Light Rifleman

Dagger: Light Rifleman
by Special Ops Paintball on Mar 28, 2009

When you’ve hammered the enemy’s line thin, all it takes is a fast, hard stab to break through. For those times when you need someone bunkered, you call the Light Rifleman to streak through the gap and break their backs.

He is the guts and glory boy—called for when your team’s getting their flank-thing on, ordered on point when you’re covering ground, and handed the flag when it’s time to make the last run. He’s fast and light and he doesn’t mind having his butt hanging in the wind.

When it comes to buildings and bunkers, he’s the close quarters specialist. His paintgun is short, light and maneuverable and it spends a lot of time getting shoved into dark corners. The Dagger’s an action junkie, and it’s a good thing, because he ends up in the shit more than anyone.
Tips for Light Riflemen

* You need a very light gearkit. Don’t take anything you don’t need. Go super-light on paint and air.

* Your paintball gun needs to be good in close quarters. Shorten your barrel and consider carrying your air on-gun instead of remote. You won’t be as low-profile when you’re crawling, but you’ll need the speed advantage on the quick assault.

* You’re probably the most aggressive player on the team and that can be a huge problem. You do your team absolutely no good in the dead man hut, so constantly remind yourself to play conservatively. Stay alive!

* If you’re getting taken out most games, then you’re putting your butt out there too far. Tighten up and be ready to dart back in a quick retreat whenever you come under fire.

* Every time you get taken out, take a few minutes to figure out why. Pick apart the situation and determine what you did to get your butt blown off. Then, figure out what you can do in the same situation next time to stay alive. If you’re having trouble figuring it out, go ask your Squad or Team Commander what he thinks you should’ve done differently.

* Wear a watch so you can pace your runs when you’re returning the flag to your base. You wouldn’t want to run out of time with the flag in your hands, would you?

* Remember, great Daggers aren’t judged by how many people they take out. Great Daggers are judged by how many games they survive. Play quick, but stay alive. That is the Dagger motto.
Field Tactics for Light Riflemen

* You have several key jobs: running point, pushing flanks, quick assaults and flag runs (when playing capture the flag.)
Running Point

* Your main job on point is to draw enemy fire and not get killed. Spook the ambushes and trick the snipers into taking marginal shots at you. Then, dive backwards and bring your squad up to engage the op-force.

* “Spooking” the ambush is an art that you must master. When you’re running point, keep behind cover as much as possible. Look ahead and assess each possible ambush point, then offer yourself as a target, but a bad target. Get them to shoot at you when the shot’s still too long or the shot’s through too much brush.

* Once you’ve spooked the ambush or hit any kind of op-force, you become part of a quick trap that will engulf the opposition. To do this, drop backwards, just a little, the instant you encounter fire. Then, your Squad Leader should send up Medium or Heavy Riflemen to create a solid base of fire. They will trade fire with the enemy and give you (and other flankers) a pivot off of which you can slide to one side and catch the ambush in a side-door cross fire.
Pushing Flanks

* Once your squad has the enemy position engaged and trading fire, the flanking elements are released to one or both sides. To flank, move cross-ways to the enemy and push a little up-field. The idea is to get angles on the side of the enemy shooters. When you begin to pummel them from the side, and your squad’s hitting them from the front, you will have them in a cross fire and they will need to retreat or be eliminated.

* When flanking, stealth is key. Don’t hesitate to belly crawl. Belly crawling is a great way to spook a shot without exposing yourself to danger. Also, nobody expects a belly crawl in paintball, since paintballers are typically too lazy to get their cammies dirty.

* Beware of other elements of the enemy force. You may be flanking right into another piece of the ambush. If you do encounter more resistance, radio your Squad Leader and have him dispatch another Medium or Heavy Rifleman to set another base of fire in front of the extended force. Then, begin a new flanking move.

* Remember, if your guys and theirs’ are trading fire, you can use the noise as cover. Also, you have the security of knowing that the shooters, at least, are totally focused on their little firefight. You can probably move freely without them noticing. (Just be sure to watch for another ambush!) Paintballers usually scoot to a firefight like moths to a flame. A fully engulfed firefight will draw attention and should give you a clear crawl into side-door position.
Quick Assaults

* On a quick assault, you will be rushing the enemy under the cover of your suppressive fire guys. This sounds like a risky proposition, but it shouldn’t be that risky, if your Squad Leader sets it up right.

* One key to a safe assault is tons of suppressive fire. Rushing directly into enemy is suicide unless someone is hammering their position with a BUTT-LOAD of paint. Sporadic suppressive fire won’t do. You need full-blown, mind-numbing, hurricane-from-hell sort of suppressive fire to ensure a safe run.

* Don’t count on any ONE player to suppress any more than ONE angle. In other words, your suppression dude can cover one small bunker or one window of a pillbox. If you’re taking fire from more angles than you have suppression men, then don’t make the rush. This also applies to enemy shooters who are way across the field. When you go rushing in, you have no way to know beforehand the angles you’re giving other players on you. Make reasonably sure that you’ve limited the number of enemy players who have a shot at you before you charge in.

