Building Your Paintball Field

Getting started.
So you read the other two articles, you have aquired your land and insurance, and now you are ready to build your paintball field.
This is where the blood, sweat and tears part comes in.   Building a paintball field is like building a web site.   They are both never done, and they both require constant upkeep. :)

There is an incredible percentage of paintball fields that fail to spend enough time and money on designing and building their paintball field.   They might get some tires, barrels and plywood, but there is never any real thought put into the design or construction of the fields.   At many fields, bunkers are no more than a loose collection of twigs and ground cover that is thrown into little piles.   These are many times where these end up being the only things available for players to hide behind.   To build a paintball field in this way is totally self destructive.   You should never settle on the designs of your fields.   It is better to only have one really nice field, versus two or three so-so fields. 

A paintball field needs to be

• Clear of dangerous debris.
• Clear of holes and sharp stumps.
• Clear of briars and poison ivy.
• Clear of boards that have nails in them.
• Balanced and winnable from both sides.
• Large enough so that all players on a team can reach bunkers.
• Long enough that players cannot be shot leaving the home base.
• Small enough that games do not always go to time limit.
• Small enough so that they are easy to referee.
• Marked well with signage and visable boundaries.
• Close to the staging area.

There was a field in my area once (it has long since shut down) that was actually built on a trash dump.   I am not exaggerating.  There was broken glass and debris all over the place.   I will never forget driving into the parking lot for the first time and seeing a broken porcelin toilet sitting in the parking lot.   When I returned two months later, the toilet was still there.   This sounds really funny but it is true.

Think of your paintball field as an amusement park

For a moment, consider Disney World, or one of those big Six Flags super-sized amusement parks....

Would you go back to them if:

• There was trash on the ground and the trash cans were overflowing?
• The staff did not have uniforms?
• The staff were not trained?
• The staff rode the rides while they worked?
• The rides were not roped-off properly and people could get hurt because of it?
• There were inadequate or dirty restrooms?
• If there was no decent place to park and your car got stuck in the mud?
• The signs marking the place were made with a piece of scrap wood and a can of spray paint?
• The rides and equipment were constantly breaking down?
• The safety gear were unkempt?

You would probably answer "NO" to all of these questions because they sound silly, and yet there are hundreds and hundreds of paintball fields across the country that are DUMPS.   Even some of the biggest fields are dumps.   This is because the industry is not regulated properly by the companies that insure them.  This means that any fly-by-night redneck can setup a "paintball field" behind his house or on a lousy piece of ground in the middle of nowhere and be in the paintball business.   The problem here is that it gives the whole industry a bad name.   But I digress......

YOU on the other hand CARE about what kind of paintball field it is that you are going to build RIGHT?

Nod your head "yes"....  Thank you. 

If you keep thinking in the back of your mind that you are running an "AMUSEMENT PARK" and not a "paintball range", you will have a much greater chance for success.    Also, you have to remember that your customers will have a completely different perception of your paintball field than you will.  So your challenge is to put yourself in your customers shoes and imagine what they will expect when they come to your place to play.   If you are starting a brand new paintball field, the best way to do this is to BOOK A GAME AT ANOTHER PAINTBALL FIELD.   By playing at another paintball field and keeping your lips sealed about your new business, you can learn the mistakes of other field owners.   You might even be able to pick their brains like you are picking mine right now.   :)   Take a road trip to the largest, most successful field within driving distance of where you live.   Here in the NorthEast the obvious choices are Skirmish in Jim Thorpe, PA, 3 Rivers Survival Games in Pittsburgh, and there is another big field in Long Island, NY.

Centralize Your Operations

On to the specifics...

When you are planning your fields from the ground-up, you should consider locating your staging area in the center of the facility.   That way, all of the fields are located radially around your building and staging area.   This makes all of the fields the same distance from staging.   This will save you a TON of headaches later.     Even if you have to surround the area with netting, it will make it much easier to know what is going on with ALL of your paintball fields at the same time.   Most of the really large paintball tournament promoters have already learned this lesson, and they setup their air filling and paint selling stations in the center of all of the fields.    Remember, you want to keep player down-time to a minimum, so if you can shorten the distance they have to walk when they are eliminated, then you will make more money.

This also gives you other benefits:

• You can combine staging areas into one area.
• Referees report more quickly to you between games.
• Injured players can reach the first aid kit faster.
• Teams get more time between games to get ready when you are hosting tournaments.
• Walkie talkies will work better becasue staging is closer.

Field Entrance

If you can, make a single entrance that leads to ALL of your fields.   Just beyond this entrance should be your target range and Chronograph station.   This way, ALL players can easily chronograph their guns AS THEY WALK ONTO THE FIELD!    It really stinks when  an entire group has to wait for one player to run accross your complex and chrono his gun at the other end of your facility. Keeping eveything centralized avoids this delay.   Delays cost you money.  This also gives you a single, mandatory "goggles on" location where you can place goggle signage.

Target Range Placement

Your target range should be placed behind the field entrance, behind the "goggles on" sign, facing away from the staging area.  This way the players are shooting AWAY from your building, and you can easily watch them to make sure that everyone is wearing goggles at the range.  Make sure that players know where the range is.   Make sure that there are "goggles on" signs at the target range.  Use netting around your target range whenever possible.  Se my other article on "making more money" for more tips about target ranges.

