Issue 15 - Nov 2012

ACTION

THE Airsoft Magazine

AIRSOFT ACTION

WEEKENDER

SPECIAL OPERATION: GREENBACK WWII MEETS

SCI-FI

WIN

VFC/UMA REX HK417D WORTH

NOVEMBER 2012

EVENT REVIEW ELITE EXTRAVAGANZA PISTOLS We've got reports from eight events – where were you?

Baz C gets hands-on with some stunning airsoft pistols

DEFENCE PHOTOGRAPHY

Who's taking the incredible photos on the frontline?

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NOVEMBER 2012 - £4.25

£450!

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CONTENTS AIRSOFT ACTION – NOVEMBER 2012

6 9 Editor: Nigel Streeter Assistant editor: Anthony Platt Graphic Design: Steve Dawson Art director: Chris Sweeney Ad design: Anna Makwana Advertising: Toni Cole Operations director: James Folkard Assistant publisher: Ruth Burgess Publisher: Wesley Stanton

Full UK 12-issue subscription rate: £59.40 For overseas prices visit: www.airsoftactionmagazine.com Cover photograph: H Photography Tel: 07979 912146 W: www.hphotography.me.uk Blaze Publishing, Lawrence House, Morrell Street Leamington Spa.Warwickshire. CV32 5SZ Tel: 01926 339808 Fax: 01926 470400 E: info@blazepublishing.co.uk

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READERS’ GALLERY YOUR CHANCE TO GET YOUR FACE IN THE MAGAZINE AIRSOFT NEWS SILVERBACK BIZON, DRAGON’S LAIR AIRSOFT AND NEW ICS PROMOTION – AND MORE! REVIEW: ELITE PISTOLS BAZ COLLINS INTRODUCES THE ELITE SHOOTING CENTRE EVENT: STIRLING AIRSOFT DAN MILLS SWAPPED RIFLE FOR CAMERA TO REPORT FROM OPERATION HURRICANE AIRSOFT ABROAD ANDREW BAGG HIGHLIGHTS AIRSOFT IN NEW ENGLAND COMPETITION ONE VFC/UMAREX HK417D UP FOR GRABS THIS ISSUE! COLD WAR WARRIORS THIS MONTH GADGE HARVEY RECREATES A LOAD-OUT OF THE SOVIET VDV

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W: www.blazepublishing.co.uk © Blaze Publishing Limited, 2012 Distribution: Distributed to the newstrade by Comag Magazine Marketing, West Drayton, Middlesex UB7 7QE T: 01895 433 800

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REVIEW: G&P M870 SCOTT ALLAN JUMPS ON G&P’S REWORKED M870 GENERATION GAME KARL ASTON ON AIRSOFT AS FAMILY TIME DRAGON’S LAIR H4H GAME NIGE WENT ALONG TO DRAGON’S LAIR’S CHARITY GAME IN AID OF H4H DEBATE: CODSOFT GARETH HARVEY PONDERS THE IDEA OF CODSOFT SOCOM TACTICAL OSCAR PLUMMER CHECKED OUT SOCOM TACTICAL’S BRAND NEW RETAIL SHOP GRANGE BIRTHDAY BASH GUNMAN AIRSOFT MIDLANDS CELEBRATES ITS FIFTH BIRTHDAY IN STLYE DEFENCE PHOTOGRAPHERS LA(PHOT) IGGY ROBERTS ON THE ROLE OF MILITARY PHOTOGRAPHERS NATIONAL AIRSOFT EVENT INSPECTOR DUVAL REPORTS FROM THE UK’S BIGGEST GAME

Copyright © Blaze Publishing Limited 2012. All rights are reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise without the express permission of the publishers in writing. The opinions of the writers do not necessarily reflect those of the publishers. The editor reserves the right to edit submissions prior to print.

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KIT TEST: 5.11 RUSH WE’VE BEEN USING 5.11’S RUSH 12 BACKPACK – HERE’S THE LOWDOWN OPERATION: GREENBACK GARETH HARVEY REPORTS FROM GUNMAN MIDLANDS’ WWII(ISH) WEEKENDER MONEY MATTERS WHAT’S WITH THE AIRSOFT OBSESSION WITH TINKERING? SNIPER INSTRUCTOR THIS MONTH DAN MILLS TALKS ABOUT THE SNIPER INSTRUCTOR’S COURSE REVIEW: FCS ACADEMY WE’VE BEEN EXCITED ABOUT FCS’ NEW CQB VENUE SPEC OPS AIRSOFT: BADLANDS TOLD YOU WE HAD A FEW EVENT REPORTS THIS MONTH...

VEHICLE CHECKPOINTS BILLY BASICS BRINGS REALWORLD SKILLS TO AIRSOFT YOUNG GUN KIT CHOICES MIKE BUTTRICK FINDS OUT WHICH EQUIPMENT SUITS YOUNGER PLAYERS MEDIA REVIEW ALEX WHARTON GETS STUCK INTO THE PLANETSIDE 2 BETA SITE DIRECTORY FIND SOMEWHERE TO BE NEXT WEEKEND...

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guess that’s summer over and done with for another year. Although not much was happening on the new gun front there were loads of events around the country – so this issue we’ve got after-action reports from some of the best, along with one or two surprises.

In my editor’s letter last month I mentioned that I have been trying to find out what effect, if any, the VCR Act has had on the number of offences committed using an airsoft weapon. I also mentioned that I had not received any information from the Freedom of Information requests I had made to various Police Forces. Well now I have – all one of them – so a big thanks to Essex Police.

I won’t bore you with the minutiae but this is what it boils down to.

Since the introduction of the VCRA to present day there have been 359 offences recorded involving imitation firearms in Essex. Of those, just one was recorded as being an ‘imitation – soft airweapon’ and was described as ‘a replica M9 imitation firearm’.

This does not necessarily mean that was the only offence committed with an airsoft gun, as there were 287 offences committed using an ‘imitation – ball bearing gun’, which might (or might not) be an airsoft weapon, as there are plenty of other types that fit this description.

Bottom line? Huge grey area, so no further forwards I’m afraid!

I would love to believe that there was only one offence using an airsoft weapon committed in Essex over the course of five years but, sadly, I very much doubt that was the case.

All we can collectively do is make sure we keep getting our message out there: that airsoft is played by responsible people, not gun-toting lunatics screaming round the streets frightening old ladies and robbing banks (pity there isn’t a law to stop the banks robbing us)!

Until next time – play well, play safe, play fair!

See you out there.

Nige

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Letter, idea or question?

Got something to say? A question for our experts? Or an article, or article idea? Drop us a line and let us know. Either email the assistant editor (anthonyp@blazepublishing. co.uk), send us a letter at the Blaze Publishing address on the previous page – or talk to us on Twitter or Facebook.

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READERS’ GALLERY Send your pics into anthonyp@blazepublishing.co.uk and see yourself in the mag – the more the merrier!

Mark Warrier at Urban 6, Staffs

all we know!

Sent in by Michael Wilkes – that’s

Johnny Eaves’ team at the NAE – complete with Alien sentry guns!

John Cass’ first time at UCAP Green Ops

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AIRSOFT | NEWS

AIRSOFT NEWS DRAGON’S LAIR CONVERTS The UK’s longest established independent paintball site has seen the light. After 28 years Dragon’s Lair (as featured on page 40 of this month’s issue) has decided to stop holding paintball events to focus exclusively on airsoft.

The site is situated at Kelvedon Hatch in Essex, right alongside The Secret Nuclear Bunker and has been the location of some truly epic games and tournaments but, as the popularity of paintball continues to decline owners and operators Ray and Jean

Cain have made the decision to put those 28 years behind them and concentrate solely on airsoft.

Speaking exclusively to Airsoft Action, Ray said: “Paintball has been my life for nearly 30 years. It has been very good to me but, in all honesty, I’d been considering the future of Dragon’s Lair for some time although I didn’t want to just walk away from it.

“I have known Nige for longer than I care to remember and when he took me down

to Ground Zero’s National Event last year I was completely blown away. I simply didn’t realise just how good the game could be and on the journey home made the decision to switch Dragon’s Lair to airsoft.

“A year (and a lot of hard work on the site) later and I know it was absolutely the right decision.”

For more information about Dragon’s Lair check the article on page 40, or contact Ray and Jean: 01708 764036 / 07703 530189, www.dragonslairairsoft.co.uk.

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ICS UPGRADE LANDMARC PROMOTION VICTORY Airsoft manufacturer ICS has launched a new ‘first come, first served’ promotion offering upgrade parts free with its M4 series of rifles. These give new buyers a free kit of parts to immediately upgrade their rifle on purchase.

The ICS M4A1, CXP.08 and M4 RIS Crane Stock are eligible for upgrade kits A-E – including the ‘Unleash Fury’ upgrade kit containing steel gear set, high-torque piston set, CXP tactical sling ring and ‘special upgrade gearbox package D’.

The Sportline versions of each of the above rifles are eligible for upgrade package F, containing: tappet plate, hop bucking, second gen metal spring guide, POM piston set, piston head and 7mm metal bushings.

Official ICS distributors in the UK are Firesupport and Elite Airsoft; at the time of print neither has confirmed how many of the various upgrade kits will be available. ICS has stated this is a ‘first come first served’ promotion with limited kits available, so be sure to get in early so you don’t miss out.

Queries can be emailed to ics@icsbb.com.

In other ICS news, the company has confirmed its longawaited M1 Garand is currently being field tested “and shouldn’t be too far from production.” ICS’ G33 should also begin shipping to distributors by the time this magazine hits the shelves.

ICS: www.icsbb.com

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Airsoft Action is the first airsoft magazine to be granted official permission

by Landmarc to photograph airsoft events held at Copehill Down Village MOD training area at Salisbury Plain. Fortunately the licence has come through in time to cover Tier 1 Military Simulation’s October event Operation: White Knight.

Operation: White Knight, 12-14 October, will be the first airsoft event held at Copehill Down to be covered journalistically by a consumer magazine.

While it has involved a few months of discussions and more than one headache, obtaining the licence means we will be able to provide good quality coverage of events held there in future.

Operation: White Knight is

a 36-hour combat operation which sees special forces units clash with Afghan insurgents and a small band of Al-Qaeda terrorists. As with all Tier 1 MilSim events players will be expected to supply and carry everything they will need for the weekend (Saturday morning through Sunday lunchtime).

The cost to play for the weekend is currently discounted and just £75 (those willing to pitch in afterwards to help clear up can knock a further £10 off their ticket fee). To read the event background or book a place visit Tier 1’s website – www.tier1militarysimulation. com.

For more information contact: ed@ tier1militarysimulation.com, 07967 225739.

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AIRSOFT | NEWS

SILVERBACK BIZON DISTRIBUTOR APPOINTED Just Cause Airsoft has been appointed UK distributor for Silverback Airsoft’s PP-19 Bizon. The first shipment should be in the UK by the time this issue has been printed.

Silverback states that the PP-19 Bizon is a full steel AEG and 100 per cent original in design (rather than a clone of an existing replica).

Just Cause Airsoft has confirmed that the retail price of the PP-19 Bizon will be £350. A package deal including a total of five magazines will be offered at £430. In the future the company plans to sell pre-upgraded ‘high cycle’ style set ups.

Guns headed for the UK will have a muzzle energy of 1.1J

out the box. Less powerful versions are designated for Italy and France, and a more powerful version initially designated for Canada may follow.

It features a V3 gearbox with 7mm bearings. Each weapon has an individual serial number. The magazine supplied is a 160-round mid-cap.

Just Cause has already taken a good number of pre-orders for the PP-19 Bizon. Watch out for a full review in Airsoft Action in the very near future.

Just Cause Airsoft: www.justcauseairsoft.co.uk, 07901 648952, sales@justcauseairsoft.co.uk.

NIGHT VISION INCOMING Body Armour & Tactical now stocks a complete range of night vision (NV) products.

With everything from Gen1 rifle scopes up to Gen3 goggles, and a host of digital NV devices, Body Armour & Tactical has a dedicated range of NV products at every price point.

While use of NV is limited in airsoft – it is mainly used in bigger MilSim events – we have seen more and more NV devices in play in the last 12 months. In layman’s terms, the higher the ‘Generation’ of a device the better the clarity of the images it gives. Digital devices use different technology, but are often comparable to Gen1+ or Gen2 devices.

Body Armour & Tactical’s offerings begin with the Pulsar Recon 325 Digital Monocular, which will set you back £340. A Cobra Optics Gen1 weapon scope costs £450, while a top-of-the-range Gen3 set of goggles costs nearly £8,000.

Body Armour & Tactical: 01223 502133, www.bodyarmourtactical.co.uk.

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THE PISTOL Baz Collins checks out some incredible custom Tokyo Marui pistols built by Mike Cripps of the Elite Shooting Centre

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ost airsofters will end up getting a pistol. It’s just the natural order of things: get a primary, must have a secondary! After a while, though, stock guns just don’t cut it and you might want something a little better. This is where Mike Cripps and Elite Shooting Centre come in.

I first contacted Mike around three years ago, to buy a simple Tokyo Marui Hi-Capa.

After a year or so I sent it back and got some upgrade work done to it, which is the best thing I have spent money on in airsoft to date.

The pistol is still with me, all this time later.

It was clear Mike knew his stuff, and with this article coming up I got speaking to him and was amazed at his background. Mike started shooting at the age of four as he was

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brought up on army camps and such, and has been shooting competitively for around 40 years. He has shot all over the world and was even a member of the UK national squad in World Shoot X. After the pistol ban in 1997 Mike gave up, until a conversation in 2002 led him to airsoft.

He has been hooked ever since. Mike quit his job and started Elite Shooting Centre, which specialises in pistols, equipment and upgrades. Mike has entered most practical airsoft pistol competitions – winning the UK PP Open five times between 2003 and 2009!

So obviously the guy is mega-qualified – but what are his custom pistols like? Well, I asked Mike to send me down a couple of his finest examples to try out.

The pistols Upon opening the package I was greeted with a Tokyo Marui Hi-Capa and a Tokyo Marui Night Warrior. I must point out that Mike only really works with TM pistols as they are the most reliable and there’s a wide range of readily-available parts for them.

I opened the Night Warrior first, expecting some souped-up MEU, but instead found a gorgeous full metal Kimber – probably the best pistol I have ever seen (though I am a sucker for 1911 pistols). It weighed a ton, featured genuine markings and was upgraded to the max; what more could you ask for?

It’s made up of a full Hurricane kit with alloy frame and slide, steel outer barrel and magwell, uprated recoil spring, Nineball

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THE ARMOURY | ELITE PISTOLS

“The Perses also performed way beyond expectations, reaching targets further than any stock pistol could – but again you pay for this quality and ability”

6.03mm tightbore barrel and a Nineball hop rubber. All said this will set you back £365 delivered, but for the cash you get an absolute monster of a pistol. I took this out on the range and was hitting man-sized targets at 40m. with 80 per cent of shots on target.

Now for a pistol that is simply unreal – I have never shot anything like this, it just reeks of quality.

After getting to know the Kimber I opened the Hi-Capa, and saw one of Elite Shooting Centre’s own creations – the Elite Perses.

Again this was sheer quality, weighed what a pistol should and looked top-notch. This isn’t a kit set-up like the Kimber but is made from parts of several different brands. The grip is made by Tanio Koba and has a very

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THE ARMOURY | ELITE PISTOLS

cool tactical look and feel; the alloy slide is

by Guarder and has ST markings; and again this has steel barrel, magwell and a Nineball tightbore and hop rubber. The magazine has been fitted with Nineball gas routers, only available for the TM Hi-Capa and Sig 226 (a real pity as they are incredible for getting the most out of your gas).

The Perses also performed way beyond expectations, reaching targets further than any stock pistol could – but again you pay for this quality and ability. The Perses is around the same price as the Kimber.

Of the two the Kimber is my definite favourite, but I am very partial to that gun.

That doesn’t detract from the Perses, which is clearly a fantastic gun. They may seem expensive but the pictures speak for themselves. These are the PTW of pistols!

If anyone is interested in something of this calibre but unsure of parts, model or cost give

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Mike a shout – he is one of the most down to earth guys around and really is a master in his field. Now, it’s time to go and sell my other pistol and get that Kimber! Any takers?

ELITE SHOOTING CENTRE Mike Cripps, one of the UK’s most accomplished shooters, runs the Elite Shooting Centre which exclusively sells Tokyo Marui gas blowback pistols including his own custom work.

The two pistols featured here The Elite Shooting Centre does not sell any products online; you will need to call Mike, who will work with you to meet your requirements.

PRICE: Both featured pistols cost £365 CONTACT: 07816 992417, www.eliteshootingcentre.co.uk

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OPERATION: Old memories resurface as Dan Mills reports on the latest instalment of Stirling Airsoft’s rolling scenario

its “The patrol took h e remainder ile th (lots of them) wh lick to d n u o r g k c a b e th scattered itself into , they were shooting yes d n A . s d n u o w ir the server! b o n a s a w I – o at me to os?” n r u jo e k li ’t n id d Perhaps they 016

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MILSIM | STIRLING AIRSOFT

HURRICANE

current mpo found on operational te as all about w is weekend operations. Th g series of llin continuous ro MilSim and a n warfare. er od more like m events, much reford itself on its He Stirling prides cAleese M hn eat man Jo links and the gr ion course ct le se the group’s himself set up potential in 2003, which weekend back became ey th pass before recruits had to ll this rs. In a nutshe badged membe night with ay id g on the Fr involved startin navigation, t gh ni g, survival, physical trainin your training to test battle PT, team training, c ifi ec , mission sp s fieldcraft skills t over 17 mile a point-to-poin RTI – oh, and ountains! of the Black M eekends n a series of w ra p The grou e to the on m running fro with a theme s been ha io nt scenar other. The curre out a mirror g tin ac rning and twisting and tu erefore since 2005 – th of current ops ledge and ow e kn a ov ffa’s Dyke I dr attendees had O lar of gu s re ow ad In the sh ral years.

Zone ing back seve elf ed at the Safe experience go talking to mys ing was hill until I arriv st up re o there I was, te und in was g Something I fo id directed and through diggin eekend w r park at the gr is t. ca th at while halfway r patrol fo smiling M y that the Opfor elcomed by a stage two in m softers. air h lis immediately w a fire trench to to Po prised fully of ent. cars continued m t w at co e M on as to w ph bs d e te th hen As I chat gether from clu o back garden, w been drawn to from afar. I als tting d rs je ha te as oo ey w sh Th he ng e h gi lling m e Polis , arrive, brin It was Nige, te after joining th Matt and Dave y all over the UK h nicer than m ho, along with w uc n m ese Poles Be re Th et he m e. ew lin off som UK group on p. rs wouldn’t ou I te if Gr of t g rs of Ai kin rs as ents Ai d ion an runs Stirling ed different ev overcast posit the CP I saw a in ed and attend in to er tra ov er , ov m et hi m ed r the fo alk at a task As we w ce touch th red mind covering I thought it a ni ing two armou ly. lay lar sp gu di re p rent t-u ffe . nice little se speaking a di d/Iraq Herefordshire would only be ng Airsoft, Northern Irelan y irli m St em fro at en s t ly. at cle se M hi ith Snatch ve was realism immen It would be w e I was in one , adding to the a balaclava! tim ue t ed ng las ne to e I’d Th if . at d ered dere operations own rticipants gath he said. I won any of them bl ck At 09:30 all pa , having had m loading my tru f od el n by Ben, go ys ve t gi m no f d ie r un br I fo for the safety S store I was hoping fo M q.

