Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

I care more about getting a (fun) game in then making sure both players have every last upgrade modeled.

As long as it's not too confusing, I don't care. So basically as mentioned earlier, all flamers are meltaguns - OK; This flamer is a meltagun, this flamer is a plasma gun, this plasma gun is a grav-gun, this plasma gun is a meltagun - not OK.

 Dakka Wolf wrote:
As far as weapons go the only thing I care about is that my opponent is consistent with what they claim the weapon is.
As for models, during a tournament I might get a bit fussy about someone claiming a Coke bottle as a Drop Pod...unless it's REALLY well painted.
Outside of tournamets feel free to use the Coke bottle.

Now I want to paint a drop pod to look like a Coke can.

I'm pretty lenient myself, as long as there is some general consistency. As long as there's no "Aha, my Scout Marines were actually Terminators" or any sneakiness like that, I'm pretty open.

Just because I prefer facing armies that are WYSIWYG, doesn't mean I'm anti-fun. I'm merely anti-headaches and confusion, the game is already complicated enough as it is.

I play heavily converted orks, so my army has a "what you see on a model roughly resembles what the GW model's item is, but the models themselves (vehicles, troops, as opposed to weapons) may look different" rule. Much more flexible.

My approach to WYSIWYG is similar to my approach to painted armies, nice terrain, etc.

In my opinion two players (or more) get together to play a miniatures game on the tabletop for a reason. Because miniatures painted to a reasonable standard on a nice table is pretty damn cool. As such I feel responsible to do my part to make that happen. I'd be embarrassed to show up to a game or event with an unpainted army, or heavily "counts-as" models etc.

This is not a critique on, say, a random opponent whose feelings on the matter might vary vastly. To me? I'm bringing my half (or more) to creating a nice looking, enjoyable game. It's the same way I view WYSIWYG. I'd prefer not to have to ask my opponent to view X as this, and Y as this. I'd like to have everything properly presented - even if a model limitation inhibits my army creation. My Warlock has a witchblade? Cool, he'll have a witchblade every game - even when I really need another singing spear.

Now, my opponent using WYSIWYG? That varies. I don't play often and when I do it's normally with a few good friends who share the mindset I have. As such I don't have to worry about facing off with a stranger using lego men as space marines and such. While I don't mind a player saying "well this lascannon is a heavy plasma gun" etc., I expect, as a courtesy, some modicum of effort put forth by my opponent to partake in the game.

I've no interest in playing wooden pegs or paper cut-outs for a wargame.

For myself? Essential. I make my minis as WYSIWYG as I can. But then again I am fairly anal-retentive about my minis so...

My opponents? Don't care to an extent. WYSIWYG preferred but as long as the minis aren't legs on bases or bottle caps I'm generally chill. I refuse to play against literal trash since the visual experience is pretty much the entire game for me. But this has never been an issue for me thankfully.

 TheCustomLime wrote:
For myself? Essential. I make my minis as WYSIWYG as I can. But then again I am fairly anal-retentive about my minis so...

My opponents? Don't care to an extent. WYSIWYG preferred but as long as the minis aren't legs on bases or bottle caps I'm generally chill. I refuse to play against literal trash since the visual experience is pretty much the entire game for me. But this has never been an issue for me thankfully.

Agreed. I'm pretry much the same, and if I have a model that isn't optimally built, it gets taken as the non-optimal it is built as.

The only people I put up with garbage from is family - my brother has been trying to get into Tau for a while, and I let him use quarters and paper circles. I'm starting to get a little annoyed though because I know he has models for most of the stuff he's fielding - I've gifted him at least 1 pathfinder squad and an ethereal fully painted and based, but I never see them. I am beginning to wonder if he's just humoring me and has in reality sold off all the models.

