Stag...Hunted...Gamed...Survived
Had my Stag on Saturday. The allocated spaces were not entirely filled, but those who turned up had a stonking good time. We were the "White Team", which meant we sported lovely white masking tape on our left biceps. Fitted out in Full Combat Camoflage and Solid Black Masks (many a Darth Vader Noise was made), we were issued with Weapons of Mass Coloration - aka Air Powered Seriously Good Automatic Action Paintball Guns.
We spent the whole of Saturday running around in the woods shooting at other mad folk like us, and in turn, being shot at and picking up some serious bruises. We started against the Brown Team, in the OK CORRAL game - lots of false western buildings, barrels etc. We lost both innings of the game, since they were exceedingly well organised, prior gamers who outnumbered us, and we were newbies who were just learning how to use the guns, crouch, and the all important fierce impact of a 200mph paintball on your body. The Second Game was called JUNGLE, played against the Black and Yellow Team, where both sides had an allocated general they had to protect in some serious forest with exceedingly dense bushes. Both teams had Stags, so we were both allocated as the Generals. In the first innings we almost won, but I got shot in the neck just before the end - obviously my body guards were not that good! The second innings was a marked improvement as Meady, Rodriguez, Brett, Snyman and Tichborne endeavored to not only protect me, but get me to the opposing team's outpost, which would mean we won flat out. After much military like movement, through underbush, and delusions of SAS missions, we ended up in the opposing teams area and won. Woohoo!
Lunch was fantastic for a Vegetarian Pallatte, if I do say so myself. Very tasty.
The third game was CHEMICAL ALLEY, where we had to gain and protect some steel chemical vats from the opposing Black and White team. The problem was, they were Zombies, or as more commonly known, CHEATS! I shot two flat in the head, easy shots, paint visible from my sniping position - but they refused to put their arms up and walk off the field. CHEATS! I wasn't the only one who complained, so it seemed the entire White team, apart from the fact we were horrendously outnumbered 2:1, were being faced with Zombies from Resident Evil Chav Land. For the 2nd innings we decided to put into place operation Chav Kill, and we put up fierce resistent to the Zombie Threat, and surprisingly my corner sniping position held me long enough to be the last White Standing at the end of the game - and STILL they shot me as Game Over was called. Stupid Chav Cheating Zombie *^@£s. Its just a game you know. Ahem. Final game was ZULU - played against the Blues from Morgan Stanley. Storm the Hut, keep it from the opposing team and you win. We lost the first innings on a narrow margin, but we realised it was more to do with the fact that the opposite side had better ingress to the hut, and were more unified. We anhiliated them in the 2nd innings. Gregor and I pinned down two sniping positions and held ours very well, taking 3 kills of evil Credit Card pushing Bankers. Snyman and Brett did a South African Resistance operation and put up a wall of immense firepower that held their advancing scouts at bay. Waseem and Ari were firing away allowing for the storming Rodriguez, Mead and Tichborne to head into the house. The ever wise Mr Thornton took up a brave position and sent many a Banker packing to the Dead Zone before being merciliessly taken out with multiple shots in the back. In the end Greg and I were facing a 3 minute to end of game call and we were unsure if we had the house or not. He lay down cover as I did a kamikazee run towards the house. Got pinned down between two sets of well hidden *ankers, and only via some careful shooting from Waseem was I allowed a Ben Jonson like Sprint into the house only to be faced with 5 of the White Team positioned inside all training guns at my advancing figure.
I had it under good authority that if Mr Tichborne was not out of ammo I was a deadman regardless of my allegiances to the White team and not the *ankers.
To be totally fair, the Morgan Stanley team were a pleasure to play against, they were fair, honest, determined, well organised and very good humoured. We decided on both sides we had found the best opponents with which to end the day. Twas a well earned draw between the innings and both teams applauded eachother well. Good showmanship from the Blues and Whites. Shame they work for a bunch of *ankers.
In all, the Paintball Stag was a wonderful day. The Weather was great, the games fantastic, the opponents varied and fun (except the Zombie Chav *@$@s) and the team spirit very good indeed. As I expected, my various friends got on well, which says something about the 'Water finds its level' comment that I suspected operated within friend circles. All fantastic people, and great fun. We had a few pints at a pub, soaked up the last of the rays, and then headed off.
The W.London crew went to The Five Chillies in Sudbury for a fantastically hot curry, and then I came back and showed Mr Tichborne one of my fave films - Black Hawk Down.
We decided, paintballing was good, but we couldn't face the prospect of going to a real war with real bullets.
We will, however, return to paintballing later in the summer. Right now, I'm nursing some serious bruises and eagerly awaiting bedtime.
