imagine if all this negativity killed off the introduction of air, and we were still stuck with co2.
I can see the comments.
The pressure's too high,
what happens if it explodes,
my ears might explode from the hissing,
the fill time is too long,
we'll have to change our bottles
Now i wonder did we make the right decision to change to air.
Tom, with all respect the analogy with HPA isn't the best, as its introduction didn't render everyone's existing investment in markers obsolete, it was simply a case of (for me) unbolting my 3.5oz expansion tank and replacing it with a HPA reg & bottom line, nothing else need to be changed. HPA also offered massive, clear-cut benefits to the majority; no more issues with liquid making your gun go hot, no more massive cloudburst in cold weather and it was significantly easier and faster to fill.
At the time some of those questions were asked - many people were concerned about the higher pressures involved. Hands-on experience alleviated many of those concerns - and the same may happen with .50 cal.
While no-one is being forced to move to 50 cal, if someone does want to take advantage of the slightly lower paint cost they are forced to either replace their current marker (or possibly pay for it to be modified), replace their existing barrels and replace their loader.
That's a significant capital outlay in order to use a ball which is almost as good as .68, but not better. Consequently many people are underwhelmed.
Efficiency and smaller size are great.....but in the time I've been playing I've never run out of air in game and I've never run out of paint - so efficiency and ball carrying are, for me at least, not an issue. Others may find more benefits here.
Cheaper paint is obviously desirable, - but if it doesn't perform quite as well as .68, why would I use it? An Ion is almost as good as an Ego/DM/Angel, but you don't see many serious tourny players opting to go for the 'nearly' option, they'd rather spend four times as much and be sure they're shooting the 'best'. If .50 cal were half the price of .68, it might tempt more people to compromise on performance, however a £5 saving a box just doesn't make it worthwhile in my opinion.
Less pain is a great idea for rental players & newbies - but as a tournament player which would you rather shoot, something that people can ignore and that is more likely to bounce due to the lower amount of energy - or something which lets people know they've been hit and is more likely to break? Personally I'd rather stick to my 'pain' balls.
A number of other people have already made the comment that the main benefits are for rental players and sites, not for tournament or serious rec players. I'd agree with that.
Obviously all of the above comes with the caveat that I've not seen or used any .50 cal products and is based purely on 2nd hand information supplied by others. I'd love to proven wrong, but most of the evidence available to date (and the laws of physics) point to the smaller, lighter .50 balls having less range, less chance of breaking and being more affected by wind. Even if the differences are small, it's not the panacea that GiMilSim have painted it to be.