Can you call a team with hired guns as “A TEAM” ?

blast from the past - Team WK with their hired gun

Well, that’s my question & I hope you guys can give an opinion or two about it.

We are fortunate to have most of the D1 teams playing in MY-NPL under sponsorship either directly or indirectly by major paintball brands & local Vendors. They are expected to carry their sponsors brand be it during tourney or even during training. Sponsors can be very picky & sponsorship can be terminated in an instance just like that eg. By wearing a jersey/t-shirt of a rival brand or using a rivals marker etc could just cost your team the sponsorship.

But how about employing the services of hired guns to play with your team in a tourney or even for all 5 legs of MY-NPL next year? Will your team be in trouble with the sponsors if the hired gun/s is sponsored by a rival brand? Eg. A team under DYE but the hired gun/s is under P.E/SP/JT/MD etc. It won’t be a problem if in this situation the hired guns uses a DM9 & DYE jersey/pants but what if they too have to carry their sponsors name & colours? You’ll be going to have a mix match of players playing under 2 if not 3 different brand of sponsors.

Can you call that team a DYE sponsored team when you’ve got a few players under a different banner/sponsor and to relate back to my title, can you even call the team as “a team” when you employ hired guns to beef up your line up? The proudest moment for a team is when you’re on the podium in your sponsor’s colours & banner but now out of the 10 guys in your line up, 2-3 will be in a rival’s colours. Will your sponsor be happy with it? Will they take any action? Only time will tell, we’ll just have to wait and see come this Feb 14-15 2009 during the 1st leg of MY-NPL cause I believe most D1 team will be facing this dilemma for the ’09 season.

Dutch Lady SHINE Project - It Starts in ME

Some of you may have came to know about it, through my endless emails and sms, or perhaps you have stumbled upon the advertisement on the tele. Yes, I am one of the finalist and I need your generous help.

SHINE Project -It Starts In Me is a contest where all finalist will share their dreams and aspirations and the top 3 finalist will receive RM15,000 as a stepping stone to make their dreams come true.

Winners will be judged based on 50% voting, and 50% from judges' marks. Therefore, to ensure a safe placing, I need to be at least top 3 with a huge gap with the fourth place.

It has been 3 weeks and all finalist have been giving stiff competition to each other. Votes were added up almost every single minute.

As I am writing this, I am being chased closely by the 4th place and I dont know how long I can sustain...So I am indeed in need of your generous help my dear friends.

Please vote for AFZARINA, a bottle of SHINE yogurt drink will only cost you RM1.99 at Giants, RM1.95 at Jusco, the Yogurt is much cheaper at only Rm1.59 in Giant. Oh, highest voters will win shopping vouchers too.

SO the more you vote, the more you stand a chance to win too.

How do you vote?
Buy any of the SHINE products and peel of the sticker of the cap to reveal the unique code. Use the code to vote for me at http://www.itstartsinme.com/

Where can you get SHINE?
As mentioned earlier, Jusco, Giants, Cold Storage, Tesco and other major supermarkets.

The more you vote, the higher the chances for my team and I to win this.

Voting period ends on 28th Dec 2008, so hurry up guys, there's only 7 more days to go!

I'd like to stress that this money is to support our team to play next year, and help us to go further in the game itself. You may not know me that well to vote for me, but you may know Mas, Azhari or Kerol. Voting for me means voting for them too.

Come on guys, Loloq has won Nescafe Kickstart and let this SHINE contest be another eye opener to the public that Paintball is a sport with a future and a game which WOMEN can play and be good at!

Paintball Gears Stolen - Lookout for these items!

Some of you might already know, paintball gears belonging to NPL Divsion 3 team, "Khalid's Team" have been stolen from their car. This happend at the Crystal Crown's hotel parking lot, and it's just behind MAPAAC. They were on their way from Kuantan to JB for the JPL. It seems that the thieves have targeted them and their goods, and only stole those - nothing else. So, it's a high probablity, the thieves are also paintballers.

I'll post the serial numbers when I get them. But this will do for now. Here are list of gears stolen from them:

Markers Eclipse
2 x ego 8 color brown/olive
1 x ego 7 color black
1 x ego etek color black

Tanks
4 x Stako

Loaders
3 x Pulse
2 x Empire B2

Jerseys n Pants
6 x Proto o8 color grey
5 x Eclipse 08 color red

others
- elbowpad eclipse 08
- hand glove nike
- proto pods

This case has been reported to the police. So guys, be aware of these markers at your paintball place. If you know of their whereabouts please contact Afzan Khalid or Sofian Daud. Anybody caught using these stolen items will be prosecuted.

