A Wind of Change

[rancid]

no surrender

Tourney ball was a dream propogated by dreamers.

Wargames sells. Person 'a' might only come back three times, but there's 3 million person a's.

Tourney paintball and this ridiculous search for the TV grail was bound to end like this... implosion. Emperors new clothes and all that.

Thank god we have some business sense come back into the market before it all disappears up its own arse.

Tourney will always be top end.

But shooting the enemy is where the money and the future is.

 

[HPUKer]

Person 'a' might only come back three times, but there's 3 million person a's.

Converting some of these a's into the more profitable b's is where I see the future.

 

[rancid]

why would I want B, Hp?

Someone who has his own gun, thinks he owns the site, buys his own paint or pays less, argues with the marshal, shoots the **** out of my normal guys. Why on earth do i want him? He's the bleedin trouble with the (and I use it very loosely) 'sport'.

Nah, i dont want bs. I want more a's. And I want them to come with their dad's and their dad's fat friend and his kids, and their mates and some old bloke with a ponytail that they met at a party.

I do not want my time taken by loads of people paying less.

 

[HPUKer]

Id like to see lots of b's running around with my branded guns, shooting at my brand of trees, with my brand of paint, sure they are paying a bit less, but I can expand my site, and I can increase its capacity, to make sure that I cater for all the a's I had before, so no loss there, but i get this great addition of the b's coming along.

Now the c's, who shoot up refs, think they own the place, brings their own paint in, and take pleasure in shredding all my a's to pieces, can stick to their tournaments.

And when person b's mate comes over his place, or his kids mates, and see his paintball gun and go wow, i wanna have one, and go and pester their fat dads for one, I smile, as another one of my products is bought, another gun to shoot my paint through, another person to tell another person to play paintball at my sites.

 

[john251282]

The main challenge is converting a % of punters into a % of what i would describe as "recballers".

Absolutely, conversion is extremely difficult. And this is why the vast majority of site owners do not bother even trying.

If you look at how it is in germany, because of the laws they have out there that forbid military sim games, they only have tourny style paintball sites. This has lead to a clear route of progression and some good tourny teams coming out of there recently.

In the UK we have nothing like this because our recball scene is so huge. Meaning that a huge number of potentially good paintball players just do recball because they have no idea what "tourny ball" is. This emphasises how poor, in comparison, our process of progression within the UK is.

I would say it is similar to a sunday 5 a side football team, they play every now and then have fun against other people. Then a couple of the players get good and want to play at a higher level and then you tell them they actually have to play hockey. So the rules are different, kit is different etc but some of the basics are similar i.e. you are trying to put a ball in the oppositions goal.

A lot of business is based around branding. And the branding of "Paintball" is totally different in the UK as opposed to the other extreme of Germany.

This is why I am now of the opinion that the sports should be totally seperated. If we can come up with a totally different name for the type of paintball that most of the people on this forums do or are involved with (tournament style), we can then mould this into what ever we want. Then we can build on getting this route of progressing players from the ground level casual players that prefer the non camo version to the elite players of the future!

 

[HPUKer]

Absolutely...........the future!

Certainly, a beautiful idea, that is in the best interests of the tournament side, which I would support. The challenge is there, and something could be done like you say, i would love to see a seperation of the two extremes of how paintball is played, but its just the cost will be extreme, and until someone, or something emerges that will back it, then i think nothing much will change

Regard to the future of corporations however (perhaps i am talking on a shorter time scale, and only thinking inside the box ), corps all have one goal, and that is to keep their shareholders happy, and however much money the corp is generating is linked to this, if they want cash, at the moment, stay in the woods, cus the sunny air ball fields will burn them.

 

[rancid]

Hp, I'm still not with you... the future of paintball is for every site operator to develop their own gun? And have their own brand of paint?

Do you know the overwhelming majority of people who own a paintball gun in the US never go to a paintball site. Giving more people more guns means more renegade paintball.... the worst sort of paintball, even worse than tourny.

You know I'd rather rent a gun than sell it. I get more bucks for my bang that way.

In fact, I'd go so far as saying the rot set in in paintball on the day nelspot sold its first gun to the public. 'Paint' powers paintball not gun ownership, and 99% of paint is shot through rental guns.

