Spring 2014

Battle preparations also revealed that the highly-reliable Navarone Gun would have to miss the battle because of marker problems. That problem, however, was not as mysterious: lack of routine maintenance left the marker too gummed up to operate reliably. It would require a complete rebuild, which was not possible because of limited time before the battle. (Editor Note: A multi-week marker maintenance effort was conducted by Tri-Pact immediately after the battle concluded to hopefully prevent such problems in the fall.)

Despite Tri-Pact's other mechanical problems, the first battle would see the battle debut of Paul's M60 Patton. With torsion suspension, extremely accurate rotate and elevate systems, and enough power to go anywhere, this would be Paul's first use of a heavy tank on the battle field.

The battle would also be the battle debut of the Field of Armor Tiger tank operated by Steve Tyng. Loic shipped the tank to Steve before the battle, filled with lots of new components. Steve was tasked with preparing the tank for battle and giving it a thorough test during the battle. The first test began before the battle, when Steve realized that he had to build a tray-style paintball magazine to replace the fancier spring-loaded magazine provided by Loic that wasn't feeding properly. A quick visit to the sole building in the scale village scored Steve a piece of cardboard (buildings really don't need a roof, do they?) and a roll of gaffer's tape from John rounded out the necessary building supplies. A few minutes later, Steve installed a full-functional tray magazine in the Tiger. (The general consensus was that Steve would charge FOA a couple hundred dollars for such "field design" work.)

After all of the early morning maintenance and repair work had completed, teams were chosen by coin-flip as follows:

Team Avengers: Frank (Tiger), Joe (Hetzer), John (Pz II), Doug (Tiger), Caleb (Bofors)

Team Kaos: Paul (Patton), Will (SU-100), Marty (Comet), Steve (Tiger), Noah (Pz II), Caleb (Bofors)

With only a single active artillery piece and no support vehicles, the "Defend The Village" scenario was chosen for the first battle. Each team would take a turn defending the village (designated by a ring of orange cones) for 30 minutes or until the defending team failed to keep an operational tank within the village limits. The Bofors Gun would be part of the village defense force for both teams.

The first sortie began with Team Kaos defending the village and Team Avengers as the aggressors. As soon as the battle began, Frank, Joe, John and Doug rolled into action, surrounding the village in short order. Team Kaos lived up to their name, with no apparent plan of defense, moving around like chickens in a hen-house about to be raided by foxes. The foxes poured on the paintballs and one by one the chickens were plucked. At exactly 6:30 minutes into the sortie, it was over, the Avengers had cleared the village of all defenders.

The second sortie would have Team Avengers defending the village. Team Kaos was itching to get even for their beat down in the first sortie and with Tyng driving the Tiger in open county the Avengers starting laying down some serious defense plans. Tree branches and buildings were moved into more defensive positions and intensive training was provided to Caleb regarding use of the artillery. For the most part, Joe, John and Doug would roam in and out of the village to meet the attackers before they could enter the village. Frank would remain in the village with the Tiger for the most part, to anchor the defense, awaiting the inevitable rapid charge from Steve and the FOA Tiger.

The second sortie lasted the full 30 minutes, with Team Avengers successfully defending the village. During the numerous attacks by Team Kaos, some memorable events occurred. The most highly publicized event was the mercilous introduction to tank combat for Noah that was provided courtesy of John. While Noah was attacking the village using Paul's Pz II, John move outside the village to shoot the tank using his Pz II. Unfortunately, John mis-judged the elevation required and shot Noah in the private parts, resulting in multiple calls of "Man Down" and an immediate cessation to the battle. At that moment, Noah became a true paintball battler and all veteran battlers cringed along with him, remembering their own introductions to paintball manhood. After a few "shake it off" comments from the on-lookers and a number of deep breaths, Noah said he was "ok" (in a slightly higher voice) and the battle resumed.

Another memorable moment resulted from yet another one-on-one engagement between Frank and Steve (who have had many such dances over the years). This time, however, it was Tiger-on-Tiger action, with Steve shaking down the FOA Tiger for Loic. Frank buried his Tiger inside the village amongst a number of large and small trees. Steve moved his Tiger into position just outside the village, waiting for the perfect moment to charge in and attack. Both Frank and Steve knew exactly what the other battler was thinking and when the moment came, both reacted with well-practiced actions. Steve drove hard through the trees, trying to quickly flank Frank's Tiger. Frank's Tiger counter dove through some heavy brush in hopes of getting behind Steve's Tiger as it made it's move. In such situations, it's basically a toss-up which tank will succeed, but in this case neither succeeded. Instead, Steve's Tiger made a quick turn at one point, slammed into a small pine tree that bent like a large spring and bounced the FOA Tiger backwards as fast as it turned the corner, stopping the Tiger in it's tracks. Frank and Steve were laughing so hard at the cartoon-like outcome that they forget to shoot each other. They did, however, agree that the FOA Tiger took a good beating and kept on trucking.