ROADTRIP - JOHOR PAINTBALL LEAGUE 2008 (GRAND FINALE)

JOHOR PAINTBALL LEAGUE 2008 (GRAND FINALE) –JPL08 GF
OCTVILLE GOLF & COUNTRY CLUB, BANDAR SERI ALAM,
PASIR GUDANG JOHOR DT
13th & 14th December 2008

JPL08 GF was going to be Team Nemesis’s final tournament in this fruitful 2008 paintball calendar of ours. 7 of us made the trip there with the 1st car leaving after Friday prayers & the 2nd car with me, soon & jr leaving KL late in the evening. Had dinner at the Pagoh R&R, Soon & myself having Nasi Lemak bungkus & a couple of Pau Daging. Jr had Spaghetti taupaued from home. We reached our hotel in Pasir Gudang at around 10pm,had our bath and did the usual day before tourney routine of changing the loaders and markers batteries etc.

Saturday Dec 13,2008
It’s a 5minute drive from our hotel to the tournament site at OCTVILLE GOLF & COUNTRY CLUB,home of Armour Paintball. 20 teams from Malaysia & also Singapore were there playing in 3 categories. Only 1 field was setup as opposed to 2 fields in the initial pre-tourney info that we got. Maybe the low turnout of teams competing had something to do with it. The field was nicely setup with DXS Millennium bunkers & the grass was great.
For the Open Category there was only 4 teams competing with Nemesis, Raskal, No Mercy & Demonz Red being the 4. Prelims was schedule for 8games & were to be played today. Tourney was schedule to start at 8am but it only started off at around 9am with the rookie division playing 1st. By lunchtime we had only played 3 of our games & the constant stoppage of play by both organiser & Refs really slowed the pace of the scheduling. By end of Day 1, 2 of the Open Division games had to be pushed to Sunday.

We had dinner at a roadside stall near the hotel selling nasi lemak & Sup Gearbox. I had Sup Perut,Urat & Daging plus a plate of Nasi Lemak. The rest of the guys had about the same too. By 11pm we were all in our bed ready for a goodnight sleep.

Sunday Dec 14,2008
We had breakfast at a nearby Mamak before going to the field. Day 2 was suppose to start at 8am but since it was still raining & also a group of MPRB ref were also at the mamak having their breakfast so we weren’t in any rush to eat our roti canai. By 8am we were at the field ready for our remaining 2 prelims game. The game only started after 9am, it was still raining but anymore delay will definitely disrupt the scheduling further. Nemesis qualified 1st in the prelims so we’ll be going against Demonz Red in the Semis. Raskal will be up against No Mercy, who qualified 2nd, showing they are a team to watch out for if they decide to play in Div. 1 next year.

Just as we were about to start playing in our Open Div semis fixtures, game came to a halt once again after a controversial incident by a ref on the field during the match between Raz Legion vs D’Mercy Kid. So another delay while we wait for the MPRB refs to settle their matters between themselves in the middle of the field. There was already talks of two different fractions between them going up against each other. We asked the organiser for an early lunch break so that we won’t be waiting in our full gears till the refs settle their problems and with the agreement from team captains the lunch break was announce from 11am-2pm.

2pm. We were ready for our semis match against Demonz Red. Nemesis won the 1st game while in the 2nd semis, No Mercy won against Raskal. In our 2nd game, it started evenly, with both team losing bodies early on. In the end it was 2vs2 with Mango and Todo both taking out each other while on the other end jr was zooming on to Dennis. Much to our dismay, jr was having a jam trigger and wasn’t able to fire a single shot while trying to bunker Dennis. So it was an easy kill for Dennis & he was able to hang the flag in time. More drama was actually happening on the other end with Todo having a go with the refs for taking him out. Words was said, equipment was thrown so in the end, Demonz Red got the win but with a price where Todo was given a 6 match ban.

The 3rd game was also not without controversy. Demonz went into the field with 5 players but Todo wasn’t in the line up. Maybe it was their understanding that only Todo was ban and they can replace him with somebody else to complete the line up. Refs came to pullout 1 player and in the end it was Patrick who was coming out. So the match started with 5 vs 4 and it was all over in a couple of minute. Gary & Amos was taken out right after breakout and soon it was all over. We were on our way to the finals.

Raskal won both their remaining game to win their semis. So it was going to be a Raskal vs Nemesis final then. It the Novice Div, it was gonna be a final between D’Mercy Kids vs Todak Lockdown.