"What if you were handed a list that was yours for the game. it read something like:

War Walker w/ Star Cannon and Bright lance have Eldar missle launcher and Shuriken cannon respectively

War Walker w/ Shuriken Cannon and Scatter Laser have Bright Lance and Eldar Missle Launcher respectively"

This is where you lose me. 4 different weapons modelled. 2 of them are the same weapon in play. To confuse things even further, the Bright Lance on model 1 isn't a bright lance in play, but the scatter laser on model 2 IS a bright lance, and the shruiken cannon is really missile launcher, but the star cannon is really a shruiken cannon?

That's getting into bits of paper beside each model to keep track. No, thanks

Asterios wrote:

 Byte wrote:
Where is WYSIWYG in the rule book?

Ahhh... they took it out. Its not a thing for the causal 40k gamer.

If my opponent and I agree and understand, I don't care if he uses a salt shaker as a dreadnought.

1. GW isn't paying me to play.
2. Playtesting is a thing.
3. Who wants to cut nice oop metal model just to have the codex change what they can take. This has happened to me many times since 2nd ed.
4. Are you not going to play a relaxing game of 40K because your opponent isn't a GW disciple?

WYSIWYG is generally reserved for competitive play(usually required) and hardcore fluff bunnies(not that there's anything wrong with that). However, there is no rule on it.

yeah but when a player brings a skeleton army saying its a SM army that is a little too much (yes have seen this happen before).

So? If I know what Skeleton is holding which weapon does it really matter they're not super humans?

I would say I am harder on myself for WYSIWYG than on my opponent.
I think of it as a courtesy to keep things as obvious and simple as possible.

I not only like to keep the main "look" of the weapon consistent, but also the colour of it.
- Light blue for lascannons with the long tube and the squared off power coils.
- Light green for plasma with the stub rounded brass end and fine ridged power coils.
- Deep red for melta, with the vented barrel tubes, tend to paint scorching at brass gun tips.
- Red with orange highlights for flamer, with the nozzle and again a brass look.
- Yellow and black hazard stripe for close combat weapons (unless power / fist / claw which has glowing blue).
- I try to fit in a bone colour for weapons that can cause instant death... it gets the point across.

The side benefit is I will not "forget" what each model does.
We are gaming, ready identification of the kit and load-out affects decisions.
Plus, keep to a consistent theme looks awesome and when using allies they automatically look coherent.

I would say the next best thing is keep all your custom weapons VERY consistent so it is all very easy to remember.

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

Asterios wrote:

 Byte wrote:
Where is WYSIWYG in the rule book?

Ahhh... they took it out. Its not a thing for the causal 40k gamer.

If my opponent and I agree and understand, I don't care if he uses a salt shaker as a dreadnought.

1. GW isn't paying me to play.
2. Playtesting is a thing.
3. Who wants to cut nice oop metal model just to have the codex change what they can take. This has happened to me many times since 2nd ed.
4. Are you not going to play a relaxing game of 40K because your opponent isn't a GW disciple?

WYSIWYG is generally reserved for competitive play(usually required) and hardcore fluff bunnies(not that there's anything wrong with that). However, there is no rule on it.

yeah but when a player brings a skeleton army saying its a SM army that is a little too much (yes have seen this happen before).

So? If I know what Skeleton is holding which weapon does it really matter they're not super humans?

It sure does. While I don't care how you wish to play 40K, each player gets a say in what they participate in. I play miniature wargames for the visual aspect of a given setting. You may not. Thus I'd have no interest in playing completely irrelevant models in a setting such as 40K. Same as I wouldn't wish to play with Space Marines in my Old West games, despite my opponent saying "Well, this Chaplain fella is actually a Hired Gun armed with a lever-action shotgun...". As I get older my time to play games is considerably less, so I'll spend it playing the games I want as I see fit. You can play someone else who is on the same wavelength as yourself, no harm done.

 Elbows wrote:

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

Asterios wrote:

 Byte wrote:
Where is WYSIWYG in the rule book?

Ahhh... they took it out. Its not a thing for the causal 40k gamer.

If my opponent and I agree and understand, I don't care if he uses a salt shaker as a dreadnought.

