Eastern Regional Field Owners Association

The Eastern Regional Field Owners Association (ERFOA) is one of two major paintball tournament series in the New England Area. The league is an X-Ball league and uses match style. Match style is similar to a football game with halves and the clock stopping under five minutes between points. Match style there are no event winners crowned but instead a year end champion. The league is closely affiliated with NEPS NorthEast Paintball Series and uses that 5-man series as a feeder league for the EROFA X-Ball League.

History

The ERFOA was created in 2010 as a replacement for the defunct AXBL tournament series. The AXBL had been the major series in the Northeast region mostly based out of New York. The AXBL was an offshoot of the CXBL ^[1] which claims to be the last remaining provider of the "original" x-ball format. The AXBL had 25 minute halves with the clock stopping under 5 minutes between points as well as 2 and 5 minute penalties. The league was growing until the off season of 2009 when numerous customer service complaints cause the CXBL owners to discontinue the AXBL.^[2] The local field owners had many discussions on trying to replace the now defunct league. Four fields worked together to create a new X-Ball style league. The league instead of having centralized events at one spot would have regional preliminary seasons with the winner and runner up from each field playing at a final event to determine the series champion. Each region would have 9 teams playing 8 matches with the team with winners being determined by the best record (tiebreaker being point differential). The rules were also changed to 15 minute halves for cost reasons. The series suffered a setback as the Pennsylvania and New York based fields were not able to come up with enough entrants. The teams in those areas choosing to instead to move into the NYPL another regional league that saw many of the AXBL teams move to their format. Fox4 Paintball and Camelot paintball were able to run seasons. Fox4 creating both a Saturday and Sunday bracket and Camelot having a smaller schedule due to limited teams.

The 2011 season had some rule changes. The first being that the ramp setting was lowered to 12.5 to conserve paint and therefore money and that it was also in keeping with the current national paintball event standards. The league was also divided up into to divisions. Major league is unranked players. The minor league is for players that are Division 3 or below according to the APPA ranking system.

General regulations

The ERFOA rules are based on the AXBL rules with slight modifications. The major changes are 15 minute halves instead of 25 minute halves. The penalties are one minute for minor penalties and two minutes for major penalties instead of two and five. The ramp setting was changed to 12.5 in 2011. The rules are similar to PSP in many ways.^[3] A regulation PSP field is 150 feet (46 m) long by 125 feet (38 m) wide.^[4] Inflatable bunkers of differing shapes and sizes are placed on the field in mirrored symmetry. Each end of the field has a start/dead box where the team starts the game and returns to if/or when they are eliminated. Each team consists of five players. The flag is placed in the center of the field and must be hung to end the game. There is a five minute time limit for the game.

The match time is kept electronically and is shown on a scoreboard above the field. A game ends when either all the players on both teams are eliminated, time runs out, or a flag is hung. A points is awarded only for a flag hang. Teams have two minutes in between points. The overall game clock keeps running in between points till the last five minutes of each half. The time stops between points for these five minutes. The team with the most points at the end of the match is the winner.

A player is eliminated when they are hit by a paintball that breaks on any part of the body or equipment or runs out of bounds or is pulled for a penalty against another teammate. Upon elimination the player must place their gun behind their start station and go to their team's deadbox, located in their back corner of the field. If a player fails to acknowledge a hit they run the risk of being penalized with a "one-for-one." This penalty consists of a referee pulling out the eliminated player and the closest friendly player.

Results

2010^[5]

2011

References