NXL FA...official anytime soon?

[MrDan]

'1. They can't stop cheating'
yes they can. but some people would rather put a lot of resources into getting fa approved. Also there were a hell of a lot of people getting pulled in Toulouse, but is the NXL millions of miles apart from the NPPL?

'2. Shooting fast is not a skill - or rather, not one an audience would care about.'
What audience would this be? personally i dont care about the invisible audiance.

'3. Tha viewing public, if it comes, is gonna want to see people getting annihilated - coming off that field dripping man, totally dripping.'
see point 2's answer.

 

[TJ Lambini]

1. No they can't - ask Lane. Ask manike. Ask anyone in the know. Odds are they missed the designer cheats and caught mostly unlucky people...

2. Fair point.

3. Fair point.

I agree with you re: invisible audience, but bear in mind NXL are still thinking TV...it may not be coming anytime soon, but the will is still there.

 

[Lucky.One]

The invisible audience is the only reason to allow full auto.

People watch cars and motorcycles to see wrecks. The only way I see paintball presented to any kind of following is if you can see the streams of paint and the 'wreck' of someone making a mistaking and turing yellow or orange (dripping).

Again, as an industry we have to decide what is important. Safety can be adjusted. But what do we want. I think everyone agrees we do not want half assed semi auto rules that are side stepped by electronic bounce and scratching our head at designer cheats.

Velocity is dangerous. There is an easy check for that. IF enough people wanted it there could be hand helds that can measure velocity in streams. IF an agreed cap was set, a hand held could measure that.

We could say 'sky is the limit' for bps. But we need to change the standards for safety gear.

The FA thing is stupid. It is dangerous, some one can lay a gun down and it can run away. FA means we are regressing to the point of stupidity.

Now the NXL can do what ever it wants but that means FA boards will be made, and they will spread. It creates a mess that everyone else will have to deal with. If they do this, they should be booed off the stage.

 

[Robbo]

Firstly, if you increase the rate of fire to full auto then you instantly close down the opportunities to move, we are already on the limit of rates of fires limiting aggressive play (Example : Huntington Beach).
If aggressive play (which is intrinsically more exciting to watch than just sitting back and lane shooting) is to be maintained then there has to be an increase in the number of bunkers.

Increase that and you automatically increase the likelihood of people being bunkered and when you now factor in these guns pointblank shooting on full auto, it don't take much of the grey ole matter to fire up to work out what's waiting round the corner.

What sickens me is the almost abject apathy when it comes to solving this problem, it's almost as if everybody (inc the industry) is saying, 'well it ain't been solved yet, so it ain't gonna be solved'.
That line of thinking is obviously self defeating.

There just hasn't been a concerted, serious attempt to thwart these cheats, we need to get serious.

I heard an argument today that because we can't catch all these cheatin bastids (in ref to the NPPL robot) that this inability should somehow open the floodgates to acceptance.
I believe this thinking is flawed in that if we can catch most of them, which I believe the robot can (and deter a lot more) then we should at least invest in this area rather than capitulate to the cheats.
The NPPL are now in a unique position here because they are fast entering a new era of tourney paintball where they can, not only dominate the tourney circuit but also control trends like this, and I mean control from the bottom up.
If they (NPPL) invest in a few more Robots and have them deployed on each of their fields with a judge who knows what he's doing and has the balls to do it, I think we can go a fair way in getting this sh!t out of our sport because make no bones about it, the use of these cheats is a cancer.
This is a bottom up approach because it hits the players on the circuit thus forcing the industry to take note.

Rather than trying to find justifications for what in essence is appeasement to the cheats, we should be working to make it as hard as possible for them to do their stuff...and if we catch them, ban them from the tourney, if we catch them twice, ban them for a year, if a third..well, we have all heard of the three strike rule !!!

As I have said before and I will say it again, why wait till some poor schmuck has both his eyes travelling outa his head at 300 fps just because we feel we can't deal with cheats professionally.

 

[Lucky.One]

Okay, Ill say it.

I could make something beat the robot. Pete, I understand where you are coming from, I agree, but I know some hard truths that make me think caps are the way to go. But FA isn't cool, even with a cap.

Ill rewrite the standard and present it and get I'll the equipment made so that it is affordable to fields (they are more important than events, but events set the trend see face mask) BUT as is well known PMI still makes FA piranhas. I made that frame, why? Cause everyone else forces me, it took a year of me working here before I succumbed and made the FA frame, I still hate it, but I need piranhas to sell so I can pay my bills.

bottom line it only takes one a-hole to set the bar and make gun/ board manufacturers do things they may not want to do. And the biggest problem is there are a lot of a-holes in pball.

 

[Robbo]

Originally posted by evil.one
Okay, Ill say it.

I could make something beat the robot. Pete, I understand where you are coming from, I agree, but I know some hard truths that make me think caps are the way to go. But FA isn't cool, even with a cap.