1. GW isn't paying me to play.
2. Playtesting is a thing.
3. Who wants to cut nice oop metal model just to have the codex change what they can take. This has happened to me many times since 2nd ed.
4. Are you not going to play a relaxing game of 40K because your opponent isn't a GW disciple?

WYSIWYG is generally reserved for competitive play(usually required) and hardcore fluff bunnies(not that there's anything wrong with that). However, there is no rule on it.

yeah but when a player brings a skeleton army saying its a SM army that is a little too much (yes have seen this happen before).

So? If I know what Skeleton is holding which weapon does it really matter they're not super humans?

It sure does. While I don't care how you wish to play 40K, each player gets a say in what they participate in. I play miniature wargames for the visual aspect of a given setting. You may not. Thus I'd have no interest in playing completely irrelevant models in a setting such as 40K. Same as I wouldn't wish to play with Space Marines in my Old West games, despite my opponent saying "Well, this Chaplain fella is actually a Hired Gun armed with a lever-action shotgun...". As I get older my time to play games is considerably less, so I'll spend it playing the games I want as I see fit. You can play someone else who is on the same wavelength as yourself, no harm done.

Which gives you less games because you're being picky over the Space Marines having to look exactly like Space Marines.

I don't care for WYSIWYG. I say let's roll dice, and have fun. Usually I do "count's as" and last game I had, someone asked me if it was ok and I said "yes no problems at all. Just please don't mind if I ask you 10 or 20 times what that mini is." and they have no issues at all with it.

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

 Elbows wrote:

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

Asterios wrote:

 Byte wrote:
Where is WYSIWYG in the rule book?

Ahhh... they took it out. Its not a thing for the causal 40k gamer.

If my opponent and I agree and understand, I don't care if he uses a salt shaker as a dreadnought.

1. GW isn't paying me to play.
2. Playtesting is a thing.
3. Who wants to cut nice oop metal model just to have the codex change what they can take. This has happened to me many times since 2nd ed.
4. Are you not going to play a relaxing game of 40K because your opponent isn't a GW disciple?

WYSIWYG is generally reserved for competitive play(usually required) and hardcore fluff bunnies(not that there's anything wrong with that). However, there is no rule on it.

yeah but when a player brings a skeleton army saying its a SM army that is a little too much (yes have seen this happen before).

So? If I know what Skeleton is holding which weapon does it really matter they're not super humans?

It sure does. While I don't care how you wish to play 40K, each player gets a say in what they participate in. I play miniature wargames for the visual aspect of a given setting. You may not. Thus I'd have no interest in playing completely irrelevant models in a setting such as 40K. Same as I wouldn't wish to play with Space Marines in my Old West games, despite my opponent saying "Well, this Chaplain fella is actually a Hired Gun armed with a lever-action shotgun...". As I get older my time to play games is considerably less, so I'll spend it playing the games I want as I see fit. You can play someone else who is on the same wavelength as yourself, no harm done.

Which gives you less games because you're being picky over the Space Marines having to look exactly like Space Marines.

Quality>Quantity.

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

 Elbows wrote:

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

Asterios wrote:

 Byte wrote:
Where is WYSIWYG in the rule book?

Ahhh... they took it out. Its not a thing for the causal 40k gamer.

If my opponent and I agree and understand, I don't care if he uses a salt shaker as a dreadnought.

1. GW isn't paying me to play.
2. Playtesting is a thing.
3. Who wants to cut nice oop metal model just to have the codex change what they can take. This has happened to me many times since 2nd ed.
4. Are you not going to play a relaxing game of 40K because your opponent isn't a GW disciple?

WYSIWYG is generally reserved for competitive play(usually required) and hardcore fluff bunnies(not that there's anything wrong with that). However, there is no rule on it.

yeah but when a player brings a skeleton army saying its a SM army that is a little too much (yes have seen this happen before).

So? If I know what Skeleton is holding which weapon does it really matter they're not super humans?

