[tomn8r]

the title says it all my friends.

at present imma counting

war party
island mob (in progress)
notorious
b.c. supernaturals
deception
kvk
misfits (newly formed)

as island speedball teams

hellfire
island militia
untouchables(?)
rez dogs

as island woodsball teams/groups

this isn't too bad, but that's out of 3/4 million islanders. is there something we can do to get more teams/players into the game? imma gonna chuck a case of paintballs to the person who has the best ideas/suggestions by april 1st. not so much a contest but as an incentive to get this topic moving. ideas ne1?

[Zero-Niner]

I think there is a Lot of promotional work needed. I don't think many people are aware what there is available for paintballing on the Island. At least in areas outside of Victoria. If it wasn't for these forums I would have no idea. I have been struggling to find this info myself. There is a major lack of good online sources and most info is out of date or from closed pro shops.

I think a majority of people are in the same boat as me, there is no Proshop or fields, only outlaws. Which many are just a small group of friends and don't advertise themselves. I know here in Port Alberni I haven't seen much and need to get out to the outlaw field on the Hump to join up with more people other than my friends and co-workers.

I think to encourage more teams, the teams are going to need to get out and make contact with these smaller outlaw fields scattered along the Island. I know this will not be easy, but if two or three teams show up and start playing a few times a year with the local field players, promote playing as teams and promo both speed and bush ball, it will move them to start creating new teams and wanting to travel to play there new friends at their home fields. Face to face contact is best, and also creating a community feeling (These Forums are a great start) where everyone can communicate and feed off each other.

SO Promote. Get the teams to go out to recruit and mentor in creating new teams.

Get posters made up with info for these forums, leagues, big games, Tourney's, so they know where to go online to co-ordinate and take part. Maybe get a contact in each area that can constantly print and post them at the local outlaw fields and other community areas and local boards. I can help design them as I have experience in this and I'm a Photoshop master

maybe these forums need a little graphic works to draws attention to them and not just the basic install. I maybe able to help, but all my boards I have designed and built are PHPBBs so I need to learn to use the IP Board templates. Adding Graphical Banner ads for major events, games and tourneys on the Island (Non Commercial for free, commercial ones should pay) will help to give a visual reminder every time they visit here.

Just a thought from the new guy stuck in Port Alberni and bored!

This post has been edited by Zero-Niner: 13 February 2010 - 10:00 AM

[tomn8r]

dude, that was frikkin awesome. beat THAT peeps!

[jrhwhite]

I believe a good number of the island players would be in Victoria (Correct me if I'm wrong). The closest speedball field to us here is all the way in Duncan which may inhibit some Vic players from joining teams or getting heavier into it due to time and transportation and numerous other inconviences. I have no idea how to fix this apart from the obvious expensive solution to get a speedball field down here in Victoria. Possibly a more organized system for people who want to go up, carpooling is another obvious solution, but some people getting into the sport such as myself may not know anyone going up therefore making it difficult to justify driving out to Duncan to play for a day.

Just my thoughts

[ragewo1f]

I believe a good number of the island players would be in Victoria (Correct me if I'm wrong). The closest speedball field to us here is all the way in Duncan which may inhibit some Vic players from joining teams or getting heavier into it due to time and transportation and numerous other inconviences. I have no idea how to fix this apart from the obvious expensive solution to get a speedball field down here in Victoria. Possibly a more organized system for people who want to go up, carpooling is another obvious solution, but some people getting into the sport such as myself may not know anyone going up therefore making it difficult to justify driving out to Duncan to play for a day.

Just my thoughts

i hear ya loud and clear

[Fifthplanecomin]

Well put Zero-Niner.
In the past six years I have never witnessed any movement for attracting new people to play outside of this forum or in a store.
(Excluding TNTs awesome radio ads or other commercial rec field efforts)

I've always felt if we wanted to introduce the 5man/7man element of the game to the public that we should host a charitable event at 'The Cage'.
One where entries/fund raising is paid directly online to the MS Society - the field lease holder could treat it like another Sunday practice but get his/her face on TV.
Reffs volunteer for free. THE MAIN PURPOSE of the event would be to raise funds and public awareness.

