It was dark and misty in the camp when Rob “Part 67”, Tom “The Joker” and his brother Kenny and I finally rolled in to our campsites at EMR, Pennsylvania, between the Loaded Crows and Red Raiders. We had been on the road twice as long as expected after an accident on the George Washington Bridge had delayed the first half of our drive to a crawl, but at least we had used the time in the van getting to know each other and getting excited for this weekend’s game. Kenny was particularly excited, as we had quite literally picked him up on the side of the road in front of his house at the last minute to go with us. He had never played an outdoor paintball game before, and we regaled him with past stories and what to expect. Now we were ready to crash. After parking the van and corralling our Porta-John into place, I helped the others with much amusement as we took several false starts in the dark setting up The Joker’s huge tent and our canopy. We talked a bit about the game the next day with each other and our fellow ERSA teams, (including Aaron “Yukon” and Jason “Stiffmeister” of the Crows, and George “Merc42”, Doug “NJHusker”, Patrick "Warhammer" and Brandon “Scarecrow” of the Red Raiders), and I found out that foam rockets were actually allowed in this game, which was not what I had heard before. No one from the ERSA had brought a launcher, and I felt like an idiot for not bringing it anyway—I would soon find out we could have really used the rockets. Note to self—bring launchers and rockets to Big Games, even if we don’t end up using them! We visited the Registration desk and the paintball store quick to give The Joker and Kenny a chance to shop, before finally calling it a night.
The next morning we were up early. I dressed quickly and rounded up some instant breakfast for everybody as our fellow player Matt “Guinness and Geishas” showed up to play. NJHusker took our paint orders in a group and went to go fill it as the rest of us set up our gear and sorted out our radio codes. The Red Raiders were kind enough to lend me a radio when mine didn’t work on their frequencies. The Joker had also brought along a small video camera that we rigged to his harness or helmet to give us video footage of the game. It would be the first time TAPs had carried a video camera onto the field. When we were all finally set up, we headed up as a group to the staging area for the pre-game briefing.
“Weird War II” was a pretty weird—and cool—concept. Based on some comics and video games, the premise was that the Axis were using occult spells and artifacts, and enlisting the aid of vampires and werewolves, to stave off the Allied advance on France and Germany, while the Allies countered with their special Intelligence groups (like the one right out of the movie Hellboy). Team Voodoo would be leading the Axis, while Delta Paintball would be leading the Allies. The ERSA was on the Axis side, and while attacking our foes we were all tasked with keeping our eyes open for props on the field, such as crystals for spells, and artifacts like the Holy Grail and Spear of Destiny, to use in the game. I had no idea how the vampires and werewolves would be used—for all I knew, maybe we had to find a pod of silver paintballs with which to shoot them.
After the briefing the ERSA marched with its fellow Red team members to Fort Worr to begin the game. At noon the horn sounded, and we headed across the speedball field in front of Fort Worr to a line of trees to the left leading down into EMR’s steep ravine. The hillside was pretty slick in the September air, and turned into a humid wet forest the deeper we went. Our opposing players had excellent cover in the green, and we had a hard time spotting them. The Joker and I took point, advancing as far as we could until we were stopped by a line of Blue players about 25 yards ahead. I had a mirror player dug in behind a bunker of tree branches who proved impossible to dislodge—not that our paint helped any. It kept breaking in the barrel, and refused to fire in a straight line no matter where I dialed my Apex barrel tip. Nevertheless, The Joker and I kept trading shots, and I managed to remove one Blue player before I was taken out. I hoofed it back up the hill (or maybe it was huffed) to our Fort as Red reinforcements came in behind.
By the time I made it back, NJHusker had arrived as well. He borrowed TAPs through a grove of trees and down further into the ravine to head off a Blue push along our left flank, while I brought up the rear and kept up cover fire. We made a good push nearly to the bottom of the ravine, until suddenly we were ambushed and NJHusker and I were both shot out at once! I was amazed that both of the group’s leaders were suddenly absent, and TAPs appeared shocked as NJHusker and I had to leave. We hiked back as quickly as we could to rejoin the game at the next insertion.
