Okay, on this whole reunification thing...

[Red Ring Inflictor]

Chi,

Some peeps just ain't gonna get it. You and I have been saying the same thing over and over about more playing time means more consumption of paintballs. You've done a better, more detailed job of it and even have dealt with the more real practice=more paintball consumption thingy. Then the minimum playing time comparisons have also been brought out. The minimum playing time for a 7-man tournament with eight preliminary games gives 24 minutes of playing time if the average game time is three minutes (I don't really know what a real mean average would be but I've reffed fields where the average game time was around 2.5 minutes). With PSP X Ball the minimum playing time is 36 x 2 = 72. So assuming that 7 players don't shoot more paint than 5 that still comes out to three times the amount of playing time which should obviously be more paintball consumption for X Ball BECAUSE THE TEAMS PLAY MORE.

With X Ball Lite no more paintballs than 7-man will be consumed because the minimum playing time for one team to reach five points would probably not be more than 10 minutes. Two games would give less minimum playing time than the average preliminary rounds of 7-man. If that's what teams want then that's what they could theoretically get.

Another interesting calculation (at least for me) is how much a team pays for each minute of play. Assuming the best scenario of 8 games times averaging 5 minutes each for NPPL at $2250 for a pro team, that comes out to 40 minutes of playing time for which a team pays $56.25 per minute. With the 3 minute average time used above that would come out to $93.75 per minute! For PSP Open X Ball the entry fee is maximum $2550 for a guaranteed minimum of 72 minutes per team which comes to $35.41 per minute. So which format is more expensive on a per minute basis?

So both sides of this argument are right. PSP X Ball is more expensive TOTALLY for teams to play (only because there is around three times as much minimum playing time and therewith paint consumption) but definitely less expensive per minute than NPPL 7-man. As Chicago has pointed out the playing time can be adjusted as in X Ball Lite.

As many players have said on the forums the past couple of years PSP X Ball is for the players who want to practice and play paintball more than just attend a good party. NPPL is great 7-man paintball well-presented and packaged with great extra-curricular activity but looks here to be a rip-off when it comes down to the business of just playing a lot of serious paintball. And X Ball simply looks better and is less boring from the outside.

 

[Chicago]

Originally posted by Nick Brockdorff
I think what he meants was, that instead of letting the game wind down to a boring close - and the flag being walked back.... the towel being thrown, amounts to more net game time in that particular match

I read that, and my brain just translates that into "7-man sucks"

Red Ring:

How about: "Do you want to SAY you're a paintball player, or do you want to BE a paintball player?"

Divisional XBall lets you pay a little more to get a lot more. As you said, you can just as easily pay the same as 7-man, get less than Divisional XBall, but still get more than 7-man.


Now, I will be the first to say that XBall probably is not the right "final" format. But it's a lot closer than 7-man.

 

[Chicago]

Originally posted by Robbo
it just seems ludicrous to me that such an in-depth debate seems to be going on about things that haven’t even been decided yet.

Seems to be perfectly natural to me, especially when you consider that the alternative would be getting real work done.

 

[Nick Brockdorff]

RRI:

I'm curious about one thing:

Why do you keep advocating X-Ball, when you know it cannot function at local level... and as such, local and international events will be playing different formats?

To me that is no better than the present situation, except for the top 150 teams in the world (if that).... and the promoters of the 10-15 biggest events and their vendors.

For the rest of the paintball world, it will mean the status quo is maintained - where there is no real affiliation with the higher echelons of the sport - who are for all intends and purposes playing a different game.

I think THIS is the time for paintball to fry bigger fish than just caring for the very narrow elite of the sport..... if we don't, it will be no more than 2-3 years, before another big division in the sport happens..... it would be unnatural if it did not.

Nick

 

[Chicago]

Why can't it work at the local level? XBall can work just fine at the local level, *IF* it is organized like any other sport. We had a full-fledged XBall league in my area two years ago.

