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 Alex Kolodotschko wrote:

Spoiler:

Here's a quote from Oni, requoting me from back in 2009:
"It's hard to get excited and inspired by hunkering down behind a pepper pot or taking the wine cork objective at the top of that enormous book, not to mention taking dangerous terrain tests on the slippery surface of a glossy magazine." (Alex Kolodotschko, Dakka Dakka) This quote about sums it all up.

A fully painted table and models is what sets this game apart from any other strategy game.
Likeminded people get to play with me on this.....

I'm not going through all of this effort to play against the grey hordes.

That's an absolutely inspiring gaming room. However, the lovely greebled walls do make your gaming table surface look a bit bland...

I run a Kult of Speed and while my vehicles are painted up, I have not really done much on my 300 boyz, 30 Nobz, 60 grotz, and 10 mega-armored nobz, two Mets (one with KFF, and another with SAG). This army is a work in progress and as such it would be an insult to not play it. I put effort in to what I do and eventually every single infantry model will be painted. So what if I have twelve primed boyz jump off a trukk, next week they will be painted. It's really only an issue if you don't see any progress over several weeks of play.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Eilif wrote:

 Alex Kolodotschko wrote:

Spoiler:

Here's a quote from Oni, requoting me from back in 2009:
"It's hard to get excited and inspired by hunkering down behind a pepper pot or taking the wine cork objective at the top of that enormous book, not to mention taking dangerous terrain tests on the slippery surface of a glossy magazine." (Alex Kolodotschko, Dakka Dakka) This quote about sums it all up.

A fully painted table and models is what sets this game apart from any other strategy game.
Likeminded people get to play with me on this.....

I'm not going through all of this effort to play against the grey hordes.

That's an absolutely inspiring gaming room. However, the lovely greebled walls do make your gaming table surface look a bit bland...

I think that's Miniwargaming's set.

You are not a painting snob, especially considering that you started the group and play in your own home with like-minded opponents. Like many have mentioned before, painted armies really bring the game to life. My group always plays with painted models, although some may still need detail work to be considered completed. We even have a few guys that are just getting into the game who show up to game nights to work on building or painting their armies and talk hobby with the those of us that are playing.

We always allow one exception, though. Because we're all so new, it's not uncommon for someone to show up early to meet with the owner of the FLGS for help with list building. If they discover that they don't have models they need and buy them from the FLGS before the game, then we allow them to play with them that night. It helps the FLGS makes a few extra bucks, so we're happy to make an accommodation.

Eilif wrote:That's an absolutely inspiring gaming room. However, the lovely greebled walls do make your gaming table surface look a bit bland...

Cheers. They're not greebles, they're precision balanced instruments essential for space travel. Greebles indeed. Pfff.
Yeah, you're not the first to say that. The surface isn't that bad it's just a 12x6 so any detail gets lost at that distance, especially with the pics being out of focus. It's actually sanded and painted in a couple of mottled tones that don't seem to show well on camera. Yeah it's flatish but versatility is important to me. I was setting up for the Apocalypse and they were the only 3 matching surfaces that I had. Maybe doing a bit of building at the weekend and i'll give them a bit more love.

xraytango wrote:I
I think that's Miniwargaming's set.

I think you're wrong. It's my set in my games room in Bristol, Britain, England, UK, GB so I think they'd have a long way to go to have a game or I've paid a lot on postage.
Speaking of which if anyone has nicely painted models and wants a game in there at anypoint feel free to drop me a PM!

I would love this group!

I will add that a FLGS club should be more inclusive, but if it's your house then up to you.

If you guys are playing out of a house I would not have a paint requirement. If you are in a remote place and theres no gaming going on else where its kind of ridiculous. House rules I guess, but some people want to get into the game but don't have the time/money/skills to paint. Denying them to play with you guys because there army isn't painted is kind of a bummer.

Before anyone brings tournaments up, i realize they do have requirements. Tourneys are also a next level play style and need to have these rules especially since their armies are sometimes judged.

I say get off your high horse and let them play.

 Kilkrazy wrote:
It's fairly common for people who don't want to do the work to paint their armies to argue that people who like playing with painted armies adn don't want to play with unpainted armies are snobs.

There isn't any special virtue in playing with unpainted armies that you lack by not wanting to do it.