It sure does. While I don't care how you wish to play 40K, each player gets a say in what they participate in. I play miniature wargames for the visual aspect of a given setting. You may not. Thus I'd have no interest in playing completely irrelevant models in a setting such as 40K. Same as I wouldn't wish to play with Space Marines in my Old West games, despite my opponent saying "Well, this Chaplain fella is actually a Hired Gun armed with a lever-action shotgun...". As I get older my time to play games is considerably less, so I'll spend it playing the games I want as I see fit. You can play someone else who is on the same wavelength as yourself, no harm done.

Which gives you less games because you're being picky over the Space Marines having to look exactly like Space Marines.

Yep, don't really have that problem. Let me ask you this - why do you play 40K? It's one of the games I play the least, but what is the attraction to you? The rules suck compared to just about every other game I've played. I'd imagine the majority of people play 40K because they like the fluff/the models etc. So why do you play? I'm curious what the point is if you don't have any interest in actually playing with miniatures that represent what interests you.

Elbows wrote:

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

 Elbows wrote:

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

Asterios wrote:

 Byte wrote:
Where is WYSIWYG in the rule book?

Ahhh... they took it out. Its not a thing for the causal 40k gamer.

If my opponent and I agree and understand, I don't care if he uses a salt shaker as a dreadnought.

1. GW isn't paying me to play.
2. Playtesting is a thing.
3. Who wants to cut nice oop metal model just to have the codex change what they can take. This has happened to me many times since 2nd ed.
4. Are you not going to play a relaxing game of 40K because your opponent isn't a GW disciple?

WYSIWYG is generally reserved for competitive play(usually required) and hardcore fluff bunnies(not that there's anything wrong with that). However, there is no rule on it.

yeah but when a player brings a skeleton army saying its a SM army that is a little too much (yes have seen this happen before).

So? If I know what Skeleton is holding which weapon does it really matter they're not super humans?

It sure does. While I don't care how you wish to play 40K, each player gets a say in what they participate in. I play miniature wargames for the visual aspect of a given setting. You may not. Thus I'd have no interest in playing completely irrelevant models in a setting such as 40K. Same as I wouldn't wish to play with Space Marines in my Old West games, despite my opponent saying "Well, this Chaplain fella is actually a Hired Gun armed with a lever-action shotgun...". As I get older my time to play games is considerably less, so I'll spend it playing the games I want as I see fit. You can play someone else who is on the same wavelength as yourself, no harm done.

Which gives you less games because you're being picky over the Space Marines having to look exactly like Space Marines.

Yep, don't really have that problem. Let me ask you this - why do you play 40K? It's one of the games I play the least, but what is the attraction to you? The rules suck compared to just about every other game I've played. I'd imagine the majority of people play 40K because they like the fluff/the models etc. So why do you play? I'm curious what the point is if you don't have any interest in actually playing with miniatures that represent what interests you.

Maybe because its fun and at least in my neck of the woods 40k is the most popular miniature war game so there's actually people to play and not just theoryhammer on the interwebs.

Davor wrote:I don't care for WYSIWYG. I say let's roll dice, and have fun. Usually I do "count's as" and last game I had, someone asked me if it was ok and I said "yes no problems at all. Just please don't mind if I ask you 10 or 20 times what that mini is." and they have no issues at all with it.

I'd rather play than not play. At this point WYSIWYG is just dreamt up or made mandatory by TOs.

I play Infinity. Try playing that 100% WYSIWYG. Never hear about that do we? Making rules without models, noooooo, only GW would do that. Try Nomads Grrls missile launcher for one.

IMO it is important, but I'm not going to be 100% strict about it. I expect two requirements to be met though:

1) The model must be a legitimate scifi model with the appropriate theme. If your reason for taking something is "this looks better than the official model" or "I need to make a minor change in upgrades, but this is pretty close" then it's a lot more reasonable than "I'm too lazy and/or cheap to bring an appropriate model" with random space marine legs on bases and $1 toys as tanks. It is important to have a game that looks like a 40k game. The rules are garbage, so if you're not getting the fluff and aesthetic parts right then why bother playing at all?

