the same for them, but I am one of the unfortunate ones that lived. I carry the burden of remembering what they did for me and my fellows. I have the burden of living up to their deeds.

As it stands, I now lie in a field hospital bed in Belgrade. I write this journal not in the hopes that someone will label me “hero,” but to remind myself of the sacrifices that my brothers made. What remains of my arm is to be amputated from the bicep-down. It didn’t survive the three-day trek to Belgrade. The freezing temperatures turned the lower part of my arm to ice, freezing the once-flowing blood in my veins. As I lie here looking at it, it appears so black that it looks like it was burnt in a fire, not frozen in ice. The docs say they can replace it with an artificial one. That’s okay with me. I’ve seen what the medicos can do.

Eroak took a hollowpoint to the sternum a couple years back. Blew out three discs of his spine all the way through his backpack. Somehow, he survived long enough to receive surgery thanks to Hidus and the field medics like him. They replaced most of his spinal column with a plexisteel replacement and grafted new conductive fibres to the shattered nerve endings.
There are gunship pilots that have quick reflexes. There are those that are so steady on the stick that they can keep a feather floating perfectly still in their engine’s updrafts. Eroak can do both…a rare sight. I guess that’s why they allow him to fly the multi-billion dollar pieces of machinery. Footsloggers like myself only get the expendable boats that the MID call “Air-deployed drop pods.” We grunts just call them deathcans.

Word has it that the enemy is following our retreat to Belgrade. They’ll probably be here tomorrow morning. Pfeil has already made arrangements for me to be evacuated by transport by then. I’m to be flown into orbit to the medical frigate. Seems they don’t have enough tech down here on the planet to graft a bionic to my soon-to-be stub of an arm. I fought with him about it, but a soldier follows orders. I hope all of them follow my only order: survive until I get back.

Looks like the docs are coming back with the aerosol injectors. Must be time for them to saw off my arm. If anyone reads this, tell Drakin that I did indeed cure us of frostbite…the only downside is the cure involves cutting off an arm.

I think I’ll ask ‘em to inject the anesthesia in the arm I won’t have when I wake up. Less pain that way. I’ve already had enough of pain for today.

Blood and Honor, The Journal of a 9th MID Soldier- Chapter 1

Blood and Honor, The Journal of a 9th MID Soldier

Chapter 1: Cold Morning in Minsk

(Round 1 of the 9th MID vs. TAW BFCL League)

It was a cold morning…just like all the others I’ve experienced in this desolate hellhole. LuckyStrike’s skills might be superb with his weaponry, but he manages to screw up even the instant coffee from an MRE. I drank it anyway, savoring the flow of warmth as it coursed down my throat and doing my best to ignore the feeling that I was swallowing metal shavings at the same time. What does he put in this stuff?

With Lorax and Heavy both out on a three-day pass, I was happy to get a decent night’s sleep for once. Rooming with those two guys in the abandoned business district here in Minsk is no picnic. Lorax snores like an FAV with a cherrybomb muffler. And Heavy? Well…let’s just say that the enchilada MRE might be his favorite, but it doesn’t do the rest of us any favors.

I sat at my post in the front line bunker, sipping my metal shaving mocha with a blissful smile on my frostbitten lips. I was daydreaming about how great the sleep period was going to be for the next two days when the klaxon started bugging out.
I almost jumped out of my skin as the screeching sound obliterated the otherwise quiet morning air. Pfeil likes to keep us on our toes with practice drills and it always happens on my watch. Shaking the spilt coffee from my cold-weather gloves, I turned around to give him a piece of my mind.

Pfeil’s eyes were hard. So hard, you’d think they were frozen. That only happens when he means business. I strangled my words and closed my jaw. This wasn’t a drill. With most of my coffee decorating the concrete floor of the bunker, I shot the last dregs down my gullet and tossed the cup as I raced to the weapons rack to grab my shotgun. Nabbing a Sentry Gun on my way to the bottom floor, I saw Drakin’s boys through my HUD as they grabbed kit and caboodle.

Lucy Quipment was parked right where I left her. Tall, sexy, with long legs and an upper body to die for, she’s the sweetest looking gal I’ve ever seen. My Bio readings were scanned as I climbed up the ladder into her cockpit and her fusion engine was purring like a kitten by the time I strapped in. My frozen fingers shot through with a throbbing pain as I yanked my gloves off and greeted the warm heat that comes with being inside a box that sits right on top of a miniature sun. I guess it’s a perk of being a walker pilot, but I try not to think too hard about what would happen if that titanium casing were ever breached.

Lucy Quipment and I moved out as the final cablings were interfaced with my helmet. She became an extension of myself. My sense of balance tied to her gyroscope, I had the feeling of ambling along at a brisk walk even though I was sitting still.

Lucy’s enhanced radar picked up a rabbit moving towards the bunker’s main chokepoint. I love these things. Rabbits are chewy little things with the only defense being speed. Little did they know we already laid traps for them.

EMP Mines detonated when the rabbit got close and Lucy opened up on the hapless driver with her twin gatlings. Like most women, when Lucy gets mad at you, her words are death.
Off to my left, the diamonds of two enemies floated along the northern side of the bunker complex. Lucy spoke harsh words again, but the men were obviously married. They avoided and ignored me and my baby and hugged some cover.

