The Slow And Unfortunate Death Spiral Of Stock-Class Paintball

**scottieb** · 08-03-2026, 01:14 PM

Dad played in a 35+ softball league when I was younger. I feel paintball can benefit from something akin to this. Unless you're super human chances are you've slowed a bit and are less able to get in and out of certain positions/postures. Stock class is the perfect answer for this.

So yes, ring up your old buddies and have them come out to play. Supply the equipment for them. That's step one. Step two is to bring someone new alongside you. Stay with them through some games. Coach them some. Mentor them. Step two done well won't make that person a stock classer for life but it will give them a love for this style of play.

**vijil** · 08-03-2026, 03:56 PM

Something that hasn't been mentioned is that most of the market for stock class - limited paint, technical skills - have moved to magfed. The desire for limited paint formats absolutely exists, and magfed is that niche now.

I'm not sure paintball honestly has room for more niches. We've got speedball, recball, and magfed. Pump and stock class demographics have blended into the latter two. There is no nostalgia.

I'm a marketing manager. My thoughts would be this: forget about purist ideas. Embrace ultra-limited-paint. Meaning, events where you allow any marker so long as each reload is a max of (choose a size, I'd suggest either 10 which would rule out most magfed, or 22 if you want to include them) and the marker can't be reloaded while firing (so no micro hoppers). And that's it. At the event promote stock class and pump, but don't mandate them. You could even award tiebreakers and have special prizes based on which team is using the more difficult marker system on average. A team that uses all stock class vs a team using sticks and CA would automatically win a tie. Or you could use a points system where points are awarded or removed based on marker types, alongside points for winning games. But please don't do the whole complex points-per-elimination bs. That was always a terrible idea.

I'm into watches. High horology watches cost 6 or 7 figures (no, I can't afford them), and they lose 30 seconds a day, and you have to wind them manually, and they basically suck as watches. But people still buy them. I think we're honestly at the point where stockclass would be better off using that tactic and switching to presenting itself as a high end, exclusive, collectors, status based alternative to other limited paint formats. Make them objects of elite desire. Forget about the masses. They've moved on. You're never going to manage another big game with only stock class.

That's how the mechanical watch industry survived.
That's how the mini brand survived.
Moncler, Burberry, Coach, Tiffany&Co,
Fountain Pens
Vinyl Records
Safety Razors
Mechanical Keyboards
The entire sailing yacht industry
even physical books are going that way.

All of them started out as mass market and survived by going premium.

If you can't compete on performance, you need something else. Luxury status is the obvious one. Paintball can't compete on price any more - people just play video games if that's the real issue. I say go high end with stock class.

I guarantee you'll hate that idea. But I know business, and I know marketing, and I know paintball, and in my opinion that's the only option if stock class wants to do more than wither away.

**flyweightnate** · 08-03-2026, 04:16 PM

^^ This.

I think if stock class remains the most ultra premium way to play, it has a shot. More stainless, more brass. More Carter and CCM and PPS vibes.

With some cheap options for the cool kids who don't own a yacht.

**vijil** · 08-03-2026, 07:41 PM

Exactly.

Haute Pneumatica.

The main problem is that I think that itch is mostly already scratched by autocockers. But there's nothing stopping someone doing both.

**BLachance75** · 08-03-2026, 10:21 PM

As someone who goes to these stock class games I don’t think that making it exclusive/high end/premium or whatever you want to call it is the answer. There’s already a lot of high end guns and gear there, a lot. It’s not uncommon to be waiting to start a game and see 5-10 CCMs, a few custom brass guns, Carters, etc next to you. There’s been games with multiple people using Carter Ducks, the real deal not Duckslide which there are also a few of those out there.

In my opinion I don’t think that the average person playing magfed have much interest in playing stock class. Having been to both magfed and stock class games they are different crowds.

