Obviously there has been a lot of feedback from the event. Main sources are:
http://www.talkpaintball.com/showthread.php?t=20031
http://www.talkpaintball.com/showthread.php?t=20007
http://www.p8ntballer-forums.com/vb/showthread.php?t=106331&page=4
http://www.ukscenario.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=4&t=5076
It’s fair to say that we’ve never seen such polarised opinions covering the same event and reading the feedback from different forums it is sometimes hard to believe that they refer to the same event.
However, there are several consistent complaints that come across loud and clear from across all the forums.
Toilets
It’s absolutely true to say that by the Sunday – many of the toilets were completely disgusting. There were seven on site this year (one more than last year) but that number was evidently not sufficient. Nearly double the number of people arrived on the Saturday this year compared to last year – it was unexpected and we did not have adequate toilet facilities for the massive increase in Saturday visitors.
With the benefit of hindsight, no less than 10 would have been ordered with one kept specifically for women. There is no getting away from the fact that the toilets were grim and we take the criticism for that on the chin and apologise to our customers.
Air
Air for this event was promised and charged at 4.5k and all 4.5k bottles were to be inspected. That did not happen – which is not acceptable.
The reason for charging was clearly made in advance of the event – it was not a revenue stream for us.
Customers were not given the service they were promised and paid for. The checking of bottles fell well below what we would deem an acceptable level. We will point no fingers – as event organisers the buck stops firmly with us.
203 players paid £2 for a service they did not receive. It is not possible to refund the players directly – however, we intend to add the £406 paid for air to the £500 we raised for the Help for Hero’s Charity and will round it up to £1,000.
Marshalls
20 marshalls were in the field as were both Lee & Tim – making 22. There are claims of only 13 marshalls – that simply isn’t the case and I have the sign-in sheet to prove it.
A total of 26 marshalls did not turn up at the event. 4 of these gave 24 hours notice and 22 just simply did not turn up.
Whilst we always assumed there would be a drop out and made contingencies for that (with the high number taken on in the first place) it was obviously massively disrupting to have so many no-shows. The entire marshall plan had to be re-worked shortly before the event started. Whilst the difference in the numbers of marshalls between this year and last year wasn’t huge – the experience and site knowledge was, and this was evident in the field. We appreciate the efforts of those marshalls who did work the game under fairly difficult circumstances.
The complaints regarding the marshalling are fair and certainly the result of the enormous drop-out rate and disruption immediately before game on – again, it’s something that we take full responsibility for ourselves.
Player numbers
506 Tickets were sold for the event.
491 played on the day.
The difference between the two sides was 39 players. This was well within the tolerance levels and both sides can be considered even.
People have claimed that the Blue side had 80+ more players – this simply isn’t true.
It has also been claimed that the sides were so uneven that the Blue’s run out of T-shirts. The last players registering for the Blue side were not issued with a T-shirt because an entire box of Blue T-shirts were stolen from the office on the Saturday night after the party.
Bias
A lot has been said about our alleged ‘bias’ in favour of the Blue team based on the assumption that there were more scenario players in the blue team and therefore we rigged the entire event to ensure they won.
Some facts:
It doesn’t matter to either Shoreline Paintball nor Lee and Tim as individuals who won the game. All 500 players were customers of ours. To suggest that we would rig an entire event for our friends to brag about it stretches credibility.
The largest faction was the Klingons numbering over 100 players and led by a friend of ours Duncan Martin. The Klingons were RED and 95% were scenario players.
A second faction on the RED side were the Gould led by another friend of ours from the Convicts Scenario Paintball Team – a team that Shoreline Paintball sponsor.
Any bias in favour of the Blue team would have been against the largest scenario faction led by a friend of ours and also a second faction led by a scenario team we sponsor. Accusations of bias are nonsense.
The scenario was completely balanced. Fact. The only people in possession of all the timings and game schedule were ourselves. Nobody else had all of the information and were therefore not in any position to call the game schedule biased.
The game schedule is available for anyone who feels it important for them to scrutinise – email either lee or tim @shorelinepaintball.com and we’ll send it to you.
Not only was the game schedule balanced – but for the first time the field layout itself was also more or less even. Both sides had the same locations for their faction battles and Envoy missions. Both sides had an easily defendable base and both sides had their Crystals or Block located equidistant from their safe area.
From game on until the final battle –the game was almost perfectly symmetrical in terms of the game schedule, props, points scoring times, battlefields and objectives. To claim otherwise just isn’t truthful and flies in the face of the facts.
