What's your "strangest" paintball experience?

[RhoXi]

Maybe not as strange as some of the stories here but it's something I'll always remember. Sorry if this is a little wordy. It's a slow day at work and the muse has taken me.

Back in fall 2002 I went to my first (and so far only) big game out somewhere in Indiana. Being an 11 year old kid at the time, my team had me hide in a seemingly useless position near our starting point close to a trail and left me there alone. I was positioned on a decently steep hillside behind some dead tree branches looking at the trail roughly 20 or so yards from it. Of course this being probably my second or third outing, my heart is pounding in my chest just waiting for the enemy to walk by. I waited on edge for what seemed like hours till suddenly an enemy patrol of about 4 or 5 guys appeared and was headed my way. This was it.

I hunkered down, certain they would see me immediately. By now I was completely amped up and knew for sure I was going to get shot. To my surprise though, they didn't spot me. They kept on walking. I waited till they had just walked by me, then stood up, brought my trusty 98 Custom to bear, and pulled the trigger. To my horror, it gun just sputtered and a ball lazily rolled out of the barrel. I was out of CO2.

I stood there for a moment frozen in place by shock. Once I snapped out of it, I recocked the gun to try again but had the same result. Tried once more but this time the gun didn't even sputter. It just made a funny plopping sound. Meanwhile, the patrol was still walking away from me completely oblivious to my presence. I had to stop them. I had one thing left I could try.

Each player was given one of those Tippmann grenades and mine was in my pocket. I grabbed it, pulled the pin, and threw it as hard as I could towards the patrol. My aim was a little off but I hit the hillside to the right of them but it was rolling right towards them. Yes! I thought I had them but as anyone who has used one of those things knows, nothing happend. It just impotently rolled through the autumn leaves and came to a rest near the rear member of the patrol.

A whole new wave of horror came over me. The last guy had definitely seen the dud grenade. Any second now they'd all turn and light me up like the 4th of July. I braced for impact but it never came. The last guy simply glanced at the dud then kept on walking and didn't say anything to his team mates. I just stood there stunned and watched as the patrol dissapeared around the bend.

I have no idea how they didn't spot me and I wonder about it to this day. Surely they should have heard my 98 sputtering behind them and the last guy definitely saw the grenade. Was it my spiffy chocolate chip cammo jacket blending in peffectly with the fall foliage? Was it just a case of tunnel vision? I don't know and perhaps never will. The irony of all this is that if I had a full tank I would've been lit up for sure. My empty tank saved me.

[martix_agent]

I'm guessing they were your own team mates and you never realized it.

[RhoXi]

You're probably right though I could've sworn they had armbands and my team didn't. Oh well.

[Arthur]

2008 SG, at the old field, forget its name but I was rushing DMZ having a blast. Bonebrake came over the speaker to remind players that nades count as kills. Just as he finished his sentence a fat nade smashed into my mask, filling it stem to stern with with a shower of paint. Ive never seen a nade accomplish this feat. It literally took me out of the game. I had to walk off field and clean it, missed the end.

[RPP]

For the first time in my 20 years playing i saw a grenade actually work at SG this year. It was amazing. Thrown into the castle at DMZ. Took out 3 people if I remember correctly.

[boomersruckus]

Maybe not as strange as some of the stories here but it's something I'll always remember. Sorry if this is a little wordy. It's a slow day at work and the muse has taken me.

Back in fall 2002 I went to my first (and so far only) big game out somewhere in Indiana. Being an 11 year old kid at the time, my team had me hide in a seemingly useless position near our starting point close to a trail and left me there alone. I was positioned on a decently steep hillside behind some dead tree branches looking at the trail roughly 20 or so yards from it. Of course this being probably my second or third outing, my heart is pounding in my chest just waiting for the enemy to walk by. I waited on edge for what seemed like hours till suddenly an enemy patrol of about 4 or 5 guys appeared and was headed my way. This was it.

I hunkered down, certain they would see me immediately. By now I was completely amped up and knew for sure I was going to get shot. To my surprise though, they didn't spot me. They kept on walking. I waited till they had just walked by me, then stood up, brought my trusty 98 Custom to bear, and pulled the trigger. To my horror, it gun just sputtered and a ball lazily rolled out of the barrel. I was out of CO2.

I stood there for a moment frozen in place by shock. Once I snapped out of it, I recocked the gun to try again but had the same result. Tried once more but this time the gun didn't even sputter. It just made a funny plopping sound. Meanwhile, the patrol was still walking away from me completely oblivious to my presence. I had to stop them. I had one thing left I could try.