2) It must be clear which models in a unit have upgrades and which don't. Something like "this flamer is a plasma gun" is clear, "this bolter that looks just like every other bolter in the squad is a plasma gun" is not. I should not have to pay careful attention to keeping track of what your proxy models are, or find out that the model with the upgrade is (entirely coincidentally!) always the last one to die. It's even better if your proxy units are standard ones ("these crisis suits have two fusion guns") and/or consistent across your entire army ("all grenade launchers in my army are melta guns") so that it's as easy as possible to remember.

I would say it's a nicety. You don't need it, so long as I know what's going on.

But it's certainly cooler when all of your Plasma Guns are actually Plasma Guns and not Grav or something.

As long as it's kept reasonable to all involved and everyone knows what's what then I don't have any issues with not strictly WYSIWYG.

Probably the most ridiculous WYSIWYG argument I've seen are the small group of people in the 30k community that get upset that their opponent is using the wrong mark of space marine armor.

Not important in any way at all. Its button counting.

 Elbows wrote:

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

 Elbows wrote:

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

Asterios wrote:

 Byte wrote:
Where is WYSIWYG in the rule book?

Ahhh... they took it out. Its not a thing for the causal 40k gamer.

If my opponent and I agree and understand, I don't care if he uses a salt shaker as a dreadnought.

1. GW isn't paying me to play.
2. Playtesting is a thing.
3. Who wants to cut nice oop metal model just to have the codex change what they can take. This has happened to me many times since 2nd ed.
4. Are you not going to play a relaxing game of 40K because your opponent isn't a GW disciple?

WYSIWYG is generally reserved for competitive play(usually required) and hardcore fluff bunnies(not that there's anything wrong with that). However, there is no rule on it.

yeah but when a player brings a skeleton army saying its a SM army that is a little too much (yes have seen this happen before).

So? If I know what Skeleton is holding which weapon does it really matter they're not super humans?

It sure does. While I don't care how you wish to play 40K, each player gets a say in what they participate in. I play miniature wargames for the visual aspect of a given setting. You may not. Thus I'd have no interest in playing completely irrelevant models in a setting such as 40K. Same as I wouldn't wish to play with Space Marines in my Old West games, despite my opponent saying "Well, this Chaplain fella is actually a Hired Gun armed with a lever-action shotgun...". As I get older my time to play games is considerably less, so I'll spend it playing the games I want as I see fit. You can play someone else who is on the same wavelength as yourself, no harm done.

Which gives you less games because you're being picky over the Space Marines having to look exactly like Space Marines.

Yep, don't really have that problem. Let me ask you this - why do you play 40K? It's one of the games I play the least, but what is the attraction to you? The rules suck compared to just about every other game I've played. I'd imagine the majority of people play 40K because they like the fluff/the models etc. So why do you play? I'm curious what the point is if you don't have any interest in actually playing with miniatures that represent what interests you.

The rules really aren't bad outside a few outliers, and yes I enjoy the setting. The setting GIVES that creative freedom though. Undead Space Marines? Necromancy is a thing. Have a nicely converted Space Lizard army? Lots of ways to make that work fluff-wise and rules wise (like an infantry heavy Iron Hands, where Bikers are just Lizard men on armoured critters, and a few bigger creatures could just be Centurions and Dreadknights). Picked up a REALLY awesome weapon for your dude but don't want to have it be a simple Power Maul? Thunder Hammers and various relics help you there.
So to be mad someone likes using Skeletons to represent their Space Marines is frankly childish on your end, and it is you that is against the spirit of the game, not the opponent.

 Stephanius wrote:
Consistency is important. If you put down three Falcons with shuriken cannons and play them as scatter lasers that is absolutely fine. Problems start when the same model or bits is played as different things in the same game.

Exactly so. I have no problem if my opponent brings all his, say, meltagun-equipped IG troopers and says he's paid for flamers. It becomes a problem if I have to keep track of which meltaguns are meltas and which are flamers.

And I do the same if I have to proxy something. I don't have an endless supply of SoB models so sometimes I let the (otherwise useless) Stormbolter models stand in for something useful like a meltagun. In that case there's absolutely no Stormbolters to be found anywhere except on Rhinos.

