Free Fire Zone – 31st May 2009
Players: Tatt, Ads, Rich

100 Players

10am start running to about 5ish. 3 short morning games with a single long game in the afternoon

The Day – Diary of Events

Game 1 – Warm Up

This simple little warm up game got everybody involved straight away, the majority of the fighting was concentrated at the Moat & Baillie (MB). We made the initial assault straight up the middle with a group of chaps which failed after a small exchange of fire. Instant regen at flag put you back into the action straight away. After the initial assault failed, we pushed left to spread the play around. I regend twice in this fairly slow paced game with limited contact despite the heavy team numbers.

Game 2 – Capture the Flag

We pushed up the left flank as once again the majority ran straight for the MB. Arrived on the left flank level with the MB to find Blue on Blue, the guys in the MB were firing onto the left flank who in return fired back (blue tape not visible as on left arms as instructed, facing away from the MB). We called out blue on blue along with something else…which soon put a stop to that.

We pushed further into the left flank clearing opposition between the pillbox and village. This suited our aggressive style of play and soon we picked up a few stragglers and forced away to the first building of the village, 30m from the enemy flag. I took a hit on the hand so went back to our base to regen. There I waited for around 5 minutes as I didn’t want to go back into the game without the rest of my guys who I was still in radio contact with.

After they regend we decided to have a crack at there base as we felt we left enough guys at the village to keep the reds occupied for a while. On route we set an ambush for 3 reds, and after picking them off carried on up the road to hit there left flank (DZ1/Delta on map). Cleared a few reds along the road and the woods around DZ1 before being shot in the back by some chump coming out of the safe zone…we laughed abit…then trudged off. Re-entered the game after we had a little bitch and moan about the young man’s previous antic’s, and pushed on up the right again, abit of revenge I guess we were after. Was about to engage some reds on the road when they told us it was game over…we heard no call from a marshal.

Game 3 – Defend the Border Crossing

I set my claymore up on the right hand of the BC next to an anti-tank obstacle facing left across the border crossing (BC) and positioned my self with the M60 on the inside left with the centre and right flank in full view. I waited 10 minutes before needing to open fire…and I was the furthest man forward on the BC. We spent the first part of the game singer, talking shit and posing for John’s (John Dean – Firesupport) camera. When I eventually opened up with some short bursts from the 60 it was over 50-60m and it was sporadic at best.

Both flanks came under sporadic assault but were in no way threatened as we had the advantage of an elevated position and were dug in. The red regens were in no way instant as they had a 3-4 minute round trip to there flag and back before they even got into a decent enough position to launch another attack. With the red regens you could see the frustration, you lose all momentum going forward and once you regen trying to fight your way back to your guys is invited another BB hit.

After 30 minutes of no real threat I mentioned to John about pulling back to allow the reds a chance to push forward into some better cover. After 5 minutes or so we did see for the first time all game some intense fighting and you actually felt for the first time the reds had a chance of over running us. An observation I made was that the smoke thrown by the marshals to provide added cover just invited the blues to fire rounds into it, I know, I did the very same and it is why the reds made no attempt of a frontal assault as it would have been pointless.

The 5 minute regen for the blues didn’t give the reds any advantage what so ever, with such a small area to defend and the blues stacked up on top of each other if 1 man took a hit he had 4 or 5 other wanting to take his place.

To be honest, it was too easy for the defenders. Would suggest giving the attackers 2/3 life’s in the field (shoulder respawns off of players behind not in front) but keep the defenders 5 minute wait or have a back to the regen point twice (2 instant regens) then dead, as its the last game before lunch any guys that get nailed early can go have lunch. This way the attackers can keep pushing forward while the defenders get weaker. Could work as a 30 minute game then reverse it as I would have enjoyed attacking the BC but never got the chance.

Lunch…Ginsters Cornish Pasty!

Game 4 – 3hr Afternoon Game

Despite the MB not actually featuring until mission 5 the main influx of fighting was either in it or around it as it is the most dominant feature on the entire map, everybody wants to be in it as it’s the strongest emplacement.