Each player was given one of those Tippmann grenades and mine was in my pocket. I grabbed it, pulled the pin, and threw it as hard as I could towards the patrol. My aim was a little off but I hit the hillside to the right of them but it was rolling right towards them. Yes! I thought I had them but as anyone who has used one of those things knows, nothing happend. It just impotently rolled through the autumn leaves and came to a rest near the rear member of the patrol.

A whole new wave of horror came over me. The last guy had definitely seen the dud grenade. Any second now they'd all turn and light me up like the 4th of July. I braced for impact but it never came. The last guy simply glanced at the dud then kept on walking and didn't say anything to his team mates. I just stood there stunned and watched as the patrol dissapeared around the bend.

I have no idea how they didn't spot me and I wonder about it to this day. Surely they should have heard my 98 sputtering behind them and the last guy definitely saw the grenade. Was it my spiffy chocolate chip cammo jacket blending in peffectly with the fall foliage? Was it just a case of tunnel vision? I don't know and perhaps never will. The irony of all this is that if I had a full tank I would've been lit up for sure. My empty tank saved me.

I had a similar experience in that I was trying to ambush some dudes at a big game. This was in 2005 and I was using my race cocker. Only exception was that I had them dead to rights, pulled the trigger a dozen times in that second and was provided with the sound of the hammer hitting the valve and the air making a muffled pop sound. The badguys instantly turned around and asked me where I wanted it. My last words before I was shot square in the goggles were....

ohhhhhhhh fuuuuuuuuuuuddddddddgggggggggge! Only I didn't say 'fudge.' I said THE word, the big one, the queen-mother of dirty words, the 'F-dash-dash-dash' word.

During the break, one of my buddies put my bolt in upside down as a joke. I am sure he was thinking I would have test fired it before playing. I didnt. I died. Thanks Harry! Not strange.....just rude!

[Pyrate Jim]

Well, there was a time I had a bounty on my head for nearly three years at Survival New York. Jerry Braun's field.
They were famous for their scenario games, some lasting 28 hours right through the night. Midnight speedball games under blinking Xmas tree lights.
I best remember one player from Canada who played the bagpipes at dawn to rouse the teams.

(this may take a while)
During one of these two-day games, I was the General for the Russian side against USA.
Each team had a special group for their general. US had Seal Team and as Russian, I had the Speznost Command. Players experienced beyond average in scenario.
And there was another group on the field. The Black Market. Refs dealing everything from information to props required for specific missions. And Mercenaries.
Not just any mercenaries. Remember this field is owned by Jerry Braun, the home team are the Master Blasters. World Champions. For hire, at a price.

Center field held a major objective, a communications hub or something. With a twist.
A box containing radioactive material sat there, and once it was opened it eliminated anyone within 20 feet. Continuously. Get too close, Ref called you out.
Now, I had seen the field pull this before. The Black Market would sell "radiation suits" being white tyvec painter's suits.
Now, I knew this and worked with access to these suits, so I had brought one.
Unfortunately, the Black Market themselves kinda forgot to bring one to sell.

The Americans had reached the central base first and opened the box. Which immediately eliminated anyone who came close.
Unable to reach the objective, they formed a perimeter.
In the meantime, our team had collected enough in "game funds" to hire the mercenaries. And that's what I did.
I had gathered my Speznost Command, handing them the tyvec suit and telling them to use that protection to close the box and bring it to the US base and open it.
Meanwhile, I had hired the mercenaries to clear their path, while the bulk of the team engaged in attacking the enemy base.

Long story short, the Speznost team delivered. Opening the box of radiation right outside the enemy base preventing them from occupation.
Since Base Occupation was a fair part of the total points scored hourly and the other team frantic because there were no radiation suits available. It eventually ended up with the other team spending everything they had to get that box closed so that they could claim their base.

Pissed them off to no end. To the point they declared a "bounty" on the "Russian General" ~ Swearing to eliminate me in any game.
Fortunately for me, I was not recognized beneath the mask in subsequent games.
Meh. Calling up memories is almost as bad as writing them out, even when they're good memories.
I know mine. I enjoy reading others.

[Cdn_Cuda]

Went to pick up some Tippmann for a forum member and show up the seller’s house to two Raccoons making sweet, sweet love and were none to happy at my arrival.

selling gear to a guy. He arrives an hour late, in an Uber, tries to bargain on price… I said no and that I’d been waiting an hour. Weird dude but was selling a good amount of stuff.

[ChillswitchEngage]

I'm surprised you waited an hour, I usually max out at ~20-30min lol.

[Cdn_Cuda]

It was a big dollar deal, so worth the wait. Otherwise I would have been gone.