Ill rewrite the standard and present it and get I'll the equipment made so that it is affordable to fields (they are more important than events, but events set the trend see face mask) BUT as is well known PMI still makes FA piranhas. I made that frame, why? Cause everyone else forces me, it took a year of me working here before I succumbed and made the FA frame, I still hate it, but I need piranhas to sell so I can pay my bills.

bottom line it only takes one a-hole to set the bar and make gun/ board manufacturers do things they may not want to do. And the biggest problem is there are a lot of a-holes in pball.

Aaron, I am well aware there are ways round the robot but if the robot catches a significant amount of markers then I see its implementation as a step forward.

What sickens me is the NXL didn't even bother trying to solve the problem, they turned a blind eye and ultimately sanctioned it and the final irony may well be that the 'blind eye' may well return to haunt the NXL in its more literal form rather than metaphoric.

Aaron, you are a very talented engineer with more than a few grey cells lurkin in that Yank head of yours, is there any way you can see of designing a piece of kit that could catch the vast majority of these cheatin slags?

 

[Lucky.One]

Aw gee thanks Pete. Ya there are several things we can do. BUT I want to know, as a group, what truly are our desires.

What I know:
The consumers love fast guns, fast guns sell.
The guns are getting faster.
Multi-mode entry markers far out sell single modes. (even though they do not comply with current ASTM standards)
The semi only standard has more holes than swiss cheese.

What I think:
The cat is out and won't go back in the bag easily.
If one company changes on its own, it won't sell guns. Their kit will be slow.
"Cheating" is open to interpretation, see the semi standard.

A strong sanctioning body (see golf or nascar) could dictate a standard in event play. Any enforceable standard would SLOW guns down. i.e. True semi only, no queing, no anticipation etc. The governing body could dictate sealed manufacturers boards. A grey area standard is not enforceable, too much opinion. Any manufacturers board found not to be compliant would be banned for a year. BUT both major circuits are run by gun manufacturers. Not the ideal situation.

You are venting on NXL, I think the gun manufacturers are to blame. Sure we want to catch 'cheats' but boards are coming from the factory with wicked settings... until that is reigned in catching the few guys with custom cheats is pointless.

We have all competitors’ guns here. There are several that ramp shots and ramp velocity. We bought these straight out of the stores. Pete, you want me to design something to catch 'cheaters'. I have it, its called my finger and I can point it at practically all high-end markers and be 100% correct.

But again, that is my interpretation of a cheat. Theirs may be different.

 

[manike]

Originally posted by evil.one
Aw gee thanks Pete. Ya there are several things we can do. BUT I want to know, as a group, what truly are our desires.

What I know:
The consumers love fast guns, fast guns sell.
The guns are getting faster.
Multi-mode entry markers far out sell single modes. (even though they do not comply with current ASTM standards)
The semi only standard has more holes than swiss cheese.

What I think:
The cat is out and won't go back in the bag easily.
If one company changes on its own, it won't sell guns. Their kit will be slow.
"Cheating" is open to interpretation, see the semi standard.

A strong sanctioning body (see golf or nascar) could dictate a standard in event play. Any enforceable standard would SLOW guns down. i.e. True semi only, no queing, no anticipation etc. The governing body could dictate sealed manufacturers boards. A grey area standard is not enforceable, too much opinion. Any manufacturers board found not to be compliant would be banned for a year. BUT both major circuits are run by gun manufacturers. Not the ideal situation.

You are venting on NXL, I think the gun manufacturers are to blame. Sure we want to catch 'cheats' but boards are coming from the factory with wicked settings... until that is reigned in catching the few guys with custom cheats is pointless.

We have all competitors’ guns here. There are several that ramp shots and ramp velocity. We bought these straight out of the stores. Pete, you want me to design something to catch 'cheaters'. I have it, its called my finger and I can point it at practically all high-end markers and be 100% correct.

But again, that is my interpretation of a cheat. Theirs may be different.

Ditto.

Good post Aaron.

 

[Grendel-Khan]

Who really cares if the leagues go full auto? Who is really impressed with trigger speed other than the kids who fan their trigger because they want it to go fast? This is one of the least important skills and Anybody worth a damn is hitting 15+ bps without even trying, so setting a FA cap of 15 would be fair. Letting the players gun do the work of firing will allow the player to concentrate more on sick moves and strategic play. Besides the first gun I had was a Spyder that shot full-auto and I did every chance I got. So do a lot of new players to the sport as well as the goofy scenario clowns. Like A said, the consumers want guns that shoot fast, and if you can't walk the trigger fast enough let the gun do the work. The whole safety argument is a total crock. The only real reason for not wanting FA is the fear of change. So many teams and players are used to the way we play and are scared that if it changes they can't keep up. Sorry suckers. Evolve or die.

 

[H]

Originally posted by Grendel-Khan
The only real reason for not wanting FA is the fear of change. So many teams and players are used to the way we play and are scared that if it changes they can't keep up. Sorry suckers. Evolve or die.

Or maybe it's that we are scared that the European paintball circuit along with it's teams would be undermined as FA is not legal in so many counties outside the US..... Pay more attention.