Press releases given to every radio and local tv stations - have a few captians get their face on the boob tube talking about their training programs, commitments, accomplishments, and unity in a greater cause out of this sport that we all play all the time - outside of outlaw, outside of the bush and into provincial and national series leagues.

How many times have you told someone you play paintball and instantly they know all about it even if they have no clue what-so-ever about what were do or what is available across Canada and the US for competitive players? Tens of thousands of people have no idea at all.

When and where was the last time you saw a poster for a CXBL, BCPPL event, March of the Rookies or Island Series - I'll bet it wasn't outside of a paintball store or outside of a paintball forum.

The hurdle I have found with creating awareness of these events and 7man options is the $3000-5000 gearbag price tag - what could really work well is forming a team to train/play 5man Div 4 with rental gear or some of us with spare gear - outfit a community training program for a new Div 4 team. If people want to buy their own they will but let em in first without the gear bag price tag.

I've always thought a bunch of bumper stickers with some slogan and the forums URL could be a fun way to get people creeping the site more.
We could sticky some new threads in the Speedball section that are focused on being informative with links, video, pictures so new site visitors can see what's out there - like threads titled correctly and not full of our off topic rambles - kind of a sub section full of good media/info/content.

There's a million things we have always been able to do but never bother.
The whole promoting thing is something that really interests me to do when not commited to a team.

This post has been edited by Fifthplanecomin: 13 February 2010 - 11:44 AM

[longstar550]

Fifth makes a great point the sport needs to be cheaper for people to start. I mean how many people are going to drop 500-1000 for an entry level speed ball set up. Migh6t be a good idea to have a few events were u have to use rentals so the public could play. also for yunger players such as myself its a great idea to wear your jersey to school maybe once a month because people ask you about it and then go out and play with you I have had it happen to me. Just some more ways to draw attention and raise awareness. Possibly a tournament targeted at newer players up at the cage without some of the more experienced players there giving some more people tournament exposure. After we get some more people in the sport we also need to have clinics for some of the newer players i mean im just into really my second season and i would love to learn from some more experienced players.

This post has been edited by longstar550: 13 February 2010 - 02:17 PM

[Zero-Niner]

dude, that was frikkin awesome. beat THAT peeps!

Thanks.

I have had some experience with this. I was strongly active with the SCA (Medieval recreation and fighting Group) on the Island and have helped with this same problem, getting the numbers to grow. I have ran an Army cadet unit as well years ago and had the largest numbers in history for that corp. Plus I owned my own Gaming Store.

Being Succefull is being visible. IF we can't be Visiible we can not be Seen. As I siad before, Teams need to get out and play with those that may not have seen how a real team works and get a chance to play with and against them. This will encourage them to orginize. If the teams make good friends with all those outlaws out there, they will be more willing to travel to go play with ther friends and hopefully start bring teams with them. Next thing you know it the Island has a nice little community that works together. Hopefully holding events up and down the Island through out the year, where everyone tries to make it out too. But we need to promote both speed and bush and not just focus on one. Hopefully someone with better contacts then I have would be able to get the teams onboard and help with a recruiting drive.

[Mike]

The island needs more players, not more teams.

Teams will come from the players, and I think unity and less teams would be better than more. Unified, structured programs where players can join, learn, play, have fun. Meet some buddies. Play some local events (Run 4 the Guns) and move on up to D4/D3 BCPPL. Warparty and Supernaturals both do this to an extent however they don't have any ties with rec fields to bring out new guys etc.

There is no easy solution where we can all just pool some time and resources. It is a process which will take a long time. I'll post more later.

[Zero-Niner]

I agree we need more players. But then again there are probably more then we can even imagine. They play privately; in the back yard with friends they know (Like Me). That’s why I suggested the Poster Campaign for these forums and local events. If someone steps up in every community to print and distribute these around their area, hopefully they will lead people that are hiding to come out and play, or at least get their feet wet by visiting this site. Maybe they can be placed at some stores that sell paintball stuff, like C-Tire, Wal-Mart (if they will allow it). Plus at coffee shops, schools, malls ect..... Maybe also plaster local online forums like what we have here in Port Alberni at alberni.ca

Being visible like I said is the best way to recruit

[SouthPark]

Heh,

One way to get players connected and networked is to use this forum as a tool for organizing AND as a tool for sharing pictures and movies of local events and games. Nothing seems to draw players to the "table" like saying that the pics you are taking during game day (be it rec ball at TNT or another commercial field or an outlaw gig) will be linked to on this forum. Once here and an active forum member the IPF becomes and organizing tool for teams , events, and smash up outlaw games.