CP e Ira CQ th a in e to to tim ed ount up in my Laid enario, the area with what am d driving plained the sc ous this time! an , ex nu th re ho st on w m re ss a le he r s fo something a unds areas (w deploying on op Pinzgauer and , the out of bo epest a ed de as us in w ir be e k La es s ac th st Pilgrim up beside opped didn’t want a myself to the ople lived and ey had been dr try. th pe un e al co lik re ll g hi on in ire ly ok rdsh cted WMIK, lo ng itself darkest Herefo nt door unexpe dered what This was setti outside their fro the hills I won Afghans BRF. its for to m in lim fro e s in ov fp dr e I th As nd. overcast ay morning!), ke nd en ee Su be w a d ce ha e ni It a me. up to be l e zero toleranc lay in store for ised to rrent operationa eapon type, th cu w om e pr ch th d ea e ha the m ne of ve meo Ben ga all the details hat I all week but so activity and w pectations and eekend’s nt w ex e ce it’ th re ‘h t g ou rin ab du sun scenario y or deliver some ring the next da Matt on the exercise. as dy spoken to pect to see du ea ex d alr ul I’d co s. on gs to hit me w itie ng hi activ yt an ap m or a s of the first thin rt op so ne sh O to no e ed er re l w ra ag e had so. Ther be volved – seve phone and he d water was to e of the area in an when he said siz t od e bu fo th – o, ail m its em by with site so am and directions a farmer’s land the individual. destruct in kilometres of ail would selfd and carried by em lie ocks spread d pp dd an su e pa 01 d on 20 an ph the outbuildings set up back in r some fun us as fo rio w in t va of as rs w blic I Ai ew Stirling stic streams and pu 60 seconds I kn create the reali er. There were to ov ed all nd te in and was times!

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roads to navig ate, hills and va lleys to climb up and go thro Nothing. The ugh, plenty of enemy had el ba rbed wire uded us, fences to rip yo nowhere to be ur combats on and were follo se en. …

Ju st wed up to thei like old times, I th r fallback C/S 24 had sp ought to mysel po sition. An old ed along the lan f! stonehouse w e carrying The Poles wer a contingent of ould e briefed and be hoodies from come the first sent off to up North battleground of their start poin somewhere. Th ts while the fri the w eekend. ey arrived in a endly forces white pickprepped for th up to cut off th eir early patro e As the enemy retreating enem ls. The Polish patrol comman had captured y, but found nothing. a team membe der led his way in front on These boys w r fro m St irli the heels of th er ng while out drivi e bo un cin lar g, ger than life an os ng back in June e hiding he was caught fa d disappointed and primarily ir and square by FF had to clear by the disgraceful co the valley of an a squirt of nd rounds from th uct of the Pole y enemy s. As soon e tail-end Char activity and ho as they realise lie pefully pick up .

Ni ce on d e. there was to be the poor POW along th no action they went back e way.

The Poles had to chatting them certainly been selves to The setup, as death! saving I saw it, was th their energy fo at the r the encounte enemy would r as they Su start at one en bsequent patro so on outflanked the d of the valley ls and ground infiltrating back patrol on two holding tasks were or down towards sides and chased th dered to flush th e FF em from the ar , ou w ho t the enemy would largely fro ea. Not only m carry out mob w he re ve th r at th , they followed ey were hiding ile ops with patrols deploy . up aggressivel At 18:30 an at ed on foot fro y which caught out the tack is launche m th e ot he chatting lads. r side. d on Aubrey’s – bu t no one is ho Th e first counters me.

The start time trike came whi A half hour lat was set for 11 le the callsign was cr er we attack Fi :0 0, w ossing a river hi ch rs – no one came and wen at obstacle. ho me here either t with a light sp Pe rfe ct… Some ov ! Where were lattering of rain. C/S 22 er, some uphi they?

There was on set off uphill af ll and some on the en ly one place th te r sig ht ey in emy bank! Th g the enemy forc co ul d be no w ey were , the final build es – first stop fo un d because they ing left on the Target HB. I tagged onto th area of were still chat operations: Up e rear of the pa ting away like mice per Blean. trol and soon and the patrol found myself Th took hits (lots recounting tra e ea st er ly of ap th pr em), while the ining days gone oach was take by and making remainder scat n by 22 while 24 wen mental notes tered itself into the t in excitedly fro of points to background to m work on for th th e w es t.

Sm lick their ok e debrief such e was seen ris w ou nd as spacing, ing from the tre s. And yes, th hand signals, ey were shoo es.

At last, someb arcs, observat ting at me too – I was ody was hom ion and radio e! just an observ W procedure. hile FF had tactically pa er! Perhaps they didn’t like trolled endlessly journos? up and The lead scou downhill, thro t seemed the ugh stream an The surroundi most d ng hills and de fi switched on an el d, the enemy had st ad ground d guided the pa were used to ayed put for th trol right on gr e ea m target; the com t effect by the ain pa rt an d…

Opfor mander briefe barbecued ch and patrol head icken! d his troops s seemed to po and then led a They were no p out downhill assa ev er t fo yw ul und wanting th t. ‘Great!’ I here in the hu thought, expe ough; nt for the ‘frie as soon as they cting to hear th ndlies’.

They certainly caught wind of e sounds of showed a keen battle erupt fro th e patrols approaching th ness for the m all sides. fight now they ey were hotfo ’d decided to oting it after them – 24 had show up! been seen on It was getting overwatch dark and the ag gressive patrolling and counterattack pushed the

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MILSIM | STIRLING AIRSOFT FF back down the valley for a regroup and rethink of how to tackle the pr ob lem. The head shed de cided to use on e item that they knew the enemy did no t possess – night vision.

STIRLING AIRSOFT

Time was set aside for planni ng and eating; the atta ck would go in at 23:00, straight back do wn the centre of the valley in force to give them what fo r.

At the due ho ur the patrols lined up ready for actio n, vehicles wer e primed to be called in as back up sh ou ld they be required, mag s were charge d, final briefs given, and we launched tow ards the target .

Contact front!

The enemy ha d their own id eas clearly.

The forward ca llsigns were bu m ped at the crossroads; th ough the enem y ca me off worse, throug h sheer weigh t of nu mbers they had certa inly upset the plan. The use of night viz was great on route but the Poles had brou ght along a m uc h cheaper version – shar k’s eye torche s!

The attack was called off afte r killing three and all pa trols were brie fe d and sent off on tasks. Th ere would be ha ra ss ing patrols at vario us times throug h the night Main house go leading to a re ! In the troops -run of the nigh went t at qu ta ick ck ly securing the by force, this tim building; no sh e at first light. ots fi re d.

What? Not ag When all patro ain? ls had been sa fe ly Th settled ey were all ca back in camp ught asleep in admin was th their e order of the beds – two in day until the ne a little tent ou xt prep for battl t front and e 14 pe , rio in cluding the co d. I quickly got my mmander, insid bivi bag out an e. The d crashed in probing attack a heap by the s all night had side of the road the effect Mat an an d t d w Be aited n wanted. Very for reveille at 05 tired, the Pole :00. s ha dr d un k some slivo, I was awaken had a fry-up an ed by the bust d gone to le of bed in the early soldiers getting hours. Not tw ready to deploy o hours later St an irli d ng qu ickly came knockin stowed my kit g and captured away and stea the died myself lot. Result! for the battle I was about to observe.

It w as quickly esta The troops wer blished that th e set out in fo e POW and two rmation and at the give guards were m n hour set off issing and at a af fa te st r a pace fruitless search towards the ta it was decided rget. We pass ed by the to interrogate the crossroads, th enemy comm is time devoid ander ‘Red’. of en em Re d ie gave nothing s, and quickly m away at all and, arched into th e morning mist sticking to the .

At set points ju rules of having st short of the to release any captured stone buildings loom after 30 minut ing out from th es , the Stirling e trees head shed had the various ba to watch them ttle groups pe fi le out eled off into grinning, know planned attack ing they would ing formations so on regen . Standing in a nearby bu out against th ilding and hast e brown and gr ily se t about to een backdrop counterattack were the white . and red stripes of Poland Endex at 11:0 hanging from 0 was fast appr a large tree at oaching the front gate an d, wanting to se .

Go! Go! Go! t them up in a strong position for th In went the as e next instalm saulting forces en t in the , a silent scenario, Stirli approach. The ng sent out figh outer perimet ting patrols er w to as se cu re breached, no as much prop shooting. The erty as possib outbuildings le.

Initial probes le were breached d to attack afte – nothing, unle r attack on ss Ta yo rg u et co UB unt the bloated de , each one repe ad sheep. lled by an ever smaller perim eter of men no t yet shot or

Stirling Airsoft runs a range of MilSim events and training days. The next event – Operation: Inceptor – takes place at Catterick on 13 October 2012.

CONTACT: 07831 429407, www.stirlingairsoft.com

medic’d back in. At this stag e someone caught a fleetin g sighting of th e prisoner, way up on the hills held by hi s two guards.

It was far too late to despat ch a patrol to capture them and Stirling ha d other problems close r to home anyw ay.

Wave after w ave came upon the new defenders of UB . Even the mor tar and heavy weapons mounted on th e vehicles could not hold back the attack ing Poles, spirited by som e success. Th e final whistle was blown with casualties mou nted on both sides. Th e remainder w ould have to settle to live to fight another da y.

All in all I thorou ghly enjoyed m y first time out with Stirling Airsoft (and the sun did make an appearance eventually).

Anyone thinkin g of giving it a go should look on their w ebsite and arra nge a visit.

Take it from m e, you will not regret it.

Remember th ough: joining th is group and being ‘bad ged’ takes mor e than the average – so co me prepared!

The cost of a weekend in He refordshire (Friday to Sund ay) is £60. Stirli ng also operates on th e big sites (whi ch cost more rent), mainly ho lding MilSim or training days, but it’s w orth the outlay as many of them are big m ilitary sites.

Okay, that’s en ough from me.

I am off to sandbag my sle eping bay!

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AIRSOFT ABROAD

NEW ENGLAND

AIRSOFT Andrew Bagg gives us an insight into what a typical weekend of airsofting is like in New England, on the other side of the pond

O

ver here in the US airsoft isn’t as popular or mainstream as it seems to be in the UK. Our small airsoft community of New England still manages to get by though.

In the US airsoft is legal in the vast majority of cities and towns, but there are some states and cities with different restrictions laws. In a future issue we’ll cover it in detail as part of our Airsoft Abroad series, but for now here’s an inside look into what a small, perhaps even ‘elite’ force of airsoft players can do.

Game on Friday: My squad and I are gathering our gear together for a privately-held 24 hour game. Guns and gear loaded up, we travel west a short distance before leaving the car and moving down a trail toward the

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Connecticut River. Arriving at the riverbank I make a call to the ‘enemy’, who is in position approximately a mile upriver. Our five-man squad doesn’t know where the opposing team is starting, what guns or gear they have, or how many participants for that matter. The only thing certain is uncertainty!

We start moving up river with a single scout up front and two teams of two following at 15m intervals. After cautiously moving forward for an hour we had our first sign of the enemy. The sun was setting behind us and a glint of light caught the eye of the scout. When he signalled with a hand motion we split to the left into the woods.

I swapped my Masada for my L96 and crouched down low. A good look at the glint 100m ahead showed it was a wireless infrared camera. We carefully flanked the camera, making sure no enemy were

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INTERNATIONAL AIRSOFT | NEW ENGLAND

“A glint of light caught the scout’s eye. It was a wireless infrared camera which we carefully flanked.

It was a good trick – if not for the sun giving away its location”

Pic caption if needed

watching us. It was a good trick – if not for the sun giving away its location.

I sent my team back downriver 100m, lightly tapped the camera so it fell over and then hastily took up a sniper position 40m away. Several minutes went by and, sure enough, a team of two enemy players arrived to investigate. As soon as one knelt down to fix the camera I squeezed off a single round to his chest, sending him back to base to respawn. The other grabbed his radio as he ran back for cover and I knew a firefight was fast approaching.

Leaving my position I regrouped with my team and we set up a small ‘killing ground’ between the river and a steep embankment.

As we knew nothing about the opposing force we decided to play it safe and hold our position. Still holding my L96 and with my scout sniper wielding a Dragunov rifle, we kept our eyes peeled, scanning the trees for movement. After a bit of quiet I sent a two-man team leapfrog-style up towards the enemy. Once they got well ahead they radioed in and the rest of our team moved up.

I pulled out my phone and checked Google Earth to devise a plan. Just beyond the trees was a 60m expanse of sand (no cover, just sand); myself and the other sniper donned our ghillie suits and set up near the edge of the sand. Through my scope I saw four

WHERE IN THE WORLD? New England is the northeastern corner of the United States. It consists of the states Connecticut, Maine, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Rhode Island and Vermont (everything east of New York state). It is bordered on the north by Canada and on the south and east by the Atlantic Ocean.

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INTERNATIONAL AIRSOFT | NEW ENGLAND

enemy posted up on guard detail… Now what?

The sun was setting behind the trees and within half an hour we would be in total blackness. Staying hidden and keeping an eye on the opposing force we grabbed a quick bite to eat and rehydrated. Now it was properly dark. The other sniper and I removed our gear and handed it to the rest of the team – it was time for us to get wet!

Our teammates held their position as we took to the water. About 5m out we were up to our necks so, with rifles held over our heads we slowly waded upriver, passing the opposition by about 50m before heading back to shore. In knee-deep water we took aim; we needed to take out four people with two shots each, and fast!

My sniper quietly said “Three… two… one,” and we squeezed our triggers together before rapidly reloading and firing again.

Success! They never expected that. With four (silent) dead men returning to base we radioed our team to move up. That’s how you get people across open ground without being detected!

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As we regrouped we could see the opposing team’s camp fire flickering just beyond a camo net. Now we knew where they were located we moved away from the water and set up our camp spot. We do not attack each other’s campsite as it is a Safe Zone, so after our camp was set up I went on a recon mission with a digital camera to gather intel on the enemy.

I crept to a spot on a hill above their position, pointed the camera and snapped a few photos. I quietly retreated back to camp where the SD card from the camera went into a laptop and we reviewed the intelligence before turning in for the night at 1am.

Sweep and clear Saturday, 5am: I toss my L96 over my shoulder and switch back to my Masada.

Our team splits up into a group of three (Team A) and a group of two (Team B, which I was in).

Team A is sent to flank the left side and Team B to go head-on. We doublechecked our comms and separated. Within

10 minutes Team A radioed to say we had lost a guy to an enemy scout sniper. They eliminated the sniper and we continued onward, watching as the eliminated player returned to camp (as there was no respawn after 5am). From the intel we acquired on the recon mission we knew five enemies remained.

With visual contact established between our teams we began an area sweep and within 15 minutes had eliminated three more enemy players. The odds were in our favour, four to two.

We heard a firefight between Team A and the opposing force. I heard two people call “Hit!” and radioed Team A for a sitrep. After five long seconds of silence I hear: “We’re all here and they’re all gone!” Good work team!

Saturday, 11am: We meet with the opposing force and all agree it was a great game – and we have to try and top it next weekend. Each time we play it gets more unique and challenging.

I cannot wait to see what happens out there next time!

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WIN...WIN...WIN...WIN...WIN...WIN...WIN...

THE ARMOURY | M2000 SNIPER RIFLE

VFC HK417 License to use official trademarks held by Umarex

Reviewed in Airsoft Action September 2012!

WORTH OVER £400!

Thanks to our friends at Armex we have one VFC HK417 AEG up for grabs – worth a stonking £425!

A VFC creation featuring accurate HK trademarks (license held by Umarex), the HK417 is an extremely true replica. Full-metal construction and solid build quality make it a beast physically and out-the-box performance is not to be sniffed at.

For your chance to add this awesome rifle to your airsoft collection, answer the question below (check the full review in the September issue of Airsoft Action if you don’t know the answer!)

QUESTION: How many rounds does the HK417 mid-cap hold?

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Post your entry to: VFC HK417D Competition, Airsoft Action, Blaze Publishing, Lawrence House, Morrell Street, Leamington Spa, Warwickshire CV32 5SZ. Or, email your entries to competition@blazepublishing.co.uk, quoting ‘VFC HK417D Competition’ in the headline. Entries received after 23 October will not be valid. One entry per household. Winner will be first correct entry pulled from the editor's hat.

Blaze Publishing would like to keep you informed of other offers and publications. Please tick here if you would NOT like to be contacted by post or email

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One place the Soviet Union really played its hand during the Cold War was the mountainous battlefield of Afghanistan This month Gareth ‘Gadge’ Harvey takes a look at Russia’s elite airborne troops

SOVIET AIRBORNE SOLDIER, AFGHANISTAN 1988

T

he Soviet Union held a special regard for its airborne forces, and rightly so.

Russia had fielded the world’s first parachute troops back in the 1930s and so it should come as no surprise that these elite shock troops would become their mainstay in the battle for Afghanistan.

Unlike many nations that keep their paratroopers as a sub-section of the army or air force, the Russians think so highly of their airmobile troops that they are an entirely separate arm of service. Russian airborne formations are almost entirely self-sufficient, with their own APCs, self-propelled artillery and helicopter air support.

The Russians had in fact been one of the first nations to explore the concept of airborne assault in the dark days before WWII. They dropped small units of men from bombers (pioneering ‘paras’ actually had to slide down the wings of the aircraft on exit as no suitable

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drop hatch was available on planes used!) which could then create diversions behind the frontline. This innovative tactic was not properly explored and developed by the USSR though; it would take the German blitzkrieg seizure of the Low Countries in 1940 to show the Soviets how effective paratroopers could be.

A crippling lack of suitable air assets saw the WWII soviet paratrooper fight mainly as elite infantry. Immediately after WWII the Russians took the lessons learnt to heart though. In particular they were keen to regain their innovative stance and, rather than rely on the conventional parachute deployment of airborne forces, looked to new technology instead.

The perfect technology was evidently the helicopter, and the Soviet VozdushnoDesantnaya Voyska (VDV), or ‘air assault force’, quickly learnt to use the parachute and aeroplane alongside this new machine. It’s also worth noting here that the VDV is proud

to boast that there is no ‘parachute’ in its title; they consider the parachute just one option in an airborne assault, something that will become more evident later in this article.

Russia’s Vietnam Soviet ‘paratroopers’ were selected from among the very best of the youth of Russia.

In each year’s intake of conscripts only the ‘Strategic Rocket Services’ could take its pick of young men before the VDV. While a typical Soviet 18-year-old had no say whatsoever in which arm of service he served, he would be able to significantly increase his chances of selection for the VDV by joining a youth parachute club before conscription!

Training was long, brutal and arduous, even by soviet standards, resulting in hardy, selfsufficient young men capable of operating in adverse conditions with little to no support. The force’s motto is in fact: ‘Nobody but us!’

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COLD WAR WARRIOR | SOVIET VDV

A behind the lines ‘diversionary force’ was not the concept the USSR had in mind though (that would be the role of ‘Spetsnaz’ raiders).

