Home
Avoid these 5 Common Airsoft
Beginner Mistakes

Airsoft is an amazing community that one can easily join. There aren’t a lot of barriers to entry but there are some common mistakes you see with new players from time to time.

Here are the five biggest mistakes that new airsoft players make.


Sniper as a First Gun

It’s pretty common for those new to airsoft to go the sniper route, but this is also one of the most common mistakes for several reasons.

Sniping in airsoft is nothing like sniping in the real world. Airsoft sniper rifles don’t shoot very far, BBs can be disrupted by leaves, and often an airsoft sniper rifle isn’t any more accurate than any other airsoft rifle. Good airsoft sniper rifles are also expensive and have a slower rate of fire.

Real sniping can be quite tiresome as it involves a lot of patience and stillness. And there is no guarantee that you get to snipe anyone.

Trust me, it's a lot more fun to run and gun than to snipe. If you want some extra range and a sniper-like role, look into being a designated marksman.

A DM moves with a regular squad but may hang back in a firefight to make well-placed shots. In a pinch, they can instantly swap to a normal infantry role and start laying down fire.


Accessorising Too Much

It’s a lot of fun to have a rifle that can accept accessories. It’s very tempting to slap everything you possibly can on a rifle and roll with it. This includes an optic, a laser, flashlight, bipod, angled foregrip, and more.

While some accessories can be handy for some roles, they aren’t always needed. They tend to increase the weight of your gun and increase its price too. Before you begin slamming accessories on a rifle, examine how you play.

• Are you in the prone position a lot? If not, a bipod is useless.
• Do you play at night? If not, the flashlight is useless.
• Can you see and use the laser?

You see where I am going here? The two accessories I’d recommend are a good sling and a decent little red dot. The red dot is optional.

Not Focusing on Physical Fitness

Airsoft is an action sport. It requires a lot of moving, shooting, sprints and more. If you want to be a serious player, it’s good to be in shape. You need to be able to transition between multiple shooting positions rapidly.

Being healthy and physically fit isn’t just important to be a good player, but also to avoid injury. This includes little injuries like pulled muscles and more severe tears and pulls.

You are likely going to be playing outside and in the heat. If you aren’t in solid shape, acclimated, and eating and drinking healthy, you can sustain a heat injury. This includes heat stroke which can put you in the hospital.

Remember to focus on your physical self to be a safe and be and efficient player.

Boneyard
Airsoft Tactical
Manual
A Guest Post by
J.W.Hurcomb



We have a great guest post for airsofters who love their tactics, want to improve their game, outwit and dominate their battle space - or simply just love the action. This guest post covers a publication written by its author J.W Hurcomb which covers all sorts of tactical hints, tips and scenarios - aimed at beginners AND seasoned players - the publication is free to download and is donation funded.

I'll it to its author to take it from here:

"Recently I finished writing an Airsoft manual specifically regarding tactics. The manual took players from individual skills that a beginner would want to know all the way to squad tactics with radio, voice and hand communication thrown in between chapters. You can find the manual at http://gum.co/airsofttactics where it’s put up as pay what you want. Read it first then pay what you feel it’s worth afterwards.

A heavily researched tactical manual written with airsofters in mind. From the beginner player wanting to learn the skills to come better to the experienced team wanting advanced tactics to strengthen their game. This manual has it all.

Today, I want to discuss counter flanking for a two man team. I think we can all agree that flanking is quickly learnt by beginners and is one of the basic tactics used to help win games. Being able to counter a flank by the enemy is in my definition one of the essential techniques to classify yourself as an experienced team. If your team has the ability to counter a flank you can stop their push forwards and launch your own counter attack.

Our two man green army Fire Team (FT), is stuck behind this bunker. The white player at the top is providing suppressing fire while the white player to the right is flanking them to launch an assault.

The first step this FT takes is to form a basic two man wedge formation. One player in front the other, the other slightly behind and to one side. The man at the front will engage with the white player providing suppressing fire. Best case he can stop his suppression, if he can’t achieve this he wants to disrupt the suppression. The player behind is going to focus on the assaulting white player. He needs to slow him down either by getting him to give up on assaulting and engage the green player from where he is or firing at him so he can’t move down the line as fast.

This is the critical moment in the game. The suppressing green player needs to get the suppressing white player to put his head down so that our assaulting green player can dash across the field and if at all possible he should try to fire at the assaulting white player to stop him from shooting at our player.

If the green player does not get across and gets hit, the other player should fall back straight away. He won’t be able to hold this position without support.

With our green player safely behind the barrels and engaging the white player on the right we are now at a stalemate. The game now comes down to either individual skill of which player can hit the other or a better option radioing or communication to your team for reinforcements to tip the scale in your favour. Though this tactic didn’t get the green team a win, it didn’t cause them to lose which is most certainly the case if the white team had finished their flanking operation.

