So many things are useless in-game. Lists have to be very particular in order to even stand a remote chance against anything. All the IG lists I see are just the same melta spam over and over. Orks can't even stand up to Eldar and Necrons, about %90 of all wargear is useless etc. etc. etc. I love the backstory and the models, but can't stand how the rules work. Is there any way to enjoy this game without having the same army as every other (insert faction) player and not getting wiped from the board? I think not.

Possible if you stick to a close group of gaming friends and mix things up, but in all seriousness, what you said about loving lore and fluff but hating the rules is a pretty common mindset. A lot of people I see and talk with who plays 40k pretty much says 'the lore is great'

Well, luckily, you're wrong. For most factions, anyway. You certainly don't have to spam Meltas to play guard, not with guards generous FW support and the new formations.

 Chef_of_Cadia wrote:
So many things are useless in-game. Lists have to be very particular in order to even stand a remote chance against anything. All the IG lists I see are just the same melta spam over and over. Orks can't even stand up to Eldar and Necrons, about %90 of all wargear is useless etc. etc. etc. I love the backstory and the models, but can't stand how the rules work.

Welcome to the perennial story of 40k.

Is there any way to enjoy this game without having the same army as every other (insert faction) player and not getting wiped from the board? I think not.

For tournaments and pickup gaming? No.

If you have a close knit group of tight gaming pals who think as you do, and everyone's willing to put the effort in to address such issues, you can, but outside of that, 7E really is a gigantic honking mess.

the_scotsman wrote:
Well, luckily, you're wrong. For most factions, anyway. You certainly don't have to spam Meltas to play guard, not with guards generous FW support and the new formations.

What you've done there is focus on the specifics and totally miss the general.

OP, yes, you're right. Some of it harks back to the very earliest days when stuff had options because they should have those options, and the odds of them ever being useful were tiny even if they had an in game function at all, but it was cool nonetheless. (There were literally dozens of mutations Chaos Champions could have, for instance, like 'Bizarre Appearance')

But realistically the choice that is so often cited by people defending 40K is merely an illusion of choice, and to give yourself the best fighting chance of an even contest, it boils down to the same handful of options.

Forge World are doing a much better job with 30K, but the main game is plagued with irrelevant and ineffective options.

 Azreal13 wrote:

the_scotsman wrote:
Well, luckily, you're wrong. For most factions, anyway. You certainly don't have to spam Meltas to play guard, not with guards generous FW support and the new formations.

What you've done there is focus on the specifics and totally miss the general.

OP, yes, you're right. Some of it harks back to the very earliest days when stuff had options because they should have those options, and the odds of them ever being useful were tiny even if they had an in game function at all, but it was cool nonetheless. (There were literally dozens of mutations Chaos Champions could have, for instance, like 'Bizarre Appearance')

But realistically the choice that is so often cited by people defending 40K is merely an illusion of choice, and to give yourself the best fighting chance of an even contest, it boils down to the same handful of options.

Forge World are doing a much better job with 30K, but the main game is plagued with irrelevant and ineffective options.

My thing is, you'd think if everything in 40k is fairly unrealistic and follows the rule of cool, you'd think weapon and upgrade choices would too. But no, there's pretty much only enough valid army lists for each army to count on one hand.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Also don't get me wrong, I don't hate that I can't field conscripts armed with sticks and expect to win, there are going to be bad lists in any game. It's just I wish there weren't so many wrong answers in 40k.

There's far more than one valid army list per codex. Sometimes something out of the blue can surprise your opponent, however, I think the main issue is different.

40K isn't designed to be competitive. People will always "hate the rules love the background" when they try to make it a game worthy of tournaments or cutting edge tactical play. It's not about that. It's about having cool moments with your toy soldiers. It's about having a laugh with friends at how you can't ever roll a 2+ save.

Tournament and WAAC play is what makes 40K unbalanced. It's really not meant to be played like that.

 Griddlelol wrote:

40K isn't designed to be competitive. [...]
Tournament and WAAC play is what makes 40K unbalanced. It's really not meant to be played like that.

40k is designed to sell stuff and not to be played at all.

The unbalance is there because no one cares. That is also a reason why GW stopped selling rules before the models came out (instead of writing balanced rules the hide them until the boxes are sold, so no one can test them and decide upon the rules if the unit is worth it).

Tournaments just show how bad the rules actually are which would take a little bit longer for non-tournament players (but even those how play just narrative realise bad design and have to make their own house rules. There is no one I know how play 100% stock 40k out of the box)

 Griddlelol wrote:

40K isn't designed to be competitive. People will always "hate the rules love the background" when they try to make it a game worthy of tournaments or cutting edge tactical play. It's not about that. It's about having cool moments with your toy soldiers. It's about having a laugh with friends at how you can't ever roll a 2+ save.

But you don't need bad rules to have "cool moments" in game

The best way to play 40K without feeling forced to be uber-competitive is to walk away from the competitive sphere and get out of the "must win" mindset.

40K is not, nor will ever be, a competitive game, regardless of what the competitive scene tries to FAQ.