The next few moments were a blur. With the power of a walker, I had a lot of responsibility by providing covering fire. I saw the incoming mortar rounds from an enemy APC floating towards my position like the arcing flight of a PowerBall in the NPBL’s UltraBowl. The rounds exploded around me, doing little damage to Lucy, but wreaking havoc among my comrades. Nameless faces lay sprawled on the permafrost, broken and bleeding.
My rage was up and I flared off a set of rockets at the murdering APC. Mid-flight, my rockets were joined by the shot of a Pilum. Smoking wreckage was all that was left.

Minutes passed and all the while, the harsh words of Lucy kept the enemy from overrunning our position. Pfeil directed me where I was needed most, and I moved to support. It was a constant battle to throw the enemy back, keeping their heads down so my comrades could do the dirty work.

“TANK!”

Oh feth. The boys in the trenches saw the tank approaching up the main road and spotted it on my minimap. The hovering bastard was out of my range. The first shot was already on the way and Lucy took a shuddering hit. The feedback caused me to nearly pass out. Electrostatic discharges swarmed around the controls of my cockpit like a teeming swarm of neon-blue hornets. I frantically hit the shields just in time to stop a second round from the tank. Just in time, but just for a moment.
The shields on these walkers were too much of a drain on the reactors to last for more than a brief moment or two. I felt sluggish and drunk as the pull on the core took a nose dive from the demands of the shields.
It only lasts a moment, but that’s all the tank needed. I frantically backpedaled Lucy towards the west, trying to put the hardened walls of the bunker between me and that hovering armor-killer.

When things get bad, they usually get worse. This was definitely the case on this damn-cold morning. A distress signal lit up on my HUD. They’d broken through! Our main vehicle depot was under attack.

Confusion reigned on comms. Shouts of “Holy feth, where’d they come from” and “They’re taking the rear base” fought for supremacy as Pfeil tried to quiet everyone down. His voice was as frosty as Lucy’s armorplas windshield.
“Drakin and his boys are going to retake our base, you guys stop freaking and get back to doing your jobs. I’m counting on you.”

That’s when I noticed that the FAV that usually sits next to Lucy was gone. The bastards had hacked our rabbit’s Bioscanner and had used it to break through. Must’ve been a Shade that did it. Those damn cloaking devices are noisy as hell, but if nobody’s around to hear it, you can usually remain unseen and undetected. The enemy had proven that.

All these thoughts happened in the span of a heartbeat. My heart skipped as the glowing streak of a Pilum shot erupted from the northern section of trenches and whizzed past my front viewing pane. It was so close that the shimmering heat of the discharge instantly evaporated the frost from the armorplas. My hand was slamming down on the shield button in rapid succession. Nothing. They hadn’t recharged yet. Looking at my fusion meter, I knew they wouldn’t finish recharging by the time the next Pilum round came in.

With little chance of the enemy missing a second time, I kicked Lucy into high gear. Her sexy legs tore up the ground underneath as I ground forwards, tracer rounds from the gatlings lighting up the enemy engineer’s position. If he stuck his head out for another shot, I’d make him pay for it in blood.

The calm sound of Lucy’s husky, bedroom voice purred in my ear, “shields on standby.”
Just in time too. Another round from that damn tank was streaking in. I hit the popper and the energy field sprung into life. Not one, but two impacts fizzled against the impenetrable shield. The engineer in the trenches was dead-on target, but too late. My shields snapped up the Pilum shot and spit it out.

I screamed in victory from the confines of my cockpit. He wouldn’t get a third shot. Lucy stalked up to the edge of the trenches and let loose on the dumb bastard. Gatling rounds ricocheted around inside the metal walled trench like a hyper-pinball table. The enemy engineer fell apart, literally shredded alive by the volume of fire.

A vindictive grin crossed my face briefly, but was wiped away by a gasp of panic. Out of my peripheral vision, another Pilum round was streaking in from further up the trenches. I couldn’t stop it. I couldn’t duck it. All I had time to do was hit the ejection mechanism.

Ejecting from a Walker is not like an aircraft. No bolts blow the cockpit enclosure. No rockets propel your seat out of the vehicle. Ejecting from a Walker is more like getting flushed down a toilet. Your command couch rotates on a hinge located where the seat meets the back rest. You are unceremoniously dumped through the underside of the walker onto the ground.
MilSpecs say you will land on your feet. They obviously never tried this in a combat environment. With Lucy still in mid-stride, the combination of being dumped out and being pushed forward means that the only way to survive is to hit the ground in a combat roll and get clear of the crushing step of the walker. Lucy hates being abandoned for death, so I don’t blame her for trying to stomp on my skull as I bailed.

I had my shotgun clutched tightly in my hands, cradling it as I came up out of my roll and murderously glared at the trenches, searching for the enemy. Lucy fell over in her death throes behind me as I rushed to the trench. LuckyStrike was trading shots with some enemies and I moved up next to him, laying down a pattern of scattering buckshot in the general vicinity of where he was firing. The HUD blinked once as it detected that one of my shots grazed an enemy’s shoulder. It wasn’t the one though. My eyes scanned the terrain and saw the engineer that killed Lucy lurking behind some supply crates to the north of my position. Without thinking, I was up and running.

“Wait,” cried LuckyStrike, but I was oblivious. Racking my shotgun, I nimbly hopped the wall of the trench and was dashing across the open area to flank the crates from the engineer’s blind side.

