All summer we’ve been waiting for cooler weather—even slightly cooler, say 90 instead of 100plus—and we finally got it.  That turned out to be too much of a good thing, however, since rain and thunderstorms forced us to quit early.  But, to everyone’s credit, nobody balked at playing in what the Army calls “good infantry weather”. 

As we met at the rally point, it was raining pretty heavily but it started lifting soon.  Brian--a new, enthusiastic Rangerballer and his son, Victor--took their two-wheel-drive truck out on a recon.  Brian reported back that he could make it to the Blue start point, so we were on.  We did start late though, ugh!

Blue and Green teams each reached their start points just after 0800, and we pushed off at about 0815.  Blue was the U.S. Rangers and Air Force PJs (Pararescue Jumpers), going into Iran to recover a downed pilot.  Green was the Iranian Revolutionary Guards, trying to capture him.  The “pilot” was Ryan Sowell, a very experienced paintballer and now one of our core Rangerballers.  He actually started as a sniper for the Blue team, along with his friend Austin, but then reverted to being the pilot after his first engagement.  A two-man sniper team was put in place for both Green (Brian and Victor) and Blue (Ryan and Austin), before the main teams started.  Their job in the opening phase was to slow down their respective opposing teams.

Both teams knew only roughly where the pilot’s last-known position was and his direction of travel.  And they didn’t know the location of the other team. We had a total of 16 players out, a decent-sized group.  The main Green team had 5 players, led by Nate (aka “Sarge"), another very experienced paintballer.  This was his first time out for Rangerball though, and he loved it.  The main Blue team had 7, with several new or at least rusty players, including a 9-year old kid.  Not a strong team. I was on Blue, but didn't take the lead since I'd set up the scenario.  I wanted to have someone learn from that responsibility.  I could tell the first guy I gave the lead to didn't have his heart in it, so I gave command to Mike Bosso, a young aggressive player who’s becoming a Rangerball vet. 

At 0815 Blue pushed off down the road into the small east-west valley, where we knew snipers were lurking.  Everyone was very slow and tentative--a repeating theme for us.  As soon as someone spotted one of the snipers (Brian) everyone stopped and milled around.  A couple of useless shots were fired at him, and we slowly advanced.  To his credit, Mike climbed up on the north ridge along with another player, and tried to get a commanding high-ground position. 

As we started to engage the snipers, we also saw the main Green team crest the south ridge to our left, about 200 meters away.  For several minutes, they were still too far away to threaten us, and if we’d moved fast and aggressively, we could have taken eliminated the Green snipers and moved west down the road.

But due to Blue’s timidity, we basically got stuck in a “kill sack” among the mesquite bushes at the bottom.  Brian and Victor had very good positions and pinned our whole team down with accurate fire.  Mike was trying to take out Victor who was in the rocks on our right, but couldn’t do it.  I tried to flank Brian from the left (while watching out for Nate, who by this time was picking us off from that direction). I moved up a small ravine--normally dry, but now surging with muddy brown water.  But Brian turned and took me out, so our advance stalled. He and Victor were holding firm against all 7 of us, and took out virtually the whole team twice!  The "Tactical Excellence Award" has to go to them, since by stalling us for so long, they ensured a win for Green--aided by a pretty pathetic performance by Blue. 

After the second regeneration signal, I took charge and pushed the Blue players up more aggressively.  I managed to get Brian out of the little ditch he was holding.  I charged up on him, just as he was trying to reload.  And finally someone got  Victor out of his sniper nest in the rocks.  Then, we could move further down the road towards the tamaracks, but Nate took me out in a little duel among the bushes (curse you Nate!) so things slowed down again until I could regenerate again (man I spent a lot of time in that deadbox!)

At the 0900 regeneration, I moved across the ravine to push up on our extreme left flank.  Most of the Green team had pushed further to the west, looking for the pilot, so I went after their stragglers.  I think I got one of them, Lonie (unless he was already dead) so we finally had a clear lane to advance along the road to the west.  To screen our flank and get a commanding view, I went high up onto the rocky hill in the center, but by that time it was raining harder and harder and thunder and lighting had started up again.  My goggles were wet inside and out, and I couldn’t see very well, so when I got up on top, I think I shot one our Blue players (I’m still not sure about that).  I was surprised to see anyone up there, and it looked like he pointed his gun at me, so I fired him up. 

At that point, I had to make a tough decision. It looked like the weather was just getting worse, and I was concerned for everyone’s safety.  With slick rocks, mud, heavy rain, the threat of lighting strikes on the high ground (like where I was standing!) and the chance of vehicles getting stuck on the way out, I made the decision to knock it off early.  I hated to do it, since we’d only been playing for an hour, and were just getting to where Ryan was hiding as the pilot.  After all, Rangerballers shouldn’t let a little rain stop them.  But radios were conking out, I saw at least one gun (Austin’s Ion) that was inoperable, and others were clogging up or having complications due to wet paintballs.  Lots of goggles were fogged or streaked. 

So, at 0915 I made the adult decision and called everyone back in.  We drove back along muddy roads, and met back at Arby’s for a debriefing.  To my pleasant surprise, everyone thought it had gone really well.  We were all wet and muddy, but had big grins and some good stories. 