The one difficulty with this standard is that it limits experimentation and players who building their armies. It would typically take me a year to paint an army fully, and I like to play around with different variants to keep things interesting.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

This. It's not really a gakky move if it's your house and your club, you can set your own rules. It's another thing to go to a store and judge/mock people for not painting.

This.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Grimtuff wrote:

coldgaming wrote:
I don't require anything from other people but I agree about a hardline on proxies, at least for myself. I think it's lame to say these chaos warhounds are flesh hounds, or this cheap dragon I bought is Archaon/Gordrakk/a Stardrake etc. I think conversions/alternative army themes etc are great, but proxies purely to save money are lame. At least for myself.

How dare someone want to save money? I personally think Chaos Hounds subbed for Flesh Hounds look quite spiffy.

I much preferred Chaos Knights for Juggernauts myself. The reception I had for them has always been extremely positive.

 Kilkrazy wrote:
It's fairly common for people who don't want to do the work to paint their armies to argue that people who like playing with painted armies adn don't want to play with unpainted armies are snobs.

It's also fairly common for people who dislike unpainted armies to disparage those with unpainted armies, so it's not really surprising people who only want to play painted sometimes get labelled snobs.

AllSeeingSkink wrote:

 Kilkrazy wrote:
It's fairly common for people who don't want to do the work to paint their armies to argue that people who like playing with painted armies adn don't want to play with unpainted armies are snobs.

It's also fairly common for people who dislike unpainted armies to disparage those with unpainted armies, so it's not really surprising people who only want to play painted sometimes get labelled snobs.

This. If you review the old Painted vs. Unpainted threads, both sides tend to get fairly heated, but I'd argue it's more the Painted side who are aggressive. Especially because (not at OP, but other users in those threads bring it up), there's no such thing as clubs that only allow unpainted models.

96% of Dakka users would prefer to use painted armies, according to a poll we did a few years ago.

 Kilkrazy wrote:
96% of Dakka users would prefer to use painted armies, according to a poll we did a few years ago.

And I'd prefer my opponents not be total TFGs, but we don't all get what we want do we? I'd also prefer to play on beautiful tables and quit my job to go pro at 40k, but that ain't happening. You can want something but also realize that the person you're playing against has wants and desires and they may not be the same as yours. I'd be interested in seeing a new poll of people who will/won't play a painted/unpainted army.

Side note: Dakka is not all encompassing. I've had several players at my LGS say they've never heard of it.

There is a bit of a difference between "preference" and "will not play" plus other circumstances to consider.

I prefer to see painted armies and I do not have to quit my job or neglect my children to get them completed.
Argue all you want: it takes less effort grabbing a couple coloured spray cans and doing some fast and dirty painting than assembling the models.
Kinda hard calling some layers of paint being a snob when all that is required is this tiny bit of effort.

I find I start refusing play with those who view their models as little more than chits on the board and dump them all in a pile when the game is done.
It is for them 98% the game and all else is what they can get away with.

I LOVE competitive but I am beginning to like the epic look of it all more.
I am willing to dust-off and play my Chaos Marines army (if I had to) to play a painted Eldar army any day of the week.

I find hosting at home you tend to have some motivation for that.
Possibly enforcing "your rules" could be part of that.
To see everything on a table painted seems awfully compelling.

Very hard for the "chit" player to say the host is "inconveniencing" him when the game is under their roof.
I like standards.
They force us to do better: nothing wrong with that.

 Talizvar wrote:
There is a bit of a difference between "preference" and "will not play" plus other circumstances to consider.

I prefer to see painted armies and I do not have to quit my job or neglect my children to get them completed.
Argue all you want: it takes less effort grabbing a couple coloured spray cans and doing some fast and dirty painting than assembling the models.
Kinda hard calling some layers of paint being a snob when all that is required is this tiny bit of effort.

I find I start refusing play with those who view their models as little more than chits on the board and dump them all in a pile when the game is done.
It is for them 98% the game and all else is what they can get away with.

I LOVE competitive but I am beginning to like the epic look of it all more.
I am willing to dust-off and play my Chaos Marines army (if I had to) to play a painted Eldar army any day of the week.

I find hosting at home you tend to have some motivation for that.
Possibly enforcing "your rules" could be part of that.
To see everything on a table painted seems awfully compelling.

Very hard for the "chit" player to say the host is "inconveniencing" him when the game is under their roof.
I like standards.
They force us to do better: nothing wrong with that.

