If you’ve never played Camp Blanding’s urban combat training facility, then you’ve missed one of the greatest scenario venues in the country. This isn’t your backwater field’s plywood town - we’re talking straight up urban assault in concrete buildings up to four stories tall. And for those of you with tunnel rat fantasies, there’s a (dry) sewer system that will allow you to get your CQB on subterranean style.

Registration opens for Battlefield Blanding on July 1st, and it’s for a great cause, so make your travel plans early and meet me in Florida in September. For an event like this, the price is right, and the chance to clear rooms with the best in the business will make the trip worth your effort.

It strikes me as inspiring that even in the midst of the current financial crunch, paintball events in my neck of the woods are springing up left and right. I don’t want to make those of you in other parts of the country jealous, but I could play a great game just about every weekend. Where I live, in the foothills of western North Carolina, there are half a dozen great fields within 100 miles, and when I expand the range to include eastern Tennessee, northern Georgia, South Carolina, and parts of Virginia, I have no trouble finding top notch scenario and big game action. I don’t know if it’s the teams, the promoters, the field owners, or the local economy, but I’m wishing I could clone myself, because I can’t be in two places at once. While I’m at D-Day in Oklahoma, I’ll be missing what promises to be an excellent Indiana Jones themed game, and the weekend I return, I may try to hit a 24 hour game only an hour from my house.

Case in point, on the first weekend in August I’ll be attended the Mil-Sim Invitational at Command Decisions. This event will mark a new path in tactical play, and I want to be on hand to launch this new venture. Later in the month (August 16), on the other send of the state, Black River Paintball will host their first Super Game, a GI Joe vs. Cobra event that will be revolutionary, but in a different way. Get this, for $45 a player, those who attend will not only get entry, air, and a ticket for the prize raffle, but they’ll get a PCS camouflage jersey and pants! All the GI Joe players will be sporting digi camo, and all the Cobra players will have urban. And there’s more! Every player on the winning team will take home a marker. That means, if Cobra wins, and they have 300 players on their side, 300 people will take home a marker, matching jerseys and pants, and possibly other prizes - all for $45. This is unprecedented. Visit the game’s site to find out all the details, and if I’ve perfected my cloning technology by then, I’ll see you there.