Our forth visit to South Yorkshire Airsoft was a pretty wintry one, very chilly but bright. We had been fearful about a light snowfall, as this kind of weather might make the drive a little difficult for some people. But in the end there was a very respectable turn-out (about 100).

This was an 'Open Day', so no theme for this one and therefore everyone wore pretty much exactly what they wanted. Teams were determined by the wearing of either a red or yellow arm band. Once again, we chose to play on the Red team as it seemed to be apt, what with out Russian army theme.

TEAM LOADOUT

This particular visit marked our first attempt to create a team loadout. We were going for a Russian army look, to counterbalance the plethora of US/M4 style impressions.

Our uniform is based on the fur-collar type military parker, numerous bits and pieces of Russian gear finished off with, of course, various models of Kalashnikovs. Wayne sported the most complete outfit, resplendent in his Russian beret, shirt and insignia, but we will all get there in the end we hope.

I was very pleased with my Russian M23 ‘Pioneer’ chest rig. Its 4 double mag pouches are excellent for holding my newly purchased set of 6 mid-cap AK magazines, and I found it very comfortable to wear.

The ‘Russian’ parkas were actually Czech army issue, but being Olive Drab in colour they are fairly generic, and at least they were Eastern European (and at just £20 each they were excellent value). Later we all want to have proper matching Russian ‘Flora’ VSR camouflage uniforms. Nevertheless, this impression isn’t a bad first attempt in my opinion (people got the idea).

THE GAMES

As usual, the SYA staff started us off with a couple of light-hearted ‘warm up’ games. I really liked the ‘pick up the bomb’ objective based race, but it seems I was in the minority.

 Left: 'Team AKA' - (from left) Dewey, Craigy and Comrade Wayne (I'm holding the camera!).

But, you can’t please everyone and the morning games are always less serious affairs designed to get the guys like me – who aren’t fit – ready for the main event of the day, the afternoon ‘Milsim’.

Nobody was disappointed with the afternoon game. Without doubt, it is one of the best of all the ‘Milsim Lite’ type games I have played at SYA thus far. It was well thought-out, tactical and interesting, but easily understandable (there wasn’t the usual clumps of players scratching their collective heads wondering exactly what the next objective was).

TACTICS

Action was continuous and flowing (as the objectives slowly changed throughout the afternoon). Dewey and I finally got our shit together, and really clicked with the ‘leap frog’ style two man ‘search and destroy’ patrol technique.

Left: Dewey and his new 'baby' - his Classic Army SLR105. Kalashnikovs were the the team gun on this day, in a variety of flavours. I myself was armed with my new CYMA AK74 031 - which performed faultlessly along side the more expensive CA versions. 

It wasn’t rocket science; one of us would pick a good covered spot, and then they other would manoeuvre either to their position or to the next best spot – then the first person would do likewise. In this way we moved forward, one person covering the others movement and we made steady progress from one objective to the other.

It was very reassuring, and efficient, knowing someone had your back as it is usually while crossing open ground from one piece of cover to another that you get picked off. But now, if an enemy showed himself at a window or doorway he was either shot out or sent scuttling for cover by my cover man (Dewey, or vice versa).

Yeah – ok, obvious maybe – but it’s amazing how many players neglect basic tactics such as this. I literally halved my number of visits to REGEN, and doubled my kill rate by using this tactic, and Dewey was very happy too.

SUMMARY

All in all it was a very good day. We made what I think is our first outing as a real team (though we desperately need to sort out proper ‘comms’). We also received and tested out a lot of new kit, and I think we really made some headway with utilizing good tactics.

Left: it was Craigs first airsoft outing, here he is in his hired DPM camo and CA M16. Not very 'Russian', but it's always a good idea to try new things out before jumping in feet first with lots of expense! As it turned out, he seemed to enjoy himself. 

Overall, there was a lot to be pleased about, and this extended to how the day was organized and how other players conducted themselves. There was, as usual at SYA, no bad sportsmanship or cheating that I saw, and it was all very good natured.

Our one misgiving was the lack of proper conveniences. The original site Portaloos having been burned down by vandals (so not SYA’s fault). Nevertheless, we certainly look forward to some eventual replacements – we are only playing soldiers after all!

I’d give the day 4 stars out of 5!

Related Links:-

> South Yorkshire Airsoft - Proteus Camp page
> Airsoft Skirmish - our resident airsoft retailer on site on the day