What Team?

Valor!

WHAT TEAM?

VALOR!!!!

What is the correct term for an amount of Southerners? A bushel? A gaggle? A gossip? A humdinger? A hootenanny? A yokel? A shenanigan?

A Regiment of Rebels!  One that is ready to run into and get cut down by nawthorn fiyahpowah.  At this point, we have 7 mobstacles to bring for the superstock rounds/open field in the back.  There are more tarps and pipes available, but not more snap tees and clamps.  If someone has those items to bring, we could make more mobstacles.

Honestly, you guys are way overthinking this.  Just bring what you want to use (within the rules) and have fun with it.  Superstock can work at Apoc if you are reasonably athletic, opportunistic, and enjoy a good challenge.  The woods in between the "alleys" and on both sides of them reduce the advantage of power, making your flywheels more competitive if you're good with them.  It's obvious that such blasters have difficulty making hits in the open and at range, so forget the obvious and try different strategies that play to their strengths.

That said, carpe testiculum is planned to take place during the dedicated superstock rounds, at least twice.  That alone will be worth attending for!  BRING LOTS OF MAGS AND LIGHT EM UP!

In celebration of my 10th Apoc, I want to make a mini documentary about the war this time, and it can be used to help promote future Apocs.  I'll have one of the government access channel's DSLRs with me, come talk about your loadout, your past Apocs, anything.  It would be especially awesome if someone like Phil could come talk about the history of Apoc.  It would also be much appreciated if someone can help find old war footage from mid-2000s and earlier ones, quality of the footage does not matter.

It's sad that NH is so abandoned that last year's Apoc wasn't even posted here, but the event itself is not only still alive, but is actually growing, with over 100 players attending in 2022!

We have something special planned for you guys in 2023 - Apoc is becoming a 2 day event!

 

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DAY ONE:

 

APOC: 

Apoc FB Event Link

When: Saturday, August 5, 2023, from 10 AM – 6 PM

Where: Cousins Paintball, 750 Whiting New Egypt Rd, Manchester, NJ
There is a secondary parking lot when the main lot reaches capacity.  After parking, check in at the main office and then walk up the path to find the staging area.  This will be marked and admin will be on hand to help.

FPS Cap: 300 FPS for most games (ignore the 250 cap in the payment link, that was copy-pasted from Cata events).  Some rounds may have different/lower caps for different player classes and blaster types.  This will be clearly explained by admin at the start of those games.  UNO Master Rule Set

Gametypes: Flag Push, Carpe, Domination, King of the Hill, Pistols, and more!
 

Cost: $15.  This is the field fee for the paintball venue and is the best deal ever - you get a whopping 8 hours of gameplay on three massive fields with trenches, a village of wooden buildings, barrels, and even a pair of loser towers!  

Payment Link: APOC Tickets

What's it like? Here is a video from 2021 Apoc - We also have vendors now, so there will be a row of popular vendors offering equipment.  Procrastinated and need to finish your blaster on the day of the war?  No problem!

 

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DAY TWO:

BPOC:

When: Sunday, August 6th, 2023, from 10 AM - 4 PM

Where: Sports Domain Academy, 1075 US-46, Suite A, Clifton, NJ

FPS Cap: TBA, will edit this in when confirmed.  I'm not a BPOC admin, just a messenger.

Game Format: Flag Dash

Cost: $35.  This is the field fee for the indoor venue, you get 6 hours of competitive scrimmage gameplay in the Maryland flag dash format, which is extremely fun.  This is a casual scrimmage, so you do not need to have a pre-formed team.  Best part?  It's indoors, so no 90 degree Jersey heat or thunderstorms to worry about!

Payment Link: BPOC Tickets

What's it like? Here is a video from a comp clinic - prominently featuring me wiping out off-break, cause I'll never live that moment down.  It's like this, but with more teams!

These are my recommendations:

1. Instead of a Rapidstrike, buy 2 Stryfes.  This lets 2 people use flywheels for the same price, and Stryfes are more versatile blasters.

2. Buy 2 Rampages or Retaliators off Ebay or somewhere other than retail.  Again, you could get 2 of those secondhand for the price of 1 at retail.

3. Strongarms are popular, buy several.

4. Skip the Jolts and get Hammershots.  The one-handed priming will allow people to dual wield and they are fun in general.

