Paintball is a great
sport that, despite all of the misconceptions about it, is tremendously
fun and
safe. Basically the sport involves
shooting paintballs with some type of
paintball marker at other people and once hit, that person is
eliminated. There is an inherent
pleasure built into the
human psyche that derives from
pelting people with relatively hard objects. The sport has its own
strategies and game play which differs drastically from anything else.
Now there are various games that can develop from this such as: Capture the Flag, Center Flag, Speedball/Hyperball , Elimination, Hide and Seek, everyone on their own, and various warlike scenario games. Most games last about 30 minutes until you start over and everyone comes back in the game similar to the elementary school favorite Dodgeball. You can play paintball on any property that you own, however its usually illegal on public property or parks. Many commercial paintball parks exist that provide everything a beginner needs to play paintball in a safe and fun environment. Usually these places have big fields with many little places to hide. Much of paintball is played in a forest or wilderness scenario, but tournament play and other similar fields have man made bunkers.
One of the biggest misconceptions about paintball is that it is not safe. This is wrong; paintball actually has one of the least reported rates of injury for any sport (lower than bowling!). The reason behind this is that all paintball players are extremely safety conscious. The biggest most important thing you can do when playing paintball is to wear some sort of approved safety goggles or mask. Every paintball park, or paintball store will have a full face mask, with a seal around the eyes to prevent serious injury. The other big injury concern is typical outdoor injuries from commonly playing in some sort of forest.
The other big misconception is that only warlike fanatics with military experience and a crazed attitude participate in the sport. I have been playing paintball for about 10 years, and I have probably run across two or three people like this, but the great majority are just out to have a good time.
Paintball is a rather expensive sport for the more than casual player. You need the proper equipment, including a marker, mask, and paintballs at the very least, which easily can run into the hundreds of dollars. Experienced players sometimes wish to bring an assortment of paintball accessories onto the field and wear full body camo. Beginners should play with other beginners at first until they learn the various paintball tactics and develop an idea for the game play of the sport avoiding the common rookie mistakes.