There are no wrong answers in 40K, just wrong mindsets.
The sooner people get over "competitive" 40K the better. This isn't MTG, with massive $$$ prizes, or MOBAS, designed from the ground up for absolute competitive play.
This is a game about Your Dudes. I still want balance in game (stop powerful unit spam, reworking PPM), and GW to put 2 minutes thought into their rules sometimes (Sod overwatch), but the minute you start balancing around competitive play is when you officially kill the game off.

 Izural wrote:
The best way to play 40K without feeling forced to be uber-competitive is to walk away from the competitive sphere and get out of the "must win" mindset.

40K is not, nor will ever be, a competitive game, regardless of what the competitive scene tries to FAQ.

There are no wrong answers in 40K, just wrong mindsets.
The sooner people get over "competitive" 40K the better. This isn't MTG, with massive $$$ prizes, or MOBAS, designed from the ground up for absolute competitive play.
This is a game about Your Dudes. I still want balance in game (stop powerful unit spam, reworking PPM), and GW to put 2 minutes thought into their rules sometimes (Sod overwatch), but the minute you start balancing around competitive play is when you officially kill the game off.

QFT.

40k is a terrible game, mechanically.
40k is a great way of generating stories about that one Codicier who stood his ground atop a fortress wall and killed the lord of change who had just slain his Epistolary tutor, or the guard Colonel who survived his command squad's massacre and killed the daemon prince responsible, or the conscripts who killed Typhus and were probably subsequently executed or zombified.

It's also a good litmus test for the kind of person you are- specifically if you're the kind of person who likes stories that go: And then I fired all my weapons every turn and by turn 3 he had nothing left.

Tournament and WAAC play is what makes 40K unbalanced. It's really not meant to be played like that.

That's true.
But there is still a tournament scene out there. Not so much in Germany, but in the States you have GT's at a regular basis.

 Izural wrote:
The best way to play 40K without feeling forced to be uber-competitive is to walk away from the competitive sphere and get out of the "must win" mindset.

40K is not, nor will ever be, a competitive game, regardless of what the competitive scene tries to FAQ.

There are no wrong answers in 40K, just wrong mindsets.
The sooner people get over "competitive" 40K the better. This isn't MTG, with massive $$$ prizes, or MOBAS, designed from the ground up for absolute competitive play.
This is a game about Your Dudes. I still want balance in game (stop powerful unit spam, reworking PPM), and GW to put 2 minutes thought into their rules sometimes (Sod overwatch), but the minute you start balancing around competitive play is when you officially kill the game off.

A balanced game is a game balanced for competitive play

40k is just a terribly written game and the more you care about the outcome of the game being determined by something other than your army composition and the result of a few random dice rolls, the more it's going to bother you.

You don't have to be super competitive or a tournament player or a WAAC player to find 40k rules terrible.

I don't care if I win or lose, I don't play tournaments.... I still find 40k terrible because even though I don't care if I lose, when winning becomes either a predetermined outcome based on list selection or a random event based on a couple of lucky rolls, I start to lose interest in the game. I feel like I might as well be playing army men and going "pew pew pew", at least then I could come up with better stories than "The Scatterbikes killed all the Orks while the Wraithknight would not die, the end".

 Griddlelol wrote:
There's far more than one valid army list per codex. Sometimes something out of the blue can surprise your opponent, however, I think the main issue is different.

40K isn't designed to be competitive. People will always "hate the rules love the background" when they try to make it a game worthy of tournaments or cutting edge tactical play. It's not about that. It's about having cool moments with your toy soldiers. It's about having a laugh with friends at how you can't ever roll a 2+ save.

Tournament and WAAC play is what makes 40K unbalanced. It's really not meant to be played like that.

Bad rules are what makes 40K unbalanced. The massive variance in power among units and codexes would exist with or without tournaments and would cause problems for friendly matches as well. Characterising 40K as a narrative game falls flat when it's based on army lists and win states instead of campaigns. GW dropped the requirement for a game master when they transitioned to 2nd edition because using points-based army lists was so much more convenient and popular. Playing matches has been the base state of the game for twenty years now.

Either GW should move back to the RT model and publish campaign books and scenarios instead of codexes or they should make a well-written, compelling wargame which is as useful to tournaments as it is to casual play.

Obviously I meant playing competitively unveils the balance issues. However, I'd argue they aren't balance "issues" at all, since the game isn't intended for competition.

I'm not a WAAC player, TFG, or someone who participates in tournaments. That said, the rules need massive revision/overhaul.

What bad could come from GW hiring an outside gaming company to come in & create a balanced competitive ruleset? Where each codex was nearly equal in power? When I walk into any FLGS, what are people playing?

Flames of War, Dropzone Commander, Heavy Gear, Firestorm Armada/Halo: Fleet Battles/Dystopian Wars, X-Wing, Malifaux, Warmachine, Magic the Gathering etc etc

What are they not playing? WH40k

This is because the rules are a damn mess, there is little to no communication from GW, models continue to skyrocket in price, support for 40k via FW is being dropped etc.