5. Skip the Magnus.  You only get 3 dart capacity for that $14ish dollar price tag, and the darts are expensive.

6. Skip anything to do with the Modulus.  Complete waste of money for this specific purpose.  Instead, get several Buzz Bee Sentinels.  Those will be the strongest blasters assuming everything is stock, and perhaps the most fun to use given the cowboy style lever action priming.  They are compatible with Nerf brand magazines and drums.

7. Skip the elite darts.  For one, elite darts suck, and two, they are expensive.  Instead, buy darts secondhand off Ebay.  If you have time to wait, get them from China for around $3-4 per 100.  See the NH stock dart buying guide for the differences between darts and their advantages/disadvantages.  If you don't have time to wait, still buy these types of darts, but make sure the seller is domestic.  You'll pay more and they may be used, but you'll still get way more darts and better darts, for way less money, than buying elite packs.  You'll want as many darts as possible, a couple hundred is not going to cut it.  Factor darts into the budget last, after you've purchased the blasters.  Whatever is leftover should go to darts.

8. Doesn't really matter what you get, as long as your sister will like it and have fun.  See what her style is.  That said, probably skip the string-powered bows.

9. Consider going on Ebay again, for extra magazines.  18 rd mags and 12 rd mags are good buys for around $5 each or less.  Try to get them in bulk.  The recommended blasters chew through darts and mags, so you'll want a lot of extras.

With those recommendations, you spend about $200 on about 15 blasters, and then have $100 left for darts and mags.  If you have time to wait for China shipping, you could have 8+ mags and 2,000 darts.

The bottom line: Try not to spend more than $25 on any individual blaster, so you can maximize how many you have while still providing good ones, and buy way more darts than you think you'll need.  Whatever budget is left should go to darts and mags.

 

^ Those are FVJs.  There is actually a risk of receiving FVJs from almost any seller of 3rd party China darts.  Always always drop a note during purchase making sure they are sending you the dart type in the picture, unless you know the seller from previous good buys.

This topic was originally made to get ideas for establishing the base avatar gallery. There are something like 600 general-themed avatars by now. There probably won't be any more. You should know what you've got to do in order to earn a custom avatar anyway - contribute original material. If you're not a big-time modder or builder that can be very difficult, so you need to be creative. War-related things could theoretically count if the subject is unique and/or significant. Having your own avatar is not even that big of a deal unless you're widely recognized by it on other forums, which is a concern that doesn't apply to very many members [you can tell by their posting styles that this is the only major forum they've ever experienced]. Personally I miss my own green X, but without lots of contributions there's no reason to have it here.

Anyway, that's why this topic is no longer of any value. The base gallery is solid, the path to custom avatars is well-known, and I'd bet my maxshot that further requests have been for years no longer necessary.

I'd be careful what you wish for...just have one of those funny feelings

I've wanted to see custom avatars for a long time now. If a person honestly can't figure out what's appropriate or not in an avatar, they won't last long. Other users will just ignore them and life will go on, I doubt that needs its own COC section.

@Greydon: IPB is probably releasing a new version soon. It's the same board, with different features. The skin isn't what would change necessarily, it's the functionality.

35-40 is terrible. My worst ball valve homemade has ranges around 130, and my best will put a dart up around 200 [angled] at only 70 PSI. Then again, mine use a different design than normal Nerf ball valve homemades due to my experience with pneumatic water balloon launchers. I personally would never use the design on the site, or a PVC ball valve. If you must use a ball valve, go with the metal ones, which are often cheaper than their PVC counterparts and open much, much faster. Plus, they are threaded unlike normal PVC valves and therefore you can screw on and off different barrels and air chambers.

Please reconsider your design, since anyone who buys a homemade that only fires 40ft is being completely ripped off. The ball valve homemades I make could get more range than that with only 10 PSI in the air chamber. They could clear 40ft even with a massive air leak. 40 is really, really, really bad.

You should also think about a bigger air chamber. I personally build air chambers of 3" pipe and at least a foot long for good performance.

I'm still confirmed and may be able to bring a friend [it would be "Axel Rose" aka the guy who got shot in the eye with a X-Bow at BCNO]. See you all there on the 19th!

There's an excellent chance that I could make this war. Let me check the calender tonight.

That was awesome, even though "Max" finally kicked the bucket. I hope to fix it up in time for BCNO.

Highlights -

- I finally got with the times and outfitted Max the Maximizer with an RSCB. It double shot sometimes, didn't shoot uphill well, and led me to run out of ammo much of the time, but overall was a major improvement.