The biggest obstacle is people expecting to win prizes every weekend they play, as tournament players have become spoiled, so it's tough to do XBall the way XBall really should be done - as a series of events. Play one or two teams a week for 4-6 weeks.

But, that assumes you agree that "everyone must play the same format", which I find to be rubbish. Who is "everyone"? Do we expect that someone watching paintball on TV is going to go to their local field, and play paintball the same way they saw it on TV? Of course not - hell, there are almost NO sports like that. If you want to play baseball, basketball, football, etc, the way it's played on TV, you need to play in high school or college or if you're lucky on a club team or bar league.

A point of XBall is, basically, 5-man with some extra strategy adn soem exotic scoring. It's not like 5-man, 7-man, etc, are much different in terms of skills - the same basic skills apply to them all.


Arguing that XBall is a bad format because not everyone can play it the same way the pros play it is like arguing blue is a bad color because it's not red. So what?

 

[Red Ring Inflictor]

Originally posted by Nick Brockdorff
Why do you keep advocating X-Ball, when you know it cannot function at local level... and as such, local and international events will be playing different formats?

I think that Chicago has answered this at least as well as I could. But you make me think about how most of us were exposed to paintball to begin with.

Internationally most people play PB for the first time at the recreational level with a group of merry-makers in the context of a birthday celebration, stag party, bachelorette party, company get-together or some similar occasion. There's usually a group of 10-12 people and they usually play Nick's favorite form of PB, simple elimination. This is usually played in the woods although more-and-more these days rec sites are getting air-ball fields and using those for rental groups.

So Nick has a point that at the grass roots most people play a game closer to single-goal formats, that single goal being to eliminate the opposite team or to hang a flag. I would venture to say, however, that that is still mostly done in the woods thereby making it a far cry from anything that resembles current tournament PB.

So there is going to be steps between introductory rec paintball and the showcase professional sport of NXL (or something like it). Just like there is a natural progression and difference between drive-way or neighborhood basketball and NBA or backyard casual soccer kicking and whatever the elite leagues of international soccer are.

In PB that progression could be: rec ball with elimination format in the woods that's somewhat loose and for fun with one or two "referees/instructors/hosts" > a local tournament with 5 or more players per side with flags and some referees > a regional tournament with 15-minute X Ball Lite with or without a simple scoreboard and with or without penalty boxes > double-period X Ball with scoreboard and penalty boxes and matches lasting 30+ minutes > elite media-focused NXL-type matches with the top teams and the best reffing and stadium-type surroundings.

Again, for the umptenth time, from the first tournament level games with standard 5-man up to NXL the game is NOT essentially different as far as the basic concept. That's why it hasn't been the slightest bit strange to see standard 5-man running concurrently, on the same fields, with X Ball at PSP events the past few years. Exaggerating the differences and getting hung up on them is splitting hairs IMO.

 

[Robbo]

Originally posted by Chicago
Seems to be perfectly natural to me, especially when you consider that the alternative would be getting real work done.

Chi Town, good point mate but it does suggest that an awful lot of quite intelligent paintballers have way too much time on their hands

 

[H]

Originally posted by Robbo
awful lot of quite intelligent paintballers have way too much time on their hands

It's far to early on a weekend for inteligent people to be posting...

I can't remeber where it was but TJ promised some news this week... as yet nothing? Or am I making the fatal mistake of believing TJ

 

[Robbo]

Originally posted by TheBroz
It's far to early on a weekend for inteligent people to be posting...

My post might tend to refute that.....

Originally posted by TheBroz
I can't remeber where it was but TJ promised some news this week... as yet nothing? Or am I making the fatal mistake of believing TJ

If TJ was referring to what might come out of the integration talks, I'm afraid the dust has to settle on another set of talks and all talk of integration has been put on hold for the time being so that respective parties can have a much needed breather..and believe me they need one.

 

[Red Ring Inflictor]

I'm just glad that they're still talking.