The crunch of my boots on the permafrost sounded like the grinding noise of chewing on GrapeNut cereal. No wonder he heard me coming. His puny SMG shook in his hands as I rounded the corner. It was a kid. He must have been a raw recruit so fresh out of the womb that he wasn’t even issued a shaving kit. No remorse. His brains formed steaming piles of gobbets on the frozen ground as I blew them through the back of his helmet. Lucy was avenged.

I’m not sure how long the battle went on. I was incoherent with rage. They had the gall to attack before I’d even finished my first cup of coffee, made me spill half of it, murdered my comrades, and put a serious hurting on my poor walker Lucy Quipment. Suffice to say, the only thing I heard was Pfeil’s cool voice directing my rage to where it would do the most good.

I saw the contrails of drop pods rocketing from the sky onto a piece of cover on the south side. Shotgun at the ready, I waded in. Arms, legs, and torsos exploded from the point-blank blasts of explosive buckshot. I found the beacon and turned it to scrap…then continued to march up the line of the southern trench, hunting for more enemies.

At the edge of the trench, I saw a lone enemy standing motionless halfway up the hillside. He didn’t see me yet. Apparently, my casual walk without firing at him must have confused him. It wasn’t until I opened up with a blast from the shotgun from medium range that he figured out I wasn’t there to give him a pedicure. My first shot merely grazed him. He panicked. Jumping around like some idiot hopping barefoot on hot coals, he tried to bring his weapon to bear. The clack of another shell being racked into the chamber, and I sent the second blast straight at his torso.

Body Armor is meant to protect you from weapons. Too many soldiers gain comfort from this and believe that they are invincible. I proved this particular soldier’s theory to be wrong. A solid round of buckshot could probably be deflected. That was back in the days before backblasting buckshot was invented.

In today’s world, buckshot isn’t just a round sphere of metal. It burned with an outer coating of white-hot magnesium. By the time it hits the target, that magnesium has super-heated the round. Melting the initial layer of body armor, the round can pass the outer shell of defense. The heat generated from the Magnesium also causes the interior of the buckshot’s spherical shell to expand. The expansion breaks a small seal that lets the outside air rush in. Sulfur and oxygen don’t mix. When one meets the other, the chemical change caused by the unstable structure of the sulfur’s molecules mixing with the Oxygen causes an explosion. Not much of one though. But mixing this small explosion with a highly explosive bit of modified RDX compound? Well…that makes for some brilliant fireworks.

The rounds pierced the body armor of my opponent, searing through the outer shell and nestling into the chest cavity. Then the explosions did the rest. His body torn to pieces, I breathlessly panted, scanning the surrounding area for more enemies.

“Proph. Proph..PROPH!”

“Sorry Pfeil, I must’ve blanked out for a second there. What’s our status?”

“You got the last one buddy. It’s over. Come on back to the bunker and we’ll start a final sweep.”

Shotgun hanging limply from one hand, I trudged back towards the command bunker. If I was lucky, I’d still have time to grab another cup of LuckyStrike’s horrible coffee before we started burial detail. With all the comrades we lost, swallowing the bitter stuff would taste much sweeter than the post-battle depression that comes with seeing your brothers buried in the cold, hardened ground of this frozen wasteland.

I guess when you’re stationed in an outpost like this hellhole, you start to take on the mindset that matches the environmental conditions. I hope my mind will eventually be able to thaw out.

** The end of Round 1. Round 2 of the Minsk battle to come in another installment of “Blood and Honor, The Journal of a 9th MID Soldier”.

Paintballing for the First Time

Original Date of writing: April 15, 2007

It was a drizzly day yesterday, but around 2:00 it began to clear up. I called around to a couple of the fields nearby and found one that had a group coming in around 3:00. They said it was no problem for me to show up and play.

I packed my gear and headed out.

The place was way out in the sticks. The directions they gave were flawless though, so I didn’t have a problem finding it.

I was fearful that the group would be a bunch of 12-year olds on a birthday party or somesuch. As I pulled into the parking area, I saw a bunch of people in BDUs…and they were all way too tall to be little kids. Much relief was felt.

I did a brief round of introductions. These were all military guys from the nearby Ft. Campbell army base. Good deal…I can dig that.

Round 1: Woodsball: When you don’t know anything, you can’t make mistakes.
We started with picking teams for the first game…woodsball. We set up, hollered back and forth that we were ready, and started the game. My memory isn’t so great on this first game. I was trying to learn by observing my teammates, but quickly found out that they were almost as wet behind the ears as I was…or at least it seems that way in hindsight.
Picture a Civil War battle being fought in the trees. No attempt at stealth…everyone found a spot of cover and traded shots until they got hit. I was the second person to get tagged out on my team, and they ended up wiping the walls with us.

Lesson learned: Do it yourself…don’t just mimic what the others are doing.

Round 2,3,4: Speedball
A small speedball course was set up to one side of the woodsball field. Everyone wanted to give that a try, so we headed over that way. We played a couple of games fairly quickly. I’ve learned that speedball doesn’t make for a good story. Lots of shots flying, not a lot of things to say besides “I was hugging that barrel like a drunken barfly on an ugly waitress” and the complete lack of satisfaction that I got from it. Speedball just isn’t what I’m cut out for.

