Steve
Originally posted by Nick Brockdorff
I am sure you are right Steve.
At the risk of sounding arrogant, yes I am.
Originally posted by Nick Brockdorff
But my point is that most of the paintball community had a very unclear idea of what bounce really was -
That's why all tournaments worth their salt have something called a captains' meeting and we were very explicit about what we were looking for and how we would test for it. Perhaps more captains ought to attend the meetings.
Originally posted by Nick Brockdorff
most of the players were apparently in breach of the new rules
NEW RULES? Those rules have been in effect since the inception of the original NPPL and since the beginning of the Millennium Series, namely, semiauto only. A gun that substantially produces more than one shot for every trigger activation (that is double-discharges more than once every five or six shots as we said in the meetings) or bursts is not semiauto and is unsafe.
Originally posted by Nick Brockdorff
in Toulouse, I'd wager that by far most of them had no idea - and were shooting standard guns in standard setup, without any intent whatsoever to "cheat".
This goes back to the team captains' responsibility to attend the captains' meetings and their responsibility to comply with the rules which were further clarified in the meetings. The problem was that many wanted to keep their markers too close to the edge of excessive bouncing and thereby often went over the line of legality.
Originally posted by Nick Brockdorff
I am aware that intent is not everything.... but when you introduce a new rule, that both refs and players (and not least manufacturers) have to get used to, it is a good idea to allow for a grace period.
What a joke! Any team should have been aware that we had clearly drawn a line against the exploding illegal gun problem at Maxs Masters and Camp Masters. It's hard to imagine what things would have been like if we hadn't taken a tough stance because, despite our efforts, there were plenty of machine guns we couldn't catch.
Originally posted by Nick Brockdorff
Banning a player from a whole event, because he is shooting a standard gun in a standar setup is a bit harsh.
You're kidding? A standard gun setup is one that complies with the decade-old rules and isn't excessively bouncy or uses cheating modes.
Originally posted by Nick Brockdorff
Let's let everyone get accustomed to the new rules, and understand them completely, before we go shooting sparrows with cannon
I appreciate you sticking up for your refs, but I hope you can agree that of all the people "caught" in Toulouse, probably a very small percentage had any idea they were using illegal equipment?
Again, that was THEIR responsibility. If you push the envelope too far you're going to get busted when the authorities decide to enforce the rules, which we CLEARLY announced and showed we would, and it was about time we got the problem of illegal equipment under control. As an analogy, I'm used to driving about 20 kph over the limit on occasion in Sweden because almost everyone else does. When I got a 2000 NOK fine for driving 84 in a 70 zone in Norway of course I was pissed and I still feel the fine was overkill. But can I reasonably argue with them about it?
The promoter and I knew that enforcement of the gun rules was going to cause some hardship on the ones who didn't take their responsibilities seriously enough and the promoter was totally behind our efforts well before the tournament.
We were able to catch and penalize excessive bounciness and by the end of the season we learned how to catch more and more of the guns with electronic cheats. But the bounce-test will always be open to accusations of subjectivity and most of the electronic cheats will go unpunished---as long as we have an unenforceable rule. And that must end.
