Grey Ops

Blue Monkey Paintball S-RAV

2012-05-27T13:26:00.003-04:00

While certainly not the first ones to create a paintball RC vehicle, the gents at Blue Monkey Paintball have created a nice polished little package called the S-RAV that they would appear to be selling (or selling in the near future).

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CCM Sniper Rifle Nearly Cosmetically Complete

2012-05-26T21:45:00.000-04:00

Bill from CCM was kind enough to comment on a recent post (http://www.greyops.net/2012/05/ccm-sniper-rifle-updates.html#comment-533203965) and has stated that the CCM Sniper Rifle is nearly complete (aesthetically at least). Check out the pictures below:

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On Vacation!

2012-05-14T12:36:00.000-04:00

I'm on vacation from the 15th to the 25th, so hopefully nothing groundbreaking in the paintball world will occur in that time. I'll be mainly (and intentionally) unreachable for that time, but if there is an emergency of some sort I can be contacted at my usual email addresses, and may get a chance to read it if it's marked urgent and contains some kind of expletive in the header. It's been a whirlwind couple of months, and I'm really looking forward to blogging a lot this summer.

Click here to check out the Tactical Survivor Blog's Facebook Page.

On the Crypsis front, the store will still be operational, and as a bit of a vacation bonus, all orders will benefit from 10% off with the code "VACAY" (without quotation marks, derp) and everything over $100 CAD before taxes will receive a bitchin' Canadian PVC Flag Patch.

Also, looking for a bit of advice. I'm headed to Ireland, so I need to know what whisky to buy there (if there's something that's worth it) or if anyone can recommend a good brand of poitín.

Paintball Marker Registration in Fredericton

2012-05-11T23:58:00.000-04:00

A bit of old news that I haven't seen anyone talk about (which is odd as you'd think it would make the rounds in our community), is that the city of Fredericton (as the Montreal Gazette reports) has instituted a mandatory registry for "anything that shoots a projectile by means of compressed air, spring or mechanical means. That covers pellet and paintball guns and, in theory, even such toys as Nerf guns." This bylaw, bylaw S-5, applies only to the municipality of Fredericton.

I try to avoid politics as much as possible on Grey Ops, so I'd love to hear you guys weigh in with your opinions of the bylaw. Here's a link to the offical document if anyone's interested. I'd be particularly interested to know if any of our East coast readers have come into direct contact with the bylaw, and what their opinion is.

CCM Sniper Rifle Updates

2012-05-05T22:57:00.001-04:00

Turns out this thing gets better and better. Gonna leave this to eye candy and videos for your pleasure. Check it out!

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Peek at Hyde Definition's Metropolis

2012-05-04T22:59:00.004-04:00

If you remember this post, you may find the below picture interesting:

This is a mock-up of the PenCott urban pattern now known as Metropolis. Lawrence Holsworth states that "It will work best in dim-light, built-up environments."Head on over to this Facebook post to make your opinion known, or as always feel free to fawn/smack/trash in the comment section below.

Guest Post: UPS Brokerage Avoidance

2012-05-03T01:32:00.002-04:00

Evan is the author of the Tactical Survivor Blog, and was kind enough to furnish Grey Ops with this article. Be sure to check out his site and Like it on Facebook! - Connor

I among many others have always been ready to smash a kitten when a package shows up at the door with some absurd brokerage fee on top of my regular duties charges that I expect to owe. Well what if we didn't have to smash those adorable kittens and instead we taught our shipping companies a lesson in empowered thinking? Well my friends, I am going to tell you how to do that.

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Get Snuggly With A-TACS

2012-04-26T17:27:00.005-04:00

A-TACS is now available in soft and snuggly form! I can see this being popular with hunters in Canada, and given the weather we've been having in Ontario they could probably still get some use out of this before the fall rolls around. Release below.
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Tracked Wheelchair for Paintball

2012-04-25T22:09:00.000-04:00

One of the major failings of paintball is that it's a hobby that disabled persons will quickly find to be rather unaccommodating for several reasons. Team Defiant has broken one of those barriers, and created a treaded wheelchair capable of bringing someone into the heat of paint battle. Kudos guys!