Which way will paintball go in the future? It will go the same way it has since day one, except now you guys are starting to notice it.

Recball isnt flourishing, it's always flourished ... how's that for an answer Rambo? I mean Robbo.

 

[HPUKer]

Hp, I'm still not with you... the future of paintball is for every site operator to develop their own gun? And have their own brand of paint?

Its certainly not for every site in paintball to develop their own gun, of course that would be silly

Its for one corp to own all the sites, or at least a large dominant proportion of them, effectlively having an army of "clone" sites across the map, on such a scale that their own brand of gun and paint is justified, perhaps through a buyout of a gun manufacturer, and paint producer.

EDIT: Il just leave it at that and see what unfolds...

 

[Robbo]

Hp, I'm still not with you... the future of paintball is for every site operator to develop their own gun? And have their own brand of paint?

Do you know the overwhelming majority of people who own a paintball gun in the US never go to a paintball site. Giving more people more guns means more renegade paintball.... the worst sort of paintball, even worse than tourny.

You know I'd rather rent a gun than sell it. I get more bucks for my bang that way.

In fact, I'd go so far as saying the rot set in in paintball on the day nelspot sold its first gun to the public. 'Paint' powers paintball not gun ownership, and 99% of paint is shot through rental guns.

Which way will paintball go in the future? It will go the same way it has since day one, except now you guys are starting to notice it.

Recball isnt flourishing, it's always flourished ... how's that for an answer Rambo? I mean Robbo.

Hmmmmm, hate it as I do, I have to concede defeat on this point and admit I was caught up in the hype of it all during the last 5 years or so;it looks as though I was over-indulging myself in a severe bout of optimism whilst you were indulging us all in a reality check, we just didn't know it at the time, or more like, didn't wanna know it.

But I think we both agreed on my Emperor's new clothes parallel (even though you subsequently swiped it from me) with pro ball but all along you had tourney ball targeted with that particular fable.

I believed the product (XBall) could hack it on TV, though I did pass comment many times on the ability of those people running our sport to actually bring it to the table, you never believed this was the case and you have been proved right it seems but.......we gave you a pretty good run for your money ..... but where did that run get us?
Yeah, yeah, Yeah, I know, no frikkin where and in debt to the tune of lord knows what ....
Let's hope this new era of rationalisation is gonna help the sport overall and coincidentally, this is the subject of my next article, so what a timely reminder to go out and buy PGi next month..the ONLY magazine with intelligent comment from across the world of paintball; rec and tourney

 

[Lump]

I'm interested as to why you suggest that Lump?

ok from the line that i can see in the sand is this, the NPPL has always had dominant place on the circuit and i am very sure that that they will not want to jeopardise this in any way. i know the PSP is snapping at there heals. but the leaders NPPL will want to stay that way. so they must get there house in order and provide the best money can buy. so i see like i said earlier a 3 to 5 year plan for them. more regional events and more showcase events.

yet the sport my split in rec and tourney ? but this will not harm us in any way.the move towards TV at the moment who cares the industry needs to solidify and get it house in order like john said

Generally I see some of the recent takeovers as being good. With no disrespect meant to current or previous owners but some of the major companies in our sport have been run by paintballers rather than business men. They could have started as ballers and then shifted towards business men but they will not have as much experience as a dedicated business team. The other positive thing about this is that it means paintball is being recognised as a sport with potential to be very large and more importantly for the business people, a very profitable sport.

the sport must become a business first then i can have the strength to move and develop. there are already enough formats to leave that where it is. the strengh in a product is defined by in ability to produce a profit and when it does we can start to showcase our product as a true sport. as it is at the moment is a lot f people all pulling and pushing to gain the foot hold in the industry. this can be seen in the UK with the tourney scene. although it is still in its early stages you can see the difference start to appear. imagine in 5 years when Syd, Wendy and Russ have all refined there business ( not knocking you guys in any way ) and they lead in there catchment. now scale this up to the US you see the way it can grow and be unified

hope i have made myself clear but i see great things for us in the years to come and i think Pete also has seen this