If GW wants to compete with these systems, then they need to make the game playable so it can get some visibility again. Otherwise its going the way of the dodo.

 Griddlelol wrote:
Obviously I meant playing competitively unveils the balance issues. However, I'd argue they aren't balance "issues" at all, since the game isn't intended for competition.

The balance issues are hugely there unless you specifically houserule against them or don't care about what you're doing to the point that it doesn't matter whether you're using rules at all or are throwing some dice around for the sake of it. "Competition games" have been part of WHFB, 40K, BFG, Warmaster and so on since the very start of them. Necromunda and such have a greater campaign focus but are nonetheless about vying for supremacy. If 40K is non-competitive, why doesn't it rely on a game master? Why isn't it structured more like Inquisitor? That was, after all, a narrative-focused game.

Never mind that balance issues can exist in games not meant specifically for competitions, too. Dungeons and Dragons had huge power imbalances among classes to the point that a non-magic class would end up useless because whatever they could do there was a spell for it. Magic ruling supreme made classes that couldn't cast spells less able to contribute which decreased the fun their players had. A well-balanced game with clearly written rules is of benefit to tournament and story gamers alike.

It still amuses me to this day that some people seem to believe that an unbalanced, lazily written, clunky and obsolete ruleset is some sort of requirement in order to enjoy a relaxed game.

Because clearly the better balanced, written and tested rulesets in the marker do not allow players to have any kind of fun.

Not only 40k is currently one of the worst game systems for sci-fi/space fantasy out there, it's also the most expensive one by a sea mile. But hey, it's ok 'cuz beer & pretzels.

Rosebuddy wrote:

The balance issues are hugely there unless you specifically houserule against them or don't care about what you're doing to the point that it doesn't matter whether you're using rules at all or are throwing some dice around for the sake of it. "Competition games" have been part of WHFB, 40K, BFG, Warmaster and so on since the very start of them. Necromunda and such have a greater campaign focus but are nonetheless about vying for supremacy. If 40K is non-competitive, why doesn't it rely on a game master? Why isn't it structured more like Inquisitor? That was, after all, a narrative-focused game.

Never mind that balance issues can exist in games not meant specifically for competitions, too. Dungeons and Dragons had huge power imbalances among classes to the point that a non-magic class would end up useless because whatever they could do there was a spell for it. Magic ruling supreme made classes that couldn't cast spells less able to contribute which decreased the fun their players had. A well-balanced game with clearly written rules is of benefit to tournament and story gamers alike.

The game has evolved, they would lose customers if they changed it too much. Simple answer.

Korinov wrote:It still amuses me to this day that some people seem to believe that an unbalanced, lazily written, clunky and obsolete ruleset is some sort of requirement in order to enjoy a relaxed game.

Because clearly the better balanced, written and tested rulesets in the marker do not allow players to have any kind of fun.

Not only 40k is currently one of the worst game systems for sci-fi/space fantasy out there, it's also the most expensive one by a sea mile. But hey, it's ok 'cuz beer & pretzels.

Nice, you seem to have read something completely different to what I wrote. That takes serous skill.

 Korinov wrote:
It still amuses me to this day that some people seem to believe that an unbalanced, lazily written, clunky and obsolete ruleset is some sort of requirement in order to enjoy a relaxed game.

Because clearly the better balanced, written and tested rulesets in the marker do not allow players to have any kind of fun.

Not only 40k is currently one of the worst game systems for sci-fi/space fantasy out there, it's also the most expensive one by a sea mile. But hey, it's ok 'cuz beer & pretzels.

At our local store, we play mostly 40k and WMH atm.
I think that WMH is not much cheaper than 40k when you play at the 50 pt level.

I'd love to play certain units but they get shot off the board before doing anything (Warptalons !)
I am therefore pushed into playing only certain units if I want a hope of winning or even competing. Heck I shouldn't really be using power armoured chaos marines if I'm trying to be competitive
I think 40k has become too big to be balanced.
lots of armies
loads of units, each with it's own options
attempts at keeping the units close to their lore.
the latest unit being op in order to raise sales
And all the while the number one priority of GW is to make money.

there are many numbers of problems and they come down to huge conflicts of interest and half baked schemes that have been half heartedly written around or over in an effort to keep the ball rolling.

many times in the past GW has tried taking the game in new directions with new modes like stronghold assault, and terror from the skies in an effort to make units that are bad in normal play useful in other formats. this hasnt panned out as planned. and when these didnt work games workshop has rather then fixing them used them as a springboard to push more stuff such as turning cities of death into a maelstrom of war rip off they then forgot to sell the card deck for despite mentioning it dozens of times in their shield of baal rulebooks. they then steamrolled any chance for those units to ever dig in and well the communities quickly dumped those game modes when they werent different enough.

