Scenario
Harry Pottier Year 3: The Prisoner of Azkaban
By Dale Ford
Mar 9, 2008, 03:47

The 2008 installment of Bill "Firebug" Meister's series of paintball scenarios inspired by J.K. Rowlings' "Harry Potter" series took place at Low Country Paintball near Ludowici, GA.  For the third year running, LCP became Hogwarts' School, the lush coastal Georgia landscape becoming the school's grounds.  Albus Dumbledore, played again by Meister, welcomed the 'students' to this year's semester at Hogwarts and got right to business in seating new 'students' in their respective houses. 

After seating the new students, Dumbledore noted that this year because of an escape from the Azkaban prison, Dementors would be on the grounds searching for the Sirius Black, the escapee.  Dumbledore warned the students that provoking the Dementors (played by the Doom Troopers, with one guest from the South Beach Pimps) would only bring their downfall, since the Dementors were invulnerable.  "Don't give them a reason to attack you", warned Dumbledore.

This year's game pitted Doom Trooper vs. Doom Trooper, with Sue Grindle playing Professor McGonagall for the Gryffindor house versus husband in real life and fellow Doom Trooper Craig Grindle playing Severus Snape for the Slytherin House.  The Professors welcomed their students to Hogwarts, and made sure to repeat the warning from Dumbledore about the Dementors. 

LCP's Billy Smith then took to the stage, explaining LCP-specific rules, including the now-famous "Ray Rule" which provides penalties to a player's team if caught cursing, especially if directed to an opposing player.  He also introduced Paintball Central, which was on hand providing the event air, and long time LCP associate Knight's Crossing Paintball, vending needed gear and expertise for players at the event.  He also asked for player's input on the new custom paintball manufactured by ProCaps for this event, which was commonly referred to as "Billy Ball".

Game on was at high noon, and the opposing Generals played each other slowly, not immediately going head-to-head in LCP's infamous "Hell's Kitchen", which has been changed somewhat to make getting around the dogleg in the field more feasible for teams assigned to the Gryffindor base and make the base more defensible.  All pretenses of slow play were put to bed at 2:45 as Sue's Gryffindor house successfully blew the Slytherin base, catching Craig in the base and giving Gryffindor a General Elimination along with the base blow.

Players took Dumbledore's warning about the Dementors seriously, never engaging them unless they were forced to by missions written into the game.  The Dementors would only disengage after running out of paint, and only after sending large numbers of opposing players off the field. 

At 4 o'clock, Craig's Slytherin house returned the favor to Gryffindor, blowing their base and catching Sue in the base, which added the General elimination as well.  As day play wound down, players from both sides continued running missions while keeping a wary eye on the merciless Dementors wandering around the field in large packs. 

At the Dinner Break, the score had Slytherin leading Gryffindor by 100 points, 400 to Gryffindor's 300 points.  Players came off field, got dinner and re-chronographed their markers to the required 250 feet per second velocity for night play.  Night play ran until 11PM, and Slytherin had expanded their lead to 525 points to Gryffindor's 350 points, but the Ray Rule caught one Slytherin player, resulting in lost points.

At 8AM Sunday, play resumed, and a nice 7v7 Quidditch match was scheduled at 8:30 AM on the speedball field.  Gryffindor won the match, and to add insult to injury, went on to blow the Slytherin base at 9AM with a General Elimination.

Play continued into the morning, with Slytherin House opening up their lead on Gryffindor.  Final Battle would pit both houses against each other at LCP's infamous Hell's Kitchen, a dogleg in the field which always makes for huge firefights.  Sirius Black has finally been cornered, and if Gryffindor House had control of him at the end of the final battle, Sirius could jump on BuckBeak the mythical horse/eagle and ride off into the sunset.  If Slytherin House had control, Sirius could only look forward to more torment from the Dementors at Azkaban.  The battle was joined, and at the end of the battle, Slytherin had their hands on Black, which had the Dementors gleefully planning new torments for him.

Everyone came off the field to get ready to hear the scores and enjoy the raffle, with prizes generously donated by ProCaps, Tippmann, DYE Precision, LCP Scenario Games, Knight's Crossing Paintball, and Paintball Central.

For Slytherin House, Craig Grindle
X.O. Bill Baines

Most Valuable Team:  Body Count
Most Valuable Player: Rocky from Xtreme Behavior
Most Valuable Ref:  James
Sportsmanship:  Doom Troopers
Most Valuable Demo: Xtreme Behavior
Young Guns:  Christopher from Knights Templar
Intel:  Lil
Most Formidable Opponent: Tactical Reapers
Most Outrageous Player: Ryan from Frontal Assault

For Gryffindor House, Sue Grindle:
X.O. James Johnson

Most Valuable Team: Black Berets
Most Valuable Player: Bob from GTF
Most Valuable Ref:  Lorenzo
Sportsmanship:  Firecomm One
Most Valuable Demo: Greg Booty from Arc Troopers
Young Guns:  Eric
Intel: Anger Management
Most Formidable Opponent: Xtreme Behavior

With that, Firebug ended this year's semester at Hogwarts, and announced that next year's game would once again pit the Grindles against each other.  Billy Smith of Low Country Paintball then took over the festivities, giving away the prizes donated by the event sponsors and having fun with players were weren't enthusiastic enough when their number was called.  One unlucky player found himself taking a dip in one of the ponds on site in order to collect his prize.  The next event at Low Country Paintball will be an SPPL Regional event to be held March 15th and 16th, 2008.  For more information, check out www.locopaintball.com

To see the over 1100 pictures from this event, click HERE