I said in my original post, it's at OP's house, I had nothing wrong with that. His house, his rules. I just said I wouldn't play there. I don't like being forced to paint. If it strikes me, so be it.

What I'm addressing is the attitude that people that don't paint are lesser for it. Guess what? Every WarmaHordes player at my LGS plays with unpainted figures, but I suppose they are lesser for it.

Also, is globbed on paint better than nothing at all? Paint so thick you can't see the details? But sure, keep your holier than thau attitude about plastic toys that you make "Pew! pew!" noises with.

 Kilkrazy wrote:
96% of Dakka users would prefer to use painted armies, according to a poll we did a few years ago.

There's a difference between "prefer painted" and "enforce painted by rules" and "disparage people with unpainted".

AllSeeingSkink wrote:

 Kilkrazy wrote:
96% of Dakka users would prefer to use painted armies, according to a poll we did a few years ago.

There's a difference between "prefer painted" and "enforce painted by rules" and "disparage people with unpainted".

I feel like it's also worth mentioning that sometimes "Sorry, I'd prefer to play against a painted army" is a great way for someone to avoid playing a game with someone they dislike but they don't want to cause a scene.

What I'm addressing is the attitude that people that don't paint are lesser for it.

Who ever said that? Quite a generalisation of gamer's who prefer to only play painted games. It seem pretty unfair to me that if I refuse to play against an unpainted army you assume i think lesser of you. I don't, your free to do what you like! Who am i to say you should or shouldn't paint your army and who are you to say what type of games i should and shouldn't play....

Also, is globbed on paint better than nothing at all? Paint so thick you can't see the details? But sure, keep your holier than thau attitude about plastic toys that you make "Pew! pew!" noises with.

You come across as super defensive, do you get that at no point am I (or the majority of painted guys on here) having having a go at you for not painting? I struggle to see how you justify this attitude.

 jreilly89 wrote:

What I'm addressing is the attitude that people that don't paint are lesser for it. Guess what? Every WarmaHordes player at my LGS plays with unpainted figures, but I suppose they are lesser for it.

Also, is globbed on paint better than nothing at all? Paint so thick you can't see the details? But sure, keep your holier than thau attitude about plastic toys that you make "Pew! pew!" noises with.

Rather than veering dangerously toward insults and hurt feelings, the important thing is to define exactly what is "lesser".

Anyone saying that a human person is "lesser" for their inability, lack of time or unwillingness to paint is clearly a snob and likely a TFG. However it is correct to say that the person's effort is lesser and that in almost all cases unpainted miniatures are lesser than painted ones.

If I have miniatures that are painted and you don't, it's accurate to think that my effort expended has been greater than yours and your figures are lesser than mine. Doesn't make you a bad person, and it doesn't make me "holier-than-thou", it's just a fact. Now, it'd be darn hard to say that without sounding rude, so I probably wouldn't but we both know it's true.

As for Warmahordes I've seen the same thing at the FLGS I used to frequent. For a brief time after my 40k days and early in the creation of my games club the really cool WM minis had me thinking about taking up Warmachine on the side. Unpainted-ness wasn't only deterrent (I'm also not a terribly competitive gamer) but knowing that I'd most likely be playing against mostly unpainted miniatures anytime I gamed at the FLGS was a big part of not going down the WarmaHordes road.

Lastly, the globbed-on-paint example is a straw man argument and not really relevant to most situations since most folks who paint don't simply glob on detail-obscuring puddles of paint. On a table, from a few feet away, even a neatly applied block-color paintjob with no shading/highlights/washes looks better than an hunk of unpainted plastic.

 jreilly89 wrote:
Also, is globbed on paint better than nothing at all? Paint so thick you can't see the details? But sure, keep your holier than thau attitude about plastic toys that you make "Pew! pew!" noises with.

I never thought I would call-out a "straw-man" argument but boy this sure is one.
Yep, when I FIRST started painting I could not make up my mind on what to paint so that one figure I think got 3 coats of Testers enamel paint... boy he was a beauty.
That tends to happen for your first couple, after that you learn rather rapidly.
I typically see few paint jobs that look like garbage, only an honest attempt: nothing to make fun of there.

"Holier than thou."... I think the viewpoint is not "nah-nah I am better than you for painting!" it just looks kinda sad and like we really are pushing bare plastic crappy toys around.
There is nothing compelling there other than possibly the "pure" pursuit of the game and little else.
The only time I have seen anyone new express interest in 40k is when they see painted armies: I honestly never heard any good comment seeing unpainted.