Unfortunately I don’t know the answer to getting more people at events but I personally don’t think social media is it. I think getting people who are at the field playing walk-on to try it is a better option. It’s great the AG has rental gear but how about trying to switch some of that to loaner gear. Hand someone a gun who is in staging and have them jump in a game with us. Let them see the fun and maybe they’ll come back.

One other thing that I think you could think about is the games and play style. People have short attention spans and are used to quicker games than the 30 minute capture the flag games. Maybe keep the flags but shorten the games. That would mix in a little of the old style with the new style.

I think I missed the first year of your events but have been to at least one of the games every year since. Thinking back to all of the people who have come and gone is shocking. I honestly can’t think of more than a few people that still play from back then. Life happens, hobbies change, health issues, family, and unfortunately death have all been reasons that people have left. I miss a lot of the guys from back then and the camp out shenanigans that took place. But I’m also extremely happy with the current group that I call friends who are now sitting next to me at the camp out, having a drink and joking around. I will continue to come to games, cook dinner and breakfast for people and share my snarky comments.

These are all just the late night ramblings or a random person.

**Fubarius** · 08-03-2026, 10:28 PM

Originally posted by vijil

The main problem is that I think that itch is mostly already scratched by autocockers. But there's nothing stopping someone doing both.

What needs to be hammered hard into people minds is that if they have a sniper (pump autococker, but we'll not get back into that debate again), then they already HAVE a stock class gun.

Just a horizontal stick feed and a 12 gram changer away.

All of them. Yes that expensive one. Yes that one you've only run on HPA. Yes that low pressure one. ALL OF THEM.

Not mine, image borrowed from the wilds of the internet. But a clear example of what I'm talking about. One horizontal stick feed and a 12 gram changer, boom, instant stock class gun.

**Riot** · 08-04-2026, 08:32 AM

If people have any “cool” short videos (bunkering, off the break, flag caps), post them up. Same for pictures, cool markers (esp autococker based.) I’ll do my part to sell this Stocktoberfest around the interwebs.

The idea is going to be to sell the other side of stock class. The game can still be a fast paced, competitive game, while still being more wallet friendly. We already have the people we have. I want to try to focus on recruiting new folks, while we continue to advertise the old way too.

**Shane-O** · 08-04-2026, 10:20 AM

Stock Class died when tourneys stopped requiring it. The REAL problem with SC is most people want every advantage when playing, not challenges to compete with open class or semis. Most people just wont move out of their comfort zone of what they are best with. Also the expense of another gun setup can be a hinderance, especially for us gun buyers/collectors. The death of Specific forums and forum use in general has had an effect, even Agglet PBN had an impact in trying to promote SC. You have to REALLY want to play SC to do so on a regular basis, especially in an open play situation. So since SPE has moved to the STL area we have lost 50% or more of regular attendance, but it is slowly climbing back. this past years event we broke out SC games in the afternoon and ended up with 19 people playing. Was the best paintball Ive played in a long time. So usually on Sunday of SPE we do a blind draw open class tourney, this year it was 3v3 on a small airball field. Next year we are doing a blind draw 3v3 but SC only. We will get a pile of loaner SC guns for people to use, and try to incorporate any manufacturers products we can. When everybody is on a level playing field equipment wise, it is so fun. But truthfully SC has never been all that popular since Constant air and hoppers took over.

**vijil** · 08-04-2026, 07:37 PM

Which is why stock class can't present itself as a super competitive thing.

It needs to be about self challenge, status, fun, and haute pneumatica. It's always going to be for the rare few. If people who love stock class and want to make stock class markers want to be able to make money doing it, they have no choice but to embrace the high end that they're already part of without knowing it.

If stock class markers cost between $5k and $10k+ or even more, were hand crafted over years with ultra fine tolerances and all the carbon fibre, titanium, yada yada whatever parts for ultra low weight and ultra high consistency with no regard to cost, one off hand engraving, and were super rare and exclusive, you'd probably see more people buying them new than is currently the case, and the makers doing better. I'm not kidding. The guys who grew up playing paintball in the 90s and now buy Patek Philippe after their big startup exit in the mid 2000s - those are your customers.