The moment of stupidity
I had a noobish moment.
We had eliminated all but one guy who was pinned down behind a barrel and a pallet. I knew he couldn’t see me, so I shifted up to the cover just in front of his position. While my teammates laid down a hail of fire to keep him tucked in, I ran down the boundary and shot him from 10 feet away. I’m not sure what happened…I guess I had a brainfart or something. We’d all agreed to not shoot from point blank and instead yell “Bang! Safety kill” and get ‘em to surrender. This totally slipped my mind in the heat of things and I pegged him once in the arm. I’m sure he’s got a bruise. I apologized profusely and made sure he knew I didn’t do it on purpose.
Thankfully, he was a good sport about it. During our next speedball round, he tagged me in the arm (from a much further distance) and we called ourselves even.

Lesson learned: Even though I’m an admitted non-fan of speedball, I did learn something. I’m a noob…I need to think about the range I’m at before I do something stupid like that.

Round 5: Woodsball: The Art of Cover
We took a break to refill air, hoppers, etc. and had a couple smokes and whatnot.
We decided to go back to playing woodsball.
In the next game, I was a bit more prepared. Another teammate and I hung out way to the left, while the rest were positioned on the right. He and I spent some time hanging back until the other guys engaged. Once we heard them shooting, we began moving up our side.
We both found some great cover and began exchanging shots with two that were facing us. It bogged down with poking out from behind cover, firing off some shots, and ducking back in.
It was just a matter of time…lucky shots tagged both of us out.

Lesson learned: Cover keeps you from being hit as often, but they still know where you are.

Round 6: Woodsball: Confusion and Concealment
With this lesson learned, I started the next game right next to the boundary of the field. With nobody else with me, I knew I could flank without anyone giving away my position by firing too early. I crouch-ran, low-crawled, and used the sound of firing to mask my movements.
I got into a great position and was able to take three enemies down in quick succession because they were too focused on the rest of my team. After getting these three, I had a friendly start shooting at me but was able to wave him off before he got me.
Not seeing any further enemies, I started moving in towards the center of the field…there was one guy left on the enemy side, and three on mine. I saw movement along the opposite edge of the field from where I had begun my flanking, so I began stalking him. I couldn’t tell at this point if it were a friendly or enemy, so I tried to get in close enough to see if I could recognize him.
Well…he popped out from behind a tree and lit my position up. I returned fire and he began running away. I shot him in the buttocks and he yelled and bawled about it. (I found out later that his marker had jammed, which is why he ran away.)
As he walked towards me, we realized a grave error had been made. He was on my team! We both said our “woopses” and I turned 180 degrees to face back into the field.
Again, I saw movement…so I stalked up a bit. We saw each other, but held fire.

Having just pounded one of my teammates in the buttocks (yeah, that’s how we talked about what happened after the game…we had great humor), I was hesitant to light him up. I yelled out “I’m Tripp, who are you?” He yelled something back that I didn’t quite catch. So, I held the barrel of my marker pointing towards the ground and walked right up to him. At 2 feet away, we were still confused. Everyone from this other group tended to look the same because they were all army guys with their BDUs on. I had a realtree patterned t-shirt and a pair of tiger stripe BDU pants on, so I was a bit easier to identify.

He said “I don’t think we’re on the same team.”
I said “Yeah, I don’t think so either, but it’d hurt like hell if we shot each other right now.”
He said “Yeah.”
I said “Let’s just call it even.”

We both walked to the neutral area where the others waited. They asked who got who and got a good laugh out of the mixup.

Lesson learned: Stealth and concealment is far superior to having a good piece of cover but everyone knows where you are.
Secondary lesson: Know thy teammates.

Round 7: Woodsball: Sneakiness is next to Godliness
The final game was another round of woodsball. At this point, our teams were tied up one to one.

By this point, I had gained a reputation for being sneaky. I guess everyone that had been tagged out the last round had swapped stories about how they went down.
I again chose the right flank just along the boundary and another teammate joined me. He said that I should stay hidden and be sneaky, and he’d draw their fire.
It didn’t quite happen that way. I found a great piece of concealment and no sooner did I get settled than I saw an enemy stalking the same area coming from the other direction. If I moved, he’d see me…so I kept still and waited for him to come into range.
My partner must have gotten impatient, because he was nowhere to be found. I held my position and held my fire. Minutes passed and the entire field was silent…no shots fired so far.
I remembered some tips I’d read online about playing effectively…one of which was to avoid having tunnel vision. I mentally marked where my quarry was and did a couple quick scans of the area. I’m glad I did. Another enemy was further forward and a bit closer to the center. He hadn’t seen me, but I had a great angle to take him out.
I held fire though…I had spotted the new threat, but had lost track of the original guy. A mental “oh schnarkeys!” kept me quiet until I could spot him again.

Shots began near the center of the field, and my secondary target began a retreat…moving across my lane of fire towards where I’d lost my original target. Now that I didn’t have to worry about crossfire, I lit him up. He had no idea what happened. Two three-round bursts and he called himself out without knowing exactly where I was.

My shots had flushed out the guy I’d lost track of. He was beginning to flank me just along the edge of the treeline. He made no attempt at stealth…he crashed through the brush trying to get to a position with two large trees forming a tight V to set up a defensive position.

I began moving parallel towards the way he came from and caught him looking the other way. It was close…and having already embarrassed myself with the earlier point-blank shot on the speedball course…I yelled for a safety kill. Well…he decided to chance it and began shooting. I’m not sure how it happened, but he missed. I ran towards the edge of the field, getting an angle on his trees he was using for cover and laying down fire to keep his head down.
I got a lucky shot and he howled in pain as I connected multiple rounds with his wrist, hand, and arm.