On returning, the Loaded Crows and I left the ravine to the Red Raiders while we began leading other Red Members across the open speedball field in an effort to take it back. Some of the Raiders decided to join us in this—they were a collective machine and seemed to be everywhere. Our paint kept breaking and wouldn’t shoot very straight, but we still managed to gain ground.
I found myself at the edge of the speedball field with Merc42 in a bunker alongside. He quickly dubbed the two of us “Butch” and “Sundance” as we began holding off the Allied hordes until more Red reinforcements could arrive. George was soon shot out by three surprise flankers from his 9 o’clock, and afterwards I was hit right in the mouth. It cut my lip through my mask, and after I walked off I was spitting red and blue for a while in front of the insertion point (the ref there seemed impressed).
By the dinner battle I was nearly out of paint, and it wasn’t working in my Tippmann well anyway. My T-8 pistol was a bit better and as the ERSA strong-armed the right side of the small field, I used up the rest of the rounds in my hopper, and then put my rifle down in a secure location and joined Warhammer in a charge with a spare clip. I don’t think I managed to hit anyone, but we seemed to do well. TAPs was having a pretty good time by the time we sat down to dinner. I lit up the grill and threw a few burgers and dogs on it for the team while Part 67 supervised Joker and his brother setting up some newly purchased gear. Kenny had bought a new Tippmann A-5, and Joker had a new BT Apex to go with the new stock I gave him for his own Tippmann. They soon had things well set-up, and I cleaned my own marker and had a new case of paint ready for the next day’s battle.
The Loaded Crows and TAPs and I elected to sit out the evening as we lacked night-vision gear. G&G elected to stay in our van rather than his mom’s hotel, and as the rest of TAPs turned in, Aaron and Jason and I sat down to relax, contemplate life and the universe overhead, and mostly to joke around with the radio as we listened in on the Red Raiders’ night battle. We thought we were good, until Warhammer came off the field and ran his copy of R. Lee Ermy’s “Full Metal Jacket” spiel through the circuit. Soon Franco walked off the field, covered with paint, and calmly let us know that that stunt had let every Blue player around him know exactly where he was. My sides hurt from laughing as I turned in.
On Sunday morning we were all stiff as we rolled out of bed and got some breakfast. We packed up the tent, then geared up and took some pictures in front of our banner. We were a little late getting onto the field (I had finally found the huge hole in my tool pocket that was swallowing all my alun keys), so we took up guard duty at Castle Aaargh.
NJHusker and I held the front entrance while the Loaded Crows took the rear. It was a long and slow shift, as the Blue team was nowhere near our base. When we were finally relieved, I collected the Crows and TAPs and we filed forward through the field towards the speedball arena.
Stiffmeister and Yukon and I took the left flank while the Part 67 took the TAPs and swung right. I could hear Stiff about 40 feet behind me saying “Doc and the Crows have entered the field!” The smile on my face was wiped off by the enemy paintball tank I walked into as I turned a corner out of the brush. I turned to warn Stiff and Yukon, but they were already long gone, leaving me alone on point with a tank bearing down on me.
I didn’t last long. I sure missed my launcher then, too.
When I reinserted and found TAPs, the tank had already been removed by another anti-tank squad. Stiffmeister and I led TAPs and other Red players up the speedball field to the opposition's front door. We began taking pot shots at Blue as they attempted to re-insert and head for Fort Worr. We held that position nearly to the end of the period before the final battle, and I took some time to clean up and eat some lunch before we had to get ready.
For the final battle, the ERSA was directed to move up a narrow trail with no cover on the left flank, between Fort Worr and a low rock wall. We were quickly eliminated by the opposite side, and after re-inserting we had a slower push ahead of us as we covered each other to gain more ground. I finally worked my way up to a forward position behind the wall where I could begin to range the Blue players on the opposite edge of the field. My Tippmann still wasn’t very accurate, and I was grateful to pull out the T-8 again when my rifle ran dry. Again the T-8 proved to shoot much straighter, and I was able to hit a few more Blues as they attempted to charge our flag positions. They couldn’t budge us from our forward positions, and we held there until the refs finally called the end of the game.
Our Red Team was victorious. I hadn't laid eyes on a single vampire or werewolf all weekend, but we enjoyed the closing ceremonies and raffles in the shade and got a few pictures of the ERSA before heading home. I can’t wait to come back next year and look for that tank!
