The Opening of Leeds First (and Only) Airsoft Site!

This was the opening game of First and Only’s (see what I did there ;)) site in Leeds. As far as I’m aware, it is the first site in the middle of Leeds (and only!) It’s a 5 minute walk from where I live so I decided it would be very rude not to be at the very first game!

First impressions

Wow… I did a little research on the site and it appears this place is on Wikipedia.

This is the front of the building…

Image from Wikipedia

Impressive, no?

And I think the site lived upto the expectations I got from this. Wikipedia says that this was the largest room in the world when it was first built which filled with a bit of worry. Large open spaces with no cover don’t make for good airsoft sites, however I was to be surprised as I later saw.

The safe zone was reasonable. Quite full and a lot of people used cars to get kitted up. Not really much different to the games at Phoenix Urban. However, my impression of this place was better. Seemed better run and there was a far higher marhsall presence (see later)

All guns were chronoed to start with and tagged with a cable tie, which I thought was a good idea as it let marshalls see which guns had passed or not. Site limits were 350 fps for AEG’s, 400 fps for semi auto snipers and 500 for bolt action snipers. I assume there was an engagement range but I cant remember hearing one in the brief. Unlike a few urban sites I’ve played at “up Norf” (being a southerner!), they did have a version of the bang rule were if you were close enough to tap someone on the shoulder, a call of bang would “kill” them. Much nicer than point blank range and quite thankful for i, even though I know it’s hard to do at times!  Maybe that foam sword WILL come in handy?

Games

Oh this was good. The site is HUGE. First game we played in a smallish office section that was great fun. Our team had to defend 3 places against a small attacking force. As we died, we joined the attacking team. This game went well as it showed the excellence of the marshalling and the site. The office complex was designated single shot only, something which I’m a big fan of, having played at Spectre. This forces you to aim and make sure you hit with your first shot, whilst also minimising the pain from full auto!!

During the games, the enemy stormed our position and I got caught out where a medic couldn’t heal me and I was stuck in the middle of a firefight and a marshall came in and pulled me out. Very sensible of him, less so for me for standing there!   Medic rules were in affect for most games… You get hit, call medic, get medic’d, carry on, get shot again then either head to respawn or the safe zone depending on the games. This is a great way of doing things I think. If you don’t get medic’d within 5 minutes, you bleed out and take the second hit. Keeps games fluid I thought.

Second game was in the main section of the mill (the large room!) However, the organisers had excelled themselves and had installed hessian walls. Ok, so these aren’t solid but they provided cover and split the place up nicely. However it was at this poitn I noticed some cheating. Using my new DE UMP (well new to me), I shot two of the enemy. I distinnctly saw the BB’s bounce off them and the two of them shake the hits off and ignore me. They kind of looked at me and got back to what they were doing (not shooting me oddly!) However a marshall saw this and  sent them straight back to the respawn which was good. The marshalls were excellent all through out the day and hats off to them for doing such a good job!

We completely wiped the floor on this game and thus the marshalls then had to plan the games based on how well we’d done rather than keep it balanced. This kinda of “on the fly” game planning realyl worked well and helped to make the day a good one!

Lunch is provided in the price which is quite expensive at £30 a game. However the site and the games made up for this. However the lucnh was a bit poor and had I known I was only going to get a boiled hot dog and a can of drink, I would have taken more food. Me, greedy? Not really.. just hungry!

I went to this game by myself my usual airsofting mates were already  busy or had attended a large weekend the week before. However the players there were friendly and by the end of it, I’d spoken to a good few of the players around me in the safe room. I didn’t go to the pub after the game but I’m assured that when the day is done, they head to the local for a few drinks.

Overall, it’s a fantastic site and I will be attending the next game on the 19th, this time however, I will be attending with mates.

Best Bit - Killing half the enemy team with a well palced BFG throw - Seeing a marshall storm across the room telling people that there dead.

Worst Bit - Lunch - Not forewarned, I wasn’t prepared for the small amount. Also the cheating at times. However the good marhsalling prevented most of this.