Having wiped out the opposition on this side of the field, I began moving deeper into enemy territory. There’s an open trail that cuts right through the field at an imaginary halfway point. Two more enemies were using this trail and a copse of trees and brush for cover…facing towards my team’s “side” of the trail. They had a damn good position…but only against people that were still on my team’s side of the field. I had them outflanked and they didn’t yet know it.
The guy who had his arm torn up was walking down the trail, but was honorable enough to keep silent as he walked towards the neutral area.
I wasn’t sure how long that honor would last, so I tried to hurry in moving up into range.
About the time I had a decent shot, he had moved up to his teammates. I had to wait for him to pass before I could attempt a shot. Again, I admire his honor. He didn’t tell them where I was.

I shot the nearest of the two enemies and he looked over at me in confusion…then recognized my camo (Remember, I was the only one that DIDN’T have a BDU jacket on) and cursed, then raised his hand and started the walk out.
His partner hadn’t seen the shots, but obviously knew something had gone wrong because of the direction the guy had just turned to look at me before calling out.

I snuck up a bit closer…closer than I liked for a shot that wouldn’t hurt too much. Having again hit someone from close range a minute ago, I was worried about causing too much pain…even if the guy deserved it for deciding to shoot instead of surrender.
I yelled for a safety, made sure they saw me, and waited. They didn’t surrender. Matter of fact, they ignored me and went back to trading shots with two other guys on my team.
I was a little confused. Maybe they thought I was on their team…after all, I was behind them.

I yelled again…”Surrender or I shoot you.”
No response…
My two teammates were rushing the last enemy…I was actually further away than they were and they still didn’t have LOS to the enemy player. When they did, it would hurt like hell if they both shot ‘em.
So, I did the humane thing…I shot the last player in the hopes that they’d call themselves out before my other two teammates made it REALLY hurt.

Thankfully, they called out after a burst of three shots and the game was over.

We all walked back and had another round of smoking and trading stories.
I had gained a reputation on my first time playing…”Sneaky Git”

I took it as a complement. I’m not sure why nobody else was doing anything similar. These were army guys, so I guess I expected a bit more than the bounding overwatch that they did. Nobody really went to the lengths that I did to be sneaky.

Lesson learned: Stealth and concealment rock, but don’t be afraid to shoot someone just because you think it’ll hurt. Everyone has different pain tolerances and a guy that yells and bawls from a hit from 20 yards away might just be a sissie.

Wrapping Up
All in all, I had a blast. As we were cleaning gear, one guy asked how long I’d been playing and prefaced it with “You played like you’ve done this before.”
I explained it was my first time and he was surprised at that. I did explain that many moons ago in my days of Boy Scouts, I was a Capture the Flag fanatic. I guess that was a good enough explanation.

We exchanged phone numbers and all headed out.
Good times…good times.

MVP of the day: My kneepads. Hands-down, this is the best investment I’ve made. The ground was wet and squishy, there were fallen limbs and brambles everywhere, and these things gave me the added courage I needed to get down and dirty where others might worry about hurting themselves.
In fact, during Round 5, I was tagged out because I got shot on the kneepad. Suffice to say, it didn’t hurt a bit.

I had bought an el-cheapo set of Rollerblading pads back at Christmas and never really used ‘em. Sooo…about a month ago I broke ‘em out and used some painter’s tape and camo spray paints to tiger-stripe the kneepads to match my pants. I did a little of the same to my mask and hopper as well.
Now that I’ve had my trial by fire, I’ll probably do the set of elbow pads in camo as well. After having gone without them the first time out, I’ve decided that I’m willing to sacrifice a bit of maneuverability and stiffness in order to give me more confidence when low-crawling.

Proper Sight Configuration

There are a lot of topics that talk about which kind of scope or sight to get and the benefits that they can give you. There is not, however, a guide on what the best way to go about making your new shiny toy work for you once it’s in your grubby little hands.

There are a couple of topics to cover. I’ll list them off at the start, and work through each one in detail later.

It is widely accepted that a magnifying scope is not a good idea for paintball use. By the time you’d get any use out of magnification, you’re at a range that is far too great for a paintball to be launched.

For the purposes of this post, we’ll assume that you are going with a more natural choice for a paintball application: the red dot sight.

1. Zeroing your sight

2. The benefits of risers and offsets

3. Mounting your sight

Zeroing your sight

Picture yourself staring downrange at your practice target.

Your new sight is positioned just perfectly. The sun glints off of the black finish and illuminates your target like an aura from heaven. The stock of your marker is nestled snugly against your shoulder.

You press your bare cheek against the warm plastic of your stock and line up the brilliant red dot with your target…it can’t run.

It can’t hide.

You are one with your weapon.

A staccato burst of three shots strikes the target with unerring accuracy…your enemies stand no chance.

You have evolved to the penultimate level of predator.

Sounds good, right? Who can tell me what’s wrong with this picture? It’s a very small detail…

“Your bare cheek”…Doh!

I made this exact same mistake my first time…I zeroed the red dot with my mask off.

This is probably the most common error. It’s nothing to be ashamed of.

If you’re like me, you love shiny new toys. Just like a kitten, you get tunnel vision when something new and preeeeetty glistens in front of your eyes. It’s hypnotic. You don’t think straight…you can barely walk straight.

Much like when that cute gal at the bowling alley winks at you and smiles.

Alright…enough goggle-eyeing the pretty girl…back to serious, manly business…there’ll be plenty of time for that after you show how great a hunter you are. (Natural Selection baby…chicks dig guys who can align a paintball sight properly. Just ask ‘em…and give me her number.)