- Good turnout and always nice to meet new people.

- Titankid didn't have a titan

- Defense during "Ride the Bull". I never really considered raiders to have a good war use until that.

- Revamped nitefinder doing some damage during that round.

- Outpost being great fun as usual. Started out boring as I was on defense, but it really got good when the tide turned and we lost several bases. I rushed up to take one back and like 5 of our people were then able to respawn. The flags were a great upgrade.

- Being the last survivor in Zombies. I rarely lose that gametype - you can't tag what you can't catch.

- Headshot on Skitzo. He was behind a large rock and there was nothing else to aim at.

- Actually finding my own darts sometimes

- Having "Max" blow up at the end of the FFA round. I was on a killing spree, 6 kills in less than 2 minutes, when I pulled the lever back and it went boom - the case completely cracked in half. I was worried about the cold making the plastic brittle, but it held up fine until then. When I fix Max, I probably will limit its use in future cold wars, falling back on an air gun instead.

I'm still making darts, have been putting it off all week. My Maximizer now has a name (Max) and I've given him an RSCB and a new paintjob. Cya tomorrow!

I can confirm attendance now, though I'm pretty fucked - all my darts are white (they'll all be lost with the snow on the ground). See you then and Merry Christmas now.

Oh one more thing, and it's kinda random: if anyone has a single tube of 1/2" PETG (think it's the thinwall type) about 8 inches long or so, cleanly cut, I'll give you a dollar for it at the war.

Keep in mind that it is a war...this war in particular draws people who come to fight. Selling is generally sporadic, casual, and specific. People come knowing what they want to get.

Currently a maybe, will know for sure by the end of the week.

Still holding onto a sliver of hope, but seeing as Sat is supposed to be like 70 degrees with sun and light wind, looks like my meet is in no danger of being cancelled. Running 3 races too, so there's virtually no chance of making the war. Hate to miss this one, some of my favorite people are there. Well, on the upside it gives Echnalaid more time to get desensitized to maxshots so that he can be ready for maximizerphobia, kicking it up a notch

Unfortunately, I probably won't be able to attend as I've got a home meet on that date. I really miss shooting the north Jersey guys, hopefully there will be another one of these later. However, please add me to the Maybe list anyway - you never know what might happen.

This is one of my favorites and I should be able to make it this time. I am a strong maybe, just have to check my schedule.

This war is still on right? I am now a definite.

Oh no, Dave hehe. This should be interesting, should I bring a port-a-potty? Oh and Skitzo, if you're still coming, can you bring my guns and darts down? I actually managed to lose a bag containing all of my Nerf supplies including barrels and my pistols. Just about the only thing that wasn't in the bag was my Maximizer [thank God!].

Another great BCNO! It's the coolest.

Highlights:

- Many familiar faces and some new ones.
- Great weather. The sun came out, the place dried out, and it warmed up.
- Dodging the blowgun during the only siege round. Can't hit this.
- Good gun variety. I love seeing a nice mix of primaries and am not thrilled with the recent trend toward only PAS, X Bows, and + Bows. Pistols were mainly 1st gens, but oh well. I had to take out my own 1st gen when the SSII decided to stop cocking.
- My Maximizer did alright. It's a big upgrade from maxshots now that I am better at controlling it. Still missed some long range shots by inches that some other guns might have hit.
- Getting trapped in a corner of the forest when a path suddenly dead-ended. Luckily nobody bothered to follow me in, so I was able to sneak back out. Only Skitzo managed to hit me in that stuff. Back in my water warfare days, we fought 2-3 hour rounds in much denser forests over a mile long and would rack up 10-25 miles worth of running through them. Trust me the limited use of the woods in this war was nothing
- Parkway 2. Snuck up on me a few times with almost point-blank opportunities, but missed the shots. Once he learns to tap, we're all dead.
- Watching Ted and Hersh chase Tim in vain at the end of a long round. Skinny kids tend to be faaaaast.
- Skitzo. His gun was deadly [no not the pullback bow thingy] and seemed to find me even at very long range.
- Being in the center of the line during a round, being shot at by 4 people at the same time, 2 on each side of the tree I was behind, and somehow living [only to be shot a few min later while I wasn't paying attention]
- That local kid we got to join in for a few rounds. Not bad at all, but I taught him twice in a row why the rock area makes for bad cover hehe.

Confirmed attendance. I may end up being there wicked early though.

