Airball or Woodsball

Two types of the games in paintball are woods ball and air ball. Although they are both ways to play paintball they are as different as night and day. Because of these differences the playing experience of the two are also radically different. Some players lean more toward air ball like tournament players, others like woods ball more for it's realistic feel. Of course the biggest difference between them is the field they are played on, one is played in in a small course of giant air filled bunkers and the other in simply out in the woods. However, these simple changes in playing fields causes a huge change tactics and strategy.

In air ball the field is small and the bunkers are big, compared to woods ball. It becomes much harder to hide or blend in with your surroundings. Although, because of these close bunkers moving around and out smarting your opponent becomes more about your own abilities where as in woods ball it can depend a lot on what you have around you to work with. It's all about how you move around the field, giving the game a bit in common with chess. Rate of fire almost becomes the name of the game, players modify their guns so that they can be fired as quickly as possible basically turning them into paint sprayers rather then paintball guns. In a game of air ball people will use markers with double finger triggers, electronic trigger kits, and adjustable triggers. to increase how fast they can shoot their marker, by doing this they increase their chance of getting a hit. This type of play sometimes seems to lean more towards being about competition then it is about fun. Players of air ball turn everything up to eleven going to the extreme where ever they can to help their chances of winning.

Woods ball is a totally different animal. What was a game of strategy becomes a game of strategy, chance, and skill. An intense game of hide and seek, that often reminds me of the story "The Most Dangerous Game". Having to creep through a forest staying close to trees and fallen logs as you go, and depending heavily on the luck that your opponent's ball will break in the brush and that yours will make it through unscathed and on target. Playing on a woods ball course is more realistic then an air ball course. You can hide behind brush and wait from someone to walk by, or sneak through the trees blending in with the woods. Woods ball has a lot of things that air ball doesn't that shake up the game and force players to change the way they play in order to win. It's the more life like game of cops and robbers we dreamed of as children.