Green and Tan

2012-04-25T18:46:00.000-04:00

One thing that I've always liked about how airsoft games are organized is that teams are typically asked to wear either predominately green or tan (and respective variations) uniforms when playing, so as to eliminate confusion during play (friend or foe identification). What I've never understood is why we (as milsim/woodsball/scenario paintballers) don't carry that over into paintball. Armbands are a good system, and make things very easy for rentals or people that didn't expect to play that day, but I have yet to see a milsim paintball scenario adopt green/tan rules during registration. The rule normally applies to uniforms only (you can wear accoutrements in whatever colour you like), and most people I know that have been playing paintball with a milsim flavour for 1-2+ years have a few sets of uniforms just lying around, so it sounds like it would be easy enough. So come on field owners and event organizers, let's see someone try a green and tan rule paintball game! If you do, Grey Ops will be sure to showcase it.

PsiOps' Doug Brown Answers Your Questions

2012-04-23T14:49:00.001-04:00

Doug Brown, of PsiOps, has been kind enough to answer a bevy of questions posed by paintballers in the below interview. If you have questions that you still want answered, feel free to comment below the post. Doug has a great wealth of information and it's always great to have him share his thoughts.

Jay Y - Where do you see paintball as an activity in the next decade or two?

I don't see it changing that much Jay. Back when we (my partner and I) were first starting out, I didn't know squat about banks, money, or running a business. Business was booming and NOBODY would loan us money. We met a banker playing paintball one day and he got us in front of his boss. He asked "Aren't you worried that Paintball might just be a fad?" I said, " Its the most American of sports. Its shooting people. We'll never get tired of that". I could see my partner shrink down in his chair in embarrassment..... but we got the loan. I wasn't very politically correct then, I'm not now. Men grow up playing Army. They have since the dawn of time. For the last 600 or so years that has involved using a gun. I don't see that changing in the next couple of decades.

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5 Years of Milsig + Sale

2012-04-20T06:14:00.002-04:00

Congrats to Milsig for completing 5 years in business! They're passing on the celebration, and have a pretty decent promotion going on right now. Check it out:

Malaysia > Britain

2012-04-16T03:24:00.002-04:00

Source

The above picture is one of the King of Malaysia. And yes, he's firing a RAP4 T68. Compare that with the previously discussed photo of Prince Charles (not even a king), and you'll see why the name of this post is irrevocably true. The paintball scene in Malaysia is pretty big, so the fact that this happened doesn't surprise me, but this will certainly be a cool bragging point for RAP4.

Crypsis Survey

2012-04-14T21:45:00.001-04:00

As many of you know, a lot of my time has recently been taken up (amongst other things) by my little store project, Crypsis. Well I purposefully try not to toot (lol toot) my own horn too much on Grey Ops, cause I like to keep things separate, but I'd love some feedback from those of you that have checked out the site (and those that haven't). So, you have opportunity to win some swag and make Crypsis better at the same time. Details below the pic/break.

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Camouflage in Video Games: A-TACS in Ghost Recon Future Soldier

2012-04-13T18:44:00.000-04:00

I'm glad I get to continue my Camouflage in Video Games segment, and in this case the news is straight from the horse's mouth! A-TACS will be featured as a pattern in Ghost Recon Future Soldier, and as seen in the promo photo above it looks pretty badass. Now Battlefield 3 just needs to follow suit and license some proper patterns for their expansions.

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XPower Claymore

2012-04-08T23:52:00.000-04:00

Coming this May is an extremely cool toy from XPower, a milsim claymore device that looks and acts the part.

Here are the specs:

CO2 powered
Capable of launching powder, paint or BBs
Uses tripwire, remote or thermal sensor

And here it is in action!
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A-TACS FG Now Available in Hydrographic Film

2012-04-05T01:19:00.000-04:00

In a move awaited by many, DCS has announced that A-TACS FG is now available as a water transfer film, available through TWN. Hydrographics seem increasingly popular with paintballers and airsofters, I'm sure this will be an easy sell.

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Grey Ops Under New Management - April Fools Post

2012-04-01T02:01:00.000-04:00

Catch you guys on the flip side.

After much deliberation, I've come to the difficult decision that Grey Ops is too much of a burden on my personal life, and I'm taking time out to work on different things. It's been a great run and I can't thank you guys enough for everything you've done for me. I'm leaving the blog and its affiliate entities under the command of a close friend of mine, one George Bluth. Mr. Bluth is the owner of a real estate development consortium, and has been buying up different blogs in the aim of monetizing them. He'll be appointing a writer to take care of things from the creative end, and I fully trust that the new team will bring you guys lots of new exciting content. The amount Grey Ops was purchased for will remain undisclosed.

Update (afternoon April 1st 2012) - April Fools!