[ChillswitchEngage]

Totally understandable.

[Magmoormaster]

Back in 2017 I think? I was working at the local paintball store, about 5 minutes away from the largest University in the state. A couple of the ROTC leaders came in, and explained that they had a big paintball-related training exercise in a few weeks and they wanted some extra firepower over the cadets. Basically the cadets had to move a half mile or so up a mountain trail and the leaders were going to stop them. The cadets were equipped with Alpha Blacks, and basically it was a one-hit-you're-out kind of a thing. I ended up selling the leaders a handful of Etha 2s and some electronic hoppers, probably V-Maxes or something. Also present was the team captain of one of the local woodsball teams (Headrush) we sponsored. He volunteered to show up and help the leaders fight the cadets. I volunteered as well, and they accepted.

So me and two Headrush guys showed up really early, with the intent of getting up the trail before the cadets knew about us. That idea fell flat, as there were a handful of cadets already there. But anyway, the mountain trail ended up being a very public trail, with hikers and mountain bikers going up and down all day. The Headrush guys wanted to go full guerilla, and went up the trail to go hide. I went with the leaders, and we spent the day basically driving around in a golf cart or wandering the trail trying to find the cadets. There were two small skirmishes, one around noon and another right before sunset, both lasting maybe a minute or two. After the second, we basically called it a day. At about that point, the Headrush guys had finally gotten close, and I had to stop them from openign fire after the "game" ended. They had literally spent all day sneaking around the woods trying to find the cadets, and didn't get to shoot a single round. They went home, I stayed for a bit and we went up the trail to the "objective," where a food truck was brought in. They all hung out and whatnot, while I kinda stood off to the side not knowing anyone. I think the cadets camped out there, which I did not do.

It was a really weird day. Like I said, we just kinda wandered around, hoping to find some action and barely found any. And we encountered civilians throughout the day, and we had to warn them that there might be some paintball firefights occuring. Pathetic day of paintball, but it was a nice change of pace for me as a college student stuck doing lame generals for several semesters in a row. And the Headrush guys getting lost all day was pretty funny.

[boomersruckus]

We all know about Bob the Angel guy. I had sent him a regulator for an LED to fix. The reg with the on/off button. He took months and months to fix it. I kept getting irritated at the delay but never confronted Bob about it. He opened up to me a few times about life kicking him in the nuts. Mentioned his sick wife and his struggles. I didnt pry for any of this info but each time I reached out to him for an update I would internally be frustrated but his responses would indicate he was in a trying time of life and so I would calm down and offer encouragement. The day he..... well. On that final day, he put my reg into the mail. It was post marked that very day. I often think about how his last actions could have been putting this regulator into the mail for a member of the community he loved. Instead of just not. Also not strange but kinda touching. A man at his wits end still thinks of others. Absolute legend.

[fat-50-]

Me and my wife visited Costa Rica for several months traveling and working on farms. This was a sabbatical from the field and stores I worked for at the time and as such paintball was still on my mind, a couple months in and we ran into several Dynasty players on a beach in Panama, on the return to Costa Rica the ich to play was huge so I searched out a convenient weekend trip that happened to be in close proximity to a field. Joined in on a mixed group to play some rec ball, the mask rules were somewhat atrocious and I kept mine glued on as example, this example was lost on the other players. We are up on the side of a hill to start an attack and defend game getting ready to play I have the mask on people are causally plugs out masks off and I hear something whiz pass my shoulder. Thinking the other team was shooting I yelled at them about the masks. No whistle and no sign of paintballs coming our way we stand there waiting again, a moment later another whiz past us.. turns out the gun range below us is also active and stray bullets have been making there way off the berm and into the paintball field area. Game on down the field we go whistle or not

[BretG]

Seen a few crazy things over the years.
This is not crazy, but just strange.
We produced a scenario game for a field in Maryland that also had an indoor soccer field. They played in there as well with large curved netting sections at each end. We visited the facility in preparation for the scenario game and got to witness the clean up operation after a day of indoor action.
The curved end netting collected all the paint from the day and a group of young people were shoveling the paintballs, which the curved netting had kept from breaking, into large drums marked Acetone. Others were scooping out the paint with pool nets and dumping the paint onto drying mats.
After a few minutes, they then scooped up the paint and dumped it into plastic bags, which were then placed into the original case boxes and sealed with tape.
I asked the owner about it and he laughed and said he sold it again as 'seconds'.

[Pyrate Jim]

Another good one. Short.
When my daughter was nine, she wanted to see what it was about. So, I took her with me to Strategy Plus in CT.
They said she was too young to play under insurance regulations.