Finals
1st game was an evenly fought match. We were three up against two from Raskal by in the end we ran out of time. So it was a draw. 2nd game was all Raskal. We lost bodies early in the game and in the end were no match against Raskal. A win for Raskal.

Final game was a do or die for us. Raskal lost 2 guys on the break and soon after lost Aris on the back left temple. With both Pot & Abby being pin on the right side of the field it took a bunkering move by Awe to take out both of them & a win for us with 5 bodies up. Soon after game over , the announcer after getting the go ahead by the UJ, announced that Nemesis is the champion. I had my doubt on this since if we follow NPL or NPPL rules, only a flag hang will determine a win for either team so since both team got 1win each, then it’s still a tie. But with all the amateurish decision done by the MPRB during day1 & day2 of the tourney then anything could happen. Raskal did a protest and for 5minutes Nemesis were the Champion lol. The result was then overruled and the championship will be decided by a 1on1 match. Another boo boo by the MPRB. Aris of Raskal when against Awe of Nemesis and the match was all over in under 1minute. Awe was hit on the face mask with a bounce ball of the bunker and so Raskal is the Champion, this time for real.

Prize giving ceremony was done way after 8pm, graciously of the VIP to still be there since arriving around 5pm. In the end we were a bit disappointed with the end result but also happy with the way we played especially in the final game. The feeling of winning the game with 5 bodies up right after losing the game before was just great.

Overall it was an OK tournament. The field, layout & paint was ok. The organiser should emphasis on a better run tourney, better scheduling & please no more MPRB marshals. The fast pace of the games in Open & Novice Division and with markers on ramping was just too fast for them to input. I guess the vacation trip……………errrr I meant training trip to HB NPPL every year didn’t do any good to them then. The comedies of errors was just hard to swallow by a professional bodies such as the MPRB.

p/s : NO, you don’t need to hang your opponents flag in a Final 1on1 game. Teams are only playing for elimination. No need to pull and hang the flag. I guess NPPL didn’t teach them that at HB. Anyway it was fun seeing Aris running & emptying his marker on his way to hang the flag.

Pros
- Great Prize Money
- Accomodations & Location
- 4k air
- nice field
- Chrono ref(he shoots only 2-3x,won’t ramp your marker).Every pallet counts nowadays :)

Cons
- scheduling delays
- marshalling %$*##@^
- weather (it seems November & December is a bad time of the year to have a tourney. Either you employ a good weather consultant or pray to god it won’t rain during the event.

ELITE - MacDev Paintballs!

So it finally arrived at MAPAAC last week. Last Sunday I had the chance to shoot these "ELITE" paint from MacDev and it was amazing! So brittle that it breaks from a drop test (shoulder high). And the it has a very nice fragrance to it! No more awful smell from other brands. You be going back home smelling nice, this I guarantee you. Come to MAPAAC and have a try. hehehehe..

Late February 2008, Alan (MD Ronin) asked me if I could design a case for MacDev. They wanted to market their own brand of paint, and I thought, why not? Something new to try. We threw some ideas around and decided to use the current Ronin's jersey camo motive as the base design. Then with some simple red theme color and we're all set.

Come March, we have done some rough designs. And I coined the word "ELITE" and we proposed to James of MacDev and he instantly liked it. SO, that would be the name of the Tournament Grade paint for MacDev paint.

After 34 files, 17 stages of design, over 30MB of files - our final design was accepted. James liked it very much. It doesn't end there, MacDev took the design, made some changes and that's how it goes! Didn't go much from the original design. Too see our work on an international product is an extraordinary feeling!

Thanks Alan, James & MacDev for the opportunity.





Here are the final designs. Same basic layout, with different objects. I had design a layout with tanks in the first few layouts, but they didn't want it at that time. Guess they liked it. hehehe...

The signature "Villain" trademark is there in the design of the box. Loved it!

Edit: Apparently to it is too brittle for some others out there. I personally had one ball break the first time I shot it (with Droid) and that's about it. After 'air' it for a while, it shoots fine! Don't leave it under the hot sun still in their bags for 30 minutes! You'll get out of shape paint for sure.

Open the bags, pour everything in the case.. let it rest for 10-15 minutes. It should shoot just fine.

Oh and, wash immediately after you get hit. My stains still there, and might disappear after a few more washes. *sigh*

Edit again: It seems there are some paintballs that are slightly different bore size than the .68 calibre. Sometimes its up to .693 and causes ball breaks! Keep on eye on this folks. When they're perfectly round shape, they shoot awesome. When they're not.. aiyooo..