Just a bit of info for everyone from down under...New Zealand's second Rotorua based tourney held on Queen's Birthday has finished. Following on the highly successful event last year and again held at the Rotorua International Stadium, this year had one Sup'Air field and a field of local construction fairly similar to Ultimate Air, with 20 seven-man teams in attendance, including two Australian teams.
A bit of pre-tourney controversy surrounded the decision by the organisers to change the tournament format to centre flag, contrary to NZPPA standard rules, contrary to expectations leading up to the event, and in the minds of some giving the Aussies an advantage since this is their standard format. At the end of the day you just have to get on with it.
To break things down:
The facilities: The Rotorua International Stadium is a first class venue. Teams have locker rooms with showers, the pitch is great, corporate viewing area with trade show and tech support from Mac Developments and sales from Paintball Supply NZ, food vendor, and two air fields. A Kiwi who attended Toulouse '00 said of Rotorua last year that the event was close on the heals of Toulouse as a quality event. And since this year was better, just imagine what that means...
The fields: The seven-man Sup'Air set up owned by Xtreme Events and was the set used last year, minus the big rocket and carwash, but with more Doritos. I personally liked the layout. The second field is owned by Tony Witherage of Christchurch and has been constructed by a company down there. They are basically like rubber rafts, and had shapes like cones, Doritos, long tubes about chest height and two big cubes, which comfortably hold four guys behind them. This was augmented with portable wooden barricades used by local team Tag 'N Release to fill in the gaps. The average height of the barricades was waist to chest height, and this promoted a lot of over the top play witch Aussie team Jetts used to good effect.
The refs: The event was reffed by the local Teams Tag 'N Release, Tag 'N Training and Tag 'N Boys with help from others such as Martin Dannefaerd, Wayne Hilliam, Vanessa Jackson and Ryan Pike. Some comments were heard about the refs not getting stuck into it enough and not being on top of things some times. As for me...The refs didn't get in my way and I didn't see any real major bad calls, so it was good enough for me.
The teams: This was New Zealand's largest event, with 20 teams attending. To put that into perspective, with roughly four million people in the country and to relate to the American population, that’s like having 1500 teams show up to a US event. Teams were placed in four pools of five, played four prelim games and based on their scores the top ten went through to the "Plate" (2nd) division or "Cup" (1st) division to play ten round robin games. The usual suspects from the New Zealand scene were on hand, and our guests included two Aussie teams, The Jetts who attended not only last year's event but the New Zealand Nationals last year as well, and Diabolique (Sorry if I've misspelled that guys).
The play: Definitely some of the best games I've ever watched. Things were a bit quiet in the prelims but towards the end of day two the games were really getting heated as the final result of the tourney rested on each game. The Katipo Jetts game was absolute poetry in motion in my opinion. The game went tag for tag, move for move, HUGE amounts of paint flying with some tight play and a bit of controversy just before the end with an eliminated player being reinserted to make it a one-on-one at the end, with Jetts pulling it off. Beautiful game to watch.
The final result: For those that are still reading what has turned into a small novel, Jetts came away the winners in Cup, beating my team Saints. We dropped two games we definitely should not have and watched the win slip away. Very disappointing. But well done to The Jetts. And the sad thing is I can't remember any of the other results. I'm sure Marty may fill in the blanks.
The player’s party: Bit of humour. Good for a laff and a natter.
Overall: Really, really had heaps of fun. Played the best tag I ever have. Second was very disappointing. At first it was kinda like "Okay. What ever". And now there is just a sour taste in my mouth. The best thing about the event is that even with New Zealand's small population and geographical isolation, we really can put on a world-class event. Thanks to Rotorua Paintball Club for holding the event, to the sponsors, and again to my wife for letting me live my dream.
A bit of pre-tourney controversy surrounded the decision by the organisers to change the tournament format to centre flag, contrary to NZPPA standard rules, contrary to expectations leading up to the event, and in the minds of some giving the Aussies an advantage since this is their standard format. At the end of the day you just have to get on with it.
To break things down:
The facilities: The Rotorua International Stadium is a first class venue. Teams have locker rooms with showers, the pitch is great, corporate viewing area with trade show and tech support from Mac Developments and sales from Paintball Supply NZ, food vendor, and two air fields. A Kiwi who attended Toulouse '00 said of Rotorua last year that the event was close on the heals of Toulouse as a quality event. And since this year was better, just imagine what that means...
The fields: The seven-man Sup'Air set up owned by Xtreme Events and was the set used last year, minus the big rocket and carwash, but with more Doritos. I personally liked the layout. The second field is owned by Tony Witherage of Christchurch and has been constructed by a company down there. They are basically like rubber rafts, and had shapes like cones, Doritos, long tubes about chest height and two big cubes, which comfortably hold four guys behind them. This was augmented with portable wooden barricades used by local team Tag 'N Release to fill in the gaps. The average height of the barricades was waist to chest height, and this promoted a lot of over the top play witch Aussie team Jetts used to good effect.
The refs: The event was reffed by the local Teams Tag 'N Release, Tag 'N Training and Tag 'N Boys with help from others such as Martin Dannefaerd, Wayne Hilliam, Vanessa Jackson and Ryan Pike. Some comments were heard about the refs not getting stuck into it enough and not being on top of things some times. As for me...The refs didn't get in my way and I didn't see any real major bad calls, so it was good enough for me.
The teams: This was New Zealand's largest event, with 20 teams attending. To put that into perspective, with roughly four million people in the country and to relate to the American population, that’s like having 1500 teams show up to a US event. Teams were placed in four pools of five, played four prelim games and based on their scores the top ten went through to the "Plate" (2nd) division or "Cup" (1st) division to play ten round robin games. The usual suspects from the New Zealand scene were on hand, and our guests included two Aussie teams, The Jetts who attended not only last year's event but the New Zealand Nationals last year as well, and Diabolique (Sorry if I've misspelled that guys).
The play: Definitely some of the best games I've ever watched. Things were a bit quiet in the prelims but towards the end of day two the games were really getting heated as the final result of the tourney rested on each game. The Katipo Jetts game was absolute poetry in motion in my opinion. The game went tag for tag, move for move, HUGE amounts of paint flying with some tight play and a bit of controversy just before the end with an eliminated player being reinserted to make it a one-on-one at the end, with Jetts pulling it off. Beautiful game to watch.
The final result: For those that are still reading what has turned into a small novel, Jetts came away the winners in Cup, beating my team Saints. We dropped two games we definitely should not have and watched the win slip away. Very disappointing. But well done to The Jetts. And the sad thing is I can't remember any of the other results. I'm sure Marty may fill in the blanks.
The player’s party: Bit of humour. Good for a laff and a natter.
Overall: Really, really had heaps of fun. Played the best tag I ever have. Second was very disappointing. At first it was kinda like "Okay. What ever". And now there is just a sour taste in my mouth. The best thing about the event is that even with New Zealand's small population and geographical isolation, we really can put on a world-class event. Thanks to Rotorua Paintball Club for holding the event, to the sponsors, and again to my wife for letting me live my dream.