So they made her a ref.

[Fubarius]

Maybe spooky, well, spooky'ish.... ok just weird. Tales from the Workbench!

Player brings in a basic Piranha to the local shop. Says it's not recocking. Ok, not a big deal, happens a lot. Shop gives it a cleaning, lube, and new hammer o-ring. Test fires ok and calls the guy. He comes in the next day and picks it up.

That weekend he goes to play and gun will not recock. Brings it back to the shop kind of pissed off, understandably so. Shop calls their blowback expert... me. I come in and take a look. Looks fine, good and clean, right kind of lube, o-ring looks good. I test fire the gun, it recocks fine. Works fine firing just air, works fine shooting paint. Chrono's good too. I test with HPA and CO2. There is nothing wrong with this Piranha. I call the guy and have him bring in his air tank, just in case.

So later that night he shows up, air tank in hand. We top it off and screw it on and fire some air in the shop, PAC PAC PAC, fires perfectly. He's happy, I'm happy, shop owner is happy. All good to go.

Guy walks over to his car, and 5 minutes later he comes back. Says he test fire air in his car, gun would not recock. So he brings it back into the shop. I take it and test it, PAC PAC PAC. He's like it did NOT do that 2 minutes ago. I believe him, and on a weird hunch. I go to the back door of the shop. In the shop, PAC PAC PAC. One step outside of the shop, BRRRP. One step back into the shop, PAC PAC PAC. One step back outside, BRRRP.

The gun worked perfect, but only within the confines of the shop. Like it didn't want to leave.

oooOOOoooh!! Spooky!

[Magmoormaster]

The gun worked perfect, but only within the confines of the shop. Like it didn't want to leave.

oooOOOoooh!! Spooky!

I had that happen so many times when I was tech. I liked to tell people I had a magical aura that made guns work when they were near me. I also told people if I dropped a part while working on a gun, it was good luck. Mostly cuz I was a clutz, always dropped parts, and wanted to feel less embarrassed lol.

Man I got dozens of weird shop tales... let's see, there was a time when the owners of a store called Missionary Mall, which supplied clothing and other goods to mormon missionaries about to go on their missions, came in to buy some gear for their son. After talking with them for a while, they kinda looked at me and was like, "what size suit do you wear?" They told me they were discontinuing a size of suit, had one in their car, and said if it fit me they'd give it to me for free. It did in fact fit, though the cut wasn't quite to my liking so I never really wore it.

There was the time that, when working on a rental 98, I found dried paint completely clogging the rear portion and flutes of the valve. We stored them with the barrel pointing up, so a bunch of broken paint must have slowly poured down into the valve.

There was another time when we supplemented another company's rental fleet for some event... I think we just rented them like 100 air tanks or something. They brought their whole fleet to us so we could sort out which pieces were ours, and I found a Pro/Carbine with a blown gas line. It actually failed where the braided line was crimped onto the fitting. Check the tank, and.... yep, the low side burst disk had been replaced (not by us) with a 5k disk, and the reg had failed.

I was filling a CO2 tank one time. This particular whip had been used to fill thousands of tanks over the years, and the threads on the ASA/fill adapter had worn down to the point that while filling the whole adapter rocketed off the tank and smacked me in the chest.

Haha one of my favorites, and I laugh every time I think of this. Guy brought a Mini in for repair. I fixed it fairly quickly, called him to tell it was ready. Never picked up the phone. Called, emailed a dozen or so times, never came to pick it up. It sat on a shelf in the tech room for over two years, when the guy writes a 1 star google review saying "they've had my gun for 2 years I want it back." Never came in or called asking about it. We responded to the review saying "it's been ready for you to pick it up, come get it we don't want it." (the review is still there). A week or so later, a guy came in to pick up a gun, I asked his name, and it was him!! I didn't say anything about the review or the length of time, and he didn't either. He just paid and left.

Oh!! One more I just remembered. Guy brought in a really nice ebladed orracle, full eclipse pneumatics, etc, and wanted me to pump it for him. I put the pump kit on, and for some reason the hammer would recock itself after firing. Like, it would bounce so hard off the valve pin that it caught the sear again. Weirdest thing I'd ever seen. I finally convinced my boss to order an autococker valve tool so I could respring it, which took like 3 months to arrive for some reason. Got it working properly, called the customer, told him his gun was finally working. I told him I wasn't going to charge him due to the length of time it took to get it fixed, and he gave me the original E2 and eclipse front block I pulled off the gun. I told him they were worth a lot of money, that he should sell them, and he was like eh I don't want to deal with that. So I ended up building a sweet e-cocker of my own, which also ended up being an orracle lol.

