Going to Airsoft just for a Stag do? Someone suggested it for a birthday party? Or a “team building exercise” with work because your boss hates you and wants to cause pain because you missed a deadline? Here are 5 tips for the first timer so you get bragging rights on WhatsApp for the following week.

I’ve done a few guides in a lot of depth down the years but this one is for J who is doing a taster session with a friend at an indoor CQB site. There’s no need to go into details about setups, team tactics or upgrades. If you’re just going for a game for a birthday or something, you’ll be looking to turn up and have a blast for a few hours, but chances are you’ll be part of a regular game day with regular players who have all the gear (maybe some idea), and it’ll be a competitive environment. You don’t want to be the one stuck in a corner, filling your trousers, being used as target practice and turning up to work the next day looking like you’ve had an allergic reaction to something.

In the UK, a lot of the more accessible sites for new players tend to be indoor CQB (Close Quarters Battle) Airsoft, usually in disused factories, warehouses or office buildings, so it’s a lot of rooms/walls/corridors and tight spaces, with fast and aggressive action, lights (or lack of), and bright colours. They’re usually in large urban areas which attracts a lot of first time players who can easily travel for their first Airsoft experience. I couldn’t find a decent video to send that covered things correctly, and I don’t want to write a novel, so if you can remember 5 things, this is the important stuff :

1. LISTEN TO THE BRIEFING

At the start of the game, the staff (marshals) will give you a briefing. Sites, and Airsoft, have rules. A lot are for safety, some are to make the games play out fairly. It’ll obviously seem a little lengthy at first but it’ll make sense when you get in there. And lets be honest, you don’t have a clue what you’re doing, so it’s important to get to the front so you can hear it, and also to shut the fuck up during the briefing so everyone else hears it too. You’ll also be told what exactly you’re meant to be doing out there – capturing a flag, getting to a certain location or whatever.

2. AIRSOFT ISN’T ABOUT SHOOTING

Really, and I know that’s not the first impression of a gun based game. It’s more about your movement, than your ability to hit a coin at 50 paces. In close quarters situations, it’s not about your accuracy anyway because it’s kind of hard to miss. Indoors Airsoft is a game of fastest on the trigger, and you need to make sure you see the enemy before they see you, so it’s more important to be able to move around quietly and without them seeing you. Be careful not to rub yourself up against walls because it creates sound and lets them know that you’re coming. Watch for lights and shadows too – try to stay in shadows but watch lights on the floor for shadows of opponents.

3. GET THE GUN UP

(Make sure it’s loaded and switched to semi auto once you get into a game, I’ll say that first because I see it too often that guns aren’t loaded or are still in safe mode once shooting starts…)

Look.

With.

Your.

Gun.

Always have your gun up and ready when you don’t know what’s in front of you.

Holding it casually around your waist while you stick your head around a corner means you’re not ready in that split second where you see an enemy player. The gun leads, always. So that if you see something, the barrel should already be pointing at it. Use it to scan around and avoid closing one eye to aim, as intuitive as that sounds. Hold the gun with two hands, one obviously on the trigger but place the other one near to the magazine and don’t hold the far end of the barrel. Tuck your elbows in so your body shape is tighter, because indoor spaces are tight, and you’re not giving anyone too big of a target. Bring the gun up to your eyes, don’t bend over to bring your eyes down to the gun. Remember there’s no recoil.

4. DON’T EXPOSE YOURSELF

Yes, keep your clothes on. But also lead with the gun, and be mindful of sticking your head or limbs around a corner or exposing them. Think of these indoor spaces as a series of rooms or boxes. You don’t want to stick anything through a doorway until you know that room in front of you is cleared, so you’ll commonly hear of a basic technique where we “pie the corner”.

Starting tightly at position 1, without sticking anything into that room, you slowly sidestep around the doorway (2) and “scan” the room until you pass a full 180 degrees and have checked the inside corner (3). In this way, hopefully you’ve ensured it was clear or you’ve shot at the people inside without sticking your head in to get shot at, all things going in your favour.

What most players think as they’re clearing rooms though is just to clear that room in front of them, which is what the pie is for;

The problem is, particularly in complex buildings, that rooms lead to other rooms. Some have windows as well. So as you pie the door, be checking for rooms and openings beyond it as well. If you look out of your kitchen window, across the street, you might see your neighbour through their window. Hopefully they’re not doing any weird shit, and you’re not taking photos. But the idea is the same – looking through multiple openings, so when we do CQB, we need to be reading not just the room in front of us, but the room beyond that (and further if needed);

• Check your corners

• Watch your angles

• Take your time, move slowly and assess the situation instead of running in screaming and hoping for the best.

5. PUT PRESSURE ON YOUR ENEMY

Some say aggression is king – and it can be if you use it right, but running around like an enraged bull leads to stupid mistakes. Don’t be hasty, but don’t hesitate. If you know there are enemies in a room, start firing before you need to because it’ll startle most players (the sound of bb’s hitting the wall next to them is pretty loud) and then guide those shots onto your target. If you find yourself and an enemy player ducking in and out of a window trading shots at each other and not getting anywhere, stop ducking. Stay up and on target and start putting bb’s in their direction, moving towards them if you can. Confidence is important, and I know it can be daunting the first time with a lot of noise and confusion and plastic balls flying towards you.

On the subject of balls slapping off walls, you can use the noise of hitting a wall near your enemy to keep their heads down and also reduce pressure on your position, stopping them from getting up and firing, and perhaps giving you an opportunity to back out of a situation where you otherwise are about to get completely fucked. It’s “suppressing fire” and doesn’t necessarily need to be a lot of fire very quickly, but just a controlled and measured way of breaking the contact.

Short and sweet, hope it helps, and if it is your first time, let me know how it goes. Good luck, and hopefully you enjoy it enough to come back!