Security

Many new field owners get all caught up and worried about building a secure storage area at the play site.    Each and every field has its own security risks.    If your field resides next to a large residential area, then you can count on having a vandalism problem with the local teenagers.   Remote fields do not have this much of a problem, but it is much more difficult to "catch someone in the act" of vandalising your property if it is remote.   I have seen fields that were WAAAAY out in the boonies that still had vandalism problems.   You may even have players that show up one day when you are closed, and vandalize the place out of frustration.   THIS HAPPENS.

My advice is to go ahead and build some small buildings that have service counters for servicing customers, but never leave anything valuable in them when you leave.   You should ALWAYS take your guns with you when you leave your paintball field, no matter how secure you think your building is.   Go to a home improvement center and get some large rubbermaid tubs to hold the guns.  They work great.  You can also run a cable through the caps on your CO2 tanks and lock them together.   That will prevent kids from emptying your CO2 tanks.

The best way to go is to get a trailer and tow it behind an SUV.   If you cannot afford that, then I am sure you can find another solution.  But if you can, then you can also lash down your fill tanks into your trailer.  Now you have a "paintball field on wheels".   You can carry netting, guns, paint and air out to a company's picnic, and play paintball at their location.   This works well and I have done it myself.  Talk to your insurance company about special rates for "off site" games.

Try to negotiate with your landlord to have a gate to your entrance that you can lock up when you are not there.    A couple of posts, a steel cable, and a padlock will work fine.

Lay of the Land

Since you want to make your fields as even as possible, or "winnable" from both sides, you should NEVER have a field in which one side is elevated higher than the other.   EVER.    If there is a hill where your field is to be constructed, then turn the field sideways so that the flag stations are at the same elevation.   Having one station higher will give that side of the field a decisive advantage.   

Many times the land features or property boundaries dictate your layout options, but your fields have to be fair to both teams.    For example, If one side of your field has a large boulder that players can easily defend from, then you may have to build a large man-made bunker in the mirroring potion on the other side of the field to balance things out.   Unbalanced fields are no fun to play.

Details make the difference

Signage

No matter how much you tell players not to, signs get shot.  They get vandalized.  They are exposed to the elements.  The very best signs that I have seen at a paintball field were aluminum signs that had vinyl lettering.   They wash off easily, and if you place them 10 feet up on trees or poles, they will last a long time.   All you have to do to prevent them being shot by players between games is to make ONE player sit out a game for shooting a sign.   Everyone else will get the message. :)

Bunkers

Logs are my favorite bunker material. They are woodsy, they are impenatrable, they last a long time, they are cheap, and they do not fall down.   They are also natural.   Nothing looks worse than a field that is made up of salvage yar parts.     Even speedballl fields look great when the bunkers are made from logs.    The difference with speedball and hyperball, however, is that the bunkers should be mobile, so that the field layout can change easily.   Logs are bad for that.   Since speedball fields are generally tiny, it is never a good idea to permanently attach bunkers to the ground.  You need to rearrange them from time to time to keep things interesting.

Almost anything will do for making bunkers.   I have seen bunkers that are made of tires, barrels, plywood, logs, dirt, twigs, holes, sandbags, trenches, even recycling containers.  That's right, those fiberglas igloos that they use for recycling containers!    I have even seen one field that used reclaimed underground storage tanks.   Those big fiberglass tanks that gas stations use to store gasoline underground!   They look like giant cold capsules, but the field owner cut them in half and turned them on their sides to make "igloos" out of them.   They were actually pretty cool.

Avoid Huts, Buildings, and Structures

No matter how tempting it is, NEVER make a FORT, a HOUSE, a CASTLE, a TREE FORT, or any structure that players can walk inside of, or climb on top of.  Avoid ladders and ramps especially.   There are MANY reasons for this.   At first glance, it would appear that the being on the top of a structure would give a huge advantage to that player, and make your fields more fun to play.   But in practice, the complete opposite is true.   Once a player is in, or on top of a building, they cannot escape.   They are trapped.  This usually leads to point-blank shooting through windows, doorways, etc. by the other team to get them out.   This can be terrifying for a newbie player.  Another unexpected liability with buildings is that when players go into a building, they feel that is "safe enough" for them to take their goggles off and clean them.  THIS HAPPENS.  And you referees cannot see through walls to stop them.  The basic rule of thumb with structures is that they should be played around, not through. 

Boundary Tape

Some general rules about boundaries:

• Fields should have at least 10 feet between them.
• There should be no breaks in the boundary tape.
• Should be highly visable.
• Boundaries of neighboring fields should be marked differently.
• Boundaries should be HIGHER than 3 feet off of the ground.
• Twine should not be used.  Cauthion tape will last longer and be easier to see.
• Yellow nylon rope is generally too expensive for wooded fields.
• Yellow nylon rope is perfect for marking specator areas (5 feet away from netted areas).
• Caution tape works great for boundary tape, but it requires a falling branches.
• Field entry points should be well marked.
• "Dead Boxes" should be well marked.

I hope that you found this article useful.   If you would like to send in comments or an article of your own, simply E-Mail Paintcheck.com.  Also check out our Field Owner Forums regularly.   There are many good tips posted there.

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