I'm sure I have more, if I remember any I'll come back and share them.

[uv_halo]

A lot of these are good, and center around personal interactions. The first story that comes to my mind:
The background: It was a recball day at the field and it was BYOP, and we had a crowds in the 20-30 size. This was not too long before First Strikes came out and in that time, I was shooting Marballizer Gator Green exclusively. I clean my gun after every day of play. On this day, I was shooting my Woodstalker Ion:


I was about halfway through the day, in the middle of a match when, all of a sudden, my eyes stop working (and I was setup to not fire on eye failure), because I had (and have) a great history with them working. I drop behind cover, onto my knees and take my barrel off (the gun is pointing muzzle down). There's nothing in the bore. I look in the breach and, there's a glob of pink paint. No shell, no gator green paint, just a blob of pink paint covering the eyes and the front edge of the bolt. I call myself out and when I begin breaking down the gun, I realize "where in the hell did that pink paint come from?" I cleaned the internals out thoroughly and there was no gator green, and there was no pink (or any other color) shell. My hopper, feed tube and feedneck (and adapter) were all clean. The barrel and the apex front were clean. The only thing that makes sense is really only few ways this could've happened (one of them conditional) and, none of them are very likely:

• A pink ball somehow got into my case of Marballizer, and I failed to see it during loading my pods or, loading pods into the hopper and somehow it made a mess in my breach without getting pink paint anywhere else in the feedpath
• A pink ball was shot straight down my barrel and managed to be shot out (like the last shot before the eyes failed)
  • But only if my breach was clear (otherwise I'd find gator green in there too)
• A pink ball somehow exploded above me and, fill landed precisely in the warp feed adapter opening without managing to touch it and landed in the breach, possibly on a gator green ball that managed to fire before the eyes cut off.

I never figured this one out, and it's the only time it's happened. I've never had a case of a wrong colored ball appearing in Marballizer case, even after Empire bought them. I honestly can't remember it happening even with scenario or field only paint (I never bought economy, always at least mid-grade).

[Hp_lovecraft]

My strangest- Some sunday in 1990 or so. The games were done, and I was heading home in my 1978 Buick Skylark. After leaving a gas station, I was pulled over by the police. Not one car, but three cars. I know that cant be good.

They order me out of the car, and have me sit on the sidewalk while they search the car, and pull out all my paintguns. It was mostly typical pump guns of the era. SL-68, Bloodsucker, Nasty Boys Super Intruder.. They place them on the hood.

The whole time they are super excited, telling me that they had a report of someone matching my description with a "car load of sawed off shotguns".. I tell them about paintball, but they kept repeating "talks like a duck". Which wasnt how you use that expression, but I wasnt going to correct them. They had no idea what paintball was. Paintball was still a fringe hobby and not well known.

Thankfully, I had some paintball magazines in the car. Paintcheck specifically. and I was able to show them what they were. It took some time, but the exact moment that they figured it out...... they just dropped everything and left immediately.


EDIT- Another story.

I love scenerio games and I love using smoke b0mbs. but the commercial ones were overpriced, and never worked good enough for me, so I started making my own in the early 90s.
My favorite scenerio game is Coram, in Long Island. It was awesome, and even had a helicopter. in fact, the helicopter was a menace, and made it difficult to attack the main hill fort.

So. I thought. What if I made a smoke b0mb so large, it would blind the helicopter? On my fanny pack was a pouch for a remote tank. Large enough for a 68k or 32oz tank. Which, coincidentally, a 2 liter soda bottle fit perfectly. SO, I made a huge smoker, filled the 2 liter bottle completely, and strapped it in my pack for the game.

Long story short- I set it off during the game... and it was a horror show. The smoke drifted across the nearby street, and throughout the staging area, and parking area, and just everywhere. They had to stop the game. Nobody got hurt, but boy they were very very unhappy.

[Hp_lovecraft]

We talk a bit more and determine that it is entirely possible to make a marker more efficient and by adding....*sigh* "power" to each shot you can decrease the amount of air used to get to a fixed velocity and therefore increase efficiency

In the old days, we would spray or coat all sorts of off things on our barrels for "more power". Like soaking in Slick-50 was very common. And huge barrels. Everyone seemed to own a 20-24" barrel for "more power". Once chronos became standardized, we all.... slowely... realized that this thinking was stupid. 300fps is 300fps.

That said.... once trick for "more power" that did work was dry firing at a certain angle a few times before shooting at the enemy. hmmmmm