Vote Here - The Choice is Yours !!!!!

[phil-boy]

I would like to vote for 2 but cant so voted for Formula 5.

When I first started out 20 odd years ago it was in the woods and was pretty good, I did leave paintball for a few years just when it went to the current Sup air tourney scene. I did enjoy this but did feel that playing for a couple of minutes per game was not very good value for money. Since then the redskins have moved to the Formula 5 format and I must say that I feel this is very good value for money and you get loads of trigger time.

I do however fancy going back in to the woods. Have played a couple of scenario games over the last year and I know its not the same but I think either a 7 or even a 10 man event back in the woods would be very good.

My two penneth anyway.

Phil

 

[Robbo]

I think we got some real good posts in terms of people explaining their reasons for selection; at least it allows us to see into what's really going on out there .... I look forward to reading some more ...

 

[Soul Doubt]

The problem for "the woods" for me is firstly on a personal level is I dont/cant take it seriously, not to say i dont have a laugh when I actually do play woodsball. Alot of players start there. Woodsball is good for new players, my original master/sensei told me that woodsball builds up your perception and field awareness. However the idea of "woodsball" does scream sport to me, its portrays itself of more of a hobby, camo'd up with a pretend AK47 doesnt appeal to alot of ballers including myself, the idea of sup'air, the glamour, style, the dedication etc etc and the distancing of itself from the military-esk wargames within the trees is what is appealing. So to sum up, Woodsball is fun, but Sup'air paintball is a hybrid that has now has its own identity and existance and to return their would do more harm than good for the growth of the sport.


P.s Camouflage totally clashes with my Lighting-Pink and Neon-Orange marker

 

[mertlesnertz]

Hmm
I dont see how you can say that a return to the woods would be more harm than good for the sport you only have to look back to see while woodsball was about paintball was booming and supair came in with everyone thinking it was good for tv so xball took over .
Whats happened now it has not grown at all and in fact its dying at this stage i would say it would be quite the opposite.

 

[bruce]

Just getting back into Paintballing again after a few years out, I voted for the 7man, the main reason it was some of the best days of my life playing paintball and i don't just mean on Supair, 7 man in the woods was also great.

I feel that we have be come a little sterile in the game, the whole set up from top to bottom is sterile the fields are all the same, they are released weeks before the event and teams can play on them or train on them what happened to turning up at the site walking the fields as a team, watching other teams do the same, formulating a plan as a team, then watching the first game and realising you may have to adjust but not just one field but four or five this to me took some of the requirement from woodlands ball into arena ball it was all part of the skill of the team. I have been lucky i fell to have played in the woods at some of the greatest sites and tournaments, Holmbush mayhem masters, campaign cup (just wood land and a mixture of the two), NPF when it was running ,5man, 6man and 7man and then Hyperball, and even the earlier days of supair where great, but some how we seem to have come off the track and taken an easy option, playing 7man in open leagues (even 5man) it was the chance of being drawn against the better, higher profile teams that made it worth attending, travelling halfway across the country to play an event.

Paintball is quite possibly not a sport it is at best a competitive hobby, there are very few if any teams and players in the Uk and possibly Europe who can say they make a living or any money from Playing the game (not running but actually playing). Don't get me wrong its the competitive side I enjoy (it what's brought me back) but it has been touched upon earlier that the atmosphere at events is just not the same as it once was, and apparently the attendances and number of teams is a lot less and until we find the underlying reason why the scene is only going one way.

The question is how is this arrested before it is too late, Formula 5 is an interesting concept and they may be on to something, and if im honest as much as i enjoyed 7man the organising required to get 7 players to site was a nightmare at times so 5man is possibly the future but its the format that needs to be worked upon to
1) make it completive to the teams 2) make it affordable to the teams to play as well as the organisers to run 3)make it fun and value for money

i have no idea on the costs for this race to 2 or 4 format but i assume this is a xball style set up and how it compares against traditional 5man (i would be interested on players views on this format how it works etc. as it seem quite popular now and just getting back into it have yet to play and taste it)
and please, please, please can we get rid of the side line coaching and return it back to a team game

Bruce

 

[Robbo]

Bruce, there are no teams in the UK or Europe who have real pro players; in fact, none of them earn money of any sort .. maybe the Dynasty guys in the US earn some money but that's about it I'm afraid and I doubt even those guys ain't gonna be giving up work ... that sort of money just ain't in paintball any more especially tournament paintball.
Go back 5 years or so and there was money around but even then, there were no real pro players in Europe whereby that was their sole source of income .. at best, it was just free paintball, that's all it's ever really been over here I'm afraid.

 

[SabreWolf]

I would love to see the return of woodland tourny ball, there is plenty of people like myself that yern for a return, there are plenty of people i know who just wont play paintball anymore who used to play at the highest level back when the woods had a decent scene, because they see supair as too repetative and not much return for your money regarding time shooting your marker, i.e. less than 10 seconds on average per round, if your lucky enough to stay in on the break and the fields... well if you have seen one you have pretty much seen them all to be honest.

Im sure there will be alot of people who will shoot me down for my views on supair but thats my opinion, i ref air ball which i enjoy but to play it, well if thats all there is to then i will have to but, i would preffer to have the choice.

I was talking to a few friends the other day and they were talking about playing soft air because there is nothing for them to play any more, these are people that were awesome players in their playing days and i say were because they no longer play because they dont want to play sup air ball and for them to say, they may be going to play air soft instead because, the only choice you have to play competative ball is on a sup air ball field, thats a pretty strong statement about our game if you ask me.