Take some time to go back and re-zero with your mask ON this time.

Practice your normal snap-shooting pose a couple dozen times before you start. Get a feel for the most common position you’ll be using while looking through your sight.

This is the position you’ll want to use for zeroing.

If you try to zero from your most comfortable pose (meaning you take about 5 seconds to get it “just right” when you’re lining up on a target), you’ll find out that it doesn’t work out quite the same when it comes to the real thing.

When it comes to red dot sights, it doesn’t matter at what angle you look through it…the dot will always be lined up with where you’ve zeroed. At least, that’s the theory. If it’s good enough for Special Forces, it’s good enough for me.

I too subscribe to this theory behind the red dot, but with a caveat: it better feel natural when I’m sighting, or it isn’t worth the extra edge a red dot gives me.

There is a method to zeroing. Probably the best description of both the process and the physics was made by Lothen in this thread. No sense re-inventing the wheel when it’s put so eloquently by someone with a much better grasp on it than I do.

Risers and offsets

Some folks mention buying an offset or a riser when mounting your sight.

You mentioned you don’t want to spend any money on these things though…after all, you want to buy that gal a soda and a round of pins at the bowling alley, and that ain’t cheap. Heck, I can’t blame you. Why back in my day…a game of bowling only cost…alright, ALRIGHT I’ll shut up with the reminiscing.

But from a hypothetical perspective, it might not be a bad idea. Let me clarify though just so you don’t get the wrong idea that it’s an absolute requirement to get your red dot to work properly…

The exception to this absolute requirement rule I just made up is how your hopper is mounted. If it is not offset somehow or another (Q-Loader, stovepipe, etc.) then you might want to settle for just buying the girl a soda and forego the round of bowling…you’ll need a little cash for one of the following…

Oops…wait a second…

The other exception to the same absolute requirement (darn loopholes…there are always so many!) is how flexible your mask is. If you can’t mash the lower part of your mask close enough against your stock to see through the sight, you’ll probably want to look into one of these as well.

Or you could just take off the stock…but that’d be an exception to an exception, and we’re not all willing to wait for an act of congress to push through all this legal jargon just to put a red dot on a friggin’ paintball marker, so we’ll forget I even mentioned this last option.
Right then…on to those things you might want to spend some money on…

1. An angle-mount for your hopper.

These come in all varieties and are referred to by a number of names. I own a Tippmann A-5 and they call this gadget a stovepipe. Others call it an elbow. There are plenty of hoppers out there that are already angled, so look at those too.

2. An offset rail.

These are gadgets that screw onto your marker’s built-in rail and are meant to jut out to the side with a new rail for mounting such things. They range in how far this jut is, but it’s usually a good inch or three.

3. A riser.

Just like the name implies, it raises the point at which you mount the sight by a margin. Some of these risers are actually more like a handle with the added bonus of being able to mount a sight on top. Others are a rectangular chunk of metal that looks kinda like a really long LEGO block.

It all depends on how much you need to raise the mounting point to make it comfortable, as well as bypass any obstructions (such as your hopper).

Given that your hopper is somehow mounted at an angle or is a very low-profile model, the only thing a riser or offset rail will do is make your posture feel more natural when trying to look through the sight.

If you can cram your face down far enough and your mask has some “give” to it, you really don’t need these accessories. They’re just going to help you feel like you’re not crammed into your mom’s clothes dryer while you’re trying to aim.

I have an offset rail, but it is still difficult to get the “feel” that seems normal for looking through a sight…which means my eye is square with the center of the sight optics.

I intend to buy something to give me some more elevation…I’m a tall gangly guy with a long neck, so I need that extra height a riser will give me compared to looking like I’m trying to snap my own neck every time I try to aim. I’m looking for the handle/mount combo for that extra elevation.

Regardless of what I end up purchasing, there is one thing that will happen before I waltz over to impress that girl with my sight mounting skills and a Dr. Pepper (Diet…it tastes just like the real thing!)…

Mounting your Sight

Once I get my new riser purchased and installed, I’ll have to re-zero the dot again.

But you ALREADY zeroed it you twit…go say “Hi” to the cute girl already!

Yeah, I hear what you’re saying. But there’s a reason.

Every time you make a modification to the position of your scope on your marker, you’ll need to re-zero.

Just remember that, and you’ll have no problems. It’ll save you some embarrassment when that pretty girl checks out your hunting skills in sight alignment too.

There’s one slight problem to having these extra doo-dads in addition to your sight of choice…

They’re attached with screws. Even the normal vibrations of my Tippmann A-5 firing on single shot cause these screws to loosen over time.

The more extra mountings you plop on to accommodate a sight that feels comfortable, the more likely they are to fall off in the field. Some Blue Loctite should help. Just be sure that before every round, you take a brief moment to inspect your screws and make sure nothing is coming loose.

There’s nothing worse than having to worry about some idiot with a screw loose running around the field with a loaded weapon. (Oh c’mon…you saw that joke coming a mile away)

If you’re using both a riser AND an offset, it’s a fair bet that you’ll always use both pieces…so why not permanently attach them? A wee bit of superglue and you have two less problems to worry about.

That’s right…TWO problems.

Number one: screws loosening.

Number two: attaching the two pieces in different places every time they are assembled.

One thing to always keep in mind: if you take a moment to ensure that you ALWAYS align the sight on the marker in the exact same place, you’ll never have to use the excuse of “My shots were off because my sight rail was two millimeters further up the mounting bracket that it was when I zeroed it.”