in addition you have the community. the community has become very disjointed. a number of editions ago games workshop started flattening out the armies and then publishing more generic books after a period of book expansion in flavour and diversity. when this happened the fun silly campaigny players started filing out the door. they couldnt tell the stories they wanted anymore with their modls on table. the heroic defenses, the ambushes, the outflanking pincer attacks. this left the tournament players and rather then build the game to only fit their needs they tried converting them into those players. which is what we were subjected too for part of 7th and all of 6th and the tail end of 5th ed even. however a lot of this conflicted with the brb rules writers who wrote for flavourful unique army design with interlocking joints. the sad part is that largely the community is still tournament heavy and when attempts to casualize the feth out the game bottomed out the game became a mess for them to manage as well which makes them frustrated. and if new players come in wanting the cinematic experience they wont find it a lot of the time.

this is then compounded by the fact that they then had corporate breathing down their necks to push sales and move units and so they started cannibalizing models or rules for the sake of sales

so we have corporate, you have rules that have been thuggishly written over in a very ham fisted approach, then you have new players getting the idea games workshop wanted from their game in the future but an existing community that doesnt want to play ball. and then you have alternative rulesets being cannibalized for the sake of time and making units worthless that shouldnt have been.

40k is a mess that you would need to go back to the drawing board on. but at the same time you would need to sit down and tell the community that no we dont want tournament players anymore. and if you did that thered be a lot of broken hearts but people would move on and from ehre you could go about starting to address corporate. its sad but if the game wants to heal and finally get rid of its old dead weight its going to need to take huge sales hits and watch its communities walk out the door. otherwise your just painting over an ever increasing number of layers of paint. i liken it a lot to that in fact. people have just painted it over again and again sometimes in totally the wrong color in places not even the whole wall rather then strip down the wall and start anew.

1) don 't play 40k, go play something more balanced and good (WarmaHordes, Malifaux, etc.)

2) Stop caring, have fun, profit

Pick one. I doubt GW will rewrite the rules anytime soon, it will keep being the mess it is. But it's a fun mess

 jreilly89 wrote:
1) don 't play 40k, go play something more balanced and good (WarmaHordes, Malifaux, etc.)

2) Stop caring, have fun, profit

Pick one. I doubt GW will rewrite the rules anytime soon, it will keep being the mess it is. But it's a fun mess

GW is not even interested to update the older codices.
Atm they prefer to release supplement books with new formations in them.

 wuestenfux wrote:

 jreilly89 wrote:
1) don 't play 40k, go play something more balanced and good (WarmaHordes, Malifaux, etc.)

2) Stop caring, have fun, profit

Pick one. I doubt GW will rewrite the rules anytime soon, it will keep being the mess it is. But it's a fun mess

GW is not even interested to update the older codices.
Atm they prefer to release supplement books with new formations in them.

Yep. I've pretty much given up on tourneys, but I still have a blast playing with buddies

 Griddlelol wrote:

Rosebuddy wrote:

The balance issues are hugely there unless you specifically houserule against them or don't care about what you're doing to the point that it doesn't matter whether you're using rules at all or are throwing some dice around for the sake of it. "Competition games" have been part of WHFB, 40K, BFG, Warmaster and so on since the very start of them. Necromunda and such have a greater campaign focus but are nonetheless about vying for supremacy. If 40K is non-competitive, why doesn't it rely on a game master? Why isn't it structured more like Inquisitor? That was, after all, a narrative-focused game.

Never mind that balance issues can exist in games not meant specifically for competitions, too. Dungeons and Dragons had huge power imbalances among classes to the point that a non-magic class would end up useless because whatever they could do there was a spell for it. Magic ruling supreme made classes that couldn't cast spells less able to contribute which decreased the fun their players had. A well-balanced game with clearly written rules is of benefit to tournament and story gamers alike.

The game has evolved, they would lose customers if they changed it too much. Simple answer.

GW would not lose customers if they one day released an excellent set of rules for 40K. The suggestion is laughable.

 Chef_of_Cadia wrote:

 Azreal13 wrote:

the_scotsman wrote:
Well, luckily, you're wrong. For most factions, anyway. You certainly don't have to spam Meltas to play guard, not with guards generous FW support and the new formations.

What you've done there is focus on the specifics and totally miss the general.

OP, yes, you're right. Some of it harks back to the very earliest days when stuff had options because they should have those options, and the odds of them ever being useful were tiny even if they had an in game function at all, but it was cool nonetheless. (There were literally dozens of mutations Chaos Champions could have, for instance, like 'Bizarre Appearance')

But realistically the choice that is so often cited by people defending 40K is merely an illusion of choice, and to give yourself the best fighting chance of an even contest, it boils down to the same handful of options.

Forge World are doing a much better job with 30K, but the main game is plagued with irrelevant and ineffective options.

My thing is, you'd think if everything in 40k is fairly unrealistic and follows the rule of cool, you'd think weapon and upgrade choices would too. But no, there's pretty much only enough valid army lists for each army to count on one hand.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Also don't get me wrong, I don't hate that I can't field conscripts armed with sticks and expect to win, there are going to be bad lists in any game. It's just I wish there weren't so many wrong answers in 40k.