RAP4 Teases us with New Summer Releases

2012-03-29T16:42:00.000-04:00

RAP4 has teased us with some new, possibly very interesting, product releases this summer. Here's the ad copy, followed by a video showcasing some new stuff (as well as variations on some things they already carry).

Real Action Paintball is proud to help you out-maneuver, out-gun, and out-play your opponents this summer with some all-new gear and exclusive technology. Our engineers are hard at work putting the finishing touches on technology we previewed to players and the media at the Paintball Extravaganza...including our all-new D-Mags and new mag-fed markers. We have some extraordinary new models coming soon that recreate SOCOM-configured carbines, and accept D-Mags loaded with, interchangeably, First Strike rounds and traditional paintballs. We even have new tactical gear coming your way, because we want to protect and empower you with more than just our revolutionary markers.

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Sport Smoke Goes Electric

2012-03-28T17:00:00.000-04:00

*Ring ring* "Hello?"

In a rather cool move, Sport Smoke has released a line of electrically triggered smoke grenades. Already very popular in fields in North America, this opens up all sorts of cool scenario options to Sport Smoke devices. Think of how fun it would be to hook one of these up to a "bomb" you have to disarm.

Here's the ad copy:

"We are happy to announce the release of our new electrically triggered smoke grenades: the TSG-EF and BFG-EF. These electric variations of the popular Tactical Smoke Grenade and BattleField Grenade feature an integral squib designed to set off the grenade when connected to an appropriate 9 volt power source. The TSG-EF and BFG-EF are ideal for remote fire applications, hobby applications, and special effects!"

Click here for the new grenades, including pricing and purchase information.

PenCott Metropolis - An Urban PenCott?

2012-03-28T03:39:00.001-04:00

If you're hoping for pictures of the tantalized pattern, you're out of luck, all I have is a name and even then it's not corroborated. But, in Sabre's (see this post) .pdf catalogue, the company lists a pattern called PenCott Metropolis. Here's the excerpt:

Interesting? I'd say so.

Vice Magazine Paintballs with Hizbullah

2012-03-26T19:10:00.000-04:00

Renters always look like renters, no matter who they are the world over apparently.

Source: Vice Magazine

If you're familiar with Vice Magazine, it should come as no surprise to you that they wanted to play paintball with Hizbullah. They used to offer free copies in a record store in Ottawa, and I remember picking up one issue that included a lot of content in this vein. Long story short, they ended up actually accomplishing their goal, and beyond the controversy that entails, you have to admit that these journalists have serious balls. You wouldn't catch me going into an underground paintball complex in Beirut to play with a bunch of cheating (yes, they cheat) terrorists who have no qualms with using pyrotechnics during gameplay. What's more terrifying is they call them out on their cheating.

Read the full story here. Vice used to offer free subscriptions if you wrote them a letter, but now they appear to charge for a yearly subscription.

Specops PenCott Update

2012-03-26T18:09:00.001-04:00

Info courtesy of Lawrence Holsworth.

Specops, of Poland, has developed some pretty awesome PenCott enpatterned (it's a word cause I say so, deal with it) clothing. On another note, apparently Polish forces have been testing clothing made by Specops in PenCott patterns in Afghanistan.
[Keep reading...]

CCM SR1 Update

2012-03-26T15:02:00.000-04:00

CCM has uploaded a video preview of their SR1 platform, showing how individual shells can be loaded and extracted. Check it out:

Love that sound.

CCM has stated that basically anything can fit inside the shells, including first strikes, regular paintballs, large nerf darts, and the the scenario dreams sniper rounds. Still no word on ETA, final pricing or other details, it still seems very much like a "it's done when it's done" project for CCM.

Ugly Milsim Markers - Exterminate All Rational Design

2012-03-22T16:43:00.000-04:00

Wow, it's been a while since I've done an Ugly Milsim Marker post, I've almost missed it. Up on the chopping block today is (drumroll please)...

The Planet Eclipse Etha! That's right, Planet Eclipse has clearly been reading some of these posts, and noticed that I tend to speak of a lot of speedball markers with rail systems slapped on them. To be ironic (oh you hipsters, you) they quite literally just took some rails and have put them in a package so you can slap them on your marker (specifically the Etha, which is already a standard marker in their lineup). To quote their ad copy, "Kick Ass!".

And yes, you may have noticed that they so deftly placed a red dot sight behind the hopper. I hear that's to improve your reloading ability, so you can view exactly where the hopper is without parallax error, thereby avoiding those big paint spills we see so often on the speedball field.