Mike - FYI: Warparty has real strong ties to both TNT and MidWay . All of our players were and are regular TNT boyz or Midway Ballers and many of them ref for these fields when not at WarParty practices.... and we continue to grow and draw new players into the Island speedball scene largely based on these connections. A year ago we did not exist as a speedball organization and with the exception of one or two ballers NONE of us played speedball. We are doing "outreach" all the time bringing new players (the new crew the "Misfits" came out today for example for the first time in force as a team.... PistolPete showed and FallBack Bill brought them all out as a product of his getting to know them... ). Every new player who comes out to WarParty practice has done so as a result of this one to one personal contact and mentoring. It seems to be working. ALmost all of WarParty has deep woodsball/recball roots...

Networking... getting the word out... Island Militia has done this in the past. We travel where the game is. If you have a game and want an OPFOR post up... betcha we can find a date that will work and we can do a smash up game. Island Militia has pretty solid contacts with the mainland players... hit us up and we can usually find a game to go to as a massive Island team (we travel as ISLAND UNITED).

Hellfire is almost always trying to get players out to hit up Midway with them... if you have a new crew you simply MUST take these guys up on the almost always open ended invitation to play with/agaisnt them. Cool bunch of dudes IMO. They ball in Duncan (Midway) but I think most live Nanaimo area so I bet if you have an outlaw gig on the go these guys will try to join in (and Joshua be sure to let IM know so we can try to roll out to).

[SouthPark]

...There is a major lack of good online sources and most info is out of date or from closed pro shops...

Heh Zero-Niner, Why not take this on? Start a local area FYI section here in the woodsball forum on IPF??!! Post games and local outlaw get togethers here... If you build it... they will come!

[longstar550]

i agree with south park part of what he was saying is why i posted the start a byop feild topic. with the idea in mind of starting a hyper or pseed ball feild in vicotria to get people into speed ball that cant drive to the cage

[Zero-Niner]

Here is something quick I put together for a Poster Campaign. Click or right click to download to view in Adobe reader



I usually like to use my own photos or ones people send me, but I was in a hurry and have no paintball pictures taken. So I Stole...Umm.. Borrowed the image and photoshop'd it. Made logo from scratch.

[tomn8r]

excellent. how about something like a 5 player tourny, 1 cage member per team, i provide free tippmans and masks for the other 4. cage player uses a pump. $60 includes a case and entry per person. we throw 20% back to a charity that we vote for here on the forum. low entry/air, free gear, cheap paint. big chunk to charity. i'll need 5 refs to volunteer.

this way every1 gets 4 buds new to the game, or from out of the woods to jump in cheep, for a good cause.

this may not fly...... just thinking off the top of my head and throwing whatever resources i can muster at it to keep the costs low and get new people in to try it. but even if this doesn't neccessarily work, the whole point of the thread is to bounce some ideas around to infuse the sport at the grass roots level and see just what it would take to get it hoppin'. we all know the sport sells itself - we just need to find a way to make it easy.

ideas like rental-only tourny day, and car pooling are exactly what we need to hear. rob's hit the promo idea on the nail. <swear filter>, i've even floated the idea of a big van. if the cage could prurchase it and drive to and from vic on sat and sun, it would prolly be full.

problem with a field in victoria is the prohibitive cost due to construction and a lease arrangement that would be cheap. insurance somewhere other than native land is a must. the zoning alone is a huge obstacle. to do it right; pay a proper manager (someone betther than me ha ha), buy insurance (ouch!), obtain the proper zoning (bon chance amigo) or work a deal with the native council (because most native land is 'owned' by the tribe), get the $10,000 for a reliable compressor. sink 5 large into the bunkers the blowers the poles the netting the crapper, the water, the power, the parking GAD! research i've done for victoria has always been halted at the 'financial return' hurdle.

we got it pretty good in that regard at the cage. i think a victoria field would be a great addition to island 'ball if it could be done safely, legally and cheaply. but if it can't, andthere is to be only one main location, then i like trent's vision of the cage being midway between the 2 largest population centres. - an hour either way. victoria and nanaimo north have about equal representation.

