Paintball Gear
An important part of paintball is the gear. Paintball gear is meant to protect the player and is mandatory before you enter the field of play. Most sporting goods store and field pro shops carry all the essential gear needed to play.
Depending on how often you play you should either buy your own gear or rent it from the facility that you are playing. If you play daily or every weekend it would be best to buy your gear but expect to pay a minimum of $100 plus yearly upkeep. It may be cheaper to rent your gear every time you play if you don’t play too often but expect to spend from $25-$50 minimum for rental. Another option would be to buy used gear from classified ads, EBay or Craig’s List. Another source for paintball gear and information is The Paintball Wars where you will find very good prices also.
The basic gear that is required includes a mask, gun (marker), and paintballs. Quality and variety abound in paintball gear as well as types of gear. The types available include gear for the different kinds of play to gear used to improve your play or even gear that makes you look good. If you are a beginner you will most likely start out with the basic gear and branch out into things like tactical or sniper paintball gear. Other gear that a paintball player may buy would be paintball gloves and a paintball vest. These items add extra protection as well as make play more comfortable.
As stated in the first paragraph one of the essential and required pieces of gear is the mask which is sometimes called “goggles”. Goggles not only cover the eyes but they also cover the mouth, ears, and nostrils of the player. It would be advisable when buying a mask to get one with a throat guard for obvious reasons. Some masks feature double layered or thermal lenses which protect against fogging. If the mask fogs up the player would be tempted to remove the mask and one hit in the facial area could be serious. If you don’t have a mask with anti fogging there are solutions that can be applied to the mask. You should also shop for a mask which has anti-scratch coating because once a mask is severely scratched it will need to be replaced.
Since paintball is a very active sport where you will be doing a lot of running, diving, and generally rolling around on the ground you must choose apparel that is durable. If you are playing in the woods camouflage gear will help you blend into the environment. You should be able to pick up some Army surplus fatigues or BDU’s in the nearest Army-Navy Surplus stores. Now if you are playing speedball you don’t need to blend in but if you are on a team you may want to appear to be uniform which will help you recognize teammates. If you are playing scenario games try to dress to look like the part of the scenario you represent.
The bottom line when choosing paintball gear is choose something that is safe but lightweight and never take safety gear off during play. For more information on paintball gear check out the the other pages on this site or search using the search bar below.