I am sure most of us have a fairly good idea of where the importance of our "man-toys" sit in the scheme of things.
But we cannot make light of our preference for our hobby: we have to fight so hard in this busy world to get our fun in.
We all have our wants and wishes so no-one can be forced to play if they do not want to.

Geordie wrote:

You come across as super defensive, do you get that at no point am I (or the majority of painted guys on here) having having a go at you for not painting? I struggle to see how you justify this attitude.

People tend to get defensive when trying to explain/excuse their use of unpainted armies.

The bottom line is that some people simply don't want to paint their toys, or at least they place a low priority on using painted armies, because if they did want to they would find the time. That's not a judgement, its a simple fact.

As I said earlier in the thread I work full time, I am studying for an MSc and I have a young family yet despite that I have still found the time to fully paint and base 2250 points of Epic Orks, 500 points of Warzone Capitol, a Necromunda gang, a Frostgrave Warband as well as a few odds and ends like objective markers and some Bolt Action stuff; this was all since the new year. If I can do it, virtually anyone else can (barring physical disability).

You know, at this point it's not even worth addressing. You guys clearly seem to have your opinion on how exactly this game should be played and I'll leave you to that in good conscience. Just please, please never darken the door of my shop, as I would never want to play you.

 jreilly89 wrote:
You know, at this point it's not even worth addressing. You guys clearly seem to have your opinion on how exactly this game should be played and I'll leave you to that in good conscience. Just please, please never darken the door of my shop, as I would never want to play you.

And yet you talk about others having a 'holier than thou' attitude...

You know, at this point it's not even worth addressing. You guys clearly seem to have your opinion on how exactly this game should be played and I'll leave you to that in good conscience. Just please, please never darken the door of my shop, as I would never want to play you.

Dude you're entitled to play who you like how you like.

I will never judge you for that, the same courtesy would be appreciated.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
To play devils advocate, after all the unpainted arguments / views so far have not been constructed too well

i can see a couple of negatives to my approach:

- Taking my stance to a club / shop where unpainted armies are the norm and declining to play someone with a unpainted army is creating a potential situation for someone to get offended (rightly or wrongly) and may be discouraging to younger players (thus why i choose to do this at my home home). I am of the opinion that although i don't outright disagree with doing this it should probably be avoided for the benefit of all.

- My stance makes it very difficult for younger players to get involved (assuming i didn't have an age limit on my group). Allowing unpainted armies reduces the barrier for entry and encourages a greater influx of young blood. If we don't have young blood this hobby will eventually die out.


Seems to me both schools of thought work well together for the hobby even if they don't always crossover.

Your hobby, do what you want, but not all of us have the luck to get super-easy models like space marines to paint some of us have armys like Harleys or Dark eldar and are not that great at painting, so while I much prefer seeing painted armies, I wouldn't turn down a game vs one as some armies are very, very hard to make them look good and I would rather play with grey than gloped on paint anyday!

@OP, yeah, you are, but it's fine since it's your prerogative. I prefer a policy of "show you've tried to make some progress even if not fully painted."

I have very few fully painted forces, only one fully painted game, and mostly when I get something new, I want to play it then, not in six months after I've gotten around to painting that specific piece as I bounce between game and faction. This isn't because I don't paint much, but because I have a high standard of what I consider done.

If you want to be more inclusive (to new players, players who want to try new things, slow painters, etc.), I'd suggest something like that as a compromise.

I'm pretty far on the game-first end of the spectrum. Painted armies are a bonus, not an expectation. It's the most inclusive way to play.

 spiralingcadaver wrote:
This isn't because I don't paint much, but because I have a high standard of what I consider done.

I'd much rather play against an army that's 90% unpainted because the person is actually trying to get them painted well instead of rushed to the table.

Most people are looking at upwards of a year to paint an army really well.

AllSeeingSkink wrote:

 spiralingcadaver wrote:
This isn't because I don't paint much, but because I have a high standard of what I consider done.

I'd much rather play against an army that's 90% unpainted because the person is actually trying to get them painted well instead of rushed to the table.

Most people are looking at upwards of a year to paint an army really well.