But that doesn't mean you'd be able to host more people and have more events. If anything it's the opposite. But I'm not talking about popularity, I'm talking about the survival of the industry side - those who craft these markers.

Popularity I have no answer for. I think lightweight (non milsim) magfed has a better shot.

**Fubarius** · 08-04-2026, 08:06 PM

Going super high end exclusive, eh, no thanks.

Might as well not exist at all for the vast majority of people.

Patek Philippe? Not a watch. Not in the slightest. Nobody buys one to tell time. Just a status symbol to show you can afford it. To everyone else, expensively irrelevant. Does not matter. Effectively does not exist. Heck, I had to google it to see if you were talking about a pen, a watch, or rare breed of pigeon for all I could care. The company could disappear tomorrow and I wouldn't even know or care.

When I said ALL snipers could be stock class, I meant ALL OF THEM, even the cheep slab side right feed or Trilogy pump build anyone can piece together for surprisingly cheap.

Also, all Trracers, all Hammers, heck all Tigersharks. One of the last true stock class pistols made, the $45 JT ER2S....

If a field wanted to promote Stock Class they should have been buying those by the crate load when those came out.

And have some instructional videos on rebalancing the springs on them, assuming it was similar to the older ER2. Yeah, not a good spring setup on them.

**Chuck E Ducky** · 08-04-2026, 08:07 PM

Stock Class will be the last to go. 12g will forever be produced for the food and Air rifle industry. As long as paintballs are still produced you can still play. People who want to play it will seek out the equipment to do so. It’s not for everyone I’m ok with that.

Even if fields went away I know I could get at least 20+ to show up at a wooded location to play 1-2x a year and have a blast. Grilling Chilling and Cracking Cold ones. To me that’s what Stock Class is about.

Slim If the numbers don’t warrant the effort advertising do the minimum and let the game sell itself. I would say +90% of your player base are not swayed by advertising to go or not. It’s more about if life allows them to travel for a two day event often far from home. I’m guessing since it’s an outdoor activity with camping weather plays a big part as well. I’m guessing gas being expensive don’t help your situation much as well. We got guys flying in and driving 6-8hrs to play.

So maybe your focus is on the wrong area. How many are you really reaching outside of friends and family of already committed Stock Class players?

**Slim** · 08-05-2026, 02:08 PM

Originally posted by Chuck E Ducky

I would say +90% of your player base are not swayed by advertising to go or not. It’s more about if life allows them to travel for a two day event often far from home. I’m guessing since it’s an outdoor activity with camping weather plays a big part as well. I’m guessing gas being expensive don’t help your situation much as well. We got guys flying in and driving 6-8hrs to play.

So maybe your focus is on the wrong area. How many are you really reaching outside of friends and family of already committed Stock Class players?

Chuck E Ducky , you're absolutely right about all this. Over 90% of attendees are already familiar with the events and life, economic woes, and weather all impact attendance.

However, social media has proven effective in boosting attendance at my events in the past - beyond the regular crew.

One example of this is our friends from Detroit - Damage Inc. It's my understanding that they saw the stockclass paintball group/StockClassHQ posts on FB and after some time finally decided to make the trip out to an event. They made the trip out again last year and brought along the paintball celebs "Happy" Holton and Fred Moulton (a.k.a. "Sgt. Splatter").

Another example is our friend Paul. He stumbled across the StockClassHQ website one day and has since become a regular playing for Pump Kings ever since.

Another example was last year a player from Hawai'i (I forgot his name) saw that SC events were happening on the AG website and attended while in town for work.

I could go on and on here.