Soviet doctrine was for mass airborne assaults; in one 1970s exercise an entire division of 8,000 men and 160 vehicles was able to land in just 20 minutes.

The VDV saw action in the Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia in 1968 but received their harshest test in the 1979-1989 occupation of Afghanistan, a war that would become known as ‘Russia’s Vietnam’.

Russia had been increasingly supportive of Marxist elements in the Afghan military and in a move that shocked the world finally invaded Afghanistan in 1979 to support a pro-Soviet puppet government. The VDV were among the first troops into Afghanistan and in keeping with their ethos arrived by transport plane. Light resistance (including some battles between Afghan tanks and Soviet air portable

assault guns) was soon overcome and with the VDV in control of the capital, key towns and airports, the Soviet ground units moved in.

Afghan resistance would continue until the eventual Soviet withdrawal in 1989, but through the efforts of the CIA- and MI6sponsored Mujahedeen (Cold War Warriors, Airsoft Action September 2012) rather than the regular Afghan army. This dogged rebellion would eventually force the Soviet Union to withdraw, but in the bloody decade of occupation the Soviet Union relied heavily on the VDV to take the fight to the Mujahedeen, often using helicopter assault tactics to drop VDV companies directly onto enemy strongpoints (similar to American ‘airmobile’ operations of the Vietnam War).

‘Flying tanks’ The VDV had a slight advantage over the US in this respect: its helicopters were quite

literally flying tanks. While the US favoured light troop-carrying helicopters, unarmed and unarmoured, the VDV’s preferred warhorse was the Mil Mi24 helicopter gunship. This massive beast was capable of carrying a fullyequipped squad in addition to its tank-busting missiles, anti-infantry rockets and lethal chinmounted cannon.

Our Cold War Warrior this month is a desantnik (literally ‘descender’ or ‘those who land’) from the last years of the war, wearing a combination of equipment modified after years of combat experience.

His basic uniform is the summer weight ‘afghanka’ uniform brought into service during the war. This lightweight khaki uniform proved far more practical than the usual M69 service uniform and even found its way into units other than the VDV. It’s worth noting that these are now very hard to find and many suppliers falsely list utility work uniforms and chemical

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COLD WAR WARRIOR | SOVIET VDV

undersuits as ‘afghankas’ – so if you’re looking to recreate this look take care when buying.

Under the Afghanka is the ubiquitous airborne ‘telnyashka’ striped blue and white vest, an item (like the parade blue beret) of great pride to VDV soldiers and which came in both long-sleeved and sleeveless versions.

The latter was more popular in Afghanistan for obvious reasons. Despite being quite conspicuous the vest was often worn as outer wear in combat (unlike the blue beret, which was only worn on base and never in the field).

On our soldier’s head is an army pattern M68 steel helmet – earlier patterns were worn interchangeably though, and without any apparent distinction. Equally common was a wide brimmed ‘Panama’ bush hat, often worn underneath the helmet to absorb sweat and provide a little cushioning. It may look impractical but was a very common sight among VDV soldiers.

One of the biggest departures from many of the Soviet load-outs we’ve seen to date in Airsoft Action is our desantnik’s footwear.

While the majority of Soviet soldiers wore the calf high ‘jackboot’ in service since Napoleonic times, the airborne forces favoured a more conventional lace up combat boot of the type shown here.

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Heavy duty combat kit VDV patrols would often require a lot of ammunition. They could find themselves in contact with the enemy for lengthy periods of time and the standard airborne ‘RD54’ combination backpack and pouches were found inadequate.

Our soldier here takes no chances with a mix of body armour, belt kit and chest rig.

The Soviet Union had traditionally held little regard for combat casualties but during the Afghan occupation began to issue body armour to protect its soldiers. The 6B3 armour vest show here was worn to protect against fragmentation and had many built-in pockets and pouches for ammunition and kit. Like all soldiers before him though, our trooper needs more ammo and so has added a ‘trophy bra’ chest rig captured from a Mujahidin warrior (other chest rigs were field-made by cutting ammo pouches from RD54 webbing and sewing them together). This chest rig holds several magazines for his folding stock AK74 5.45mm assault rifle (as well as having his bayonet and some grenades wedged into it!).

For more immediate ammo supply he has also taped two magazines together; this practice tends to be frowned upon in western armies as it can lead to the second magazine

becoming easily fouled but for the increase in firepower is worth the risk. Essential survival supplies are carried on the soldier’s belt kit and include the essential water bottle in its carrier, a respirator in a lightweight cloth case and, unsurprisingly, even more ammunition!

Here at Airsoft Action we’re usually surprised (and pleased) at how quickly and cheaply a Cold War load-out can be assembled – but this is one impression where that is definitely not the case. Soviet kit from the Afghanistan era has become highly-collectable and there are a lot of bad copies and fake kit being passed off as genuine.

To that end we’re eternally grateful to Tom of the Red Alliance, who has modelled his own ‘re-enactment quality’ kit for this article – even with our collective knowledge and experience it’s a tough impression to put together well.

Don’t be dismayed though: if you’re prepared to put the effort in it’s a fantastic, practical and fun load-out for Cold War FilmSims that looks awesome and sets you apart from the crowd at regular airsoft events.

One word of warning though: as with many ‘elite’ units, veterans of the VDV can be touchy about their kit being worn for a ‘game’, so it’s a good idea to leave the prized blue beret out of your collection!

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18/9/12 10:01:11

G&P M870

Scott Allan’s been playing with G&P’s revitalised Remington replica – here’s the verdict...

S

hotguns? You mean, like, guns that fire shot?

The G&P M870 shotgun series has been gone for many years but is now back with a vengeance G&P is (and always has been) rated as a top manufacturer. Back in the day it only made accessories and replacement parts for the Tokyo Marui dominated market. Eventually G&P started to sell complete out-of-the-box models. The M870, a direct copy of the Maruzen version, was a big hit. For some reason the parts went out of production for many years – until a few months ago, that is.

If you want a full-metal heavy-weight shotgun with a great look and feel that doesn’t have an outrageous price tag, you’ve found it.

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It is based on the Remington Model 870 Wingmaster, a US-made pump-action shotgun that was used by law enforcement teams all over the country. Available in many different bore sizes (shotgun speak for calibres) this was an extremely versatile and popular system and has sold millions of units worldwide, proof its design is as good today as it was 20 years ago.

Shotguns have always been great law enforcement weapons due to their versatility; different cartridges cater for different scenarios but when you want a big hit at close range few weapons can match it.

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THE ARMOURY | G&P M870

First impressions A full-metal shotgun is a rare thing in airsoft but this is what G&P has very kindly delivered. Die-cast and machined aluminium, as well as polymer parts, add up to a rock-solid system that sees the models starting just over the 2kg mark. They can be kitted out with flashlights and steel stocks (which weigh an extra 1.2kg!), and with a variety of RIS rails and different pistol grips, not to mention stocks rearing their heads, it will not be long before we start seeing outrageous custom Magpul shotguns sporting Eo-Techs and torches with a billion lumens!

Performance is not to be sniffed at either – starting at 350fps with a Blaster 0.2 is pretty darn good. There is even an upgrade set available, but I suspect this puts it right over the limits for almost every UK site. The hop unit is a fiddle: two screws are removed, so you can remove the outer barrel to access the grub screw. You could drill a small hole in the outer barrel to allow any time access instead though. Once the hop is set I would not expect it to go anywhere so option one is viable for most players.

The magazines are a nice touch – they show a fake shotgun gate on the bottom and hold 22 rounds, plenty for most engagements. The only gripe I have is the single-shot action; tripleshot seems to be more desired these days. So long as you can live with that these are brilliant in every department.

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THE ARMOURY | G&P M870

“It will not be long before we start seeing outrageous custom Magpul shotguns sporting Eo-Techs and torches with a billion lumens!”

Practical shotgun Woodland sites are always going be a struggle with a single-shot, but it’s not impossible. It would not be the first time I heard ‘you and that bloody shotgun’ at the end of a game as someone quietly clears an area of enemy players. In my experience, weight of fire often wins in woodland games – not that high-cap junkies do much better than mid-cap monkeys!

Indoor sites are definitely going to be a more even playing field for these weapons – the short versions with torches especially. As it’s made of metal you are not going to be overly worried that every knock or bang is going to cause it to fall apart in your hands.

With retail prices starting at £135 it is hard to find anything wrong with the M870. They are good value, excellent build quality and a great primary or back up weapon. They’re also customisable to suit each players needs – it is hard to think of a good reason not to have one.

This is great for people who have large collections. What to buy the man who has a dozen M4 variants? The G&P M870 full-metal shotgun! You will not be disappointed.

G&P M870 CONSTRUCTION: Aluminium; polymer grip and pump handle WEIGHT: From 2,000g POWER SOURCE: Spring MAGAZINE CAPACITY: 22 round VELOCITY: 350fps PRICE: From £135 CONTACT: Landwarrior Airsoft 0131 654 2452 www.landwarriorairsoft.com

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November 2012

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17/9/12 16:22:06

FEATURE | FAMILY MATTERS

GENERATIONS IN CONFLICT

Karl Aston took up airsoft as a way to spend more time with son Nat – and found it ideal for bridging the gap that separates parents from teenagers

I

raced across the gap and pressed myself against a fence for cover.

Incoming rounds beat a dangerous rhythm against the taut steel fence and I quickly realised that my eagerness had put me in a precarious position. I couldn’t move anywhere without being an easy target for the enemy. I wondered if anyone could fire on me where I was and had that question swiftly answered when a burst of automatic fire hit me on the head, arm and chest.

“Hit!” I shouted and raised my hand into the air. Being trapped in that position was bad, being dead in that position was worse. It was virtually impossible for anyone to come and ‘medic’ me without being hit. A slow five-minute bleed out and the walk to regen seemed inevitable.

I looked back towards my teammates and saw that my son, Nat, was among them. I thought that he would see my situation and rush to my aid, but he seemed to have no desire to sacrifice

himself to rescue me. It would be a suicidal endeavour to rescue me, but hadn’t I treated him to KFC only a few days ago? Does a Boneless Banquet count for nothing on the battelfield?

Time was short and I had no choice, so I shouted, “Nat, come and medic me or I won’t give you your pocket money!” It was a command unlikely to find its way into the annals of military history, but it did guarantee a roll of the eyes from Nat and laughs from everyone else.

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Nat and Karl take a mid-game pause for a photograph

Teenagers are funny things, especially your own. Sometimes it’s funny in a good way – other times it’s funny in an ‘I’m beginning to wish they were someone else’s children’ way. We watch nervously as our children enter those tricky years of confusion, mood swings and lack of confidence. We wonder just how that lovely child, who happily held our hand to cross the road, changed into something so spiky, ill-tempered and impatient. As parents the words we need are understanding, empathy and communication; they can be elusive.

One of the best ways to spend time with your son or daughter through their teenage years is sharing an interest with them. Something you can do and enjoy together without it feeling forced. For me and my son that shared interest is airsoft.

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My son has had an interest in guns since he was a small child and it’s an interest I did not discourage. Some people wonder whether it is healthy for children to have an interest in guns, or even to play with toy guns. I answered those questions years ago, but the question I now had to ask myself was whether airsoft would be a suitable hobby for a 14 year old.

I concluded that the benefits outweighed any negatives. My own experiences have convinced me that playing combat games does not make you more violent a person. In fact, I would argue that playing airsoft can give you a much better understanding of how truly horrendous war is. The vulnerability you can feel when facing BBs emphasises how perilous your

existence would be on a battlefield facing real bullets.

Once we had decided to try airsoft, we found a site only 15 miles from where we live. Checking that my son was old enough to play we signed up for our first game, an open day event at First and Only’s Asylum site.

I have to be honest: the first time we went neither of us was sure if it was the right hobby for us. We enjoyed it, but there was much that had to be learned – the conventions, rules and unwritten rules that can mean so much to how a game is played. But when we went back a second time the interest suddenly exploded within us, and as most readers of this magazine will understand we were soon indulged in making lists of all the guns we would get when our skirmishers’ defence was attained.

From playing airsoft with my son I not only discovered a shared interest, but a hobby that we could both play as equals.

Nat wasn’t just a child following his parent around, I didn’t have to make allowances for him; he could play the game as well as me. Also, being a lot, erm, slimmer than his father meant he was a much harder target to hit than I was. I felt my son benefitted in lots of ways from playing the game. There was social interaction (often with people older than himself), exercise (a day’s gaming can give you a very good physical workout), taking responsibility (for your weapons and your

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FEATURE | FAMILY MATTERS on-field conduct) and a duty of honesty (the cornerstone of our hobby whatever your age).

As for any negatives for young people playing the game, the only one that stands out is the salty language that can come with mixing with adults in this environment. Maybe I shouldn’t expect people to change their behaviour, but perhaps it is okay to ask players to modify their language if they see young teenagers are playing the game.

Nat relished the visits to The Asylum site. His confidence grew and he was soon happily talking to people he had only just met. On the battlefield he enjoyed racing to aid people who were shouting for a medic. After only a few games he was keen to move around the battle unencumbered by his dad. I enjoyed

the game for its combination of military tactics, exercise and handling realisticlooking weaponry. I could remember enthusiastically playing ‘war’ as a child, but airsoft has taken that childhood game and given it an adult edge.

Now all I need to find is an airsoft equivalent of the Johnny Seven ‘One Man Army’ gun (ask Google if you aren’t old enough to remember it!).

We both derived pleasure not only from playing the game, but also from discussing tactics, reading airsoft magazines and debating new gear. After registering with UKARA I have been able to take the next step of having my own weapons – and of course buying a weapon for my son to use is perfectly legal. Slowly we are finding our feet in the hobby and losing the label of ‘newbies’ – even if I do still get hit far too often.

But as Nat says: “Just because you have some experience doesn’t mean you aren’t rubbish!”

‘Quality time’ has become a catchphrase attached to the interaction of parents and their children. Well, airsoft has given me a lot of quality time with my son.

If your son or daughter shows any interest in playing and they are old enough to get involved, encourage them to come along with you to try a skirmish. Airsoft can help build a bridge spanning the chasm that can exist between parent and teenager.

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17/9/12 13:00:26

DRAGON’S LAIR CHARITY SHOOT More than 100 players joined forces at Dragon’s Lair to raise funds for Help for Heroes. Nige reports

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egular readers of Airsoft Action may well remember that I covered the opening of a new airsoft site in Essex (back in our very first issue), called Dragon’s Lair.

For those of you that haven’t seen the article: Dragon’s Lair is run by husband and wife team Ray and Jean Cain, who had been running the site as a paintball operation for well over 20 years (making it the longest established independent paintball site in the UK).

Ray has been a good friend of mine since the early days of paintball and in the run up to the launch of AA he came with me down to Ground Zero to see what airsoft is all about.

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He was so excited by what he saw that on the journey home he made the decision to introduce airsoft at Dragon’s Lair. Immediately he set about organising his first ever airsoft event – a free day for players to try the site and give some feedback.

A year on and it was great to be back at ‘The Lair’ to see what’s changed and cover the site’s biggest airsoft game to date.

I don’t think there can be a person in the UK that hasn’t heard of Help for Heroes but, just in case you’ve been living on a different planet for the past few years, Help for Heroes raises money to support members of the Armed Forces who have been wounded in the service of their country. They ask supporters

to ‘do their bit’ to show these extraordinary young men and women that they are cared for. Over a million people have responded to date and millions of pounds have been raised to buy much-needed services that will aid their recovery – but more is always needed!

Ray was over at BadgerTac2 chatting to the guys about all sorts of things when, according to JB (owner of B-Tac2), the idea of doing a charity game just “sort of came up in conversation”. As long-time supporters of H4H the charity was chosen as the beneficiary.

The date was set and the call went out for support, sponsors and players – and, in true airsoft fashion, the response was excellent.

Many companies offered raffle prizes or

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EVENT REPORT | DRAGON’S LAIR

“Suicide runners, grenades and smoke in hand, almost broke through before being picked off.

Total mayhem ensued but above it all was the unmistakeable sound of laughter!”

THANK YOU! More than £2,100 was raised for Help for Heroes and Ray has asked us to pass on a huge thanks to all the people, players and companies that helped support the event or donated prizes for the raffle.

In no particular order, thanks to: BadgerTac2 Elite Shooting Centre Viking Airsoft Armoury BadgerTac Skirmish Airsoft Billericay Big Mac Models Mad Badger Airsoft The Essex Range Armex Limited DB Custom Guns RAW Airsoft Airsoft Action Ray also put up Dragon’s Lair walk-on day prizes

support in other ways. One of BadgetTac2’s regular visitors even offered to hand-build a totally unique, one-off custom rifle that would be auctioned off on the day.

I arrived well early on 2 September to be there as players arrived, but the car park was already half full! Players had been arriving from before 7am. By 9am the line of vehicles stretched right back along the site approach road and the smell of cooking bacon wafted around the Safe Zone as players relaxed in the sunshine and got some breakfast down their necks. Ray told me he was hoping to have about 70-80 players turn up – by game on 115 had arrived, a brilliant turnout.

It was really good to catch up with some of the guys who were there last time I visited and all of them said the same thing: that Ray had been doing an amazing job with the site and it was now a truly excellent place to play airsoft.

While waiting for everyone to finish getting prepped Ray took the opportunity to show me the additions and alterations he had made and

I can only think of one word to describe them – impressive!

The original fort is still there but it’s now surrounded with defensive positions, machinegun nests and trenches. It also features a brand new three-storey wooden watchtower that wouldn’t look out of place on a film-set – which is where the site’s pub came from!

On the opposite side of the valley to the fort, in the middle of a village, stands The Firetrap Lock-Inn. Rescued from destruction after use on a film-set this now forms the centrepiece of another excellent location from which to launch attacks, or to defend when necessary.

Elsewhere around the site Ray has constructed loads of new positions, including slit-trenches, machinegun pits and defensive positions. These haven’t just been thrown up (or dug) in any old location though; much thought has gone into the siting of each one to make sure they retain that all-important playability factor.

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EVENT REPORT | DRAGON’S LAIR

With all players signed in, every gun chronoed (and tagged), safety briefing done and teams selected, everyone made their way out for game briefing from head marshal, Ray Jnr (Ray’s son). Incidentally, three generations of the Cain family are involved with Dragons Lair: Ray, Ray Jnr, and Ray Jnr’s son, Jnr Ray Jnr (only joking, his name is Nathan!).

Anyway, with the game briefing done in Ray Jnr’s inimitable style (and which I

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couldn’t possibly repeat here!) one team headed into the village while the other made for the fort. Warm up took the shape of an ‘attack and defend’ game against the fort.

This game seemed to set the tone for the rest of the day and is best described as ‘all-out airsoft fun’. With medic and regen rules kept as simple as possible to ensure continuous play it was inevitable that there would be some epic moments, and in both the first and second games (a reverse of

the first), the word ‘epic’ probably wasn’t enough!

Mass attacking charges were met by barrages of return fire, with defenders putting up seemingly impenetrable walls of BBs. Sneaky-beaky attackers crept around the back and took out lines of defenders before being despatched. Suicide runners, grenades and smoke in hand, almost broke through before being picked off. Total mayhem ensued but above it all was the unmistakeable sound of laughter!