The final battle centred around the Transporter Deck – made specifically to replace the Staargate location of previous years which was manifestly unfair to one side.
The Deck was located as evenly as practical between the two safe areas. Claims that it was 10 feet from one safe area are ridiculous. Claims that the only entrance was located facing the Blue safe area are also not true. The entrance opened down field – facing neither safe area. However, the design did mean that the Red side had to pass down 3.5 metres of one of the walls before using the entrance referred to as the ‘rape zone’ in a graphic made by someone. In hindsight, the entrance should have been 1.5 metres to the left and in the middle of the wall – but this is really marginal stuff and it made little impact on the game.
The fact that during the last hour and a half the base changed hands six times (fact – both Tim & Lee were permanently stationed inside the Deck during this period) would indicate that both sides were able to take the base and the entrance location had little meaningful impact.
Claims of marshall bias, wiping, overshooting, uneven fields etc come from both sides at all games. Whilst more marshalls would have helped – players themselves are responsible for how they behave on the field and a cheat is a cheat, no matter who is promoting the event.
Our last word on the accusations of bias is to say that the facts above should put an end to much of the rumour being bandied about. If we wanted to slap our mates on the back – then we could think or easier and cheaper ways of doing it than organising a 500 player paintball game and deliberately rigging it. The fact that one of our own sponsored teams and the largest ‘scenario’ faction was actually on the losing side have all been conveniently forgotten.
Firing into the safe zone
Is never acceptable.
Has to be said that it has happened at in all previous years and to a much much greater degree. Because the game was so much more even this year it was significantly reduced – on the two occasions we became aware it was happened our marshalls intervened and cleared it up within a couple of minutes. On both occasions, the players didn’t seem to be completely aware of there they were on the field in relation to the safe area and moved off as soon as asked.
Pyro
To be honest – you either enjoy pyro or you don’t.
The location of the pyro effects wasn’t ideal – but was the best solution with the space we had.
Would we put so much pyro into a big game again? – No.
We tried something new – many players didn’t enjoy it. Lesson learned.
Safe Area provision
The far safe area is less comfortable than the near one. No side has won from the far safe area for many years. Most of the criticism of last years event came from the players located at the far safe area and the same is true of this year.
Greater provision was made at the far safe area this year than in previous years. The number of temporary covers was doubled and we heard no complaints about inadequate staging at any point during the weekend.
Saturday night
The same fire show and some music as normal – however the vandalism that took place was disgusting. The two teams responsible for the damage have held up their hands and offered to put it right and we’d expect no less.
On two further occasions we intervened to stop people smashing up other areas of the safe area. If we knew the names of the people we’d post them here as this sort of behaviour has no place in paintball and those responsible should be ashamed of themselves. We were tenants on the site for the weekend and felt responsible for those idiots who don’t know how to behave.
Broadly speaking a decent night with the exception of some towards the end.
Conclusion:
Staargate 2008 had slightly more players this year than in previous years. We used previous years infrastructure as a guide for this years event with some things kept at last years levels and some things increased. In hindsight, we would obviously do many things differently and we feel the comments surrounding the toilets, air and marshalls are fair – we have no problem with that and agree with much of what has been said.
However, much of the stuff that has been thrown around as fact over the past couple of days is complete rubbish and much of the argument has seemed to have had an underlying sup’air v scenario feeling to it – hence the enormous difference in feedback between different forums.
We always knew that taking on a flagship event like the UK’s second largest game means you put your head above the parapet and Shoreline were the third organisers in as many years. Mistakes were made in three key areas and we’ve held our hands up to that, explained why they happened and what we plan to do about them. We’ve not pointed the finger at anyone else and have taken those complaints on the chin.
We have no issues with being judged on the event itself – but the event seems to have descended into a Sup’air v Scenario bun fight with some ugly comments on the forums. To see comments from some players bragging about shooting marshalls just sickens us to the bones.
After last year an almost identical bun fight broke out over the same forums, the same accusations and nonsense spouted resulting in a change of event organisers.
If the event does go ahead next year, then there will be yet another change in organisers. We thank everyone who came this year and enjoyed themselves and we are sorry to hear that some of our customers were not satisfied.
We’ve no doubt that this post will be picked over and will spark more debate. Anyone is welcome to email us, PM us or if necessary ask around for our numbers and give us a call if they wish to discuss the event itself – we’ll duck nothing!
However, we don’t see much value in engaging in debates surrounding rigging, bias, nepotism or who stole who’s dinner money. Those arguments go on for ever often obscure any valid points being made.
Tim & Lee
Shoreline Paintball