This tactic and more are explained in just as much detail in the Airsoft Tactics Manual which can be found on http://gum.co/airsofttactics.

Train hard, Fight easy.

KitbagQuarterMaster
Mil-Tec Tactical
Metal Wire Goggles
- Reviewed by Yosser

Boneyard
Have YOU changed to
LiPo's Yet?



Have you made the transition to LIPO's yet?

Gunfire now hold a great range of LiPo's to suit most AEG's and the quality is outstanding. Psst!.....Rumour has it that Gunfire have sourced these from the same factory that produce Lipo's for use by the Chinese Republic's Peoples Liberation Army - and we all know that like most military organisations quality and reliability will be high on their list of priorities. The range Gunfire have available covers your standard 7.4 and 11.1 ranges in a good variety of milliamp hours, physical sizes and currents 20c & 25c - plus if you want BIGGER even a 14.8volts LiPo.

Now, lots of players are still wary when about using LiPo's - I will admit to not being an early adopter of the technology myself but just a few simple precautions are all it takes, as we've all heard the horror stories surrounding LiPo's.

SiG552 Commando with easy to fit LiPo

Simple LiPo Precautions include:

• Never leave a battery unattended whilst charging (use charging bags where necessary)
• Never over charge or try to charge too quickly.
• Always use a balance charger (a good quality charger should ALWAYS be used) and set it correctly for the number of cells and charge rate required
• Never flatten your battery - use a LiPo alarm or as soon as you notice the ROF drop change the battery in your AEG
• Faulty batteries should be replaced (if your battery 'balloons' up please dispose of it!)
• DO NOT short the battery out!

Boneyard
The Joy of
PLINKING!

As airsofters we have all had the odd ‘plink’ at a tin can or two in the back garden. Whether that’s to ‘scope’ in a new AEG or GBB pistol/rifle or making on-going tweaks and adjustments to hop or its general setup ‘plinking’ brings its own joys from time to time.

Tin cans have their charms and give a satisfying ‘plink’ when hit and I’ve even drawn up my own targets on some scrap paper but I decided to take a closer look at ‘range’ ideas and soon realised the limitations of a few systems. Here’s a brief overview of my ‘findings’, hardly scientific and sometime ‘obvious’ I hope this helps some of you to obtain a better ‘plinking’ experience.

Tin Cans
Easily obtained, but need replacing or resetting every time you knock them down (you could place them on sticks however). These shred too easily for my liking and are likely to cut you if not handled correctly when they have been well used. Again, no scoring or measure of accuracy. Very satisfying when hit though, probably where 'plinking' got its name.


Chalk Targets
Chalk targets like the TARIAN MARKS targets reviewed here: http://www.airsoftodyssey.blogspot.co.uk/2013/03/tarian-marks-targets.html these are great and give a very satisfying break and powder wisp when shot at but the mess they make, makes them a bit of a pain to clean up at the end of the day!


Steel knock down Targets
I use these a LOT – and are a great re-usable target but you do have to hit them with some force and they don’t always knock down first time depending upon how you set them. With these however you just know if you’ve knocked them down with no scoring rings on them, but great for timed runs and such like but they are very expensive.


Paper Targets
A Great cheap system and one that you can easily sort yourself, with a DIY option and if you spend some time searching print off options available via a few websites. The draw backs for me though are the print costs when you realise just how quickly you’ll run out of printer ink! Plus depending upon the shooting ranges involved these targets can rip through far too readily!



Heavy Card Targets
Again these are more expensive to purchase in comparison to paper targets but were originally designed for use with airgun pellets at a much higher fps and weight, so at a distance can be difficult for airsoft BB’s to penetrate. Not ideal for airsoft use depending upon your distance from the target.


170GSM Paper Targets
The best of all worlds really on this one and the most successful of the lot for both private or range use for competition and scoring use. The paper is of a heavier weight but not too thick for airsoft BB’s to penetrate than card. The paper weight makes for cleaner penetration of the round and less confusing tears in the paper. Obtaining pre-printed targets in colour also helps with aiming and sight acquisition as well as scoring at a distance. I love these targets so much I’ve had some ‘custom’ designs made up which will be getting more and more use in competition and not to mention plinking, a great way to improve and hone those shooting skills.

If you’re after some of your own get in touch with the guys at Contact Left who can custom print or supply plain paper, card, or paper 170gsm quality targets with either the traditional roundels or figure 11/12 type target designs and more. They sell direct from their website or via e-bay. Check them out for your ‘plinking’ or range needs on the links below.

Website: http://www.contactleft.co.uk/
E-bay Shop: http://myworld.ebay.co.uk/contactleft