With that amount of fire going on you would think it inevitable that at least one player would suffer a ‘sense of humour failure’, but not today. I didn’t see or hear anyone bitching, moaning or whining – but did hear plenty of calls of “Good shot” and “Nice one player” throughout the day. I guess uppermost in players’ minds was that today was all about raising money for wounded soldiers, not shouting the odds or pampering egos.

Lunch was followed by a ‘who can get a smoke, grenade or body into the pub the quickest’ game, before the raffle and auction.

As I mentioned earlier, loads of companies had generously donated prizes for the raffle but the centrepiece was the custom-built rifle to be auctioned first.

Bidding started at £250 and my bid of £300 was quickly left behind. Two players slugged it out until one made the winning bid of £580 – a great sum of money that won a very appreciative round of applause from everyone.

The raffle quickly followed, with prizes ranging from rifles, game days, kit, BBs and even a remote-controlled helicopter chosen by the lucky winners before the Help for Heroes cake was cut and players headed out for the final game.

Unfortunately, yours truly had to head off to a family engagement before it finished but I did see Ray Jnr making his way out onto the site clutching a handful of helium-filled party balloons…

I didn’t ask – I wasn’t sure I wanted to know the answer!

DRAGON’S LAIR AIRSOFT Brentwood, Essex, CM14 5TL PRICES Walk-on: £20 Rental: £45 (including gun, mask and 3,000 BBs) CONTACT: www.dragonslairairsoft.co.uk, 01708 765036 / 07703 530189

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DEBATE | CODSOFT

JUST A

GAME?

Gareth Harvey asks if basing airsoft games on popular videogames is lazy planning, or giving the players what they want

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irsoft is a diverse hobby, but a recent online discussion about the influence of computer games on the sport really got us fired up. Is ‘roleplaying’ a computer game in real life the peak of excitement, or just a cash-in by lazy game planners?

For many ‘softers the chance to play a ‘real life’ game of Call of Duty or Battlefield is a dream come true. Others despair at the growing number of ‘computer clone’ game plots. Does airsoft need to borrow plots and storylines from the console generation? It’s probably fair to say that some sites see an easy option in running a game based on a best-selling console creation, but is this giving the playing public what they want or just a stunning lack of creativity?

The phrase ‘codsofter’ is used as a term of derision for this sort of thing and if this style of play is taken to extremes on a fun Sunday open day – especially if this impacts on your own style – then perhaps it is right to deride it. (Equally, I can’t fail but see a certain irony in simulating a simulation!)

I may be dedicated FilmSim player but I can empathise with those that cringe every time they see a Captain Price clone on the pitch. I appreciate that airsoft is a ‘sport’ for many, and that the aim is to complete the objectives, shoot out the opposition and have fun. So if your take on the sport is relatively laidback and focussed on playing well, I can believe that having orders shouted at you by some guy lugging aaround two tons of real-steel military hardware is really going to get your goat!

Among the team, the general consensus was (unsurprisingly) that it’s not such a bad thing, as long as it’s in moderation. No one wants to be railroaded along a ‘scripted’ story where your playing skill makes little difference if the next scenario has you forced into a desperate defence despite wiping the floor with the other team in the last game!

Is it too hard for site owners to come up with original plots or is it simply a case of wasting their time if they do? If most of your players want to ‘capture the flag’ or be ‘king of the hill’ is there much point inventing an exciting set of missions or linked campaign scenarios?

On the flipside, immersing yourself in a weekend of utter fantasy at a game based on, for example, the Resident Evil games can be simply brilliant; but for me part of that experience relies on being with a host of likeminded players. You all have to be into it or the ‘suspension of disbelief’ is easily shattered.

Furthermore it’s a lot easier to ‘get’ the idea behind said Resident Evil game, than to have to listen to an hour-long story brief or read a 30 page backstory epic on a website before you can understand what’s going on and get stuck in.

So to close I’d leave you with this, put to me by my friend Andrew: “It might be a bit annoying to have a generation of new airsofters running around like they’re playing Call of Duty, but surely anything that gets them actually out there running about and playing is a good thing?”

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HAVE YOUR SAY We want to hear what our readers think about the topic highlighted in this article – or anything else airsoftrelated that you have an opinion on, for that matter.

We may publish responses or use them as a starting point for future articles, so please include your name and location so we can name and shame you – sorry, credit you for your contribution.

Letters can be sent to the address at the front of the magazine or emailed to anthonyp@ blazepublishing.co.uk.

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17/9/12 10:00:51

SOCOM TACTICAL shop launch Oscar Plummer reports from a successful first day at Socom Tactical in Hampshire

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ocom Tactical has opened a new airsoft shop in Fleet, Hampshire.

After trading online for four years, Laurence Kay and Melissa Evans-Prosser have taken the jump and opened their retail shop, with 1,100sq/ft of space.

Socom sells a wide range of kit – from rigs to RIFs –that you might need for a skirmish. Its opening event was brilliantly attended with nearly 300 people streaming through the doors to check out the merchandise, chat to staff and customers and take advantage of some excellent opening-day discounts.

What’s more, Socom Tactical has integrated a social area with big-screen TV, refreshments and sofas so that visitors can discuss their purchases and recount stories from their last game – or just park their partners while they browse the shelves!

There’s also a notice board for customers with surplus kit to trade.

The Socom guys are really keen to help players, old and new, get in touch with

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BUSINESS FEATURE MATTERS | DEFENCE| PHOTOGRAPHERS SOCOM TACTICAL

“The Socom guys are setting up a social club to give local players a place to meet and make teammates”

other skirmishers in their area. They are setting up a social club to give local players a place to meet and make teammates. They are planning regular events on and off the skirmish field and got off to a great start with an afternoon barbeque.

Plans for the future include new products on the horizon – the company is working with a UK manufacturer on a new range of pyro which should be on the shelves soon.

Easy to find, with plenty of parking and shelf-loads of airsoft kit, you’ve no excuse not to check it out!

SOCOM TACTICAL Socom Tactical’s new shop is located on: Reading Road South, Fleet, Hampshire, GU52 7SD. Customers can still place orders on Socom’s website or by giving them a call.

CONTACT: 01252 616868, www.socomtactical.net

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13/9/12 11:46:03

Michael Jones joined in the celebrations at Gunman Airsoft Midlands’ fifth birthday bash

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n a warm Saturday morning I made the trip to Gunman Midlands’ site at The Grange.

The weekender was an event celebrating its fifth birthday and as such I was told there was something special in store.

Since I first passed through those gates several years ago a hell of a lot has changed – buildings, the carpark and most importantly the game zone. On their first ever game the field had been covered with just stalks and the main compound. Now the trees dominate

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much of the landscape and there are more structures, bunkers and a CQB area to boot.

After the usual safety brief and chrono check on the purpose-built range, site owner Jim Sefton began the specific event brief. It transpired that we would be split into two teams – the Golden Monkey Drug Cartel and Griffin International Tactical Service (or GITS, for short).

Within the two teams we were split further into specific squads: assault, support and assassins, each with a

squad leader and their own set of objectives. I joined the Monkeys on the assault squad as we made our way out to our command position.

Instead of a ‘return-to-Safe Zone’ type of day we were encouraged to take our essentials out with us to store in our own undercover CP. After settling in we readied our weapons and gathered for the squad brief, paying extra attention to the little gem of intel regarding the floating minefield that occupied the bridges in the centre. The whistle blew and we were off.

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EVENT REPORT | GUNMAN MIDLANDS The battles were fierce, with neither side wishing to give any ground or resource away. At one point in the morning we were tasked with taking the farm from the GITS assassins, who were dug in like part of the scenery. Our only glimpse was when the heavyweight sniper rounds struck us. With a little (OK, lots) of luck we managed to eliminate their forward defence, giving us a muchneeded buffer of hard cover.

I wasn’t so lucky and had been standing in the medic position for some time. After bleeding out and walking back I saw my team charging the

remaining GITS, leaving no stone or grassy root unturned until all the ghillies were accounted for.

And that’s when it happened.

A marshal approached. Immediately I’d wondered what I’d done wrong.

But that wasn’t it. “You’re a sleeper spy working for the GITS,” he said.

“Respawn from their CP and retake the farm.” Oh crap!

I took one final look at my fellow team and headed off. I knew they would be a little confused at first but it wouldn’t last long. Actually, it took only a matter of seconds for them to figure it out and in return light me up like a Christmas tree while laughing their bloody heads off!

Personally, I don’t blame them.

Day one ended on a particular high as we all returned to the Safe Zone weary and battle bruised. On a normal day I would be straight in the car on my way home for a hot bath but there was still another day to get through. Fortunately help was on hand, and it’s worth pointing out now what sets The Grange apart from the pack.

When I first visited in 2007 there was a very clear understanding of what they wanted the site to be: the ‘country club’ of airsoft. This doesn’t just mean the amazing facilities like fitted showers/toilet block, food area, gun workshop and so on – there’s all the extra-curricular activities they run on-site too. From martial arts to swordplay and, erm, Zumba through practical shooting, literally every niche seems catered for. Most importantly, though, is the way it’s run: everyone’s helpful, friendly and more than willing to help.

Anyway, back to business. After a hot shower I made my way to the après airsoft taking place in the food marque with

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EVENT REPORT | GUNMAN MIDLANDS

licensed bar. It didn’t take long before old stories and even some pictures from the last five years surfaced. The night was a much-needed rest from the day and was everything I had hoped for.

The next morning started the second leg with the bright sunlight stinging a few of the more party-orientated eyes, myself included. After a coffee and another hot shower – don’t mind if I do – we got our heads in the game for another day of play.

As we gathered for the brief it became apparent that all the efforts of the previous day played a part in this. Another ‘out all day’ style was ahead, and a very interesting game with a supply-chain theme was in store. Each team had to expand its CP to satellite CPs, pushing their boundaries to control more of the map and the resources.

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The GITS started well, pushing the cartel right back to their main CP, but it didn’t take long before King Kong was going bananas at his troops to get back the ground they had lost.

The weekend was a success, the airsofting excellent and the evening’s social even better. I must admit that The Grange was never my favourite site in the early days. But these last few years the site has exploded with foliage like a forest: cover geometry is as close to perfect as I’ve ever seen. These things don’t come from nature – it’s the persistent hard work and dedication from the team, always striving to improve the player experience, that makes the Grange what it is.

Here’s looking forwards to the next five years!

GUNMAN AIRSOFT MIDLANDS Frog Lane, Balsall Common, Coventry CV7 7FP Gunman Airsoft Midlands operates two skirmish sites in Balsall Common, Coventry: The Grange and the nearby Proving Ground (RAF Honiley CQB site). It also hosts its regular WarDogs FilmSim campaign.

PRICES WALK-ON: £30 RIFLE HIRE: £20 CONTACT 01676 532384, www.suspensionofdisbelief.co.uk

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Iggy Roberts explains the role of defence photographers, and the danger they put themselves in to bring home images from the frontline

FRONTLINE

PHOTOGRAPHERS R

eports from various conflict zones involving the UK feature many images captured by military photographers.

The Royal Navy, Army and Air Force all have their own in-house photographers who take stunning pictures and video footage of everything from war zones to the Royal wedding, and every sort of job in between.

Each of the three forces has slightly different requirements for its photographers, but the basics are the same. All photographers go through the same course to qualify as a defence photographer before being assigned to their first job in the service they joined.

The main role of defence photographers in the RN and RAF is public relations (PR) photography. Other requirements are news gathering, technical photography for defects and damages, crime scene photography,

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intelligence gathering, portraiture, recruiting, group photographs, event photography, sports photography – the list goes on. The Army photographers have two main roles: Media Ops (PR) and Operational Stream (surveillance).

PR boosts recognition for the armed forces and lets the public know what their nations’ armed forces are doing and where they are all deployed.

During training, defence photographers learn the basics of photography and the skills they will need for a varied career. Filming and video editing are learnt later in their career.

One of the jobs available to photographers from all three forces is the Defence Media Operations Centre (DMOC). Here the focus is on active operations such as Afghanistan. The team of photographers consist predominantly

of army photographers with a small contingent from the RAF and RN. All are deployable, and there is a team of personnel from DMOC that is ready to move anywhere in the world. This readiness is rotated between the photographers at DMOC to allow individuals off-duty time. The team consists of two photographers (one stills camera operator, one video camera operator) and an officer that acts as a team leader/writer/interviewer.

RN photographers work on various ships while they conduct anti-piracy patrols or offshore security patrols. They also work with the Royal Marine Commandos on the frontline in places such as Afghanistan.

RAF photographers deploy with their squadrons or as a small team to Afghanistan or wherever the RAF is operating, be it surveillance or air defence.

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FEATURE | DEFENCE PHOTOGRAPHERS Army photographers will deploy with a brigade or as a small team called the Combat Camera Team (CCT). The CCT is made up of the same layout as the teams sent from DMOC, but solely compromises army personnel. All army photographers are individually called upon at times within their career to make up and rotate the team every six months. Currently the CCT spends the entire six months covering frontline operations in Afghanistan. They are often embedded with the forward units all over Afghanistan and cover the various operations from the front.

Defence photographers of all services find themselves on the frontline. All defence photographers that deploy to Afghanistan or any conflict zone are armed. The weapon systems used are the L85A2 (SA80) Carbine and Browning or SIG 9mm pistol.

When photographers from DMOC deploy, we carry either our two professional Nikon cameras or P2 video camera, attached to our body armour so they can be quickly swapped to our weapon systems as required for force protection or personal protection.

While patrolling we also wear a helmet; eye and ear protection; gloves; desert boots; MTP uniform; kneepads; a daysack or Bergen containing food, water and extra ammunition for ourselves and link-ammunition for the squad automatic weapon (SAW) or general

purpose machine gun (GPMG), extra batteries, extra lenses, flash for the stills camera, laptop and BGAN to transmit the video and images back to the UK; and a sleeping system depending on the length of the operation being covered. We tend to leave the laptop and BGAN transmitter back at the patrol base (PB) if we are returning there.

All photographers on the frontline must maintain their fitness and soldiering skills so they are not a burden to the section or unit they are attached to while covering the story.

This allows them to get to the sharp end where the fighting takes place and give you all at home a glimpse of what it’s really like on the frontline.

The imagery produced by defence photographers is used by regional and national papers, internet pages and magazine publications the world over. Video footage is used in news and documentaries by BBC, Sky, ITV and channels from other nations.

During one operation in the scorching Afghan summer of 2007, an army

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FEATURE | DEFENCE PHOTOGRAPHERS

“The unsightly scenes of dead enemies around him were stomach churning, but in situations like that there is no time to dwell on the horrors of war”

photographer got so close to the enemy that the order ‘fix bayonets’ was shouted over the radio by the platoon commander.

The photographer had been in Afghanistan for just 10 days before he went to cover an Infantry Company attack to clear compounds containing known enemy positions.

Before he embarked on his first photographic tasking he tried to exchange his cameras for the newer Nikon D2 cameras. However he was left to struggle with two Nikon D1s which have a poor battery life. As a result he had to carry 12 batteries in two large pouches on a belt around his waist – one for charged batteries, the other for dead batteries.

The kit he was carrying consisted of all his personal soldiering kit, including his Browning and L85A2 (SA80 A2), a long, cumbersome weapon compared to the A2 Carbine that defence photographers now use.

It was his first time into battle. As the Company advanced he could see the artillery fire bombarding the compounds ahead.

They drew closer to the first compound

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as an enemy opened up with a machinegun.

The lead section closed in and destroyed the enemy position. As the first bullets went down range the photographer got used to the situation unravelling around him and felt able to do his job. He advanced with the section he was attached to. At this point he had one hand carrying his camera and the other his weapon. That’s when the platoon commander shouted the order to fix bayonets.

The photographer took the decision to carry on taking photographs because that was what he was there to do. He maintained a situational awareness and made snap decisions when it was safe to photograph.

The unsightly scenes of dead enemies around him were stomach churning, but in situations like that there is no time to dwell on the horrors of war.

As a result of his courageous decision the army photographer had fantastic imagery of historic interest and his photos were published in The Telegraph over the next few days, showing the world what being on the frontline in Afghanistan was really like.

For RN photographers working with Royal Marine Commando units or as part of the Mobile News Team it can get equally heated.

At the beginning of the Second Gulf War one RN photographer was part of the first push into Iraq with the United States Marines. He arrived just behind the initial wave advancing through to Baghdad. In order to catch up with the guys at the front engaging the enemy, he had to walk through clouds of smoke drifting from the burnt out vehicles of the Iraqi Army.

As he advanced he noticed there was an eerie silence in the air and through the smoke he could see the dead Iraqi soldiers littering the scorched earth.

The silence was broken by the sound of an approaching truck cab, which came to a halt 200m in front of him. One of the two Iraqi soldiers in the cab jumped out brandishing an RPG. Just as he brought it to aim at the RN photographer, an American Hummvee roared out of nowhere, squealed to a halt just feet behind the photographer and let rip with a .50 calibre machine gun.

The soft body of the Iraqi truck cab didn’t stand a chance and immediately blew up.

The Hummvee just drove off in a cloud of thick dust, leaving the RN photographer to continue his walk to the frontline.

Every piece of military news or print that appears in the papers is enhanced by the images from a photographer, more often than not a defence photographer. They are your eyes into the military and can take you to the harshest combat environments, from the comfort of your homes.

IMAGE CREDITS Our thanks to the following for the images supplied with this article: Staff Sergeant Will Craig, Corporal Barry Lloyd, Sergeant Tom Robinson, Corporal Tim Hammond, Leading Airman (Photographer) ‘JJ’ Massey, Leading Airman (Photographer) ‘Iggy’ Roberts, Corporal ‘Wez’ Calder, Corporal Paul Randall and MOD Crown media

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17/9/12 14:45:24

EVENT REPORT | NAE

Airsoft Action’s French correspondent, Charles Duval, reports from the UK’s biggest airsoft event

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his might be my fifth year at the NAE. Neil, Pam, H, Rich and everyone I know there always seem pleased to see me and spend some moments chatting. I must thank them for their time and hospitality.

It is now like a second home. Yes, my tent will give me grief as usual and will be more like a swimming pool than anything else. Yes, most of my batteries will be flat before the game even starts. Yes, I will lose my car keys a thousand times and yes, the charcoal will undercook or burn the meat.

But I believe the game and the players are getting more and more ready for those two days each year. The site is usually open from Friday morning until Monday lunchtime. By Friday lunchtime everybody is there ready to play. This is impressive.

As soon as you have paid your fee you will have the security procedure, game map, game schedule, two plaques and the patch.

I spend my Friday night in my personal swimming pool of a tent. I shall burn it.

It’s 10am on Saturday morning. I am not ready. Howard is ready; the 1,650-ish other players are ready; all the marshals are ready.

Let’s play!

Well, after the safety speech. It is always too long or too short and most of us should have read the security process anyway. What I do like is to see and hear the ‘old’ players teaching the new guys. “Put your goggles on, mate!” This is a basic need and needs to be dealt with. I am pleased to see that this is working.

As in previous years there are three teams: Bravo with orange tags, Delta with

white tags and the Others in blue. Each team will have one main officer – my team (Delta) has Woody for the second time. On arrival to our base his game plan pleases me a lot. “Play well, don’t cheat, try to get objectives… But mainly, enjoy yourself.”