Having seen the carnage at the MB we flanked left and after some more aggressive moves to push out some reds we bypassed the village of Hoy Lee Wangk. Having decided that the only man even capable of making this work was me “Cough Cough” I saw an opportunity so gathered as many young men as I could and pushed further up the left flank. We dug into some good cover left of the point A and by now had somewhere in the region of 20 chaps with us. We lined ourselves up and leading the way we made a full on assault to point A…unfortunately i over shot our advance and got abit too close to Delta. A mistake i payed for, I was the first chap hit, but I did take a couple with me!

At this point my nearest regen was DZ1 but wanting to stay away from the fighting I kept right of point A and at the village I tracked back looking for DZ4. Along the way I bumped into Angry Dan (Urban Marshall Chap) who pointed me in the direction of my nearest regen point, 5 minutes later somehow I ended up in DZ1, I did a full circle. To my amazement I found both blue and red regening together and 50-60m away players fighting at the village, this was very unexpected as I have never seen a dual regen site before.

Using my radio I hooked up with Rich who got tagged soon after me, we had a chat about what to do next as the fight had spread over the entire map and we didn’t know which of the missions had been completed. I had to walk over to point A (while dead) to see that the mine had already gone, but the fight for it still in full swing…nobody knew! Not knowing which of the objectives had been completed, and not fancying a walk to find out we walked up to the MB (firebase) and had a chat with some blues (around 10) who had been defending the MB since game start. We decided not to pursue the brown crate as it was past mission completion time and the .30cal had already been destroyed at the firebase so we decided to make ourselves useful and secure the firebase and base drop area during the fall back to the Pill box. We had no idea if the other missions had been completed or not. Had sporadic fire from up to 7-8 reds, some we had to ask if they were alive or not, they were for about 3 seconds! We came under more friendly fire as they claimed they could not see our tap, which in fairness is about right, 1 inch of tape at 40-50m isn’t much to go on.

Eventually we got bored and walked back to the safe zone around 4pm. With over 100 players the opportunity to engage targets was few and far between. The regen rules limited the aggressive nature of some players and we spent more time, looking for and spending time in regen areas than in actual contact with the opposition. Friendly fire was frequent and continuous all day.

The MB is the biggest focal point of FFZ, everybody wants to be in it as it’s the strongest emplacement on the entire map. It’s in the centre of 3 regen sites and between point A & B so needs to be held to complete mission 1 and to an extent mission 2. If you want to keep everyone out of the MB, say there’s a nuke in there and only the brown crate containing the launch codes can deactivate it, anyone that go’s into the MB before its deactivated is killed by radiation or something.

With so many players, why is the fighting concentrated on the centre of the Map? Because that’s where all the regens are, there are at least 4 large areas with nothing in, why no put the regens there, it keeps the dead players away from the fighting and would be a lot fairer. DZ3 is a great example of a regen out of the way but it did suit the red team who went after the blue flag.

Would prefer to see both arms tapped up and with 2-3inch tape, at these distances camo is irrelevant anyway so why not advertise what team you’re on.

I guess not being used to these specific regen rules we found it a hard day, the pace was a little slack at time’s and feel the environment and the rules gave an advantage to those players who don’t get stuck in and would rather walk around the boundary keeping out of harms way or stuck inside a bunker. Having 2/3 lives in field using shoulder regens then back to the flag (Combat Action Games) or medic rules using designated medics (Ravensnest, A2C, Gunman) would keep players in the game longer and would create a more trilling faster paced game. I know it seems a little unrealistic but this is Airsoft, and the last time I played 1 hit dead all day long was at Paintball some 10 years ago.

In Summary

Great site with some cracking natural features and man made emplacements. Not being regulars at FFZ and being used to different rules and games I guess we seemed a little out of place. And with all the fighting at distance because nobody wants to be careless with there 1 live nobody takes risks and pushes forward which is why a lot of chaps stay back creating stalemates and slow paced games such as Game 3 at the BC and the stalemate in Game 1 & 2. In the opinion of this young man, make them 30 minute timed games with regens favouring the attackers, it’ll make for a fast paced game where both teams can have a crack at winning. Draws are just boring. This was our second time at FFZ and it wont be our last, had a cracking day first time round but this time we just couldn’t get stuck in and please can somebody do something about the burst monkeys, I didn’t get through a bag of bb’s all day and was running the 60, I saw 5,10,15 second bursts of fire from guys all day, thats not realistic, its just pointless and greedy and comes down to who has the biggest wallet. Its just not right.