Black Friday Game Results

With a grand attendance of 19 players, we held our Black Friday Foam-tacular on November 25th at 5:30pm inside St Pauls United Methodist Church in Papillion, NE.  We played Nerf and Laser Tag games in the maze-like building until 10pm, so it was quite the evening!  Unfortunately, only this group picture exists.  We were all having too much fun to nab any pictures of gameplay.  Speaking of gameplay, it was quite the night with lots of memorable moments and interesting strategies.  From getting showered in darts from the balcony overlooking a room to some not-so-even randomly-picked teams, there was craziness left, right, and center.

Some impressive mods made their debut tonight with some good and bad results.  First, the bad.  See that guy near the center with the Clear Raider?  That's the shotgun-grip one I just modified.  It's now on my workbench being fixed.  Apparently he took the term "Slam Fire" literally and messed up the internals of the Deploy grip I modded onto it.  I may just revert it back to it's original handle.  As a result, I ended up loaning him my modded Whiteout Longstrike.  Thankfully he didn't break that one.  But there was some good news too, with my modded Vulcan EBF-25 owning the competition!  I suppose the only downside to that was that I was always on the receiving end of it.  Reports from it's users were quite favorable.  Because I was without my main blaster for most of the game, I switched to using a Magstrike.  In the past, folks using this blaster usually got owned because they would be out of ammo more than they were actually firing.  But if you ask anyone at our game how I did with a pair of Magstrikes and 2 extra magazines, they wouldn't tell you the same story.  I had a LOT of fun with that blaster and adopted some unorthodox strategies out of necessity of using them.

We played 4 Nerf Games of 20 minute increments before switching to LTX Phoenixes for Laser Tag.  We played 3 more matches with that and called it a night.  There were never really landslide wins for either side, so it was neat to have close matches and even rivalries.  I want to say almost all the blasters that saw action last night were modded in some way, so it was a pretty intense game.  My legs are still killing me 2 days after this 4 hour long event.  The verdict from everyone is that we want to do this again soon... and we will!

Keep it here on Monday for a full review of my completed Vulcan!

Put a Spring in your step... or Blaster

Orange Mod Works has a nice deal, along with a slew of new products to go with it.  In the midst of Winter coming up, they've got Springs!  Spring upgrades for lots of your favorite Nerf blasters that are out right now!  Head on over to OMW to get your hands one!

Spring sale... in the Fall!

Decisions decisions...

Messin with Configurations

I know, I know... N-Strike barrel extensions don't actually increase range or boost performance, but you've got to admit this much:  they still look cool. Perhaps my favorite barrel extension is the one off the Longstrike.  The design looks great on the Spectre and Reconand has rails on the top and bottom.  Last year, when I was messing around with configurations of N-Strike Accessories, I found a combination that I could not resist.  It's a Spectre with a scope, Raider-style Stock (pictured is a Super Soaker Shotblast stock), a Longstrike Barrel and a Tactical Light mounted underneath it.  Unfortunately, none of these options match in stock colors.

The guys at Indigo Studios have been teasing me for a long time with their Whiteout Spectre box art that gets talked about a lot.  If they made it, I could use a white ShotBlast stock and the Whiteout Longstrike barrel to mostly complete a unified looking version of this aesthetic beauty.  It'd be great, but we still don't know if it'll ever even happen.

So I've been considering painting some parts to match other stock parts that would unify the design.  I've had folks ask "Zook, why don't you just repaint the whole thing whatever color you want?!?"  Well, the truth is that, while I am quite capable of painting my own blasters, that when it comes to Nerf, I try to avoid this.  I like painting my Laser Tag blasters in camouflage and such because we actually use them outdoors.  I don't mind the stock Nerf colors on my blasters I use indoors and in the event that I get a picture nabbed when I'm playing a Nerf Game, I want it to be eligible for "Shot of the Week" :)  Silly, I know.

So now the decision is... what parts do I paint to unify the design?  Thanks to the parts I have... there are 3 major options to consider.

1. Whiteout Colors.  I would have to paint the body of the Spectre white and attach a Whiteout Longstrike barrel with a White ShotBlast stock and scope.  It could wind up being in vain should Wal-Mart actually release the Whiteout Spectre... in which case I'd feel pretty silly.  I also don't have a good method of replicating the Whiteout Graphics onto my white-painted Spectre.
2. Blue Colors.  I would have to paint the body of the Spectre blue and attach a Longstrike Barrel and Raider stock.  I do like my blue blasters, so this doesn't seem like an awful idea.  My worry is that the blue paint on top by the priming handle will wear off showing the yellow underneath. This wouldn't be so noticable/bad on the Whiteout repaint.
3. Yellow Colors.  I would have to paint a Longstrike barrel's blue panels Yellow.  Attach that to my Spectre with a Yellow Raider Stock.  It could even add a Yellow scope and Tactical light to complete the original look in that picture above.  This would be the easiest option (and the Longstrike Barrel would look great on my Yellow Recon too)

So... I've got those 3 options that I'm trying to decide between.  Any insight as to your opinions or choices would be great, so leave a comment if you want.  I wanna do my painting before it gets REALLY cold around here!