5 days until the war.

Strong maybe.

Only IV? I'm pretty sure this is at least VII by now...cause I've been to four and missed two...

I don't want to dropout, because of dx's rule, but I have work and other stuff after...

"After"

Hmm...don't see the problem there. Of course if the war would make you late, make up a fish tale. Having a stomach virus and violent diarrhea works virtually 100% of the time - people don't ask questions. Anyway, you normally look like you've got vio...I mean..just come to the war

I might buy some PETG if it has a better fit with white FBR than my eastern Conn CPVC.

It was a fun war, though I still need a better gun. Even a well-modded LS can't match the speed of darts fired from a maxshot, crossbow, etc. Most of the stuff I shot was traveling slow enough to easily dodge.

Yes but you must admit the three of us versus the 8 or nine of you and actually winning a round was pretty sweet.

We could have taken the second round as well if they had listened to counters. When a flank is rushed, the opposite defending flank should wheel around and counter-rush immediately. The threatened flank should either all shift across your own line or break in the other direction and wheel around for a pincer. None of that happened. One problem was that too many people were intimidated. They gave you guys the initiative, and that was a mistake.


What went well:

-Having a kid surrender while I was still like 50ft away from him.

-Rushing straight through the opposing team without being hit.

-Hitting Mike from the limits of my range with a severely angled shot.

-Surviving a 4:20 round with all 4 lives remaining.

-Having kids abandon their positions simply by sprinting at them from a flank.

-Dodging a billion shots, especially in the beginning.

-Teaming up with Mike and scoring several hits from behind the same tree.

-Being chased by Mike while trying to change clips on the run, finally getting it in and shooting Mike.

-Having my still-injured right leg hold up well throughout the war.



What Sucked:

-Having my Longshot jam during a point blank duel with Vacc and hiding under a slide.

-Shooting several broken darts and having them spin out.

-Being shot from two directions at the same time during defense.

-Watching my side not execute proper counter-shifts again and again and again during the pistol rounds.

-Getting shot on the left flank and yelling at people to defend it, only to have nothing happen and Mike rush through with the flag.

-Having no support after sprinting to the flag.

-Giving up on team tactics altogether.

-Running out of energy during the later rounds and getting shot too often.

-Getting tapped by a kid so small that I couldn't see him coming.

If I'm available, I will be there...have to see what my friends want to do this weekend. If I can go, I hope there's at least 7 people confirmed...small is ok, but there is a limit. Each of these wars costs me about $42-48, so it's gotta be worth it.

Anyone have a new date for this war yet?

If it's in Feb then I'm a shaky maybe. After mid January track will lock up almost every Saturday until early May.

Can't do the 19th, but the 12th is open, barring a miracle in indoor track.

This site is a resource for nerfers to get and share information. Improving a gun's range is only part of that exchange. You'll find that even in the modding sections, many mods are not focused on range, but ROF or perhaps cosmetics. Besides, range is only as good as the person pulling the trigger. Just because something can shoot 150' flat doesn't mean that you'll hit people at 150'. I've found that a lot of kills take place from 50' to 75', so if you are accurate in that section, you'll rack up kills even if your primary is far from top of the line. I used a stock spring PAS shooting 80' to 90' for quite a while, and it could be taken head to head with +bows and the such despite the lower range. Speed, aggression, and good accuracy while shooting in motion more than make up for a deficit in range.

And this war, hopefully, will secure UMD...probably the Art-Soc building, an indoor venue. You don't need long range in there. There's so many stairwells and corners that ROF is what counts more. Even in the open hallways, standoffs could be broken by shifting people to pressure other entrances. Just remember that we're shooting each other with plastic toy guns and foam darts. The point is to have fun, regardless of how far your gun shoots and how many players you hit.

If this pans out, I'll definitely get drawn down to DC again, the venue is too great to pass up.

There's a war in Upper Saddle River being planned, you could try to coordinate with them as it's nearby. Otherwise, I'd give it a few weeks, Jersey's got a lot going on.

Dux- for settling arguments between people

That's only because I've held more admin/mod positions than I have fingers in the water war community. You get quite used to dealing with people after years of running/moderating forums.

Heh, but I don't deserve anything, seeing as I haven't made my contributions to the NIC...yet.

The Administration as an entity gets my "vote" for obvious reasons.

I find it rather funny that my name randomly popped up here. I barely have a reputation in the NIC yet, let alone made much of a contribution yet. Although the key word is yet...