Oh yes…that’s right.

No more excuses…you forfeited your right to make excuses when you decided to take up the position of Sniper.

If you zero your red dot and permanently etch a couple of lines (a carpentry nail does the trick) to mark the front and back positions of your sight/offset/riser combination, you’ll always have the confidence of knowing that when you re-mount them before a match, they’re being put back on in the exact same spot as when you painstakingly zeroed it the first time.

You COULD take it a step further and just superglue or JBWeld the whole contraption in place, but I would STRONGLY advise you not to for numerous reasons.

First off, the whole idea of customizing your marker is the idea that you can always un-customize it back to the factory defaults. Why? What if your marker is completely pooched and you have to buy a new one? Or maybe you scored some cash in the lottery and bought one of those wiz-bang new markers (and took the pretty girl out for a movie with a LARGE popcorn thrown in with the spare change)

That’d mean buying the whole sight set again.

Secondly, when it comes time to strip your marker down to the bare components for cleaning, you may or may not have a problem doing so because of the addition of this permanent fixture.

Third, think about transporting your gear. Most totes don’t take into account “breathing room” in the bag for what might turn into a huge bulge from the offset, riser & sight.

Fourth and finally, you may switch positions on the field. Not because you suck at sniping…I’d never imply that.

Okay, I might…but we don’t know each other that well yet, so why don’t we just be friends? (Be prepared…that’s the line you’re going to hear from the pretty girl if you don’t have your paintball sight alignment skills in top shape)

Let’s just say that you are so uber-sneaky that they beg and grovel for you to go Light Rifleman in the next round.

That big honkin’ rig you have for your sight is next to worthless for this position. (No flames guys…It’s my opinion and I’m sticking to it.) Why not leave it off so you can dash around without all the excess baggage?

Before going off the deep end and permanently affixing everything together, keep these thoughts in mind.

Wrapping Up

Alrighty then…I’ve covered all the basics. Get out there, get that sight zeroed and mounted properly, and by all that is holy…make sure you freshen up that deodorant before going to talk to the pretty girl.

You smell like soggy burlap. Actually…what the heck are you doing in a Bowling Alley with your Ghillie Suit on?!?!? Freak!!!

Risk The World- My First Scenario Game

Risk the World was put on by MPP Games at Bearclaw Paintball in Fayetteveille, TN June 1-3

This was my first scenario and I must say, I couldn’t have picked a better one to learn what it’s all about.

–Saturday–

I was invited to play with the Ridge Runners (Playing on the French side) and thoroughly enjoyed the level of sportsmanship that everyone exhibited. We butted heads with the Spartans most of the first day along the northwestern hillside. It was an exhausting skirmish in some difficult terrain. Mario’s boys sure kept us in check, neither side able to gain much ground.

The highlight of my Saturday play was on that cursed hillside. Many of my teammates were being eliminated, so I hunkered down in a patch of brush and prepared an ambush.
The suspense was exhilarating. With no fellow Frenchmen left, I was all alone. I could hear the Spartan players talking and moving forwards towards my position. Suspense leads to some pretty heavy breathing. My mask was so foggy I couldn’t see much of anything…I was working off of hearing and vague shapes.
I laid low and watched two Spartans walk within 5 feet of either side of my position as they gained some ground. They camped out for a moment to survey the terrain and decided to move back and regroup with some reinforcements that were heading their way from the Spartan base.
They moved back…one Spartan moving so close to me that only a single piece of undergrowth kept him from stepping on me.

Having met up with their reinforcements, they began another push forwards. With my goggles so fogged it was turning into droplets of dew on the inside of my lenses, I could barely make out the orange ribbons on two Spartan masks as they headed directly towards my position.

I popped up with my marker raised in their general direction, hollering for all I was worth for them to surrender. It was a gamble that paid off…I wouldn’t have been able to hit the broad side of a barn the way my visibility stood.
I was expecting to return to the respawn point looking like I’d been tie-died in orange and green, but the two fellas showed great class and raised their markers in surrender.
I’d like to give those two guys special honors, as they did not reveal my position to their teammates as they walked off the field…but it was obvious the Spartans now knew I was there.

It wasn’t soon after that more Spartans were heading towards my position, dead-set on flushing me out. It was hero-time, so I popped up, fired a stream of paint on some Spartans I could barely make out at the bottom of the hill (thank you for wearing orange on the backs of your goggles as well!) and was summarily Spartanized once my position became obvious.

Towards the end of the afternoon play, my marker gave up the ghost. “Mitzi,” my Tippmann A-5 had had enough and so I left the field a bit before the dinner break.

I talked to Bob in the Bearclaw shop and he was kind enough to provide me with a rental. Special thanks to Bob and Susie for being so kind!

–Sunday–

On Sunday, we decided that another day of mountain climbing just wasn’t in the cards. The Ridge Runners were tired of running up those steep ridges, so we decided we’d go for an easier target…the Mongols. Boy were we mistaken!

The Mongols gave us one heck of a firefight. My rental marker saw more paint go through it in the span of 20 minutes than I had shot all day Saturday. And then I shot some more!

We had our work cut out for us. Assaulting an enemy base isn’t exactly the easiest thing to do, but a couple of my fellow Frenchmen saw an opportunity to do some damage. Our one rocket launcher-toting hero and another infantryman and I (Sorry, I never did learn your names) picked our way into a dry streambed on the side of the action. We worked our way into a position inside a copse of brush and prepared to make the assault.
With a mere 20 minutes to go before gameplay ended, we knew we had to make this count.