Thinking of it, he did not mention the BBQ which is without doubt the main objective.

Maybe I should talk to him about that.

Here, when you are dead you have to find a dead zone (which hopefully contains more of your team members than those of other teams). What I usually do, in order to avoid the start of a bad game, is search for a dead zone. Yes, there is a 30m no-shoot area around the ‘main’ dead zone. Thanks and all, but I’d rather walk the extra 20 minutes to start from a proper dead zone.

It still amazes me to see a group of 50 or

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“It still amazes me to see a group of 50 or 60 guys obeying a chief. In France this would never happen, never. But here, when the attack order is given, it is done!”

60 guys obeying a chief. In France this would never happen, never. But here, when the attack order is given, it is done!

In the village I saw an incredible scene – 80 guys against 80 guys, maybe even more!

The corridor is only 20m long but 5m wide and it is raining BBs! Some don’t even reach their target, meeting another in mid-air. Delta is trying to get in but with no success. While some are trying to recover from this action, I am looking for my shoes. Both of them. They are in the mud – I have walked a few meters before noticing.

At the end of a day’s play the main objective is food and drinks. I have been waiting for this moment. Start the BBQ

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EVENT REPORT | NAE

before the raffle – 16 AEGs are up for grabs but I never win… But it’s not all bad news, the BBQ is in full swing at least! We meet people, drink a few brews, try a few weird recipes.

I will give a miss to the night game this year – and for the second year in a row the Saturday night is quiet. It is 11.30pm and not a noise. Unbelievable!

Tonight I think I’ll sleep in the car.

After a better night’s sleep it is Sunday. I have been racing after my sleeping bag all night, and my air mattress – well, let’s not talk about it. I’m still emotional.

This morning, however, I am ready: I have my XM177E2 Tokyo Marui with no strap, only

two hi-caps, two grenades and the map.

Let’s go!

A few missions were selected; we are ready to maintain the pressure. Some of the French wanted to have a little revenge on a marshal (they have been chasing each other for the past three years).

I have killed a little tree. I was trying to follow the young ‘uns when they all jumped over a fallen tree. It was probably about 1m high, and I did jump over – but the landing was not expected. The face went first and the beer tummy followed with both feet close behind. Both heels landed on my back. The noise woke up the enemy and I got shot.

The whole day was a succession of mishaps; my two grenades decided to explode into pieces. My shoes went AWOL (again). I did not even fire a single round.

Sometimes I wonder if I ought to just stay in bed!

Was it a good day for airsofting?

Absolutely yes. Airsoft is not just firing BBs. It is an open window into others people’s lives. I made new friends, and got to meet up with friends made in past years. Here you can meet a GP without having to make an appointment, or talk to a police constable without having to drive like a maniac. I do love this world! I will be back next year.

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17/9/12 17:42:09

5.11 RUSH 12 MULTICAM Airsoft Action gets hands-on with 5.11’s RUSH 12 Multicam backpack

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he 5.11 RUSH series of backpacks was designed in conjunction with SGM Kyle Lamb, who was decorated for valour for actions in Mogadishu, Somalia (made famous by the film Blackhawk Down). That tells you

a little something about the heritage of the RUSH backpacks, and the thought that has gone into the design.

The RUSH 12 is the smallest of the family, the ideal go-bag size and perfect for stuffing with kit for a one- or two-day event. It might be the smallest of the range but that doesn’t mean it’s small; with a 22-liter capacity and a main compartment big enough for a laptop and a pair of boots with plenty of space to spare, the RUSH 12 is deceptive.

So far the backpack on test has seen action in two countries at various events. Filled with spare batteries, food, hydration bladder (it can take up to a 60oz bladder), lenses, gadgets, spare socks and a jacket it lasted out an entire two-day event without feeling uncomfortable.

That’s partly due to the ample padding in the shoulder straps, and partly to the almost obscene amount of adjustments you can do to get it sitting just right on your shoulders. There’s also a rigid, removable back plate to keep it firm and straight, avoiding any long-term back pain.

With 16 pockets and compartments to organise it is extremely suited to accessing kit rapidly – so long as you can remember

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KIT TEST | 5.11 RUSH

“Big zipper tabs allow easy access when wearing gloves, and five separate zipper compartments mean you can store things logically for those under-pressure kit changes”

which pocket things are in. Big zipper tabs allow easy access when wearing gloves, and five separate zipper compartments mean you can store things logically for those under-pressure kit changes.

Of course, if 16 compartments isn’t enough there’s a host of webbing on the front and sides to allow for some modular customisation – along with a Velcro flag patch to show your colours!

One thing I’ve never worried about when using 5.11 kit is construction quality. Made of water-resistant nylon the backpack feels rugged and durable; the zips are clearly designed to withstand some rough usage and there’s no signs of any wear or tear on any strap or seam. If it’s reasonably looked-after I can see this surviving several years of weekly use. Practical touches like drainage holes in the bottom and elastic keepers for excess webbing show the level of attention that has gone into the design, and while it comes at some cost it is more than worth it.

And of course, we’d be remiss if we didn’t point out the authentic, all-over Multicam pattern (though it is also available in black, for £80). That, combined with its smallish size and excellent design, mean this isn’t limited to the skirmish field; this is a true bag for all occasions, equally suited to the festival or fairground as it is the battlefield.

I should know – mine is a veteran of both!

If you reckon you’ll still need more storage space, the RUSH series is completed by the RUSH 24 and RUSH 72, which are essentially the same beast but a little bigger.

SPECIFICATIONS MAIN COMPARTMENT: 18in x 11in x 6in CAPACITY: 21.2 litres CONSTRUCTION: Water-resistant 1050D nylon COMPARTMENTS: 16 FEATURES: Fully adjustable; web platform on front and sides; padded shoulder straps; glove friendly zipper tabs PRICE: Around £115 Our thanks to 5.11 Tactical for providing products for review 5.11 TACTICAL: www.511tactical.com

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17/9/12 17:44:10

OPERATION GREENBACK Gareth ‘Gadge’ Harvey may be a veteran of the WWII FilmSim, but Gunman Airsoft’s latest ‘secret mission’ put his purist sensibilities to the test

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n the last 10 years we’ve seen WWII airsoft come on in leaps and bounds, from early ‘open days’ in 1940s kit to full-on re-enactment events that make Saving Private Ryan look like a side show. Over the years I thought I’d seen it all, so was completely unprepared for Operation Greenback, a ‘secret mission of WWII’.

Now I’m usually something of a WWII purist and was expecting, if anything, a bit of cloak and dagger sneaky-beaky operations from this one. Maybe raiding a German base for secret plans, assassinating a General, you know the sort of thing.

What I wasn’t expecting was something that resembled the bastard child of Band of Brothers and The

X-Files!

Once again I’d been recruited by

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Gunman Airsoft to lead the allied contingent in this WWII adventure.

Like all the players I was completely in the dark about the true nature of the event and its utter weirdness until the day. So, in the interest of suspense I’ll explain how events unfolded as the players encountered them. If I told you the mission brief I was given by Gunman head honcho Josh at the start of the game you’d accuse me of making it up.

Strange and sinister…

So here’s what my team of plucky US and Brit commandos knew: somewhere outside of Salerno in Italy, a renegade Italian officer codenamed ‘Greenback’ was looking to defect and had information vital to the Axis defences of Italy. Our mission was to infiltrate

the German lines, locate Greenback and then get the hell out of Dodge. So far so good.

We lost no time setting up a command post (I won’t bore you with the details of the usual safety briefs) and tasking recce patrols to try and find where the Germans were, what they were up to and exactly where codename Greenback was. For once things went really well; regular readers will no doubt be aware of my legendary lack of success as a commander but within the hour I had accurate reports of German positions, strongpoints, patrol routes – and more importantly two strange and sinister reports.

Firstly it transpired that the Germans were not just fortifying their positions but were up to some no-good scientific investigations, a nefarious Indiana

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FILMSIM | GUNMAN AIRSOFT

“So with a Faustian pact made we decided to form a renegade unit in true pulp fiction bad guy style and execute all the grunts (I told you I was pretty villainous)!”

Jones style archaeological dig… and in more chilling news one of our squads had found the remains of some hastily covered mass graves. All intriguing stuff.

After sending out a few patrols to find out more I received the inevitable contact reports as the Germans finally spotted our scout groups (our lads were not that good by the way – the German team were under orders to deliberately ignore anyone making a half-decent effort to hide!) and sporadic firefights broke out. Just as I was getting an afteraction report form one of my Sgts a second group brought in the mysterious Greenback.

They had found him wandering about in civilian clothes and managed to escort him back to our lines to safety. And around here everything

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went a bit Twilight Zone. Greenback (as we believed him to be) showed us paperwork that convinced us he was actually a British Secret Service agent and explained that we had to stop the German archaeological dig as it was of vital importance to the allies. The details were top secret, but orders are orders and reluctantly I decided to send out squads to act on his information.

Absolutely bonkers Now, Josh had pre-warned me about what was really happening and it was pretty convoluted and mind blowing.

Unknown to all the other players, this new agent was actually the evil Professor Moriarty (we’re still not sure if he was the Moriarty) and was playing each side off each other – pretending to be a German agent to the Axis lads – but his real aim was to secure the dig.

Why did he want it? Because it was the site of a crashed spaceship escape pod occupied by the powerful psychic alien who was the real Greenback.

Obvious when you put it like that, isn’t it? No, actually, it’s ruddy bonkers – but trust me it was great fun!

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The battle was now truly on, as the allies battled in the mistaken belief they were trying to foil a German secret science plan but in reality were just helping Moriarty free Greenback and harness his mind control powers.

As part of the game mechanic, even while imprisoned in his underground machine Greenback was able to harness his mind control powers and do a ‘body snatcher’ job on any one his controlled minions killed. This meant that, as the game wore on, both Axis and Allies found themselves confronted by zombie-like mind-slaves loyal to the alien. This, however, was still unknown to us until more graves were found (including one ‘occupied’ by a real buried crew member) which gave diary snippets, paperwork and clues to Moriarty’s true identity and plan.

Scum and villainy Soon a vicious three-way firefight was under way with each faction desperate to control the dig site. As the game wore on both the Germans and Allies began to find themselves hard-pressed as more and more of their number

came under the control of the psychic alien.

Enough was enough and, under a white flag of truce, my commando group approached the German positions. I had a brief in-character chat with the German leader Herr Bauer (actually my mate Rich) and in our best ‘Allo ‘Allo accents agreed to have an hour’s truce to wipe out the mind-slaves and defeat Moriarty and Greenback.

Here I did something less than honourable: while the truce was in full swing I detailed two of my commandos to steal and hide vital components of the German dig site and sabotage their work (just in case we were betrayed).

That wasn’t the end of my villainy... oh no... but more of that in a minute.

A brutal battle on the hilltop dig site eventually saw us destroy the alien forces. Our technicians looked into the life support systems of Greenback’s metallic tomb; Moriarty had escaped and we were in the dark as to what to do. The boffins worked out that the counter rapidly ticking down would almost certainly release Greenback (and doom the world) when it reached zero.

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FILMSIM | GUNMAN AIRSOFT The final countdown We were presented with two possible buttons to stop the countdown: one was sure to activate the life giving machinery. Without any indication as to which button was which, we were forced to use the highly scientific theory of ‘eeny meeny miney mo’. I opted for the red button, and was relieved to see the countdown stop – and then reset to 30 minutes!

In a situation reminiscent of TV series Lost it transpired that for the time being we would have to stay united and press the red button once every 30 minutes until our respective main forces could join us.

Taking Bauer to one side we had a conflab… our characters were both part of top secret science research commando units and we knew we were in posession of the galactic equivalent of dynamite here; together we could be very powerful, with Greenback’s powers under our control. So with a Faustian pact made we decided to form a renegade unit in true pulp fiction bad guy style and execute all the grunts (I told you I was pretty villainous)!

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FILMSIM | GUNMAN AIRSOFT

“I’m sure the WWII purist will be frothing at the mouth with outrage at Operation Greenback – but it was epic!”

Still, you can’t do war crimes on your own, so we proposed our plan to some of the dodgier members of our teams who decided that potential world domination alongside us was better than a life in the army. Hired thugs by our sides we lined up our respective force in parade ground style and explained that we needed to join force to monitor this new power – and if anyone would like to volunteer to join our force the rewards would be immense… Predictably a fair few guys broke ranks to join us but the loyal and brave (and honest) solider stood firm, vowing to report us as soon as they got back to friendly lines – which Is exactly why Rich and I then gave the order to open fire and massacre the lot of them!

(For safety purposes we ‘dry fired’ the guys at close range with no ammo in the thugs’ guns).

So perhaps the weirdest WWII game I’ve ever been part of ended with two crazed megalomaniacs and a band of

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murderous henchmen camped out atop a forested hill, trying to work out how to enslave an omnipotent alien for their own ill-gotten gains. Totally ludicrous I grant you, but in everyone’s opinion brilliant fun (even the gunned-down grunts loved it!).

As I’ve said already this wasn’t a normal WWII game and if you’ve not played a WWII FilmSim please don’t be put off – this was an exceptional, fun game. Part of Gunman’s ‘secret missions’ series, which are always a little bit oddball and mildly sci-fi or horror-based, its strength lies in it being a secret from the players until the plot becomes public. Sure, you know you’re not going to be in a stand-up WWII fight but you never know exactly what is going to happen.

I’m sure the WWII purist out there will be frothing at the mouth with outrage over ‘Operation Greenback’ but honestly – you weren’t there man, you weren’t there… and it was epic!

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17/9/12 18:00:45

MONEY MATTERS | UPGRADES

Are manufacturers giving you your money’s worth? Scott Allan ponders what qualities he wants from his perfect rifle

GUNNING FOR

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have played for a great many years now and I know there are all types of players out there. You have tinkerers, geardos, high-cap bangers, chairsofters, MilSim junkies and newbies, to name just a few. Each group stereotypically has its pros and its cons and while I probably cross into a few of these groups, I have always believed one thing firmly – that I am not a tinkerer.

One of the LWA technicians (both of them, in fact) love tinkering. But why?

“Here’s my £400 Mr. Retailer – now pass those screwdrivers.”

You buy a car, fill it with petrol, wash it and keep the service regular and it serves you well (unless it is a Land Rover, but that’s another story). But customisation has long been a big thing with airsoft and it wasn’t so many years ago that if you went to 350fps with a 9.6v NiCad battery you were pretty crazy. Now, instead of running

upgrades for rifles out of the box retailers have to run downgrades! This is possibly due to the shift in the manufacturer’s demographics, away from Japan and more into Europe, the US and other areas in Asia where power limits are higher. In the UK most sites run around 330-350fps and this works well in my experience.

One thing I do not really understand is why a rifle needs upgrades at all. You have paid your money and bought a stunning little machine, but the barrel is not always the best quality. The same is true of hop rubbers and often the wiring is a little poor, and why do they still have a fuse? I am not knocking any one

manufacturer in particular and all have their little niggles – some are very constant while others appear and disappear from batch to batch. I will not start listing these issues for each manufacturer for fear it will be taken as gospel and by the time you have read this a different batch can have a different series of issues.

A perfect rifle?

One thing I have found is that there is no perfect manufacturer,

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no perfect rifle and definitely no perfect owner!

So why is there fantastic packaging, beautifully sculpted externals, free BBs and a spare magazine, yet poor wiring?

Why not ditch those sub-standard BBs and spend the extra pennies on silver plated wiring? Scrap the standard 6.08mm brass barrels altogether, and the free spare magazine, and make a quality 6.04 tightbore that will suit most players.

One of my original thoughts for this was to sell upgrades, but it simply does not make sense. Companies such as G&P do not sell tightbore barrels and while its rifles are one of the best all round, in my experience they have one of the worst standard barrels if you compare all manufacturers side by side. I change the inner barrel to either an Ultimate tightbore or (preferably) a Prometheus tightbore in most rifles I own as standard, regardless of manufacturer. Recently I have been putting on Deans connectors and changing to Ultimate Silver Plated wiring as well.

Generally that is all I change and I feel that this gives a good improvement for about the £50 in parts.

So if these parts are not massively expensive why are they not in our AEGs as standard?

Some companies offer ‘Budget’ and ‘Professional’ rifles; G&G and ICS are at the forefront with this. In the test between the Pro Line G&G and ICS Sig in

Airsoft Action August 2012, you could see where each company had concentrated its efforts. Neither was terrible but there were noticeable different pricing strategies for various parts inside the rifle. Some parts were good, others were average or disappointing.

Quality as standard G&G has just announced that it will be adapting its Top Tech professional range to a higher spec with the following extras: * 6.03mm nickel plated barrel – good news!

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MONEY MATTERS | UPGRADES

* 16 AWG wire set – higher rates of fire and less resistance * Stronger motors capable of running 4,500 rounds per minute with a M150 spring (this should be circa 500fps) – one can only presume that this is some form of high-cycle set up * Zinc alloy hop-up chambers – hopefully this means consistent fps So this is all good news for the consumer. Although metal hop-up chambers are good the quality can vary; so far the best we have seen is the Madbull M4 chamber. I have seen these add 40fps to a rifle due to the quality of the air seal alone. A good quality inner barrel is one of the best upgrades any gun can have.

So is it laziness from the manufacturers, or do they believe they are giving us what we want? I reckon some may just be victim to the ‘this is the way we have always done it’ syndrome. Some, like G&G, do listen to their customers – ever since its disastrous launch many years ago G&G went back to the drawing board and sorted everything out. Then players said they want more for less and the Combat Machines were born. The Raiders are fully plastic (even the RIS rail) but are tough, cost £140 and come in either tan or black and two different barrel lengths. The internals are okay and the barrel is not the best, but it fills a gap in the market. When a manufacturer sells us a model for £300£400 I believe they should be all-singing and all-dancing on the specification sheet.

So why not drop your manufacturer an email saying, ‘Hey, I bought your rifle and I really like it but haven’t you thought about doing this?’

Who knows – it might just work…

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17/9/12 17:46:55

Dan Mills, author of Sniper One, looks back at the gruelling task of becoming a sniper instructor

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n 1994 I passed the Sniper Instructor Course held at the School of Infantry, Warminster. Passing this course enabled me to go back to my battalion, then stationed in Omagh, Northern Ireland and select, teach and train potential snipers and ‘badged’ members of the battalion. It also allowed me to test and qualify snipers from other units in the field army.

Over the years the doctrine has changed and altered to suit the current trend of thinking in the Infantry but I will concentrate this article on the course of training I undertook.

Students on the course (me included) had to arrive with a ‘Method of Instruction’ course under their belts, which meant they were qualified to teach. There was no time on this course to train you to stand up and instruct; it was all about learning the skills of the trade while demonstrating that you

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could plan and conduct lessons, training and ranges.

In 1994 the course instructors passed on the valuable skills that would create a successful sniper instructor and ‘badged’ sniper.

Map reading: Teaching and testing the sniper’s understanding of map reading, use of air photographs and his ability to navigate by day and night.

A sniper’s navigation and map reading needs to be well above-average. Many tasks involve finding, locating and fixing the enemy, often behind enemy lines.

Training spanned everything from basic symbols, grid references, measuring distance, compass use, bearings, resection, intersection and intervisibility, to the more difficult air photography scaling and gridding, stereoscope use and day and night practical and written navigation tests.