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:
The rules really aren't bad outside a few outliers, and yes I enjoy the setting.

No, the rules are bad in just about every possible way. You could write an entire textbook on game design using 40k as an example of how not to make a game.

The setting GIVES that creative freedom though. Undead Space Marines? Necromancy is a thing. Have a nicely converted Space Lizard army? Lots of ways to make that work fluff-wise and rules wise (like an infantry heavy Iron Hands, where Bikers are just Lizard men on armoured critters, and a few bigger creatures could just be Centurions and Dreadknights). Picked up a REALLY awesome weapon for your dude but don't want to have it be a simple Power Maul? Thunder Hammers and various relics help you there.
So to be mad someone likes using Skeletons to represent their Space Marines is frankly childish on your end, and it is you that is against the spirit of the game, not the opponent.

Sorry, but skeletons as space marines does not fit the fluff at all. You can write up your own fanfiction about the idea, but it has nothing to do with any canon material. And when people play 40k they usually want to see something like the canon background, not a random heap of models taken from various other games. You can call it childish all you want, but the aesthetic factor matters. After all, the rules are terrible. If you're going to play a game of space lizards vs. undead why play 40k at all? Why not use those models with a better game?

Now, if you really want an undead army you have a perfectly good example: chaos zombies. Do a horde cultist or traitor IG army with wave after wave of undead marching to their second death. Skeletons instead of zombies works a lot better than trying to pretend that a skeleton has the same T4/3+ stat line as a power armored superhuman.

I'd say "Prefer" too. Consistent, unambiguous non-WYSIWYG is fine: "all my Sternguard models have combi-plasmas but they're actually all just bolters", I have no issue with. Likewise things like "all my Devastators have lascannons, even though one of the models seems to have a heavy bolter". But four heavy bolter guys, and "this one's a plasma cannon, this one's a missile launcher, this one's a grav-cannon and this one's actually a heavy bolter"? Ack, thppppft. I'm gonna want those marked in some other way, because that's confusing.

Likewise for things like "these Pyrovores are actually Biovores" - fine. But "this Pyrovore squad is Biovores; this one is actually Pyrovores, and the third one counts as Malanthropes"? Yeah, no. That's confusing, once again.

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

 Elbows wrote:

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

 Elbows wrote:

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

Asterios wrote:

 Byte wrote:
Where is WYSIWYG in the rule book?

Ahhh... they took it out. Its not a thing for the causal 40k gamer.

If my opponent and I agree and understand, I don't care if he uses a salt shaker as a dreadnought.

1. GW isn't paying me to play.
2. Playtesting is a thing.
3. Who wants to cut nice oop metal model just to have the codex change what they can take. This has happened to me many times since 2nd ed.
4. Are you not going to play a relaxing game of 40K because your opponent isn't a GW disciple?

WYSIWYG is generally reserved for competitive play(usually required) and hardcore fluff bunnies(not that there's anything wrong with that). However, there is no rule on it.

yeah but when a player brings a skeleton army saying its a SM army that is a little too much (yes have seen this happen before).

So? If I know what Skeleton is holding which weapon does it really matter they're not super humans?

It sure does. While I don't care how you wish to play 40K, each player gets a say in what they participate in. I play miniature wargames for the visual aspect of a given setting. You may not. Thus I'd have no interest in playing completely irrelevant models in a setting such as 40K. Same as I wouldn't wish to play with Space Marines in my Old West games, despite my opponent saying "Well, this Chaplain fella is actually a Hired Gun armed with a lever-action shotgun...". As I get older my time to play games is considerably less, so I'll spend it playing the games I want as I see fit. You can play someone else who is on the same wavelength as yourself, no harm done.

Which gives you less games because you're being picky over the Space Marines having to look exactly like Space Marines.

Yep, don't really have that problem. Let me ask you this - why do you play 40K? It's one of the games I play the least, but what is the attraction to you? The rules suck compared to just about every other game I've played. I'd imagine the majority of people play 40K because they like the fluff/the models etc. So why do you play? I'm curious what the point is if you don't have any interest in actually playing with miniatures that represent what interests you.