Unless your tau, eldar or space marines.

 jreilly89 wrote:
1) don 't play 40k, go play something more balanced and good (WarmaHordes, Malifaux, etc.)

2) Stop caring, have fun, profit

Pick one. I doubt GW will rewrite the rules anytime soon, it will keep being the mess it is. But it's a fun mess

Is Warmahordes really that balanced?

from what i understand there are entirely armies that can fully counter lists before it even hits the table. that sounds far from balanced.

Honestly a more balanced game while helping the tournament scene would still help the casual scene as they will be able to take whatever they want while still having a close game. it leads to both players having fun instead of one getting roflstomped for taking something subpar.

 Desubot wrote:

 jreilly89 wrote:
1) don 't play 40k, go play something more balanced and good (WarmaHordes, Malifaux, etc.)

2) Stop caring, have fun, profit

Pick one. I doubt GW will rewrite the rules anytime soon, it will keep being the mess it is. But it's a fun mess

Is Warmahordes really that balanced?

from what i understand there are entirely armies that can fully counter lists before it even hits the table. that sounds far from balanced.

Honestly a more balanced game while helping the tournament scene would still help the casual scene as they will be able to take whatever they want while still having a close game. it leads to both players having fun instead of one getting roflstomped for taking something subpar.

From what I understand, yes/no. There are still broken combos, but armies are more balanced and I believe PP releases FAQs a lot. Also, games are shorter, so it's not as much of a slog and the entry cost is cheaper, as you usually only field about 10-20 models.

Don't get me wrong, I'm totally for a cleaner ruleset and balanced armies, but I also know the arms race that is 40k and have come to accept it.

I play 40k and WM/H

Playing the most expensive Fraction in WM/H, it is till cheaper over all than 40k. Not only because I don't need 200€ of Books to play one Fraction, but also because an army to play with is about 250-300€.
Also their Army Boxes with a massive discount help the keep the price low. (compare it to a 1500 point, playable 40k list with 30% Discount and we never got boxes with playable forces in it from GW)

Balance is difficult, but you can always win against your enemy and compared to 40k, the balance is nearly perfect because every single unit of a Fraction has its place on the battle field
For tournaments you have 2 lists to get not into the problem of facing an Anti-List.

 Griddlelol wrote:

The game has evolved, they would lose customers if they changed it too much. Simple answer.

You mean like they did with every previous Edition of their games?

 Griddlelol wrote:

Rosebuddy wrote:

The balance issues are hugely there unless you specifically houserule against them or don't care about what you're doing to the point that it doesn't matter whether you're using rules at all or are throwing some dice around for the sake of it. "Competition games" have been part of WHFB, 40K, BFG, Warmaster and so on since the very start of them. Necromunda and such have a greater campaign focus but are nonetheless about vying for supremacy. If 40K is non-competitive, why doesn't it rely on a game master? Why isn't it structured more like Inquisitor? That was, after all, a narrative-focused game.

Never mind that balance issues can exist in games not meant specifically for competitions, too. Dungeons and Dragons had huge power imbalances among classes to the point that a non-magic class would end up useless because whatever they could do there was a spell for it. Magic ruling supreme made classes that couldn't cast spells less able to contribute which decreased the fun their players had. A well-balanced game with clearly written rules is of benefit to tournament and story gamers alike.

The game has evolved, they would lose customers if they changed it too much. Simple answer.

Korinov wrote:It still amuses me to this day that some people seem to believe that an unbalanced, lazily written, clunky and obsolete ruleset is some sort of requirement in order to enjoy a relaxed game.

Because clearly the better balanced, written and tested rulesets in the marker do not allow players to have any kind of fun.

Not only 40k is currently one of the worst game systems for sci-fi/space fantasy out there, it's also the most expensive one by a sea mile. But hey, it's ok 'cuz beer & pretzels.

Nice, you seem to have read something completely different to what I wrote. That takes serous skill.

To be fair, he is not the only one to give this interpretation - I came to the same conclusions reading your post.

GW let the rules be written either by hacks, or by talented people but without an overall vision/coordination. We can argue which one of these two is the real thing happening, but the reason is that management does not care because people will buy their minis anyway for the awesome fluff (that they are destroying since 5th) and stupendous minis (that are becoming more and more an over-designed nightmare).
They must be right, look what happened to Warhammer Fantasy Battle!

BTW, people should explain me why a balanced ruleset is a bad thing. You can ignore the rules if you want more "narrative", but make up rules on the fly is far more difficult.

Kaiyanwang wrote:

BTW, people should explain me why a balanced ruleset is a bad thing. You can ignore the rules if you want more "narrative", but make up rules on the fly is far more difficult.

Because accepting that the separation of "good/balanced rules are for tournaments only and bad/imbalanced/highly random rules are for funny games at home", does not exist would destroy the illusion of the whole 40k gameplay.

I can understand this, investing 600€ just to realise that there is actually no game to play, but just putting your minis on the table, move them around and put them back in the shelf (and roll a D6 at the end to see who won) let people ignore the facts and come up with "I don't need good rules to have fun".