This post has been edited by tomn8r: 13 February 2010 - 09:38 PM

[Cheap-o]

What do you mean "all the way in duncan"

It takes me 10 minutes more to get to the cage than TNT.

On the actual topic:

I think we would see more growth in the sport if we actually had a physical paintball store - correct me if I'm wrong, but there were a lot more players when Bastion Victoria was open...

[pballer99]

A good area to promote paintball would be colleges and universities- like UVic, Camosun, VIU, and especially at the colleges in Duncan.

I doubt there's many places on the island with higher volumes of people belonging to the demographic we'd want to target. And while some students, such as myself, are very very broke, most have their school paid for and have disposable income.

I believe the last UVic residence paintball trip to TNT had over 100 participants, with minimal advertising.

Taking this idea a step further, UVic (and I imagine most other colleges/universities?) has very active clubs. Twice a year there are giant club days, where literally thousands of students drop by to check it out. UVic's ski and surfing clubs for example (sports which are arguably more expensive than paintball), have well over a hundred members each, and recieve enough funding to regularly provide discounts for trips to places like Panama and Whistler.

The requirements for forming a club are minimal, and funding is available. While I don't know many details about club funding, having enough funding to help pay the gas for weekly cage trips doesn't seem unreasonable.

Many of the island's competitive speedball players attend some form of post-secondary institution. Perhaps with some support from the island paintball community, they would be willing to get the ball rolling.

[SouthPark]

Frenchie... go here (below). The link takes you to a PDF of a recent UBC alma matta meeting... I believe there was a presentation to the council to get a PB club going and, if memory serves me correctly, most U based clubs get some sort of $$ support... just a thought... get er going at UV bud! It is not right for UBC to be ahead of UVic... is it??? I think not.


http://www2.ams.ubc.ca/images/uploads/7_-_...ary_18_2010.pdf


ZERO 9ER... love the poster.

Cheap-O... you are correct... the drive up to the Cage is faster for me then the drive out to TNT... both are easy to do though. Car pooling!!

[pballer99]

As a UVic student I am obligated to hate UBC with every fiber of my being.

I'm unsure if I'll be able to give a UVic paintball club the time and attention it deserves next year while I'm writing my honours thesis.. But at the very least I'd be willing to help out with it.

[Kyle.Bocskay]

excellent. how about something like a 5 player tourny, 1 cage member per team, i provide free tippmans and masks for the other 4. cage player uses a pump.

YAY PUMP SPEEDBALL

[camoking]

If an event to get new people into the sport were to get off the ground, we should contact CHEK NEWS's Island 30 program they like to run human interest stories about happenings here on the island.

[gav1n]

jhrwhite said it.. we need a field closer to vic. also, i and some peers are still looking into a uni club/team, and want to see where it leads..

[Cheap-o]

Cheap-O... you are correct... the drive up to the Cage is faster for me then the drive out to TNT... both are easy to do though. Car pooling!!

Living at the bottom of the hat helps though XD

[Fifthplanecomin]

Doing a fund raiser around an event doesn't require placing someone responsible for collecting and donating the funds after the fact.
As a example my wife and I raised over $8600 for the MS Society last year with three other people and participated in a weekend event in Mill Bay.

Teams can fund raise on thier own. You can create a team online profile where donations are collected by the team members by online contributions.
Donated prizes can be rewarded to teams that collect a 'above and beyond' amount. Your entry can be your teams proven collection of $1000.
It's a lot easier then you think.

But that's just one example - there are a zillion other ways to do it beyond trusting someone elses calculator and check submission.
Plus there is no point in doing it without the distribution of the press release material.

[longstar550]

2 or 3 man turnaments would help to cuz its alot easyer to get 2-3 people togeather than it is to get 5

This post has been edited by longstar550: 14 February 2010 - 06:09 PM