Myself and the other infantryman moved in front and burst out of the brush, guns blazing. Yelling, whooping, and generally making a ruckus, we were able to distract the enemy Mongols long enough for our rocketeer to get a shot off. Kablooey! The base went bye-bye and if rumor is true, we got the general and a small handful of other Mongols who were holed up in the base.

We skirmished with a few other Mongols before they beat us back. By the time we were eliminated, time was just about up. What a way to end the game!

Thanks to all…It was a weekend to remember.

-Tripp (aka “Tree”)

My first visit to Bearclaw Paintball

Bearclaw Paintball is a facility located in Fayetteville, TN.

First, let me say that the day I played was very slow, but very rewarding. Throughout the day, there were rarely more than 6 persons to a side. As I understand it, it is a rare thing to have so few people at Bearclaw.
Of particular note is the fact that 7 Tennessee Titans NFL players were there. It was almost like a private party was being hosted…only that wasn’t the case. Great guys, all…and not being a football enthusiast, I can say that this is based on personality alone, not the view of a goggle-eyed fan.

Right then…on to what will be a more typical experience:

If you’ve never been, here are some things to set your expectations…

If you are a SPEEDBALL player, don’t bother. There are plenty of other courses around that offer speedball on a much more pleasant level for your playstyle. BearClaw does have a speedball field or two, but many of the obstacles pull double-duty as extra bits of cover in and around their woodsball fields during scenario games, so you may be limited to a single course of wooden buildings.
If you are a die-hard Speedball player, you might as well stop reading…the rest of this concerns people who are either woodsball-oriented, or are willing to give it a try.

If you are a WOODSBALL player, a 4-hour drive wouldn’t be a waste just to experience what Bearclaw has to offer. Maybe not every weekend, but at least once. I myself traveled 2 hours and have zero complaints.

First off, there’s the owners & staff. Mr. Robert & Miss Suzie treated me like royalty.
I got a tour of the various areas within the woods (courtesy of a golf cart ride along the varied trails made especially for Scenario Tanks) by Mr. Robert. The way his eyes lit up and the depth of description he used to talk about the history of certain areas (such as the downed airplane and the swimming pool-turned-bunker) let me know that he wasn’t just a business owner…he was a true enthusiast. I got the impression that the fields are never truly “done.” There’s always something more in the works.
Miss Suzie made a huge impression on me. The nicest gal you’ll ever meet. She truly made me feel great about spending my day at Bearclaw even with the small number of players on that particular day.

The rest of the staff ranged in both age and experience…from the first-time “paintball serfs” who were working in order to get playtime, all the way through to more mature (read: older in age, not behavior…we’re all giddy kids when it comes to shooting Nerf rockets from a cannon!) scenario veterans who helped mentor the newer refs. All were knowledgeable and more than willing to facilitate the interests of the players.

Having met the people, let’s go into a bit more detail on the scenery.
Some so-called Woodsball courses are basically nothing more than speedball fields with trees as obstacles with everything else bush-hogged to the dirt. Zero undergrowth, and a fairly cramped field of play.
Not so at Bearclaw! The expansiveness of the wooded area seems incalculable your first time through…it’s as if the field (and buildings, sandbagged bunkers, and other terrain) go on forever. Inbetween these obstacles and pieces of cover is the concealment factor. Yes, there are trails and pathways big enough for a golf cart…but the rest of the area is absolutely covered in undergrowth…great for concealment.

Painstaking effort has been put into not just creating a facade, but a well-bodied field of play.
It’s not a Hollywood set with a singular attraction and nothing behind the scenes. There are buildings, bunkers, and bits of cover everywhere…not just enough to define a particular section as “The Fort” or “The WWII camp.” The focal points of the areas are there, but the surrounding areas all have something to offer players who don’t want to get bottlenecked into one particular area of the field.

By the time lunch rolled around, I was overdue for some chow. I grabbed a Chicken Finger special from their concessions and couldn’t handle the amount of food I got for my money. I think even the voracious appetites of the NFL players were satisfied.

Facilities were great…covered areas to sit in the shade and eat, plenty of outdoor seating, showers & toilets…not Porta-Potties…real toilets (and two designated especially for ladies), and a Pro Shop with merchandise, cold drinks, etc.

Field paint is required. Anywhere from 45 to 55 bucks for a case of Procaps (Either X-Ball or Draxxus). I have come to realize that there are many people who will go on forever griping about the cost of the “field paint only” sorts of places and frankly, I don’t understand. Why complain?
It’s a fact that in order to play paintball, you will spend money. Everyone knows the price ranges for a case of decent paint, so what’s the problem? It’s not like they’re selling Brass Eagle crap at inflated prices. It’s actually worth feeding into your hopper.

If you can’t afford to buy the paint at the field, don’t bother showing up. Would you go to a video arcade with no money and expect to enjoy yourself?  More realistically these days, would you bring your PSP to an arcade just to get in a game? Would you decide to take a cross-country road trip and not budget for gasoline?

Paintball isn’t the cheapest sport out there. Not by a longshot. Most of the time though, you get what you pay for. Bearclaw was a great investment of both my time and money.

Thanks for the great experience Bearclaw…I’ll be seeing you again real soon.

Regards,

Tripp aka “Tree”