During the debrief, I learned that despite problems, the radio play partially worked. The pilot (Ryan) had made in contact with the Blue leader (Mike) and was trying to talk him onto his position. We even had Rangerball's first instance of 'electronic warfare', as Michael tried some 'spoofing' to get the pilot to give his position away. But with pre-arranged frequencies, and security codes, Blue worked around the spoofing. So we're adding another dimension with the 'commo fight'.

And for the second time in a row, we had someone puke! As a Blue sniper, Austin had been running up and down the south ridge taking out Green players, but I guess the adrenalin was a bit too much. He did recover fine, but now I think we've established a Rangerball tradition. I wonder who will keep it alive next time?

Ironically, as we were sitting there in Arby's, the sky cleared and the sun came out!  After that, the day shaped up with great weather, which sucked.  If we’d just stuck it out, we could have finished the scenario. . . But no, I think I had to make the decision when I did.  It was getting crazy. 

Anyway, some lessons learned (and relearned) during this one: 

Tactical:

Push!  We saw yet again that a team that hangs back and hunkers down will more than likely get stomped.  I don’t mean to be insulting, but the Blue team’s performance in this regard was pretty poor.  In the first 5-10 minutes after we’d encountered the Green snipers (and before the main Green team came down from the south ridge) we had a good opportunity.  If we’d pushed aggressively on, especially on their wide open flanks, we could have easily taken them out even if they’d got some of us.  Instead, we got hopelessly stalled.  The essence of offense is to advance.  If you hang back, you’ll probably never reach your objective, and you actually endanger your team. Push forward!


Leaders matter.  This is a corollary to the “push principle”.  I’ve seen it multiple times in other games, and experienced it first-hand in this one.  Most players are reluctant to do so, but when a leader steps up and takes charge, it makes a real difference.   One of the main things Rangerball is about is developing leadership qualities.


Obstacles in your mind.  I noticed the normally dry ravine, now turned into a muddy torrent, formed a psychological barrier most players wouldn’t cross.  It was actually only a few inches deep, but hardly anyone sloshed through it.  This brought a theory to mind: Some physical features (gullies, streams, fences, thick brush, steep ridgelines) will form “obstacles in your mind”—even though they’re easily crossed.  These mental obstacles can channel players into certain areas, or keep them out of others.  Whichever side you’re on, this can be used to your advantage.  It can help you predict where the enemy will be.  And if you consciously push through these non-barriers, you can surprise them. 

Cammies really work.  We’ve seen the effectiveness of camouflaged clothing (and equipment).  Better said, we’ve noted the non-effectiveness of non-cammies.  Some patterns work better than others (see note), but any kind of cammies are better than regular clothes.  White or colored t-shirts are like beacons, shiny chrome guns glint in the sun, and bluejeans stand out much more than you think.  Not a lot of blue bushes out there, after all.  Cammies won’t make you disappear, but they do make you harder to see and often harder for a shooter to acquire you quickly.  It’s kind of like the joke about getting away from a bear.  You don’t have to be invisible, just more invisible than the guys with bluejeans. 

Note:  Surprisingly, in the terrain we normally play in, desert cammies (like DCUs) are usually too light.  There are more greens and browns in our S.Utah desert than you’d expect, so light tan stands out.  With the rain this time, that was even more true.  The bushes greened up, and dirt and rocks got darker.  Nate with his DCUs stood out like a ghost, while Ryan in his green BDUs blended in much better.   The digital woodland the Marines use (called MARPAT) looks very effective, and I’m tempted to get some.  But I’m leaning towards the new digital Army Combat Uniform (ACUs), also called ARPAT, as it blends in well with sagebrush—and since the real Army Rangers use it.


Wet paintballs suck.  The biggest problem with playing in the rain is that if your ammo gets even a little bit wet, it starts to get gooey and clump up.  So if you reload, and rain gets into your hopper, it can jam your gun.  If you have to reload in the rain, take precautions to keep the inside of your hopper and your paintballs dry. 


• Electronics and rain don’t mix.  The rain was starting to wreak havoc on anything with circuitry. Austin's Ion went totally "Tango Uniform" and I could hear Ryan's radio transmissions breaking up, like there was a short somewhere. I was playing with my trusty Custom 98, but I wonder how my SP-8 (tactical Ion) would have fared. Hmmm. . . what would happen if you dropped a nice electronic gun into a swollen creek?

Also, here are some lessons learned from Brent Blanchard, who came out with us for the first time and played on the Blue team. Brent's played paintball before, but not like this. Said afterword that "that was the best 60 min of paintball I've ever played!" Here are Brent's lessons learned:

• The advantage of momentum should be sought and exploited.
  
  
• Communications coupled with coordination is key. Only once was I able to maintain contact with another team member and attempt to circle in on an opposing player. Although I was taken out unexpectedly, my team-mate was able to finish advancing and removed the enemy while he reloaded. Perhaps shots fired at me saved my team-mate's "life."
   
  Also on this point, I later found myself alone and quite far forward from the rest of the group, just south of the road. From concealment, I could see a player slowly walking around with his hands on his head like a prisoner--then saw another player. Not having been briefed on the Pilot situation (SNAFU from my reporting to the wrong rally point before we went out), I hesitated and wondered if he was our pilot and had been captured by the Green player. I should have engaged and taken them both out right then. Had trouble coordinating fire & movement with a team-mate who arrived shortly thereafter, and by the time I advanced, they were long gone.