Similar to "I don't need to drive fast on the highway, I like to drive slow and watch the landscape" after they get tricked into buying a broken car

 kodos wrote:

Kaiyanwang wrote:

BTW, people should explain me why a balanced ruleset is a bad thing. You can ignore the rules if you want more "narrative", but make up rules on the fly is far more difficult.

Because accepting that the separation of "good/balanced rules are for tournaments only and bad/imbalanced/highly random rules are for funny games at home", does not exist would destroy the illusion of the whole 40k gameplay.

I can understand this, investing 600€ just to realise that there is actually no game to play, but just putting your minis on the table, move them around and put them back in the shelf (and roll a D6 at the end to see who won) let people ignore the facts and come up with "I don't need good rules to have fun".

Similar to "I don't need to drive fast on the highway, I like to drive slow and watch the landscape" after they get tricked into buying a broken car

I laughed loudly

You can always just build a list around fun. The options available give you a wide array of options to play. If you want to optimize your list for competitive play then you can. But you can also make a fluffy list thats fun to play as well. Seems like your FLGS has a lot of competitive players.

 mrveng wrote:
But you can also make a fluffy list thats fun to play as well.

No,
You can make a fluffy list, but it is not fun to not even have a chance to win against other fluffy list.
Some armys need to get the best and most competitive list available on the table, just to have small chance to win against a "fluffy" list.

If you don't mind being the guy losing every single game he plays, than this is ok. But for most others just losing is not "fun" and gets boring after a while.

 Desubot wrote:

 jreilly89 wrote:
1) don 't play 40k, go play something more balanced and good (WarmaHordes, Malifaux, etc.)

2) Stop caring, have fun, profit

Pick one. I doubt GW will rewrite the rules anytime soon, it will keep being the mess it is. But it's a fun mess

Is Warmahordes really that balanced?

from what i understand there are entirely armies that can fully counter lists before it even hits the table. that sounds far from balanced.

Honestly a more balanced game while helping the tournament scene would still help the casual scene as they will be able to take whatever they want while still having a close game. it leads to both players having fun instead of one getting roflstomped for taking something subpar.

I play both.

There are far, FAR more frustrating WMH lists to play against than 40k, if you can believe that. The utter infuriating frustration of playing against a list that is built around the principle of "You can't do anything" which many WMH lists are.

You pick a caster? There is almost always an optimal list for that caster. ALSO (and I don't know why people have the impression this isn't the case) formations with free rules for abiding by them are totally baked into WMH with "theme lists." And some of the theme bonuses put stuff like "get 15% of your army for free" to absolute shame.

The "pro" of WMH is that a really, really good player is GOING to stomp on a weak player, as long as they're both optimizing their lists.

and, if you really like a particular unit? Odds are you can use it in an army. As long as you are perfectly OK with structuring your whole list around it, your caster, and basically everything. With my army, I picked 3 monsters I liked, and I was able to create a list that was semi-good based on those. I can hack it with most tourney lists. But I picked 3 models, and 18 were mandatory, essentially.

Personally, I hate the forced removal of the closest model; if my guy in front has a melta and he gets shot, everyone in the squad is too dumb to snag the good weapon. It's foolishness. I fully tossed my marines, and built my army to not have to deal with that type of stupidity.

 timetowaste85 wrote:
Personally, I hate the forced removal of the closest model; if my guy in front has a melta and he gets shot, everyone in the squad is too dumb to snag the good weapon. It's foolishness. I fully tossed my marines, and built my army to not have to deal with that type of stupidity.

IIRC 5th didnt have precision shots which would add more use for having it now with owners removal choice. it also prevents arguments about which is closer.

 timetowaste85 wrote:
Personally, I hate the forced removal of the closest model; if my guy in front has a melta and he gets shot, everyone in the squad is too dumb to snag the good weapon. It's foolishness. I fully tossed my marines, and built my army to not have to deal with that type of stupidity.

That killed off the Tyranid-CC-lists and others.....

if you don't play competativley, it seems that most of your issues with 40k would be mitigated

And no, WM/H is not cheaper then 40k unless you ONLY collect the models you need, AND NO SPARES. looking at the prices, the price per kit is about the same, but for the "standard" WM'H level, you need less kits. That's not cheaper, that's a case of the meta needing less stuff.

 Ankhalagon wrote:

 timetowaste85 wrote:
Personally, I hate the forced removal of the closest model; if my guy in front has a melta and he gets shot, everyone in the squad is too dumb to snag the good weapon. It's foolishness. I fully tossed my marines, and built my army to not have to deal with that type of stupidity.

That killed off the Tyranid-CC-lists and others.....

And slows down the game too. This is another thing I find funny of GW. With precision shots implemented, and the old removal rules, we would have the simulation of aimed shots, the simulation of teammates gathering the cool weapon, and we would spare time.

But not. That would be too easy. Is mind-boggling.

Griddlelol wrote:

Tournament and WAAC play is what makes 40K unbalanced. It's really not meant to be played like that.

