Paintball Digest. Richard Sapp
ALIENS ATTACK EARTH!
Is it later than you think, fellow Earthlings? From the dark recesses of the universe, an alien army is poised and ready to make the human race an endangered species. They have descended like a plague of locusts to devour everything of value on a planetary scale: all natural resources, all foodstuffs and, finally, all life forms.
Human beings throughout the world are putting up a valiant resistance as they realize defeat means annihilation for the species. The infrastructures of governments and their armed forces, with the exception of rudimentary communication, have ceased to exist. Pockets of humanity are fighting with all the fury and tenacity of a last stand.
His Excellence, Emperor Zan, Supreme Commander of the Planet Nebula, has studied this inferior race and expects an easy victory. He has promised to wrap up his attack in only 24 earth hours! One of the last vestiges of resistance is in this secluded area of southern California. Surveying the rebels, His Excellence snidely commented, “These Americans, as they call themselves, don’t know when to give up to their superiors.”
Text taken from: Viper Paintball Production Role Playing Scenario Game Script Jungle Island Paintball , Lake Elsinore, California June 21-22, 2003
Lincoln Hawke, a former commando who, by sheer force of will, survived the initial attacks, has found himself as leader of what remains of the human race. He knows this is a fight for survival, but this is the kind of fight he now believes his forces can win. It is no longer a battle of the big guns; it has become mano-a-mano, man-to-alien. “Those swollen green brains of theirs look about as soft as the rest of their bodies,” Hawk confidently told his troops.
Watch for aliens! The portal to another universe is lighted at the lower right corner. A flare ignites the night sky over a scenario game in the U.S. Southwest. Looking directly at a flare can kill your night vision, but a flare can be extremely useful in re-orienting yourself and spotting the enemy in the dark.
The portal through which the aliens pass is lighted at night and leads to a new scenario dimension.
Players who raise their arms and markers during a game are hit and should not be shot at. Elimination in a scenario game usually lasts less than 30 minutes and can be a welcome break.
Join the force of your choice in the battle to end all battles. Who shall be the victors and what is the future of planet earth? It all comes down to one final weekend, June 21 and 22, in the hills of California.
PLAYING THE GAMES
Role-playing scenario games got their start in the late ‘80s (as did most of the rest of paintball) and as they have developed, they have become extremely popular, mostly because they are extremely fun. If you have never played in a scenario game, you haven’t experienced one of the most exciting things you can do in the outdoors.
Scenario games are fun because they stretch everything you normally do across a very large canvas. The difference in playing a 10-minute capture-the-flag game with a dozen buddies at your local hyperball field and a 24-hour assault on the king’s castle with 700 of your closest friends is practically indescribable. And there are several other aspects to scenario play that you won’t find at your average recreational game. These include the use of motorized tanks, mortars, bazookas, mines, night vision scopes, grenades, Ghillie suits, snipers, lasers, helicopters and special effects! The sky is the limit, but because of the suits and the charts and graphs running paintball insurance carriers, there are often very careful special rules about how, when and where such things as tanks, mortars and rockets can be employed.
Scenario games are often based on a story line, either historical or fictional. A historical story line, for example, could be a replay of the battle of Gettysburg in the U.S. War Between the States. A popular fictional storyline is the great castle assault that takes place in The Two Towers, book two in J.R.R. Tolkien’s epic trilogy Lord of the Rings, or even a situation from a comic magazine (and movies) like the X-Men. Sometimes, the scenario director develops an all-new storyline that gives players great freedom to assume special characters and develop roles. A game based on a Vietnam situation or a terrorist incident may even incorporate air assaults, helicopters, booby traps, snipers and spies.
Now, all this doesn’t come cheap, says New Jersey’s Steve Cranmer, a member of the team Joint Fury. For a good 24-hour game, you can expect to pay $50 or more to register, he says. Paint is almost always “Field Paint Only” and, yes, field hosts do overcharge for the paint, sometimes as much as $90 for a case.
Sure, this is a lot more expensive than you can buy it at a local paintball retailer or over the Internet, but a 24-hour scenario game that draws hundreds of players is very expensive to produce. The field will have added more referees than normal and they have to work around the clock under pressure to enforce safety rules and make decisions they don’t normally have to worry about.
The field owners will have to add extra portable toilets, food concessions, extra rental markers and air/CO2 fill stations. They will have to worry about zoning permits, noise ordinances, liability insurance, staff radios (dozens of replaceable batteries), game organizers, special game props, real medics on site and perhaps even off-duty police for traffic control. Then remember they need to make a profit, too, because without making a profit you won’t have a scenario game to play in next year. It’s the American way.
Allied armies storm ashore at Skirmish USA’s D-Day recreation and run for cover from the intense “German” fire, just like their parents from the “Greatest Generation.” Plenty of referees dot the playing fields to make sure that all players keep their goggles on and that no markers exceed the 280-fps limit in a scenario game of this size.
Nevertheless, whether you are a newbie or an experienced player, when you storm a Nazi bunker or are part of a gang holding up a train for the mine ’s payroll, you’ll never forget the experience. A scenario game can’t possibly be beat for getting you hooked on extending your paintball knowledge and experience.
Scenario games don’t last just 10 minutes. If you get involved in one of these, expect to spend your whole weekend hustling and shooting. Actually, games can last from six to 26 hours. The event typically begins with a party and early check-in on Friday. Actual play begins on noon Saturday and ends around noon Sunday. There are scheduled breaks for dinner and A FEW hours of sleep at night. You will be tired, dirty and happy.
If you can, you certainly want to arrive at the field early on Friday, because the usual pre-game player party on Friday night will be one of the event’s highlights. If the game organizers are at all on top of their game, they will make sure everyone has a chance to mix and meet each other, not just hang out in their own little groups. Anyway, you’ll make dozens of new friends and meet the organizers and the specialized role players. Unless you are shy, you’ll feel like you are a vital part of the event. Sometimes the party includes a barbecue, maybe a beer tent (if you are above the legal age) and possibly even a band.
After you register, you’ll probably be given a packet that identifies who you will be in the scenario and what you must do for your side. Certainly, this varies with the scenario producer and by game, but a packet contains something like this:
1. A laminated badge for you to wear around your neck to show you have registered. It assigns your player number and attests that you have chronographed properly.
2. A “character card” that assigns you to a squad and gives you a