Sunday, May 14, 2006

Airsoft, Part 3

I had my second day of gaming outside today. My goals were to have fun, call all hits as soon as possible, and keep learning. Things went pretty well. First I wasn't sure if I'd make it because I was sick earlier this week. Then the weather looked sketchy so I wasn't sure we'd be out today at all.

I'm still able to look at the experience as basically an outsider. In part that's due to the fact that I'm a foreigner here in Japan, so I'll always be an outsider to some degree. In addition, I'm a newb so there's lots I'm trying to pick up on the fly. Finally, it's something so out of the ordinary yet oddly familiar that it's easy to reflect upon my experiences.

I'd be almost afraid to loan these guys a real gun at the range. Airsoft give one great practice at draws, obtaining a good sight picture, stance, and tactics... but whoa... this squad has almost no muzzle discipline. Just today, I saw a guy pull the trigger on his handgun then look down the muzzle repeatedly when no BB's had shot out. All without wearing his facemask dangling around his neck. Guys also wave their muzzles around with loaded weapons in the safe zone. During one of the pre-game huddles, a guy went to load his handgun, and racked the slide while casually covering half of us with the muzzle before holstering his weapon. They have an odd habit of resting the muzzles of their rifles on top of their feet while standing around.

I'm not really worried since these guys will almost never get a chance to handle a real firearm. But I'm being very conscious about not letting a lax attitude around the airsoft field effect how I handle my real steel firearms or my airsoft replicas.

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