Griddlelol wrote:Obviously I meant playing competitively unveils the balance issues. However, I'd argue they aren't balance "issues" at all, since the game isn't intended for competition.

Perhaps you could explain how a game format where two people play in order to determine a winner, frequently by keeping score, is, in any way, not intended to be played competitively?

I think what you're saying, whether you mean to or not, is that 40K isn't meant to be played fairly, which is entirely much harder to argue was done deliberately.

Griddlelol wrote:
The game has evolved, they would lose customers if they changed it too much. Simple answer.

What about customers (like me) who would come back if they changed it?

 Azreal13 wrote:
[

Perhaps you could explain how a game format where two people play in order to determine a winner, frequently by keeping score, is, in any way, not intended to be played competitively?

I think what you're saying, whether you mean to or not, is that 40K isn't meant to be played fairly, which is entirely much harder to argue was done deliberately.

Full disclosure: 40k would be better with balance. But since it's not and has never been balanced, let's talk about what it is.
40k is a strange game in that while it uses a scoring system to tell you who won the game, victory and scores are far less important than how that victory and score came about. In sports, especially professional competitive sports, a goal is a goal. Trouncing the opposition is encouraged. The more points the better, within the rules. You put your best players on the field and exploit every weakness of the opposing side.

40k is far more collaborative. I'd say that it's not designed to be unfair for one player but that it can easily be unfair if the players choose to make it so.
And it will be one player, bringing his best units as if he were picking a fantasy football team with future guns, who unbalances the game.

If the codexes were balanced with each other then there wouldn't be a problem trying to treat the game as a competitive exercise.
The fluff guy and the tourney guys match wouldn't be decided by lists before models hit the table.

But because the game is not balanced, treating it like a sport is a fool's errand that ruins your opponents experience unless they are like-minded.

It is still, at its very core, competitive. Two players determining a victor can be nothing else.

Sure, you can point to Rogue Tader and the recommendation for a GM, but then I can point to the likes of Alessio talking about how there was a drive to simplify and steamline the game to make it more suitable for tournament play.

"It's collaborative" is an excuse out of the same stable as "forge the narrative" and is a retrospective justification for an underinvestment in rules production. The next iteration of the core rules will be the 8th. Most other games are dialed in by the 2nd.

I think the simplest explanation is the decision makers had convinced themselves that the game is unnecessary for the sale of models, and have consequently neglected it for a number of years.

In that time, they've driven off and disillusioned some of the most talented rules writers working today, and now find themselves on the receiving end of that talent deployed elsewhere, alongside coming to the realistion (or perhaps simply people who understood it all along getting in places to affect change) that many players wanted a game that they enjoyed playing after all.

Ironically, considering the mess I feel current 40K is, I also feel more optimistic about the future of the game than I have in some time, but make no mistake it is inherently intended to be competitive, that it isn't merely illustrates how unfit for purpose it has become.

 Desubot wrote:

 jreilly89 wrote:
1) don 't play 40k, go play something more balanced and good (WarmaHordes, Malifaux, etc.)

2) Stop caring, have fun, profit

Pick one. I doubt GW will rewrite the rules anytime soon, it will keep being the mess it is. But it's a fun mess

Is Warmahordes really that balanced?

from what i understand there are entirely armies that can fully counter lists before it even hits the table. that sounds far from balanced.

Honestly a more balanced game while helping the tournament scene would still help the casual scene as they will be able to take whatever they want while still having a close game. it leads to both players having fun instead of one getting roflstomped for taking something subpar.

There aren't full armies that counter lists. Specific pieces? Sure. But the factions are all very well balanced against each other. And hard counters are ok - anti tank guns should counter tanks, but be less useful against infantry, for example.

Now, let's be clear - Warmachine is broken out of the box. Thankfully, most games are organised around their steamroller format, which is very well balanced. To be specific, it is perfectly imbalanced. go look that one up! Steamroller is what makes Warmachine good as a competitive game.

Warmachine is a complex game, with a lot of hard counters (some things straight up out match other things, but everything has that one thing that counters it, so no one thing really dominates) and soft counters (imagine 40k where all ranged weapons were ap2 and all cc weapons were power weapons) which is reflected in the fact that the damage output of models is often quite staggering, and even a basic guy with a rifle can inflict a whole lot of hurt. What this means for you as a player is that generally, no matter what the other guy has, chances are you have some thing that can kill it. Warmachine is a very empowering game in that sense in that there is always something you can do.

A further word about steamroller. Those hard match ups that I spoke about? Well, steamroller is based around the principle of multiple lists (meaning if you come up against a hard counter for one, you can still play the other), multiple victory conditions (scenario or assassination), faction sideboards along with a very comprehensive and pretty balanced set of tournament scenarios. On top of this, privateer press frequently errata things that are op or things that are skewing or otherwise unbalancing the game g(eg, the Haley 2 nerf). There is no 'one way' to play this game. And there is a lot of variety in the approaches you can take, as the factions are quite varied in their play books.