Log Home white used to be a fat foam with a good metal fit. I stopped ordering it when it became a thin CPVC fit without warning. The fat variant is the best performing foam I have ever encountered, if you want to max out the most powerful blasters available, this is the foam you use. The fat version is extremely resistant to heat, but a good hair dryer held over a pillowcase will do the trick. Unlike most foam, you really need to apply pressure when burning the holes in for the weight. It's best used with #8s for slugs and no lighter than 3/0 fishing weights for domes. For barrels, use aluminum or brass. If you can't obtain those metals, use medium wall copper (you have to ask specifically for this), or magic CPVC (if you can find it) or thin wall PETG. Because it's so expensive and now not guaranteed to be received, don't waste this foam on lesser darts or weaker blasters. Save this shit for when you need to bring out your A+ game. However, note that white is easy to identify in mid-air and to then dodge. You need to make adjustments to your shooting style, timing, range, etc to compensate for this.

Thin Log Home white is like an entirely different foam, and thus deserves a separate paragraph. As mentioned by others, it's an excellent fit for standard (non-magic) CPVC. This foam is highly reliable, but I don't like it nearly as much as the fat version. It tends to squish and crumple more than the fat version and is a bit too narrow for #8 washers if you care about exposed metal (you should). It is slightly more responsive to heat, so you have to be careful not to expand it too much. Expanded foam via heat will lose its firmness in the barrel and won't perform as well or fit in your CPVC anymore.

MHA pink foam is the best performing thin foam that I have encountered. It's seriously dense and resists heat better than it looks like. Because it is highly dense, but not totally stiff, this foam is the easiest to work with when burning holes and making domes. It doesn't push back against the glue gun, but it also keeps the hot glue contained without losing the sidewalls, which is excellent. This foam doesn't have the longevity of white, if you step on it during play, those darts will deform more than white ones. I've also found that it weathers poorly. However, it's got one of the highest recovery rates in all-weather (white won't come back in the snow!) and in all-terrain. This is a double edged sword, because being easy to identify on the ground also means easy to identify in the air. Pink is among the easiest darts to see being shot at you, so it's harder to hit someone with pink than most other foam colors. Availability is the main drawback of this stuff, you can only get it from MHA and Kane won't sell it to you if you want to make slugs or conventional domes with it.

Best Materials beige (Hot Rod XL) is the cheapest option out of all the good foam varieties. A full 2,500 ft spool is only around $130something when on sale, which blows away everything else. A spool is a lifetime supply of foam for 99% of nerfers, you'll never need to buy darts again. You can order it by the foot for I think 15 cents a foot, 11 cents if you buy enough feet. This is usually a fat foam, not for your standard CPVC barrels unless you stretch it. It is pretty stiff and pretty dense, leading to pretty good heat resistance and pretty good performance. White and pink will outperform beige, but not by enough to matter in play. When I switched from white to beige, there was no noticeable difference. I did lose some feet off the end of my max range, but I don't engage at max range anyway. The main downside to beige is dart recovery. You will readily find white and pink, but good luck finding beige. Then again, it's dirt cheap, so who cares, just make more? I find that this foam works best in fat fits and weights like mentioned in the first paragraph. You could run #6s with this, but those darts will not be stable in the wind and you won't hit anything, relative to your potential hit percentage with #8s. Being relatively dark, beige is fairly difficult to see in the air and is good for hitting people with.

I can't tell what the Amazon foam actually is from those pictures, so I can't comment on its attributes.

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If I were you, I would honestly buy Best Materials beige and change barrels. You could still use an RSCB, but I'd move to an aluminum or brass barrel instead of CPVC. The reduced friction would allow you to have a longer, more accurate barrel. I was a CPVC pump-action springer guy once, but aluminum performed noticeably better, so I never went back. Note that when using fat foam and metal barrels, the dart fit logic tables are reversed, you want a slightly looser fit for a high power springer (not loose, but looser than you normally would use) and a tight fit (much tighter than you would normally use) for a high power air blaster. I don't know why, but these have given me the best performance (read: intersection of range, velocity, and consistency). Your results may vary.

*But, Rob, half that advice is utter bullshit! My x variety of foam is so much better or my y barrel with z fit is better* These are personal observations from years of handling these foams and fighting with and/or against them. Your results may vary.

I am a definite. Hopefully my gun doesn't blow up this time...