Thats wot I did this weekend :)
--
dp
We spent the whole of Saturday running around in the woods shooting at other mad folk like us, and in turn, being shot at and picking up some serious bruises. We started against the Brown Team, in the OK CORRAL game - lots of false western buildings, barrels etc. We lost both innings of the game, since they were exceedingly well organised, prior gamers who outnumbered us, and we were newbies who were just learning how to use the guns, crouch, and the all important fierce impact of a 200mph paintball on your body. The Second Game was called JUNGLE, played against the Black and Yellow Team, where both sides had an allocated general they had to protect in some serious forest with exceedingly dense bushes. Both teams had Stags, so we were both allocated as the Generals. In the first innings we almost won, but I got shot in the neck just before the end - obviously my body guards were not that good! The second innings was a marked improvement as Meady, Rodriguez, Brett, Snyman and Tichborne endeavored to not only protect me, but get me to the opposing team's outpost, which would mean we won flat out. After much military like movement, through underbush, and delusions of SAS missions, we ended up in the opposing teams area and won. Woohoo!
Lunch was fantastic for a Vegetarian Pallatte, if I do say so myself. Very tasty.
The third game was CHEMICAL ALLEY, where we had to gain and protect some steel chemical vats from the opposing Black and White team. The problem was, they were Zombies, or as more commonly known, CHEATS! I shot two flat in the head, easy shots, paint visible from my sniping position - but they refused to put their arms up and walk off the field. CHEATS! I wasn't the only one who complained, so it seemed the entire White team, apart from the fact we were horrendously outnumbered 2:1, were being faced with Zombies from Resident Evil Chav Land. For the 2nd innings we decided to put into place operation Chav Kill, and we put up fierce resistent to the Zombie Threat, and surprisingly my corner sniping position held me long enough to be the last White Standing at the end of the game - and STILL they shot me as Game Over was called. Stupid Chav Cheating Zombie *^@£s. Its just a game you know. Ahem. Final game was ZULU - played against the Blues from Morgan Stanley. Storm the Hut, keep it from the opposing team and you win. We lost the first innings on a narrow margin, but we realised it was more to do with the fact that the opposite side had better ingress to the hut, and were more unified. We anhiliated them in the 2nd innings. Gregor and I pinned down two sniping positions and held ours very well, taking 3 kills of evil Credit Card pushing Bankers. Snyman and Brett did a South African Resistance operation and put up a wall of immense firepower that held their advancing scouts at bay. Waseem and Ari were firing away allowing for the storming Rodriguez, Mead and Tichborne to head into the house. The ever wise Mr Thornton took up a brave position and sent many a Banker packing to the Dead Zone before being merciliessly taken out with multiple shots in the back. In the end Greg and I were facing a 3 minute to end of game call and we were unsure if we had the house or not. He lay down cover as I did a kamikazee run towards the house. Got pinned down between two sets of well hidden *ankers, and only via some careful shooting from Waseem was I allowed a Ben Jonson like Sprint into the house only to be faced with 5 of the White Team positioned inside all training guns at my advancing figure.
I had it under good authority that if Mr Tichborne was not out of ammo I was a deadman regardless of my allegiances to the White team and not the *ankers.
To be totally fair, the Morgan Stanley team were a pleasure to play against, they were fair, honest, determined, well organised and very good humoured. We decided on both sides we had found the best opponents with which to end the day. Twas a well earned draw between the innings and both teams applauded eachother well. Good showmanship from the Blues and Whites. Shame they work for a bunch of *ankers.
In all, the Paintball Stag was a wonderful day. The Weather was great, the games fantastic, the opponents varied and fun (except the Zombie Chav *@$@s) and the team spirit very good indeed. As I expected, my various friends got on well, which says something about the 'Water finds its level' comment that I suspected operated within friend circles. All fantastic people, and great fun. We had a few pints at a pub, soaked up the last of the rays, and then headed off.
The W.London crew went to The Five Chillies in Sudbury for a fantastically hot curry, and then I came back and showed Mr Tichborne one of my fave films - Black Hawk Down.
We decided, paintballing was good, but we couldn't face the prospect of going to a real war with real bullets.
We will, however, return to paintballing later in the summer. Right now, I'm nursing some serious bruises and eagerly awaiting bedtime.
Thats wot I did this weekend :)
--
dp
I hurt today. And that was just the hot curry afterwards... :-)
I'm not sure about that film... it was a pretty powerful portrayal of how traumatic conflict is, but... only from the US "Band of Brothers" perspective. And at the end you're reminded that 17 US soldiers died (and they're all named) and... erm... 1000 Somalis.
Ridley Scott's a good director, it was a powerful film... but I felt a certain unease at bits of it.
Still, we had a great time and even though I had no clue as to what was going on (if getting shot by our own teammates is an indication), I'd love to do another session.