The rules really aren't bad outside a few outliers, and yes I enjoy the setting. The setting GIVES that creative freedom though. Undead Space Marines? Necromancy is a thing. Have a nicely converted Space Lizard army? Lots of ways to make that work fluff-wise and rules wise (like an infantry heavy Iron Hands, where Bikers are just Lizard men on armoured critters, and a few bigger creatures could just be Centurions and Dreadknights). Picked up a REALLY awesome weapon for your dude but don't want to have it be a simple Power Maul? Thunder Hammers and various relics help you there.
So to be mad someone likes using Skeletons to represent their Space Marines is frankly childish on your end, and it is you that is against the spirit of the game, not the opponent.

What you're talking about here is completely different than what has been indicated before. If you go through the effort of meticulously converting an army with exceptionally reasonable "counts as" models, armed with the proper weapons? Sure, go nuts. Are your skeletons wearing power armour with bolters (or similar weaponry) etc.? That's fine. You want to run 3rd party Imperial Guard, awesome. Go for it. While I agree that skeletal space marines don't match canon at all, if you've put in a ton of effort into making them armed/outfitted like proper space marines which you want to run them as, I have no problem with it.

I used to run a Farseer on the old metal converted disc of Tzeentch (the tech one) as his "Jetbike". That's different than me placing an Ork warboss on foot and saying "that's my Eldar Farseer on a jetbike". If you put in effort to make a facsimile who is armed/equipped you're showing effort. Showing up with cardboard chits, or green army men and saying they're your 40K army --- not kosher.

I didn't say I'd be mad at someone for fielding skeletons as an army, but I wouldn't bother playing them. My expectation is that someone put forth a solid effort to put a properly armed/equipped and painted army on the table. If you can't be bothered to put forth effort, I'll find another opponent. I have a nine year old nephew who won't field unpainted/improper models...so I suppose I hold adults to a similar standard. Doesn't piss me off or make me angry, I just won't waste my time with said person/player. Doesn't mean I wouldn't sit down and play a kick ass board game with ya, like BSieged, or Zombicide or something. 40K for me is about a fulfilling visual aspect and telling a story.

Lol, I recently played a game against my friends necron codex...all but three models were substituted trough chaos and tyranid models...so much for wysiwyg...

I don't mind at all.

I'm good as long as it is consistent and follows the spirit of the rule...in that models with non-standard wargear should be easily identifiable as having it.

I'm middle of the road when it comes to proxies and conversions. Everything should look like it is supposed to using GW models/bits where possible. That being said, GW doesn't not make it easy or cheap to adhere to strict WYSIWYG. Am I going to care if a BA or SW players uses standard Tac Marines to fill out squads? No. Would I care if somebody plopped down an unconverted D&D miniature to use as a Demon Prince? Probably. Especially if it looks smaller or different than the standard model to gain an advantage.

Recasting is also probably here to stay but I'm against it for the most part. Mostly because as more of it enters circulation, the more it's going to be resold to unsuspecting people that are assuming they are getting high-quality GW models.

That goes for competitive play though. Do what you want with friends (except selling recast models/bits).

WYSIWYG is a joke. Either you go all in or you don't. I just find it funny the WYSIWYG camp will say it's mandatory but yet will not have WYSIWYG grenades or ammo, and then make excuses as to why psychic powers are not WYSIWYG.

Now before you go on how psychic powers are random now, they were not when you had WYSIWYG police back in 5th edition when you picked what you waned. The point still stands the WYSIWYG police will always make an excuse why you have to conform but will have excuses when they don't conform.

Go all in or not at all. There is no middle ground That is called being a hypocrite then.

To recant slightly on earllier - when id just finished a five game in a day tournament - on a normal gaming night when we have 3+ hours for a game, chat, trip to bar etc - sure. Be a bit loosers

In a tournament, which my brain already struggles with? Make it as easy for me as possible