I have to agree to a point with op though, since I have well over 10,000 points but very few are painted, but if there were some reason of why I should paint them up, I might have put more effort into it. as of now my main opponents run codex:grey sea so even if I wanted a full painted game, I would be SOL for literally years. My friends nids he started are still incomplete after 3 years but I got mine done in a month or so (swarm) but at the same time... They look real bad in comparison to some.

 cosmicsoybean wrote:

AllSeeingSkink wrote:

 spiralingcadaver wrote:
This isn't because I don't paint much, but because I have a high standard of what I consider done.

I'd much rather play against an army that's 90% unpainted because the person is actually trying to get them painted well instead of rushed to the table.

Most people are looking at upwards of a year to paint an army really well.

I have to agree to a point with op though, since I have well over 10,000 points but very few are painted, but if there were some reason of why I should paint them up, I might have put more effort into it. as of now my main opponents run codex:grey sea so even if I wanted a full painted game, I would be SOL for literally years. My friends nids he started are still incomplete after 3 years but I got mine done in a month or so (swarm) but at the same time... They look real bad in comparison to some.

My first ever army I painted over the course of maybe 3 weekends, it looked pretty poor.

My Tyranid army took me about 3 years. I probably could have done it in a year and a half if I'd really worked at it, but realistically not much faster. Each unit took me about 2 months if I dedicated most my free time to it. The reason it took 3 years instead of 1.5 is because there's only so many evenings and days off I can dedicate to painting the same fething scheme on the same fething army before I get sick of it and need to spend some free time doing something other than painting models

Even though it's what I did, I don't expect anyone else to paint an army like crap just to get it to the table to play with it. If they want to paint it well, I don't really care. I've played against enough armies that were painted so poorly that they only looked marginally better than an unpainted army to care these days.

AllSeeingSkink wrote:

 cosmicsoybean wrote:

AllSeeingSkink wrote:

 spiralingcadaver wrote:
This isn't because I don't paint much, but because I have a high standard of what I consider done.

I'd much rather play against an army that's 90% unpainted because the person is actually trying to get them painted well instead of rushed to the table.

Most people are looking at upwards of a year to paint an army really well.

I have to agree to a point with op though, since I have well over 10,000 points but very few are painted, but if there were some reason of why I should paint them up, I might have put more effort into it. as of now my main opponents run codex:grey sea so even if I wanted a full painted game, I would be SOL for literally years. My friends nids he started are still incomplete after 3 years but I got mine done in a month or so (swarm) but at the same time... They look real bad in comparison to some.

My first ever army I painted over the course of maybe 3 weekends, it looked pretty poor.

My Tyranid army took me about 3 years. I probably could have done it in a year and a half if I'd really worked at it, but realistically not much faster. Each unit took me about 2 months if I dedicated most my free time to it. The reason it took 3 years instead of 1.5 is because there's only so many evenings and days off I can dedicate to painting the same fething scheme on the same fething army before I get sick of it and need to spend some free time doing something other than painting models

Even though it's what I did, I don't expect anyone else to paint an army like crap just to get it to the table to play with it. If they want to paint it well, I don't really care. I've played against enough armies that were painted so poorly that they only looked marginally better than an unpainted army to care these days.

Even though mine look like crap compaired to other peoples here, it feels amazing to drop down a fully painted army. I don't have a problem painting I just don't know HOW to paint. Sure, there are tutorials, but thouse are for specific units and particular colours, I can never seem to find any that work for me.

I don't think there is anything wrong with your approach especially because it is a home group.

I would like to think people would be a bit more inclusive in a FLGS situation to help those who might be newer players.

As it has been said multiple times, people have different goals with this hobby/game, go with what you like. I never understood why people would get bent out of shape when a hobby group didn't match their priorities for the game. It's like going on a date with someone and realizing that you have different goals. You move on. There is no need for name calling/conflict.

ultimately it's up to you to decide is being a "paint snob" is worth missing out on playing some cool new people/introducing others to the game more or whatnot is worth it. As long as that answer is yes, then you are doing the right thing. You obviously have a group that is growing and healthy so keep doing what you are doing.

I don't have a problem with playing against a grey tide or fighting over a coffee can for terrain. I have a very busy life and while i'm making progress on my armies/tables, i'm not there yet and i'm not willing to not play the game I love while I am working on it. but again, different approaches are cool in the hobby.

I hope your group keeps growing and you guys keep having a blast with it!