Newbie Paintball - What you need to know

New to Paintball
What you have probably know by now is that, paintball is a team sport. The basic objective of the game is to eliminate the opponents by 'marking' them with paint, and grab their flag back to your station. Basically thats the most of it. Then there are variations to the ruling and format which is another whole new story.

Let's play ball!
Grab a few friends, say around 8-10 players so that you can play each other, with 4-5 players per team. I'd recommend bringing your friends and play with each other as they probably have the same skills level as you. Try not to play walk-on games and play with those seasoned players - you'll get mowed over and over, and that is NOT fun.

Paintball parks/centers
There are a lot of paintball park or centers here in Malaysia. Here are some of the recommended ones.

Malaysian PaintBall Academy (APM)
Location: Petaling Jaya, Selangor
Contact: Mr. WY Wei - (+6) 016-332 3372 / 012-337 0775
Tel: (+6) 03-6277 7779
Fax: (+6) 03-6277 7711
E-mail: taction@time.net.my

PaintBall TAG
Location: Desa WaterPark, Kuala Lumpur
Contact: Mr. Bernard Cheng - (+6) 016-207 2665
Mobile:(+6) 016-268 2816
Tel: (+6) 03-2149 1839 / 1837 / 1836
Fax: (+6) 03 2144 3182
E-mail: paintball@hr.berjaya.com.my

MudTrekker Senario Centre
Location: Kuang, Selangor
Contact: Mr. CJ Ong - (+6) 016-311 6104
Tel: (+6) 03-5632 3118
Fax: (+6) 03-5638 2128
Website: www.mudtrekker.com
E-mail: admin@mudtrekker.com

Xtion Paintball
Location: Bukit Jalil Sports Complex, Kuala Lumpur
Contact: Paul Lam - (+6) 012-218 4333, Reza - (+6) 012-261 6844
Website: www.xtionpaintball.com
E-mail: paul@xtionpaintball.com

NPNG Sports Centre
Location: Taman Desa Aman, Sungai Buloh, Selangor
Contact: Azman - (+6) 012-246 2965
Tel: (+6) 03-6156 6699 / 9966
Fax: (+6) 03-6157 6699
Website: www.npng.com.my
E-mail: xperience@npng.com.my

PaintBall United
Location: Eagle Ranch Resorts, Port Dickson, Negeri Sembilan
Contact: Matthew - (+6) 012-345 6667
Tel: (+6) 03-2164 8600
Fax: (+6) 03-2163 7001
Website: www.paintballunited.com.my
E-mail: info@paintballunited.com.my

Equipments, Rates & Costs
Now that we have the locations of these parks, let's see how much money we need to play a few decent games with friends.

Generally across all centers, the costs are as follows.

Starter pack Costs: RM45 - RM60
Includes
Goggles
Mechanical Marker
100~200 pellets

with additional RM50~RM60, you can get extra 100 pellets.

If you want to purchase pellets in cases, the price varies from center to center. The price varies from RM200 ~ RM350 per case (2000 rounds) and differs if you're a member of that center or not.

But generally, the costs are more or less the same. Call up each center to get the best price for you and your friends. They usually charges less if you're in a large group or corporate events.

Rental Equipments
Don't expect high-end markers or goggles like the ones you see in paintball magazines, videos or photos when you come to these centers. Unless if there are high-end stuffs up for rentals (especially markers), then you have to stick with basic rental equipments. They are not bad actually.

Tippman Custom 98

Pretty basic entry marker. Highly durable and accurate. Small profile.

Kingman Spyder TLX

Lighter than the Tippman but with slightly taller profile. Shoots faster.

Safety
Rental markers are usually choroned at 260~270bps (balls-per-second). Anything more than 300bps is deemed dangerous and illegal. The marshals will always advise you to keep your barrel plug/barrel socks ON all the time, when you're not in the field. Only when the marshal says "Socks off" then only you take it off. Otherwise, always keep it on. This is safety priority.

Don't joke around with markers to your friends, like pointing at them or behaving like a terrorist (you know, shooting in the air style). Always treat them as LIVE weapon. You want to play safe right? We had cases last time, when newbies accidently shoots their friends OFF the field. You might make somebody blind.

And of course, standard basic rental goggles. Nothing fancy there. Keeps your eyes safe though. There are alot of rental brands, so you might get different goggles from different centers. Here's an example.

Vent Helix


Teams
Okay, now you know what to expect from paintball centers, let's start playing. When you have players to make two teams, try to make them wear the same shirt/jerseys for each teams. Makes identifying team mates easy, behind those goggles, you can't tell whose who. You might shoot your won team mate! it happens! LOL!

What you need to wear:
1. Long sleeve shirt/jersey
2. Long pants (cargo, track pants, sweat pants etc)
3. Shoes (running, sneakers, boots - no metal studs)
4. Lots of drinking water
5. Spare clothes & towel

Game on!
There ya go. All the things you need to know to start playing paintball. Read the rule book or ask the operator. Play safe and have fun.


When we were noobs