Observation: Teaching and testing the sniper’s ability to observe and accurately report the results of his observations.

Lessons included the introduction and use of binoculars, scout regiment telescope and the CWS, the common weapon (night) sight of the period. Tasks, techniques and indication of targets, observation logs and field sketching were also involved.

Practical tests often involved observing a given ‘arc’ for a period of time before moving to observe the same ground from a second arc for a further period of time, after making a field sketch of the given piece of ground. Students would locate, identify and describe each item found in the given arcs on his sketch.

Cam and con: Teaching and testing the student’s method for hasty concealment, subsequent observation and defensive fire positions.

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REAL-STEEL | TRAINING demands high standards to pass. Once the basics are mastered you will group and zero iron sights, telescopic sight and common weapon sight allocated to the rifle. Students will then go on to different levels of the application of fire using iron and telescopic sights, snap-shooting, shooting in NBC conditions and firing at moving targets.

Judging distance: Teaching and testing the student’s ability to judge distance with and without aids. This is one of the hardest skills to get right.

During lessons you will learn the basic methods and techniques for judging distance and be taught to use optics to measure distance. Other lessons include the appearance method and unit of measure, halving, bracketing, key ranges, squad average and use of air-photo and map.

Stalking: This is what it’s all about. The aim here is to teach and test the sniper’s ability to use the ground by approaching, selecting and occupying a fire position, engaging a target and withdrawing without being observed. This test involves all the skills that are required to carry out a basic sniping task.

Map reading is used to plan, then to navigate in and out of the target area.

Camouflage and concealment is required, once you have stalked into a fire position; distance to target is judged during observation of the target and set onto the rifle sights. The target is then shot before stalking back out of the area to safety.

Each student had to complete three hasty arcs on which they would have several minutes to sprint to a position of cover, adopt a concealed fire position, correctly set range to target and remain concealed while an observer led an impartial ‘walker’ onto your position.

This is one of the most difficult skills to master. It represents a meeting engagement on patrol and is a good test of competence in selection and use of cover.

Shooting: The aim of the shooting phase is to teach and test the student’s ability to shoot accurately by day and night.

Sniping’s end product is the ability to shoot the target, putting as much distance between the firer and target as possible.

Long-range shooting must be mastered after the basic ranges.

Firers need to be an above-average shot when arriving on the course; the test

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REAL-STEEL | TRAINING

KIM’S GAME Said to be based on the hero from a Rudyard Kipling novel, Kim’s Game involves placing a number of different objects on a tray before covering them up. Players sit round the tray and it is uncovered for one minute and they have to remember what is on the tray.

The items are then covered again and each player writes down what they can remember seeing.

The game promotes the development of observation and memory skills and is known to have been used by both British and American Sniper Training Schools.

The test involves the student being dropped off in a holding area where he is sent to prepare himself. Here he confirms his location and identifies his position on map and/or air photographs. He then cams up to blend into his surroundings before receiving a brief.

In the brief he will be given a target description and location. Stalking towards the target he must select a fire position no nearer than 300m to the target. The most important thing to do at this stage is to ID the enemy location as soon as possible. After careful study of map and air photo, plan and use a route in (and later out) of the target area using as much dead ground as possible to avoid being seen.

The course staff will be sat in the enemy location watching the ground around them

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with binoculars. Any movement to their front and a walker is despatched immediately to the location. If you are spotted you will be pointed out (using a fair and accurate walking system) and you will fail the stalk; in real life you would be captured and likely killed.

Once you have stalked in, confirm the location of the target and select and occupy a defensive fire position. Here you use the cam and con tips learnt on the course to hide yourself – but remember you will need to keep the ability to shoot the target, so the weapon must be in a fire position (pointing at the target!).

The student then fires a shot (blank) at the enemy position. The staff check if they can see the firing position – if they can you fail. If not they send the walker to within 10m of your position where they will again look for you. If spotted, again you fail.

Here you will fire a second shot at the target, with the staff watching to find you – through binos at an area where you are known to be within 10m. It is difficult! If you are good (or lucky) and still hidden to the staff they then instruct the walker to point at you.

You get the picture – if spotted you fail. To assess your cam and so on they tell the walker to touch you, to see if the cam you have used has done the job it is intended for. If that’s all good they will tell you what they can see and points to work on.

Finally the walker will check your sight settings to see if you can judge distance – and if it’s out, guess what? Fail! You will then be given a timed aperture of a number board, usually a Huns head target with a letter or number displayed; finally, you need to ID the symbol accurately to pass the test. Phew!

Sniper knowledge: Teaching each student sniper the history and tactical employment of snipers and general knowledge of sniping and associated skills. This takes the form of continuous information overload and testing throughout the course – you will need to know your subject matter thoroughly to pass the written sniper badge test.

Soak up everything taught on the course and you won’t go far wrong. You don’t want to be the poor individual who passes everything in the field only to fail back in the classroom – do the revision!

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SITE REVIEW | FCS ACADEMY

FCS

ACADEMY Oscar Plummer learns a valuable lesson at Firefight Combat Simulations’ new CQB site, The Academy in Essex

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hings we enjoy: Successful pistol shots from a secondstorey window onto a rooftop sniper.

Things we do not enjoy: The target standing up to reveal he is on your own team.

Moral of the story: Think before we fire.

That’s just one of the lessons I took away after a day at Firefight Combat Simulations’ (FCS) new site, the Academy. A disused conference centre near Chelmsford, Essex, it contains more than 100 rooms, open areas, stairwells and rooftops to skirmish across.

Just to top it off, there is a sizable patch of ground around the buildings which is also in play.

First impressions are great. Admin-wise it’s in a good location for transport, the parking is convenient and the Safe Zone is dead comfy.

The site itself looks amazing: from the outside it’s clear that the multiple levels offer a lot of ground to control and considering the orientation of the site – a slightly curved main block with an outlying annex – there are an awful lot of angles to consider. A quick mooch around the perimeter underlines this; there are a lot of vantage and entry points, both horizontal and vertical. Even before we were briefed into the first game I knew this was not going to be a simple site to play!

The whole site has a great atmosphere to it, pervaded by that fantastic sense of decay you get from a building that’s seen better days. That means variety – and realism. Every room is different – kitchens, conference rooms, dorms, a bar (including tactical wine rack), many with tattered remnants of their former occupants.

Frankly, if there was a fairground out back I would have believed I was in Pripyat 20 years after Chernobyl!

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This is my first time at an FCS event, but its reputation precedes it. I knew to expect something more than the usual, straightforward head-to-heads, and did not leave disappointed. Andy Janson and his team run a set-up that rewards planning, staying on objectives and sticking with your team. Also, ‘spray-and-pray’ is actively discouraged: AEGs are on a 300-round limit per game, but gas and spring are unlimited (common sense required).

On the other hand, there is no minimum engagement distance, and full-auto is allowed. The message is clear: this is grown-up airsoft. We are free to play as we wish but will have to live with the tactical consequences we make for ourselves. Empty your mags in the first 30 seconds and you are going to have a hard time making objectives. The overall rule from the briefing sums it up perfectly: DBAD. Don’t be a dick!

The other key message – teamwork – is hammered home in the Safe Zone. Games are briefed with reference to excellent maps, and each team is split into squads. Over the course of the day squads are often given specific roles and objectives. If they go off-task they will seriously damage chances of overall success.

One touch I particularly like was a variant on the medic rule: each squad has a dedicated medic, who has to return to their respawn point to return players to game. That helps reinforce squad communication – if the medic isn’t kept abreast of the overall situation they can’t make the judgement whether to make (often essential) contributions to an ongoing firefight, or whether to disengage and head back to respawn to bring players back in.

So how does it play? In short, very well.

The first couple of warm-up games introduce us to the site. I go in to the game thinking that I’m going to be on classic CQB sweep and

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clear tactics. Instinct dictates that a fair amount of assertiveness and full mags should get us through the complex and onto objectives effectively.

Oh no! I soon learn that there are multiple stairwells and entry points to pretty much every area of the site and I really need my wits about me. The warm-up game is a domination set-up, with a number of points to capture. The team with the most at the end of the game wins.

Straight away it’s clear that the multiple routes through the site means that nowhere is totally secure. The points change hands plenty of times in the course of the game, meaning no dull stalemate and plenty of action.

It’s also very rare that you can consider yourself forted up; there are always too many angles to cover to be able to do it on your own, so movement means a series of short dashes from point to point with at least one other member of your squad – no bimbling or lone wolves here!

I was also struck by the amount of vertical awareness needed – all those windows mean you can quite often find yourself overlooked and pinged out by a sniper.

The opposite is true, though – I managed at least one cheeky shot up into a player with his back to an open window, and rooftop snipers aren’t so high up that they are invulnerable.

The variety of rooms is great, too. You push through a big, open room punctuated by waist-level cover, out into a heavily overgrown courtyard, then up stairs into narrow, crowded, gloomy passageways with dozens of doors leading off. Some of the corridors are very tight – so much so that we found it most effective to break into pairs to make ground.

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SITE REVIEW | FCS ACADEMY

But as always, it’s not just the site that makes the skirmish. The FCS style really sets the tone. FCS is applying its own brand of airsoft to the Academy – planning, preparation and above all high levels of awareness pay massive dividends here.

This comes to the fore in a series of tacop games. These are a number of short, swift and sharp scenarios, where each team is briefed separately on the overall mission and a number of secondary objectives, then given 10 minutes to plan their execution.

Over the afternoon we found ourselves conducting vehicle-borne raids, covert extractions, search and rescue games and hostage rescue. Oh, and being initiated into the Church of Top Gun. Yes, you heard me right!

What really made these ops for me was the way the FCS approach led the teams to work up their own approach, and then carry it through in the face of changing objectives and last-minute curveballs thrown in by the briefing teams. I will never again assume that the agent we are extracting won’t have changed sides…

I also liked the way that the FCS gameplans sometimes took players out of conventional shooting, assault/defend roles and wrote them in as unarmed civilians,

covert-carry agents, casevac teams or stood-down OPFOR who couldn’t enter play until alerted. Not knowing the trigger that would awaken the other team (or indeed whether the group of civvies in front of were hiding any sidearms) meant that tension was up the moment you entered play. One note, though: dropping an impact grenade while sneaking up on sleeping OPFOR is generally a bad idea!

So what’s the conclusion? The site has tons of potential and the FCS team has put a huge amount of effort into making it a great place to play. The day I attended was only the second skirmish at the Academy, and although you should always expect a certain amount of bedding in with new sites I came away with a big smile on my face. A big part of that was down to friendly and helpful marshals and players, who really bought into the day and made it work.

But the really big thing for me was that many of the games were as much about assessing your own performance as they were about overall objectives.

There was just as much satisfaction in being the guy that got the casualties evac’d as there was in being the team that grabbed the OPFOR leader.

So overall I think the Academy is a superb site for teams and individuals who want something more than an everyday blat-around skirmish. It really rewards players who want to get stuck in, to immerse themselves in a way of thinking and playing that’s as much about planning and execution as trigger time.

The day didn’t feel like a full-blown MilSim. While it had elements of that sort of game there was a level of creativity and the unexpected running throughout – all of which was governed by the overall rule of Don’t Be A Dick, making for some goodnatured and extremely fun games.

Well worth a visit!

FCS ESSEX ACADEMY Danbury, Chelmsford, Essex CM3 4AT Firefight Combat Simulations runs open skirmish days at The Academy on the first and third Sunday each month.

PRICES WALK-ON: £40 (discounts available for early or team bookings) RIFLE HIRE: £25 CONTACT: 07973 240177 (Andy); www.firefight.co.uk

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With the future of the British Isles at stake, Oscar Plummer joins the Free Peoples’ Movement to report on the final battle, organised by Spec Ops Airsoft and Redwolf Airsoft

BADLANDS: THE ROCK T

hree things come from Portland Bill, Dorset: Portland cement and stone, staples of the building trade; a thriving windsurfing and watersports community tucked in behind Chesil Beach; and a hotbed of anarchist nutjob Raiders.

Residents of this picturesque south coast landmark, which sticks out into the channel like a hitchhiker’s thumb, don’t know that if British society collapses their rocky outcrop will be a key battleground between the remnants of the old British government and Socialist rebels.

In the dying days of 2012, fuel riots lead to the collapse of Parliament and the fracturing of society. Two main factions form amid the rubble; the British Union Forces (BUF) struggle to retain the vestiges of Queen and country, while the Free Peoples’ Movement (FPM) have

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stuck two fingers up at the old order and are fighting for freedom and a new way of living.

The battle has raged back and forth across the country, but the eventual victory will go to whichever side can take control of a strategically crucial supply dump nestled in the rocky sides of the Bill.

The two factions mass for a final weekend of conflict which will decide the future of the British Isles. Unfortunately, a small group of renegades who spurn both the BUF and FPM are also on the ground and ready to stick their oar in. Typical!

This is the storyline for the Badlands Weekender, hosted by Spec Ops Airsoft and Redwolf Airsoft at The Rock, a series of quarries cut into Portland. As it’s a weekender I’ve joined about 100 other players camping up above the quarries.

We’ve got spectacular views; on one side

the English Channel and on the other, acres of battlefield cut down into the earth.

Game on This really is a special site; the quarries are still active, meaning that the battleground can change dramatically every week.

We actually descended from the Safe Zone into a massive bowl formed by the quarrying! Once you hit the floor of the site there are tracks, gorges, blockhouses, machinery and everywhere great piles of rubble and giant stone boulders. I don’t think I’ve ever had a similar sense that I was entering a conflict zone.

I’ve plumped to join the FPM for the weekend. This isn’t a political choice – it’s purely fashion. The BUF are kitted out in full camo, as befits dull and conventional government forces. The FPM is free to cut loose with their gear, and take the

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EVENT REVIEW FILMSIM| |SPEC GUNMAN OPS AIRSOFT

field in a ragamuffin style – there is some fantastic clobber in circulation! Both sides, though, are armed to the teeth and ready for a fight.

We start off with a good briefing from the Spec Ops Team – we’re under usual rules, with one really crucial exception: an absolute ban on coloured smokes.

This close to the channel they could well alert the coastguard helicopters, which is something to avoid. We’re then divided into our respective sides, with each team allocated a player marshal to maintain the flow of the narrative and objectives as well as help out players who are new to the site.

We are entirely free to play as we wish though and the teams soon organise themselves into squads. For once I’m glad I’ve brought comms – we are definitely going to get spread out over a distance.

Fortunately, the nature of the site means that reception is really rather good.

The first day is about taking and holding ground; there are a number of objectives spread out around the site and we have to take and hold as many as possible.

Secondary objectives are dropped in every now and then. The team that captures them gets bonus resources, such as mortar rounds and airstrikes.

Both teams took off and got stuck in, with hostilities triggered by a truly titanic pyro. Some fierce firefights kicked off immediately, and then coalesced into a series of running battles for two major points – a crossroads and a ridge towering over the site.

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The site really is a pleasure to fight through. There’s a lot of high ground to take and hold, which offers great opportunities for Dickers who lurk up on ridges and coordinate their teams. At the same time, random features and channels formed by stone and rubble develop into fiercely contested infiltration routes and strongpoints. The site certainly keeps you on your toes! I spend the early part of the day fighting around the crossroads, and certainly hadn’t scratched the surface of the site by lunchtime – and better still, I’d never really been out of a contact for more than half an hour.

It wasn’t long before the locals paid us a visit though. I was bunkered down behind a pile of stone, dodging some very canny BUF snipers, when I heard an engine in the distance. I didn’t pay it too much attention, being slightly distracted by rounds bouncing off the boulder above my head, until some music started. Odd, I thought, and continued cowering in the dust.

But then it started to get closer, and closer… until a battered, jury-rigged, tattered and heavily armoured technical roared around the corner, screeched to a halt and disgorged a horde of screaming

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mentalists. Then it cheerily brassed me up with a roof-mounted .50cal and tore off into the distance with only the echo of Black Sabbath to mock me as I bimbled back to spawn. Awesome!

These were, of course, the local Raiders, who proceeded to rampage back and forth across the site for the whole weekend, giving the good news to whoever got in their way. I had thought the FPM were rather natty, but these guys looked absolutely brilliant: this season’s raiders were sporting a combination of leather, rubber, steel and even fur. The Raiders, who were there to prod the storyline along and provide a technicalborne PA for the event, had put just as much effort into their style of play as their kit. From my perspective, they were really even-handed – not hindering either team unfairly – and did a great job of popping up in various places to throw a new objective into the mix and add a real flavour to the struggle. At one point, both sides of a BUF/FPM firefight I was in looked up to see Raiders massing on the skyline. I’m pretty sure I wasn’t the only one that panicked just a little when we saw that one was lugging a minigun into the fight!

The first day saw the crossroads and

the ridge changing hands several times, and ended with a fairly even score between the teams. Back at the campsite we compared notes on the day’s play and the site. There was a really good atmosphere between the teams – helped along by great facilities at the campsite. As well as Spec Ops providing lovely catering and good, clean loos (very much a plus…)

Redwolf had brought a shop with a brilliant selection of custom kit to drool over.

Redwolf also provided goodie bags for every player and brilliant prizes for a raffle.

There is always the question of how to fill the evenings at a weekender – and the Spec Ops guys played a blinder by staging a spring/gas zombie game. They took us down to a different, much more open quarry, and divided us into two teams.

We were briefed that we were trying to escape a quarantine zone. Whichever side controlled a central point at endex would be able to board the last helicopter out. The quarantine zone was in place because the dead were rising, of course, and seeking the brains of the living. This meant that as players were picked off in the battle for the central point, they rose as undead and started harassing the survivors.

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EVENT REVIEW | SPEC OPS AIRSOFT

“It cheerily brassed me up with a roof-mounted .50cal and tore off into the distance with only the echo of Black Sabbath to mock me as I bimbled back to spawn.

Awesome!”

I got pinged out early on, so got to spend the next hour or so charging around like an utter moron, trying to separate survivors from their team and turn them into a walking corpse with a judicious blow from my foam baton. I can honestly say this was some of the best fun I have had at an airsoft game – ever! As the numbers of undead increased it almost turned into a sheepdog trial – moaning lurchers herded the teams (many of whom were yelping amusingly) around the site. Every time a survivor was tagged there was a massive cheer from both survivors and zombies.

Eventually, though, it had to end. While the blue team (wusses!) hid in a pile of boulders, the red team found themselves surrounded in the centre of the site and bunched up into a last redoubt, which held out for a few desperate minutes until they were swarmed under. It was absolutely brilliant, and only the failing light stopped us starting all over again.

Seek and destroy Day two picked up the storyline again, with each team having to secure and deploy components for a rocket system which would enable them to destroy their opponents’ base and seize control of the

supply dump. Objectives which had been fought for the day before now became targets to destroy and deny to the enemy.

The fight rolled from one end of the site to the other, ensuring new areas for players to discover – a nice touch which helped avoid any repetition. Energy levels stayed high across both teams and there was no second-day lull. The Raiders kept up the pressure, with some daring raids on key points or simply loitering in a threatening manner – not to mention challenging people to pistol duels!