Yes, we've always had a "core" group of local players that have been attending for years and quite a few of them have gotten friends and others to participate via word-of-mouth. Yes, most of this core group came from MCB. But all the other new players you see at these events learned about them from social media or websites. Unfortunately, the number of new folks has been relatively small.

To all:

People can hate on social media all they want. I'm not a huge fan myself. However, promoting an event on social media works and it works well. This isn't my opinion. It's a statistical fact. Don't take my word for it. Please look it up.

The problem is that one person or one organization can't effectively leverage social media alone. We just don't have enough SC players engaging on social media right now. It takes a broad group of people to share, comment, invite friends and interact with social media content in order for it to have any real impact. The more people interacting, the bigger the impact. Again, not an opinion. Unfortunately, the stockclass paintball group on FB has less than two thousand members. The more people we can get to cross post and share content in different FB groups, and on different platforms (Insta, Reddit, etc.) the more exposure these events can have. Not just my events - ALL stock-class events.

As mentioned, my last two events were down in attendance by one third. I'm not saying social media is going to blow attendance through the roof, but I have every confidence that it can at least help to bump the numbers back up - maybe even to where they were just a couple of years ago.

Like I said, I can't do it alone, and it's not a huge ask. If you can't, you can't. If you can, then any help will be appreciated.

Joining the Stockclass Paintball group and sharing content from there is a great place to start. Same with sharing posts from the StockClassHQ page, Stockclass Heroes page, all the CCI Phantom groups, Nelson groups, regional pump groups and local pump teams. Ideally, getting exposure on local podcasts would be a huge help too.

To be honest, when I limit my interactions on social media to engaging on only paintball-related groups, then it's kinda similar to being on MCB.

**vijil** · 08-05-2026, 03:16 PM

If I put my marketing hat on, and bear in mind I'm not a stock class player although I did try to get into pump for a while:

You need to spend money, and make cheesy viral clickbait tiktok style videos across all the platforms. "You wont believe what this old guy did", "could this be the greatest paintball gun ever" (make sure you yell - quiet voices don't go viral), "is this the most ridiculously complicated way to play paintball", "HOW IS THIS FAIR", "is this the most expensive paintball gun ever?"

You get the drift. And pay to boost them.

I recommend using metricool.com to schedule things out across multiple platforms on their free tier.

Do you know anyone who can edit well, and people who have a big personality? That combo is essential.

**Chaos** · 08-05-2026, 03:16 PM

I'm doing my best to help promote as much as I can. As it stands I've introduced three new players within the last year and hoping his time goes on to introduce a few more. My son seems to be enjoying it even if he doesn't play much and I'm hoping as he gets older that he'll spread the word to his friends. As it stands my step daughter's boyfriend who have brought to a few events now is already spread the word to his friends and has gotten at least one of them into it. If everybody does the same as I'm doing and keeps the word going hopefully we can help keep the sport alive.

**$L!mBo** · 08-05-2026, 10:02 PM

tried to get this rolling at Ganza this year, but I want to
hire a video crew that normally does skateboard stuff to come out and do that style of editing for stock class events.

throw in some memes, throw in some quick graphics, maybe quick little player profiles, "show me your gun", some (in good taste) harmless pranks/shenanigans
fish eye lens, tracking shots of dudes doing run throughs and bunkering

try to make it interesting, rad, "extreme",
appeal to the adhd attention spans of the modern phone slaves

heres some good inspo:

https://youtu.be/c2zIto55QlQ?is=xZEmdkTni3gcIY2k

https://youtu.be/GMk8bH7cRWc?is=OmK3ub4mXKdjeh95

https://youtu.be/5alEehUwsRs?is=IVXyGOD26HM5zmK8

i think if we did a featurette "BANJOMAN VS THE WORLD" or "STOCK VS ELECTROS" like the games we sometimes do atthe end of the day at slims, set everything to some sick tunes, it will get around, folks will want more

The Slow And Unfortunate Death Spiral Of Stock-Class Paintball

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