Skirmish Paintball is a paintball

Paintball

Paintball is a sport in which players compete, in teams or individually, to eliminate opponents by tagging them with capsules containing water soluble dye and gelatin shell outside propelled from a device called a paintball marker . Paintballs have a non-toxic, biodegradable, water soluble...

 arena

Arena

An arena is an enclosed area, often circular or oval-shaped, designed to showcase theater, musical performances, or sporting events. It is composed of a large open space surrounded on most or all sides by tiered seating for spectators. The key feature of an arena is that the event space is the...

 company in the United Kingdom, United States, Ireland, and Australia. Paintball venues operated under the Skirmish trademark

Trademark

A trademark, trade mark, or trade-mark is a distinctive sign or indicator used by an individual, business organization, or other legal entity to identify that the products or services to consumers with which the trademark appears originate from a unique source, and to distinguish its products or...

 are privately owned.

General

Skirmish Paintball UK was founded in 1984, and celebrated their 25 year anniversary in 2009. The company runs 27 sites in the UK, all belonging to the UK Paintball Sports Federation (UKPSF). Skirmish Paintball is open to play for anyone aged over 11, and caters to group bookings - including bachelor

Bachelor party

A bachelor party , also known as a stag party, stag night or stag do , a bull's party , or a buck's party or buck's night , is a party held for a man shortly before he enters marriage, to celebrate his "last night of freedom" or merely to spend...

 or bachelorette parties, corporate, school or college events.

Skirmish Paintball sites allow players to hire equipment such as camouflage suits, or pyrotechnics - including simulated hand grenades and smoke bombs. Several sites across the UK also provide both Laser tag

Laser tag

Laser tag is a team or individual sport or recreational activity where players attempt to score points by tagging targets, typically with a hand-held infrared-emitting targeting device. Infrared-sensitive targets are commonly worn by each player and are sometimes integrated within the arena in...

 and Airsoft

Airsoft

Airsoft is a sport in which participants shoot round non-metallic pellets launched via replica firearms.Gameplay varies in style and composition but often range from short-term skirmishes, organized scenarios, military simulations, historical reenactments, to competition target shooting events...

facilities, playable in the same paintball arenas already existing on the sites - along with rental of related playing gear.

History

The Skirmish paintball name was originally trademarked by Martin & Simon Penniston-Bird, and as the brand name got bigger, the license fee for the rights of the name "Skirmish" is now purchased individually by the private owners of the separate Skirmish sites across the UK.

UK locations

Aberdeen Bristol Brighouse Basingstoke Birmingham Buckingham Cardiff Cobham Crawley Dorset Edinburgh Essex Exeter (granted a bronze medal in the Green Tourism awards in 2007)

Glasgow High Wycombe Ipswich Leicester Leeds Northampton Nottingham Norfolk Norwich Wakefield Wolverhampton Warminster

Pyrotechnics

Pyrotechnics that can be purchased from a Skirmish Paintball site are hand grenades and Smoke bombs, with some also providing flash bangs.

• Hand Grenades
  • Hand Grenades are constructed using a cardboard shell, with a fuse inside that has 20-25 paintballs around the center. To light the fuse, you must tear off the cap, and use the reverse side, which resembles the side of a match box to spark the fuse. When the fuse is lit, there is an approximate 5 seconds before the grenade shatters and explodes, firing coloured paint in all directions.

• Smoke Bombs
  • Smoke Bombs use the same lighting technology as the hand grenade, with a reverse side to the cap which you must strike against the fuse. When a smoke bomb is lit, it releases coloured smoke for about 2 minutes, to provide cover, or smoke out other paintball players.

• Flash Bangs
  • Flash Bangs are more often seen on airsoft days. The flash bang has the same lighting technique as the hand grenade and smoke bomb, but after the fuse has been lit, it sparks a bright white flash to temporarily blind the opposition, or any other players that were staring at the pyrotechnic when it went off.

External links

• http://www.skirmishpaintball.com Skirmish Paintball Official Website
• http://www.paintballskirmish.co.uk Play Skirmish Official Website