We enjoyed the sunshine for much of the day, although the temperature meant a lot of fluids were needed. Portland stone is white and reflects sunlight very effectively! Everything came to a head with both teams battling to move rocket components up to the highest point of the site, where they could be assembled and fired. A Hamburger Hill struggle developed, with the FPM and BUF fighting toe-to-toe for the summit.

Here the Spec Ops team had prepared a real treat. The FPM narrowly edged the battle (despite harassment from the pesky raiders) and secured the launch site – a multiple launch rocket setup. The victors triggered the launch and got the

satisfaction of massive blasts destroying the BUF base.

Badlands was an absolutely brilliant event. I normally come away from a game thinking of a couple of things that I would have liked to see done differently, but on this occasion I can’t. The only downside for me was that my knees took a battering from clambering around rocks all weekend!

The Spec Ops team, the site, the scenario and most importantly, the players were all fantastic. There was great play, and atmosphere, and a healthy dose of humour throughout. I’ve got my fingers crossed for another Badlands soon!

SPEC OPS AIRSOFT, THE ROCK Portland, Dorset DT5 2EG Spec Ops also runs a woodland site at Bloxworth PRICES WALK ON: £25 RIFLE HIRE: From £15 CONTACT: 07984 656947, www.specopsairsoft.co.uk Redwolf Airsoft www.redwolfairsoft.com

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Whether in the war zones or part of a roleplaying event, vehicle checkpoints should be handled carefully. Billy Basics explains…

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ehicle checkpoints are used by armed forces, terrorists, militias, guerrilla groups and criminals throughout the world. They are a method of controlling movement of the opposition and access to a specific area.

Sanctioned armed forces will use them to deny terrorists and criminals the freedom of movement along roads and highways, forcing them to use harder, more arduous routes to ply their deadly trade. This uses up their valuable time, energy and resources. In a similar way, law enforcement agencies deny criminals free movement of drugs or trafficked people.

Vehicle checkpoints (VCPs) have several things in common regardless of who’s manning them. The one thing I am most aware of (having driven through quite a few) is that they are all dangerous – and I mean properly dangerous, to everyone! You can’t fail to have seen news footage of the twisted chassis of cars in the Middle East, Afghanistan and Iraq, or seen horrible YouTube clips of truck bombs tearing through VCPs. The danger doesn’t come just from this kind of incident though: the guys manning them are a real danger too. Imagine for a moment that you are given the job of manning a VCP for 24 hours. Recently there have been drive-by

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shootings from AK47-wielding motorcyclists, drivers charging through not being able to understand you and the threat of suicide vehicle borne improvised explosive devices or car bombs – and all you’re armed with is your personal weapon, body armour and your wits.

You’ll be bricking it! You’ll be tired, scared, apprehensive, nervous and looking for threats everywhere and in everyone. The safety catch will be off and your finger will be nervously caressing that trigger. You’ll be wired. You can imagine these are not ideal circumstances for keeping a cool head while looking for the combat indicators.

Combat indicators These are things around you that will let you know that something is not right.

They’re a big one for troops in Afghanistan currently; ask any soldier recently returned or just about to go (having completed his pre-deployment training) and he’ll reel them off like his mobile number or email address.

The absence of the normal; presence of the abnormal; empty streets that are normally buzzing; evidence of recent digging near roads; wires, unusual items around, things that don’t belong… Even just the hairs on the back of your neck standing up.

Our brains are incredible processors of information (well mine is anyway) and we are aware of only a fraction of what we take in. If your conscious self didn’t spot it, maybe some other part of you did and is letting you know that it ain’t happy however it can. It’s also called intuition.

When you approach a VCP it’s likely that you’ll be unaware what has taken place in the past few hours, so you need to do as little as possible to make them twitchy or to draw attention to you and your vehicle.

It doesn’t matter what rank you are or what task you’re on; sights may well be trained on you from the time you enter the approaches to the VCP until you pop out of the other side, and until they identify you as a ‘friendly’ you’re at risk. You’re under someone else’s control, so for your own safety put your ego in the glove compartment or it may be shot off!

A few years ago an Italian rescue mission went badly wrong in Iraq at a VCP. The hostage had been successfully liberated from captors in a daring raid and the relieved team, high on their success, sped towards a friendly checkpoint straight into a twitchy soldier – who mistook the speeding vehicle for a threat. I believe both the team leader and the girl they rescued were killed.

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SKILLS ROOM | BILLY BASICS

“Until they identify you as a ‘friendly’ you’re at risk. You under someone else’s control, so for your own safety put your ego in the glove compartment or it may be shot off!”

You can also never guess at the mental state of the bloke who asks you to wind down your window. Years ago I drove through a VCP in Bosnia and shared some cheerful banter with the bored-looking Canadian guard in the hut with an M203 in his hands. I think I commented that it was “another glorious day in the Corps” and that we were all living the dream (which I borrowed from James Cameron’s Alien).

By the time I had parked up and had a coffee in my hand in the camp cook house, the poor guy had blown his head off in the guard hut. It turned out that he was on his fourth tour of the same area and he’d had a ‘Dear John’ that week. Of course I felt dreadful, and I still think about him occasionally but it’s a frightening illustration of the potential dangers that you can only avoid by being really careful.

Established, permanent VCPs are for all intents and purposes static ambushes which

no longer rely on the element of surprise to be effective. They have the same elements (if you need a detailed reminder refer to the ambush articles): left cut-off, main body, right cut-off.

The cut-offs front and rear will have some stopping power, often in the form of caltrops they can pull quickly across the road to pop tyres; there will be somewhere for them to take cover and there’ll be a few of them, to search but also to cover the searchers while they are about it.

You’ll then pass into some form of chicane, which can be formed of either vehicles or barriers. The point of this is to slow you down so they can pull you over.

There will be some form of command element here where the boss will be.

Somewhere close by will be the big guns with overwatch of the whole scene and will provide advance warning from both directions.

Illegal or rural VCPs might be just a few barrels and a hut manned by some ill-trained, unmotivated guys that have been there for weeks, so what’s the best way to get through unmolested? I always think of these kind of checkpoints like school bullies. They’re not manned by the brains of the operation or the high flyers; they’re bored, looking to wind you up and get a reaction. You might be the only interesting thing that’s come along all day.

So the way to get through is to just be the most boring person you’ve ever met at a party.

Just think dull, dull, dull. Approach slowly, keep your hands in sight, don’t do anything unless they tell you to, do what they tell you, don’t offer any information unless you’re asked for it and if they want to see in the trunk, open it.

Don’t answer back or get annoyed. If you do they’ll be laughing to themselves and will delay you until they get bored, and they have all the time in the world. When you’re on your way they’ll go back to mulling over how crap life is.

A rather impetuous colleague of mine took the same route day in, day out with his driver down a road in Africa. Each day he’d roll up to a VCP and go through a pantomime with a guard who wanted a little bribe, but didn’t want to make it too obvious. So they’d haggle a bit, play out the mock surprise for the dozenth time, and they both knew where it was going.

One day my colleague was in a hurry and gruffly said he didn’t have time and offered him some notes, and probably didn’t even bother to lift his sunglasses (he was a bit of a muppet to be honest). The guard had them all out, stripped off and sitting in puddles by the side of the road for hours – and made them eat the money!

So be careful and patronise at your peril.

Take care out there. Billy out.

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KEEP COOL AND CARRY LOADS Y

Mike Buttrick and Nick Lawrence have been working out which kit works best for younger players

ounger players are an important group of skirmishers that are regularly overlooked in the airsoft community.

Thankfully Airsoft Action has begun to buck this trend through its Young Guns articles which gives a valuable perspective from the younger player’s perspective, now Michael Buttrick and Nick Lawrence look to continue this good work by looking at a sample of the loadouts available for younger players to use and what may be the best option for smaller players.

At a recent game a young player complained of a headache. It was one of the hottest days of the year (around 25°C with no cloud cover)

1. DPM CHEST RIG

A more compact piece of equipment, due to its design the chest rig sits comfortably across the torso. We felt it would be easier for smaller players to access the pouches, too.

Kristian rated this kit as his favourite: “You can reach the pockets easier, it is light and comfortable, though it is awkward to get on and off.

“You don’t notice it is there until you need to get something out.”

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and the player was carrying around an AEG with full magazines and was wearing a full-face mask and tac vest. Despite several warnings in the safety brief he hadn’t thought to take out any water. Mike gave the player a drink and suggested he remove his vest at lunch to carry less weight.

We rarely consider the weight we are carrying around at games. Neither of us is a shining example of masculine physicality, but we are not particularly small. We found out a long time ago what load-out suited us best and what weight we can carry without straining ourselves. A few days later we talked through

the issue; it was obvious to us both that younger players, while vastly smaller than the average adult, will still try to carry the same kit.

What is the best kit for a younger player to use though?

We called upon the help of Kristian, 12 years old and a regular player at our local club.

He’s typical of the younger demographic that we encounter as marshals and players, and his opinion would be invaluable in finding out which load-out is best for the smaller player.

We gave Kristian the opportunity to try on all of the different pieces of equipment and to get into shooting positions while wearing them

2. PLATECARRIER

The platecarrier was included as it is such a common piece of kit in airsoft these days, though at £100 for an average item it may well be out of the price range of younger players.

This was Kristian’s second favourite: “It’s good for carrying things and easy to get to the pockets; it is difficult to get on but once on it feels heavy but fine.

“I like the style and the amount of easy access pockets.”

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YOUNG GUNS | KIT CHOICES so that he could get the feel of how each one would restrict his movement.

We also asked him to access the different pouches to find how easy it was to get to magazines and equipment. This last point was one of the most vital issues – after all it’s equipment designed for an adult with longer limbs.

For the purposes of this article we have chosen: DPM Chest Rig, Tan Platecarrier with MOLLE pouches, Personal Load Carrying Equipment (PLCE), Olive Green Belt Rig with pouches, and a DPM Tac Vest.

Conclusion We were quite surprised by this result; we thought Kristian would lean more towards the lighter and compact equipment. The plate carrier was his second favourite and when we asked if his choice was influenced by console games he stated that it wasn’t – he simply liked the design.

On a very hot day it may be better for younger players to choose the chest or belt rig, or the PLCE, as the lack of weight will cause less water loss and help avoid dehydration.

3. PLCE

The PLCE was included as it is a good piece of equipment that allows the player to balance the weight they are carrying on their hips, rather the torso.

Ranked behind the chest rig and platecarrier, Kristian said: “It is quite light and easy on the shoulder; it’s fairly easy to get to the pockets and easy to get on and off.”

The tac vest may be a better option than the platecarrier as it is lighter weight and has a vented back piece to stay cooler. For winter conditions the platecarrier and tac vest could be better, as the increased weight of the kit will keep you warm when the temperature drops.

Younger players should think wisely about what kit they want to buy – the kit that looks the coolest may not be the best choice for you.

You may want to consider different load-outs for winter and summer games, but whatever you do choose get out there and have some fun!

4. BELT RIG

The belt rig was chosen for similar reasons to the PLCE, but didn’t impress Kristian – the design doesn’t work so well for smaller players.

Kristian summed up the belt rig: “It is light, easy to get on and take off and the pockets are easy to get to.

“The straps didn’t give much support and felt loose, and it was obvious it is meant for someone bigger.”

5. TAC VEST

The tac vest ranked last in Kristian’s list, surprising as it is a lightweight design falling between the platecarrier and chest rig.

Kristian said: “It has loads of pockets and is fairly light; the pockets are easy to reach and it is easy to move when wearing it.”

www.airsoftactionmagazine.com

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With a business model emphasising free content over paid-for advantages, PlanetSide 2 could be a revolution in MMOs. Alex Wharton gets in on the beta action

H

aving managed to get an invite to the PlanetSide 2 beta I thought I’d write a preview to get you all excited for it. I need more players to shoot at after all! By the time you read this it may well be out and have changed greatly, but currently there’s no official release date so who knows?

The original PlanetSide was released in 2003, and while older PC gamers may hold it dear it had some pretty serious issues that made it a little frustrating to play. That aside it broke ground that even to this day no other game has attempted. It is the original Massively Multiplayer Online First-Person Shooter and while others have popped up over the years, none come close to the scale of PlanetSide.

The game is based around the planet of Auraxis and the three factions fighting for control over it. The map currently in the game is 64km/sq of uninterrupted fighting ground. It’s truly huge, and if the original is anything to

082

go by there will be multiple content expansions too.

The land is broken up into areas with small outposts to sneak in and take or huge bases that will require some serious force to out the opposition.

Picking the side you will fight for quickly becomes a matter of pride.

Your faction becomes your home and you will fight to the death for it (usually many times over!).

The three races are: Terran Republic, New Conglomerate and Vanu Sovereignty. The Terrran are the government-backed military force and the powerhouse on the planet. Their ideals are built around the premise of peace through war. They are the red team and usually the most populous as newer players usually join in droves.

The New Conglomerate are the rebels and freedom fighters. They fight against the Terran Republic to gain their freedom and are represented by blue on the map.

The Vanu Sovereignty are the new

thinkers of the human race, believing that humans need to evolve by adopting alien technology. They are represented by purple and have some of the most powerful weaponry of all the factions. They are built around speed and stealth, so hit hard and fast, utilising laser and plasma weaponry.

No matter which faction you choose there are seven classes to pick from, each with its own strengths and weaknesses. Nothing is quite as simple as it seems here though: even the Light Assault class, the basic all-rounder, comes equipped with a jetpack allowing you to launch onto roofs and over walls.

Strike fast from the skies!

Through Medic, Infiltrator and MAX Suit, the classes are hugely varied and the range of abilities and weaknesses makes teamwork vital. Each class has different weapons you can unlock and extra abilities or equipment to lug around.

You can also change the way the class is played. For example, on my

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MEDIA REVIEW | PLANETSIDE 2

Heavy Assault class I have unlocked a foregrip and a 3.5x scope. This means I can sit at range and suppress players as they assault instead of getting right up close. I’ve also unlocked a 10x sniper scope for those extra-long range shots.

Next I’ll be looking to pick up some explosive packs so I don’t need to waste my rocket ammo on stationary items.

There are a number of different vehicles you can purchase. From the small one-man quad bike used to get you into the action to the massive Galaxy support craft which holds a huge number of players and acts as a resupply and respawn point. There are also some light or heavy gunships, a couple of tanks and a big APC. Vehicles are customisable too.

The game is ultimately free-to-play.

You create an account, download the game and you can get stuck straight in – no initial outlay required. While most games using this model require players to sink real money into their character in order to be competitive,

PlanetSide 2 is set to challenge the ‘pay to win’ model. The game’s ‘cash shop’ doesn’t sell guns and vehicles that give players a clear advantage; instead it sells equipment already obtainable in the game, as well as exclusive visual customisations and 24-hour ‘XP boosters’. There is a small amount of exclusive paid-for content, players unwilling to part with real money can use in-game currency to unlock the majority of the upgrades.

Hopefully we won’t have to wait too long for PlanetSide 2. I would urge everyone to give it a go. The first time you roll out of a base in a tank, with

another 30 beside you, squads in APCs behind with gunships and Galaxys overhead, you will realise exactly what PlanetSide 2 is about – combat on a truly epic scale!

PLANETSIDE 2 DEVELOPED BY: Sony Online Entertainment

PUBLISHED BY: Sony Online Entertainment PLATFORMS: Microsoft Windows Release date unconfirmed (2012) www.planetside2.com

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SITE DIRECTORY Find somewhere to be this weekend…

SYMBOL KEY

Is it woodland or urban?

Check the key!

UKARA

UKARA MEMBER UKASGB MEMBER WOODLAND

£

SHOP ONSITE BATTERY CHARGING URBAN PYROS ALLOWED REPAIR SERVICE DESERT

ATROOP AIRSOFT

Clocaenog Forest, LL16 4SP 07967 394976 www.atroop.co.uk

ABSOLUTE AIRSOFT

Maidenhead, SL6 3SS 07871 314951 www.absolute-airsoft.co.uk

ACE AIRSOFT WAR GAMES Penkridge, ST19 5RE 07786 192832 www.aceairsoft.co.uk

ACE COMBAT

Kent, TN12 7DG 01303 814803 www.acecombat.co.uk

AIRBORNE 101 AIRSOFT CLUB Downpatrick, Co. Down, BT30 07718 032541 robinsonm24@btinternet.com

AIRSOFT ASYLUM

North Lanarksire, ML7 5 www.airsoftasylum.webs.com ayrsoft@gmail.com

084

AIRSOFT COMMANDOS Sutton, near Ferrybridge 07723 061386 andyace@ntlworld.com

AIRSOFT KGB

Porkellis Moor near Helston, Cornwall, TR13 0 Chef1322@hotmail.com www.kgbairsoft.com.

AIRSOFT SKIRMISH

Stoulton, WR7 4QW 07764 587410 www.airsoftskirmish.co.uk

ALPHA ELITE GAMING

Le Mont de Rozel, Jersey, JE3 5 01534 733697 www.aegairsoft.je

AMBUSH ADVENTURES – SOUTHAMPTON

New Forest National Park, SP5 2DW 01252 315225 www.ambushadventures.co.uk

AMAZON EVENTS

Hellingly, East Sussex, BN27 4HL 0844 2570433 www.amazonoutdoorevents.co.uk

AMBUSH ADVENTURES – CHOBHAM

Chobham, Surrey, GU24 8SL 01252 315225 www.ambushadventures.co.uk

APOCALYPSE AIRSOFT

Sittingbourne, Kent, ME9 7QP 07872 348 576 www.apocalypseairsoft.com

ARENA AIRSOFT

Grimsby, DN31 3JD 07752 404060 www.arenaairsoft.com

AIRSOFT SKIRMISH CQB

Studley, B80 7LY 07764 587410 www.airsoftskirmish.co.uk

AIRSOFT XCALIBRE

Macclesfield, SK10 4SZ 07921 837658 www.airsoft-xcalibre.co.uk

ALL ARMS AIRSOFT

Near Trawden, BB8 8SN 07909 683464 www.allarmsairsoft.co.uk

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AIRSOFT SITES | DIRECTORY Huge thanks to our friends at Airbana (www.airsoftmap.net) for supplying data!