Congrats Nerflover! Week 5 info too!

Congratulations to NerfLover, the winner of Week 4's Giveaway: the Minimized Firefly built by Icicle of Arctic Nerf!  Get in contact with either of us about receiving your prize.  Hope you enjoy it!

Sorry for the Weekly Giveaway announcement for being so late.  I've been busy this week with family and Thanksgiving schtuff, so I'm not exactly prepared for the announcement this week.  I didn't get a chance to finish up and properly "advertise" this week's item, but here's some general info on it.

This week's prize is an upgraded Dart Tag Sharp Shot.  This is an excellent small blaster when modded and, in general, I like it's construction a lot.  While it's the weakest of the Dart Tag blasters in it's stock configuration, the upgrades I have made to it have it performing exceedingly well.  The seal on the O Ring is perfect enough that it will actually suck a Streamline dart into the blaster if there's one in it when it's primed!  Again, I apologize for not having more info on this right now.  I'll make another post showcasing the blaster early next week.

And the question to answer to be eligible to win is this:  What do you think of the direction the Dart Tag line has been taking with their new 2011 lineup.  Be it marketing, comparisons to the older Dart Tag blasters, or just general likes or dislikes about the blaster, I wanna hear what Nerf Nation has to say about Dart Tag half a year after it's latest release.  (and with a new Blaster on the way)

Thanks for reading and good luck to everyone!

Improved Seal Technique

I've been doing light mods on Nerf Blasters for awhile now, but one of the performance upgrades that I've always had trouble with was improving the seal around the O Ring.  I've tried different types of Tapes, but the problem I run into is getting the right thickness around the plunger tube.  When I was working on sealing up electrical bits on a Laser Tag blaster, I brought out my Liquid E Tape (it paints on with a brush and dries in about 4 minutes) and had an idea.  Since the Liquid Tape can be applied evenly in coats, I thought I could make a good seal around the O Ring with it.  After testing it on a few blasters and figuring out how thick to get it, I've pretty much worked out the kinks in this idea.  

Liquid Tape can be purchased at most retailers and hardware stores.  Mine is "Performix" brand that I picked up at Wal-Mart.  They run a little over 4 bucks a bottle and underneath the cap is the paintbrush applicator.  It goes on pretty well.  All you have to do is remove your O Ring and apply it evenly around the end of the plunger tube.  Get the first coat as even as you can (if you can still see orange, it's too thin).  It'll take forever to dry if you use too much though, so don't put this on in gobs.  After 4 minutes, apply a second coat to finish it up.  The bottle says to let it dry for 4 hours for a permanent set.  After that, put your O Ring back on and add a little bit of silicone grease.  This should be a near-perfect seal for Reverse Plungered blasters.  It may require different thicknesses on other types of blasters.  

Liquid Electrical Tape can be removed relatively easily, so if you find you've applied too much, you can get it off after it has dried.  Don't try to take it off while it's still wet.  It makes an awful mess.  The one you see in the pictures was for my Longstrike Blur.  While the Stock Spring that I tried it out on was too weak for this perfect seal, the Orange Mod Works Stage 1 Kit for the Longstrike pushed through it just fine (and is quite powerful too!)  This version had 3 coats on it.  I'll be experimenting more with this Liquid Tape and if I find any other good uses for blaster modifications, I'll post 'em up here.

Calm before the Storm

This picture is only what I have on hand.
The rest is stored at a friends house (about 2/3rds more)

On Black Friday, November 25th, I'll be taking part in an annual tradition with my friends and family.  While for some, this tradition is just another Nerf and Laser Tag game, for others, it's a chance to let out their failed shopping frustrations from the sales they missed that morning.  Either way you cut it, there's a lot of Foam Flinging and Laser Blasting that is always a highlight of our Thanksgiving break.  It used to just be laser tag games outdoors, but with weather not being so kind this time of year, we have since moved the event indoors and included Nerf in the event.  Last Year's event was held inside an indoor Laser Tag arena, which was awesome.  Unfortunately, they are now out of business, so we have since retired to using a Maze-like church that a few of our friends are members of.  Regardless of the venue, folks are already asking me "hey, can you reserve that yellow gun for me?" in which case, I bang my head against a door for a few minutes since there's too many yellow blasters in my armory to count.

Eyes on UT!

Keep your eyes peeled, as sometime within the next 24 hours, Urban Taggers is set to reveal some more new equipment!  Remember when that slew of new info came out with the Speedswarm and Rayven?  They also caught wind of a new Super Soaker based off of the Thunderstorm with a removable stock that had EVERYONE talking.

Well, according to Urban Tagger's Facebook page, we'll be seeing a review of this soon!  Check out that Transparent shield mounted on their Praxis and the sturdy looking removable stock!

So hit that refresh button every hour or so on Urban Taggers!  I'm excited to see what they have to say... even if it's a Super Soaker!