* Another key to a successful rush is to put the enemy under fire from multiple angles at once. If you’re attacking a defensive bunker from only one direction, then you’re putting yourself at huge risk by rushing. Your squad must hit that bunker from two or three sides. You need to make life really, really stressful for the defenders before you go busting ass out there in the open.

* As you can see, quick assaults are a lot more like surgery than they are like a football blitz. Think it through before you go trucking out into the open.
Flag Runs

* You should never really “rush” for the flag. Before you go wading in after the flag, or other objective, your team should have cleared the defenses around the objective. There’s not usually a good reason to “rush” for the flag. You’re responsible for flag runs BACK to your base, not necessarily getting the flag into your hands.

* Before you make a run back to your base, you should know exactly what is going on at your base. Remind your Team Commander to radio the Defensive Squad Leader to get the 4-1-1 on the situation back at your flag. If the flag is lost, or is under heavy attack, your Team Commander should leave a substantial contingent in the enemy defenses. If your flag is in good shape, then everyone can head back. Also, when your Commander checks with defense, he should find out where any known enemy are hiding and how to avoid them.

* When you head back to the flag, hold back and let your squad run interference in front of you. It’s too late in the game to be running into an ambush.

* Stay clear on the time. You should have a good idea of how much time’s left in the game before you begin your flag run. Pace yourself to whatever time is remaining. No need to get sloppy if there’s plenty of time left.

Ideal Attributes for Light Rifleman

* Aggressive. To run point and make rushes, the Dagger must have a lust for battle. The biggest challenge will be getting him to dial it back and play smart.

* Excellent physical fitness. This guy is the team runner. He never tires and he’s ready to run the flag after a hard game of assaulting. Usually, he’s light and fast.

* Good street smarts. A guy with a lot of common sense will begin to see combat patterns (without being able to explain it) and he’ll stalk the field like a mountain lion.

* Willing to take orders. Hard-core, type-A guys can’t be controlled by a Squad Leader. Too much aggression and hard-headedness in a Dagger just gets him taken out quickly. The commands of a Squad Leader can be the perfect leash for the Light Rifleman—if he’ll accept quality coaching.

Light Rifleman Skill Progression
Basic

Requires at least one paintball day playing Dagger position.

The mad rush is one of the lamest plays in paintball. He who charges usually dies. However, a good Light Rifleman turns the mad rush into high art.

While he’s learning when to rush and when to wait, the Light Rifleman will pick up a few dozen welts from poorly timed breakouts. There’s really no other way to learn. A good Dagger will err to the side of getting shot up rather than waiting too long.

Likewise, learning to flank and run point are also high-risk positions, but to sign up for the Dagger position is to volunteer for the serious action. Eventually, you will beat the odds with speed, agility and a keen sense of timing. A super-light gearkit doesn’t hurt, either; with a light gun and just a couple of hundred paintballs in reserve, the Light Rifleman can float through the melee like Neo from the Matrix.

It takes time to learn the art, so wear your welts with pride!

Senior

Requires at least six paintball days playing Dagger position.

He’s getting his groove thing going, now that the Dagger has a little time under his belt. He’s seeing the holes, watching the firing lanes and picking his paths carefully. The timing’s coming together as the Dagger matches his runs to sync with his team’s bursts of suppressive fire.

On flank, the dude’s pulling together some sweet side-door moves. When his squad hits a roadblock, he flips to one side or the other and slithers up until he finds that perfect window. By now, he’s taking out at least three or four of the bad guys before he gets eliminated.

His gearkit is looking better, too. His gun is trimmed down and he’s packing the bare minimum in paint and accessories. He’s wearing, or considering buying, more athletically-cut fatigues since standard military issue doesn’t give him the agility he needs.

With all that running and gunning, he’s dropped a couple of pounds and he’s faster on his feet than ever.

Master

Requires at least fifteen paintball days playing Dagger position.

Like a martial arts expert, the Master Dagger can slide into enemy bunker complexes before they have any idea he’s there. He frequently wipes out whole squads with lightning fast pushes and flanking maneuvers.

He’s the ultimate badass pointman. He pushes upfield fast enough to get there but slowly enough to sucker the opposition into shooting at him before they have a good shot—giving away their positions and bringing down the full wrath of the squad. He draws the shot, drops back and then puts the killer flank on the ambushers.

If ambush is the problem then the Master Dagger is the solution. He’s honed that game of cat and mouse to a high art. Rarely does his team get caught with their pants down, and they usually chew through an ambush with speed and style.

His gearkit is feather light, with a compact paintgun and pods carried out-of-the-way.

As the sharp point of his squad, the Master Dagger takes the game to the enemy with guts, speed and grace.

Elite

Requires at least fifteen paintball days playing Dagger position and a special commendation from Team Special Ops Paintball.

His level of skill was plainly obvious when Team SpecOps ran across this ultimate speed player and he has earned the commendation of Elite Dagger. His drives, flanks and feints are the best-in-his-class and any squad would rock with him on point.

His sense of an ambush is uncanny and he knows the perfect moment to lead a breakout charge. To watch him play Dagger is like watching a mongoose fight a cobra. He twists and turns and, when the moment is perfect, puts the bite on his opponents.