 

[Return of the Silver Fox]

The problem is that we have tried to adapt the sport for television and forgotten why it was popular in the first place. I think anybody who has been involved in the sport for a while will recognise that this is not going to happen in any significant way. Perhaps its time to face this reality and focus on what will make the sport grow - player enjoyment.
I've played all formats here, other than formula 5, and I think each have their own positives but x-ball lacks a basic fundemental in that the coach can compensate for a lack of skill in players and also negate the ability of the opposing team to bust the killer moves that made the game exciting in the first place.
The other formats rely more on teamwork and great communication and subsequently teams build a stronger relationship and loyalty to each other.
The other aspect is that x-ball excludes players mixing as much. When you were stood waiting for your games in the past you had all levels of teams rubbing shoulders with each other. It allowed novice players to speak to top level players and allowed teams at the top to showcase their products. It was more of a community and that helped keep the numbers involved in the sport.

 

[Donk]

I guess the problem with releasing field layouts before the day is it creates a massive financial divide between those who are not loaded & those with deep pockets. You need to be a team of pretty talented individuals working like a well oiled machine to turn up to an event with no plan & win vs the team that had the cash to train the field before the event. Walking the fields (in the PA days) was a team effort & definitely made the event a weekend affair with the planning over dinner & inevitable beers sat night then looking blankly at the captain on Sunday when you are cross questioned on who is going where...

7 man was the bee's knees, smaller fields & faster guns made it swing to 5 man to speed up the amount of games in a day (IMHO anyway) It is no secret I think F5 is the solution to cost vs game time & I would like to see this the way forward for all UK ball. The statistics are are great idea & the more players that get involved the more chance we have of getting more series in different locations throughout the UK to squish the long haul travelling. Then maybe a champions league style cup for the higher & lower ranked teams with maybe a BIG shield with a few smaller bits on it to be engraved to show who dominated UK ball each year?

Hey I can dream...

 

[Ainsley]

This is a real tricky question Pete.......one without a strictly correct answer.

The problem is, the higher up the ladder your team wants to progress, the more it costs in our current structure. We're debating whether to run Xball race 4 next season, however, we'd have to amalgamate 2 of our squads and therefore cut the amount of games per player in order for the average guy on the team to be able to afford the format. We do like the "thrill" of xball, and the ability to turn things around (our first team currently play race 2). We're not a fan of the coaching aspect of the game though, it takes away the flare of those people who have that "awareness" built into them.

When we played 7man, although we really enjoyed the format as a one off at the end of last season, we found that we used more paint than we do playing race 2 now........it's all about sitting on your lanes etc etc and the games take a long time to play out. With this in mind, and most players being cost conscientious, I don't think that I could vote for it either. Not only that, it means that new teams have to try and gather at least 7 bodies per event rather than 5 (which is hard enough in itself). This might sound a minor point, but we need to attract and absorb new teams as easily and effortlessly as possible, so keeping the head count down on teams seems like a sensible way to go.

I think one needs to look at whether value for money is classed as trigger time, or what the total comes to at the end of the day........I know that all of my junior players have jobs to fund their paintball, and work every spare minute outside of their studies to be able to play and train 2/3 times a month. Next year, some of them will be wanting to make the jump to the first team, but they simply would not be able to afford race 4 if we ran with a small squad, so where do they go then? I don't think they see value as how long they've spent on the field. To them, the day as a whole is what things are about, and the games are just an aspect of that.

There needs to be progression, without a doubt, otherwise what are we aiming for? Personally, the way I see it is that people want to constantly set and achieve goals, and whilst I understand the "fun" of open divisions, it also takes away any kind of professionalism we may just hold.....to me, that is surely a regression. That's another reason why I think fields should be released weeks before and not just on the day. My team (and especially my junior team) get a real kick out of training the field, working out their plays and trying to find things we haven't spotted. They bring more money to the game by training most weekends at NPC, and without that commitment, I think they'd drift away and treat paintball less seriously in all honesty. It's the hours they put into training that add meaning to their tournament days and keeps them wanting "more" if you like.

I can't comment on F5, as I've not yet tried the format. My only concern looking at it from an outsiders perspective is that the teams who shoot more paint have the upper hand, locking down the lanes to the buzzer, and it goes back to what you consider value for money to be; trigger time or the grand total. I can see that if offers a central focal point to the game though, and certainly not writing it off......I'm just ill equipped to comment on a format I haven't yet played

Over the past 2 years we competed in the UWL format at NPF, alongside Ledz and about 6/7 other teams. Cracking days, but they weren't without their flaws. The squads were 11, which was probably the biggest factor in the low team turn out. As I mentioned with 7 man, it's hard enough to get 5 guys, never mind 7 or even 11. Games were also 30 minutes long, which resulted in some heavy paint use. I know Ledz's lot shot about 16/17 cases and we shot a couple more on top of that. Not a cheap day when added to entry fees.

Anyway, back to the question. Just reading back on what I've written here, I don't think I can vote with confidence on any of the options presented. I can't write off Xball, but I think that ramping needs to go to bring back some trigger skill into the equation, they need slightly bigger fields to allow for more movement, and bunkers to allow for "more mature" (myself included) players.

One of the main problems as I see it is the cost to level of play ratio in our game. In other sports, the higher you climb the cheaper things get, which is seemingly impossible with our game, which creates a real chicken/egg scenario with the fundamentals we have already instilled. I don't have the answers here, I'm just trying to make sense of it all, and reason why I can't honestly choose one of the options. Maybe it's just time for the blue pill......