AWA HERTS

Sawbridgeworth, Herts, CM23 4BJ 07732 184957 www.awaherts.com

CERBERUS AIRSOFT - RIVOCK EDGE

Keighley, BD20 0LS 07891 469492 www.cerberusairsoft.co.uk

BARNSLEY AIRSOFT

Shafton, Barnsley, S72 8RE 07779 236166 www.barnsleypaintball.co.uk

BATTLETEC AIRSOFT

La Couture, Guernsey, GY1 2 07781 104068 www.battletec.co.uk

BETTER BATTLES

Ravenshead, Notts, NG15 9DH 07967 940043 www.better-battles.com

BRAVO 2-2 AIRSOFT

Leisure Lakes, Mere Brow, Southport. PR46JX 07790 715059 www.bravo22airsoft.com

CERBERUS AIRSOFT SHEFFIELD WOODLAND

Sheffield, S6 6JE 07891 469492 www.cerberusairsoft.co.uk

CLOSE ACTION AIRSOFT Corby, NN17 3BB 07740 165787 www.close-action.co.uk

DOGS OF WAR

FINMERE AIRSOFT

DRAGON’S LAIR

FIREBALL SQUADRON

DRAGON VALLEY AIRSOFT

FIRST AND ONLY – ANZIO CAMP

Houston, Renfrewshire, PA6 7BP 07853 195290 www.dow-airsoft.co.uk

Brentwood, Essex, CM15 0LA 07703 530189 www.dragonslairairsoft.co.uk

Caerwent Training Area, South Wales, NP26 5XL 07921 336360 www.dragonvalley.co.uk

EAST MIDLANDS AIRSOFT COMBAT ACTION GAMES

Maryland, Norfolk, NR10 4 01328 711867 www.combatactiongames.co.uk

COMBAT SOUTH URBAN

Earlswood, B94 6SF 0844 870 9785 www.sabreforce.co.uk

ELITE ACTION GAMES – DORKING

Portsmouth, PO6 3LS 02392 655636 www.combatsouth.co.uk

Dorking, Surrey, RH5 5AB 01784 433023 www.eliteactiongames.com

COMBAT SOUTH WOODLAND

ELITE ACTION GAMES – EPSOM

BRISTOL AIRSOFT

Bristol, BS1 2HQ 07776 288826 www.bristolairsoft.com

Fareham, PO17 5ND 02392 655636 www.combatsouth.co.uk

BRIT-TAC AIRSOFT

Sheffield, S2 5TR 07795 631331 www.brittacairsoft.com

CONTACT! FIGHT SCHOOL

Kelvedon Hatch, Essex, CM14 5 01438 368177 www.thefightschool.demon.co.uk

BUNKER 51

Charlton, SE7 8NJ 0870 7549653 www.wolfarmouries.co.uk

COOL UNDER FIRE

Doddington, Kent, ME9 0JS 07960 532613 www.coolunderfire.co.uk

C3 TACTICAL

Longhope, Gloucestershire, GL17 0PH 07597 938011 www.c3tactical.co.uk

CERBERUS AIRSOFT - THE COMPLEX

Horsforth, Leeds LS18 4RP 07891 469492 www.cerberusairsoft.co.uk

CERBERUS AIRSOFT - THE SANDPIT

Bradford, BD2 1BQ 07891 469492 www.cerberusairsoft.co.uk

CORNWALL AIRSOFT ASSAULT

Truro, Cornwall, TR2 07837 475012 www.cornwallairsoftassault.co.uk

Epsom, Surrey, KT18 01784 433023 www.eliteactiongames.com

ELITE ACTION GAMES – WORTHING

Worthing, BN13 01784 433023 www.eliteactiongames.com

DELTA TEAM 3

Skelmersdale, Lancashire WN8 8UT 07986 053076 www.deltateam3.co.uk

Sutton Coldfield, B75 5SA 07582 684533 www.fireballsquadron.com

Leek, ST13 8 07862 288359 www.firstandonlyairsoft.com

FIRST AND ONLY – BATTLE LAKES

Royal Tunbridge Wells, TN3 9AP 07862 288359 www.firstandonlyairsoft.com

FIRST AND ONLY – BUNKER WOOD

Kidderminster, Worcs, DY11 5SA 07862 288359 www.firstandonlyairsoft.com

FIRST AND ONLY – KHE SANH WOODS

Otley, West Yorkshire LS21 2NA 07862 288359 www.firstandonlyairsoft.com

FIRST AND ONLY – MANCHESTER WOODLAND Bolton, BL7 9TS 07862 288359 www.firstandonlyairsoft.com

ELITE BATTLEZONE

Bexley, Greater London, DA5 1NX 07968 448475 www.elitebattlezone.co.uk

FIRST AND ONLY – THE ASYLUM

Kidderminster, DY10 3PT 07862 288359 www.firstandonlyairsoft.com

EXPERIENCE AIRSOFT

Swindon, Wiltshire, SN5 0AN 01380 728982 www.experienceairsoft.co.uk

CUMBRIA AIRSOFT

Dumfries, DG12 cumbria.airsoft@virgin.net www.cumbria-airsoft.com

Buckingham, MK18 4JT 07976 184897 www.finmereairsoft.com

FIREFIGHT COMBAT SIMULATIONS

Lewisham, SE13 5SU 07973 240177 www.firefight.co.uk

FIRST AND ONLY – THE EMBASSY

Leicester, LE2 6EA 07862 288359 www.firstandonlyairsoft.com

FIRST AND ONLY – THE MALL Reading, RG1 1NR 07862 288359 www.firstandonlyairsoft.com

FIFE WARGAMES

St Andrews, KY10 3XL info@fifewargames.co.uk www.fifewargames.com

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SITE DIRECTORY Find somewhere to be this weekend…

LAC SITE 3

Saxillby, LN1 2JW 07775 877057 www.lincolnshireairsoftclub.co.uk

LAC SITE 5

Kirton Rd, North Lincs, DN16 07775 877057 www.lincolnshireairsoftclub.co.uk

LINDSEY AIRSOFT

Manby, Lincolnshire, LN11 8HE 07955 487983 www.lindsey-airsoft.co.uk

FREE FIRE ZONE

Farcet, Peterborough, PE7 3DH 01733 247171 www.freefirezone.co.uk

FRV AIRSOFT

Annacloy, Downpatrick, BT30 8JJ 07730 586926 www.frvairsoft.com

GASS AIRSOFT – PENN

Penn Bottom, Bucks, HP10 07907 788970 www.gassairsoft.co.uk

GASS AIRSOFT – PIDDINGTON

Piddington, Oxfordshire, OX25 1 07907 788970 www.gassairsoft.co.uk

HIGHLAND TACTICAL AIRSOFT IV25 3PY 07702 846090 www.highlandtacticalairsoft.co.uk

HILTON PARK AIRSOFT

Wolverhampton, WV10 7HU 08000 354490 www.paintballuk.com

GREENZONE COMBAT

Co. Armagh, BT60 1NE 07772 919974 www.greenzonecombat.com

Spanby, Lincs, NG34 0AT 07971 560249 facebook.com/HomelandTacticalAirsoft

INVICTA AIRSOFT – RAINDEN WOODS

Folkestone, Kent, CT18 7AY 01227 763335 www.invictaairsoft.co.uz

ISLAND RECON AIRSOFT COMBAT

Near Shorwell, Isle of Wight, PO30 07964 751047 www.islandrecon.co.uk

LAND WARRIOR AIRSOFT GUN HO AIRSOFT

Guisborough, TS7 0PG 07525 435696 www.gunhoairsoft.co.uk

Gorebridge, Midlothian, EH23 4LG 0131 654 2452 www.airsoftedinburgh.co.uk

LAC SITE 1 GUNMAN AIRSOFT – CAMBRIDGE

Bury St Edmunds, Suffolk, IP28 07854 277264 www.gunmanairsoft.co.uk

GUNMAN AIRSOFT – NORWICH Norwich, Norfolk, NR10 07854 277264 www.gunmanairsoft.co.uk

086

Matlock, Derbyshire, DE4 5FW 07974 507166 www.matlockcombatgames.com

MAW

Melton Mowbray, Leicestershire, LE14 07562 479966 maw.airsoft@hotmail.com

HOMELAND TACTICAL AIRSOFT

GRANGE FARM AIRSOFT

Leicester, LE9 9FP www.gingerliberationfront.com

MATLOCK COMBAT GAMES

MIA

Cornwall, EX23 9JL 01288 331748 www.airsoftsouthwest.co.uk

Northfleet, Kent, DA11 9AA 07968 448475 www.elitebattlezone.co.uk

NSC AIRSOFT

Hetton, Sunderland, DH5 0 07983 333521 www.nscairsoft.co.uk

NTAC

Durham, DL4 2ER 01642 281220 www.ntac.co.uk

OBAN AIRSOFT – HILL ARGYLL Argyll and Bute, PA37 1 07967 710185 www.argyllsurplus.com

OP-TACTICAL UK – TEAN-OPS Tean, Staffordshire, ST10 4JT 07964 990831 www.op-tac.co.uk

PATHFINDER GROUP AIRSOFT MILITARY SIMULATION Former RAF Camp Sopley/ Merryfield Park, Hants, BH23 02380 899369

PHOENIX AIRSOFT MILITARY OUTDOOR ADVENTURES

Wrightington, WN6 9PL 01942 514724 www.*militaryoutdooradventure. co.uk

MILSIM UK

Checkley, Staffordshire, ST10 4NS 07523 916607 www.milsimuk.co.uk

Budby, Notts, NG22 9FG 01623 812483 www.phoenix-airsoft.co.uk

PLATOON 1HQ

Rochester, Kent, ME1 1 HQ 01634 829063 www.ptt-1hq.co.uk

PLAYERS OF WAR

High Bonnybridge, FK1 3AD 07767 203979 www.playersofwar.co.uk

NCIS AIRSOFT

Edinburgh, EH14 4 nick@ncis-airsoft.co.uk www.ncis-airsoft.co.uk

Gainsborough, North Lincs, DN21 4JH 07775 877057 www.lincolnshireairsoftclub.co.uk

NOMAD AIRSOFT

LAC SITE 2

NORTHERN ALLIANCE AIRSOFT

Gainsborough, North Lincs, DN21 4JH 07775 877057 www.lincolnshireairsoftclub.co.uk

NORTHFLEET CQB

Fenwick, Ayrshire, KA3 6AY 07904 998250 www.nomadairsoft.com

Thirsk, North Yorkshire, YO7 3LQ 01845 565465 www.northernallianceairsoft.co.uk

PREDATOR COMBAT GAMES Ballynahinch, BT24 8NF 028 4377 0566 www.predatorcombat.com

RAVEN’S NEST

Suffolk, IP8 4 01473 831563 www.ravensairsoft.co.uk

RAW WAR AIRSOFT CUMBRIA Wigton, Cumbria CA7 3SZ 01900 85645 www.airsoftcumbria.co.uk

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AIRSOFT SITES | DIRECTORY Huge thanks to our friends at Airbana (www.airsoftmap.net) for supplying data!

RIFT AIRSOFT COM’S SITE 3 Chipping Warden, OX17 1LZ 07751 586781 www.riftairsoft.com

07766 770830 www.southdownairsoft.com

TA EVENTS

Hemel Hemstead, Herts, HP2 7QB 07894 059794 www.ta-events.co.uk

SPEC OPS AIRSOFT – BLOXWORTH RIFT AIRSOFT (COTTENHAM) Cambridge, CB24 8RL 07751 586781 www.riftairsoft.com

Wareham, Dorset, BH20 7EU 07984 656947 www.specopsairsoft.co.uk

TACTICAL WALES AIRSOFT

Reynoldston, Swansea SA3 1AS 01792 473336 www.tacticalwales.co.uk

SPEC OPS AIRSOFT – THE ROCK SECTION 8 AIRSOFT

Shotts, N Lanarkshire, ML7 5AB 07974 026517 www.s8airsoft.com

Portland, Dorset, DT5 2EG 07984 656947 www.specopsairsoft.co.uk

UCAP GREEN OPS

Linch, West Sussex, GU30 7 07590 818881 www.ucap.co.uk

UCAP SANDPIT

Bean, Kent, DA2 8 07590 818881 www.ucap.co.uk

TACTICAL WARFARE AIRSOFT

ULTIMATE WARGAMES – FAWKHAM

TASK FORCE SKIRMISH

ULTIMATE WARGAMES – LIMPSFIELD

Warlingham, Surrey, CR6 9PL 020 8665 1299 www.tacticalwarfare.co.uk

Fawkham, Kent, DA3 8NY 01268 796130 www.ultimatewargames.co.uk

STIRLING AIRSOFT SECTION 8 AIRSOFT

Shotts, N Lanarkshire, ML7 5AB 07974 026517 www.s8airsoft.com

Coventry, CV3 6NX 07831 429407 www.stirlingairsoft.com

Cowbridge, S Glamorgan, CF71 02920 593900 www.taskforcepaintball.co.uk

Oxted, Surrey, RH8 0RH www.ultimatewargames.co.uk

STORMFORCE AIRSOFT SG1 COMBAT GAMES

Co. Londonderry, BT45 8NA 07713 273102 www.sg1combatgames.co.uk

SKIRMISH AIRSOFT BILLERICAY

Billericay, Essex, CM11 2TX 01277 657777 www.airsoft-billericay.co.uk

SKIRMISH EXETER

Exeter, Devon, EX4 5 01548 580025 www.airsoftexeter.co.uk

SOUTHDOWN AIRSOFT

Petworth, West Sussex, GU28 0LR

Rugeley, Staffordshire, WS15 4LD 07515 937633 www.stormforcepaintball.co.uk

SUSSEX AIRSOFT

Slinfold, RH12 020 8150 9284 www.sussexairsoft.co.uk

SW WAR GAMES – SCRAESDON FORT

Antony, Cornwall, PL11 3AB 08456 345011 www.swwargames.co.uk

SW WAR GAMES – TREGANTLE FORT

Antony, Cornwall, PL11 3AZ 08456 345011 www.swwargames.co.uk

THE DESERTERS AIRSOFT

URBAN6AIRSOFT – ZONE 13

THE EX SITE

URBAN6AIRSOFT – IVYWOOD

Redford, DD11 07751 878175 www.thedeserters.co.uk

Mold, CH7 4 07840 001975 www.theexsitewales.co.uk

Stone, Staffordshire ST15 0QN 07432 291729 www.urban6airsoft.com

Elmhurst, Lichfield WS13 8EU www.urban6airsoft.com

URBAN6AIRSOFT THE WARGAMES CENTRE

Stevenston, Ayrshire, KA20 3LN 08456 434326 www.scottishadventurecentre.co.uk

UCAP AIRSOFT

Portsmouth, Hants, PO17 6AR 07590 818881 www.ucap.co.uk

Stone, Staffordshire, ST15 0QN www.urban6airsoft.com

URBAN ASSAULT

Ramsey, Cambridgeshire, PE26 1 01733 247171 www.urbanassault.org.uk

VIKING AIRSOFT

Welwyn, Hertfordshire, AL6 0UN www.vikingairsoft.co.uk

WARMINSTER AIRSOFT

Warminster, BA12 7RZ www.warminsterairsoft.co.uk

XSITE AIRSOFT OUTPOST Dunstable, LU6 2EE 01494 881430 www.xsiteairsoft.co.uk

XSITE AIRSOFT – LANE END High Wycombe, HP14 3NP 01494 881430

Email anthonyp@ blazepublishing.co.uk to add or change a site listing

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..... 29 ..... 35 ..... 36 ..... 88 ..... 36 ..... 35 ..... 43 ..... 30 ..... 88 ..... 30 23, 88 ..... 15 . 2, 88 15, 88 ..... 30 ..... 24 88, 92 ....... 7 ..... 88 ....... 8 35, 88 ..... 36 ..... 91 ..... 45 51, 88 ..... 24

DEALER LISTINGS

ADVERTISERS INDEX Action Hobbies .......................................................................29 Airsoft Innovations ................................................................35 BadgerTac .............................................................................36 Badger Tac 2 .........................................................................88 Combat Action Games ............................................................36 Dragon Valley Airsoft LTD .....................................................35 Edgar Brothers ......................................................................43 Enola Gaye ............................................................................30 First & Only Airsoft ...............................................................88 Gunman Airsoft .....................................................................30 JD Airsoft ........................................................................23, 88 Just BB Guns Ltd ...................................................................15 Land Warrier Airsoft ........................................................2, 88 Military 1st......................................................................15, 88 Outdoor Pursuits / No VAT ....................................................30 Patrol Base ............................................................................24 Pro Airsoft Supplies .....................................................3, 88, 92 Redwolf ...................................................................................7 Shoot n’ Scoot ........................................................................88 Socom Tactical.........................................................................8 Surplus Store...................................................................35, 88 Tactical Airsoft UK Ltd .........................................................36 Thatchreed ............................................................................91 TLSFx Ltd .............................................................................45 Wolf Armouries ...............................................................51, 88 Xsite Airsoft Ltd ....................................................................24

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November 2012

17/9/12 18:25:11

AIRSOFT

ACTION

BOOKSHOP

Total War - SRP £25.00

The Retreat - SRP £10.99

AA Price £21.00

AA Price £9.00

Tank Men - SRP £8.99

Never Surrender - SRP £8.99

SAS Operation Storm - SRP £25.00

Kill Switch - SRP £6.99

The Kill Zone (hdbk) - SRP £18.99

The Kill Zone (pbk) - SRP £6.99

AA Price £6.00

Killing for the Company (hdbk) SRP £18.99 AA Price £16.00

Soldiers Pocket Book - SRP £10.00

Cadet Pocket Book - SRP £8.00

Air Cadet Pocket Book - SRP £8.00

Army Cadet’s Log Book - SRP £4.00

Skill at Arms - SRP £6.50

AA Price £7.50

AA Price £16.00

AA Price £7.50

AA Price £7.50

AA Price £7.50

AA Price £21.00

AA Price £3.50

AA Price £6.00

AA Price £9.00

AA Price £5.00

www.airsoftactionmagazine.com

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Visit www.virtualnewsagent.com for these fantastic offers. Either fill in the form below – don’t forget to put a tick by the books you’re ordering – and post/fax to us, or call us on the number at the bottom Title

Author

Category

SRP

AA price

Tank Men

Robert Kershaw

Non-fiction 1112-001

Code

£8.99

£7.50

Never Surrender

Robert Kershaw

Non-fiction 1112-002

£8.99

£7.50

Total War

Michael Jones

Non-fiction 1112-003

£25.00

£21.00

The Retreat

Michael Jones

Non-fiction 1112-004

£10.99

£9.00

SAS Operation Storm

Roger Cole & Richard Belfield

Non-fiction 1112-005

£18.99

£16.00

Kill Switch

Bill Shaw

Non-fiction 1112-006

£6.99

£6.00

The Kill Zone

Chris Ryan

Fiction

1112-007

£18.99

£16.00

The Kill Zone

Chris Ryan

Fiction

1112-008

£6.99

£6.00

Killing for the Company

Chris Ryan

Fiction

1112-009

£18.99

£16.00

Soldiers Pocket Book

Maj John Hobbis Harris(retd), Rupert Godeson and John H Harris

Non-fiction 1112-010

£10.00

£9.00

Cadet’s Pocket Book

Maj John Hobbis Harris(retd)

Non-fiction 1112-011

£8.00

£7.50

Air Cadet Pocket Book

Maj John Hobbis Harris(retd)

Non-fiction 1112-012

£8.00

£7.50

Army Cadet Log Book

Maj John Hobbis Harris(retd)

Non-fiction 1112-013

£4.00

£3.50

Skill at Arms And Shooting

Maj John Hobbis Harris(retd)

Non-fiction 1112-014

£6.50

£5.00

World War II StreetFighting Tactics

Stephen Bull

Non-fiction

1112-015

£11.99

£10.00

World War II Infantry Assault Tactics

Gordon L Rottman

Non-fiction

1112-016

£11.99

£10.00

Pegasus Bridge Benouville 1944

Will Fowler

Non-fiction

1112-017

£11.99

£10.00

Soldier I – the Story of an SAS Hero

Pete Winner

Non-fiction

1112-018

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Special Operations Forces in Iraq

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Fairbairn-Sykes Commando Dagger

Leroy Thompson

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The Rocket Propelled Grenade

Gordon L Rottman

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Elite:160 World War II Infantry Assault Tactics - SRP £11.99

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Soldier I – The Story of an SAS Hero - SRP £8.99

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