repiV
Tank
- Joined
- Sep 11, 2006
- Messages
- 4,283
- Reaction score
- 2
Anyone here play airsoft?
I had a passing interest in it years ago and bought an M16A2 and MP5A4 (Tokyo Marui for anyone that knows their airsoft) as it was looking like they were going to make the sale, import or manufacture of replica firearms illegal in the UK. As it happens, they did exactly that
- but you get an exemption if you play airsoft!
Recently for whatever reason I decided to bring my guns back from London where I had left them when I moved and rekindled my interest. So after spending an eye-watering amount of money this month on kit, I've been to a couple of game days so far. There's a surprising amount of places to play...it seems to have grown far more popular in the last several years. I'd say as a hobby rather than a birthday party activity it has a load more players than paintball now. There's three sites local to me, two of which are accessible by public transport and one via a 3.5 mile walk (now lift by new friends, fortunately).
The first place I played at was a CQB site and about half the people playing were Royal Marines. That ended up being quite painful. Got shot in the forehead three times at close range and once on the top of the head. Some interesting marks to show for it! One guy got his tooth shot out, which is why I wear a shemagh...
The other is a woodland site. It's mainly a paintball place split up into arenas but in the afternoon all the paintballers had gone home and they gave us the entire 120 acre site for an epic 3 hour game. Which started off very promisingly, as myself and my four new friends who I had met the previous week managed to make our way around stealthily and stalk a group of enemies for a while before taking them out before they even knew we were there.
It went downhill when we got spotted figuring out how to attack a fort soon after, and I got shot. I consequently spent the entire remaining two and a half hours of the game walking 200 paces up a very steep hill because I was dead, then walking back down it again to try and find anyone from my team, getting shot and walking 200 paces up the hill again. With the occasional 5 minute interval to observe groups of enemies, try and figure out how to get around them quietly...and then get shot. My arthritic ankle did not thank me for this one bit! Now I want some binoculars or a 4x scope because it was impossible to tell what team anyone was on at a distance.
It's a completely different game from paintball in a lot more ways than you might expect. In woodland it's a lot slower-paced and more strategic, since the weapons are generally full-auto and a lot more accurate to much higher ranges than paintball guns are you can't really get away with charging around. You also have to watch out for snipers (a decent airsoft sniper rifle with some money poured into it can be accurate up to about 250ft) and support weapons. Those things can lay down in excess of 25 rounds per second, they're quite awesome! There's also a lot to be said for being able to line up a target down the iron sights and squeeze off a 3-round burst.
It's pretty good exercise for endurance. The woodland day was pretty tiring. I'm glad to see some functional benefit from lifting weights actually, when I first bought that M16 it was quite heavy to hold but I managed to lug it around all day along with everything else. Definitely think I would have struggled majorly before.
In anticipation of this thread being useless without pics, here's some of my gear:
M16 (+ magazines)
MP5 (+ magazines...I need loads more magazines - shit gets expensive!)
British Army issue assault vest I picked up from the surplus store. £45 brand new, you can tell we're going through defence cuts. I also got some nearly-new camo jacket/trousers for dirt cheap.
Kneepads (glad I got those).
And so on.
So...as to the original topic. Does anyone play airsoft?
I had a passing interest in it years ago and bought an M16A2 and MP5A4 (Tokyo Marui for anyone that knows their airsoft) as it was looking like they were going to make the sale, import or manufacture of replica firearms illegal in the UK. As it happens, they did exactly that
- but you get an exemption if you play airsoft!Recently for whatever reason I decided to bring my guns back from London where I had left them when I moved and rekindled my interest. So after spending an eye-watering amount of money this month on kit, I've been to a couple of game days so far. There's a surprising amount of places to play...it seems to have grown far more popular in the last several years. I'd say as a hobby rather than a birthday party activity it has a load more players than paintball now. There's three sites local to me, two of which are accessible by public transport and one via a 3.5 mile walk (now lift by new friends, fortunately).
The first place I played at was a CQB site and about half the people playing were Royal Marines. That ended up being quite painful. Got shot in the forehead three times at close range and once on the top of the head. Some interesting marks to show for it! One guy got his tooth shot out, which is why I wear a shemagh...
The other is a woodland site. It's mainly a paintball place split up into arenas but in the afternoon all the paintballers had gone home and they gave us the entire 120 acre site for an epic 3 hour game. Which started off very promisingly, as myself and my four new friends who I had met the previous week managed to make our way around stealthily and stalk a group of enemies for a while before taking them out before they even knew we were there.
It went downhill when we got spotted figuring out how to attack a fort soon after, and I got shot. I consequently spent the entire remaining two and a half hours of the game walking 200 paces up a very steep hill because I was dead, then walking back down it again to try and find anyone from my team, getting shot and walking 200 paces up the hill again. With the occasional 5 minute interval to observe groups of enemies, try and figure out how to get around them quietly...and then get shot. My arthritic ankle did not thank me for this one bit! Now I want some binoculars or a 4x scope because it was impossible to tell what team anyone was on at a distance.
It's a completely different game from paintball in a lot more ways than you might expect. In woodland it's a lot slower-paced and more strategic, since the weapons are generally full-auto and a lot more accurate to much higher ranges than paintball guns are you can't really get away with charging around. You also have to watch out for snipers (a decent airsoft sniper rifle with some money poured into it can be accurate up to about 250ft) and support weapons. Those things can lay down in excess of 25 rounds per second, they're quite awesome! There's also a lot to be said for being able to line up a target down the iron sights and squeeze off a 3-round burst.
It's pretty good exercise for endurance. The woodland day was pretty tiring. I'm glad to see some functional benefit from lifting weights actually, when I first bought that M16 it was quite heavy to hold but I managed to lug it around all day along with everything else. Definitely think I would have struggled majorly before.
In anticipation of this thread being useless without pics, here's some of my gear:
M16 (+ magazines)
MP5 (+ magazines...I need loads more magazines - shit gets expensive!)
British Army issue assault vest I picked up from the surplus store. £45 brand new, you can tell we're going through defence cuts. I also got some nearly-new camo jacket/trousers for dirt cheap.
Kneepads (glad I got those).
And so on.
So...as to the original topic. Does anyone play airsoft?