At the end of the day, Warmachine is probably one of the best (or at least better) balanced wargames out there. Individual 'pieces' might be rocks to some other pieces paper, but on the macro scale, and the faction scale, the game plays well, and in terms of 'duds', there are very few real stinkers in the game. The synergy/combo based nature of the game means thst everything can be built into a game winning list. No, not everything works with everything else, against every conceivable opponent, all of the time. But pretty much everything does have real, legitimate in-game 'value' and has a place.

I recall an army that is supposed to have some kinda ghost defense. its there shtick, then there is another army that has nothing but magic weapons that bypasses all of that. that sounds like a massive dick punch to one player.

Isnt perfect imbalanced entirely not balanced at all? its just rock paper scissors which is just as bad. its the Exact same problem as 40k in that the game is won and lost from list alone.

 Brennonjw wrote:

And no, WM/H is not cheaper then 40k unless you ONLY collect the models you need, AND NO SPARES. looking at the prices, the price per kit is about the same, but for the "standard" WM'H level, you need less kits. That's not cheaper, that's a case of the meta needing less stuff.

Thats nice, needing less Boxes for the same price =/= cheaper?
So for 40k you get only what you need and for WM/H you get more than you need and you spend the same amount of money for them. That makes WM cheaper.

Just because you buy more than you really need does not make it expensive (otherwise X-Wing would be twice as much as 40k)

 Desubot wrote:
I recall an army that is supposed to have some kinda ghost defense. its there shtick, then there is another army that has nothing but magic weapons that bypasses all of that. that sounds like a massive dick punch to one player.

Not really.
You're talking about cryx ghost lists? Yeah, they're not op. When they attack, they become corporeal for a turn, so normal weapons can get them too. If ghost lists were untouchable by anything other than magic weapons, you might have a point, as like 40k, it would boil down very quickly to 'ghost lists' versus 'magic weapon spam to kill the ghost lists'. As it is, the cryx ghosts units have their place, have value, but don't dominate. Neither do magic weapon lists (like my doom reaver lists).

the thing with Warmachine is nothing is immune. Unlike 40k where there pendulum is swung very much towards 'survival' for your basic weapons, in WMH, it's very much swung towards offense. By choice.

The issue with 'all x' lists is that they are spam lists, or skew lists. By their very nature, skews will do well against some stuff, and get hard countered by others. Thankfully those multi-list formats allow for both the existence, and validation of spam/skew lists (I love my mad dogs of war list-50 doom reavers is a thing of beauty!) but at the same time, they don't dominate overall, and are certainly not 'unfair'.

 Desubot wrote:

Isnt perfect imbalanced entirely not balanced at all? its just rock paper scissors which is just as bad. its the Exact same problem as 40k in that the game is won and lost from list alone.

It's not quite the same thing though. 40k suffers from a lot of other structural issues too. 'The list' wins in 40k is more of a consequence of its appalling game design and lack of care or serious design choices than perfect imbalance. 40k is horrendously schitzofrenic, and doesn't know what it's trying to be, too many things essentially have no value/place and are basically pointless in the grand scheme of things. Too many things in 40k don't do enough. The power pendulum swings very much towards 'survival' - thing of the 'kill math' of a basic marine with a Bolter. I mean, this guy should be gunning things down like crazy, instead you often need huge numbers of them, putting down huge numbers of shots to kill basic infantry. When the game 'skews' towards survival, basic dudes and basic gear become nothing more than wound counters, and the guy with the melta gun and the power fist is the guy who carries the weight of 'doing things' - the game frequently becomes about them, and everyone else is pointless. And then this evolves into the arms race of getting the biggest gun on the board, going first, apply target priority and roll dice. GW does not help with releasing ever more powerful things of whose in game value (ie points costs) is seemingly decided on a whim, and you get a hundred points of x being three times the value of a hundred points of y, or whatever. And the arms race and power creep continues and accelerates. In other words, it's not perfectly imbalanced, it's just imbalanced.

No, wmh is certainly not won and lost from 'the list' alone. If the game was about 'one list' you might have a point, but it's not. You need to examine the entire steamroller package. Steamroller is played at a certain 'game size' for a reason, as severe skews have less of an effect. I've looked across the board plenty of times and thought 'prey' only to have a gruelling slog of a game that came down to the wire. Like I said previously, there are multiple win conditions, side boards, multi-list formats and essentially, whatever happens, thanks to the game mechanics favouring offence and damage output, chances are that you can always kill the offending piece. there is always a way and always a work around. How you use your list is often quite important.

And perfect imbalance is actually pretty ok as a game theory. It means that everything has its place and has 'value'. Unit a is a good counter for unit c, but is countered in turn by unit b, whilst unit c has other value elsewhere as a support piece, The trick is to essentially make sure that it's cyclical, and that there are always answers available and to hand. No one thing acts as 'all the answers' and everything has its 'silver bullet'. And thankfully, WMH has enough variety and enough elements acting as 'shock absorbers' for those hard counters that it's rare that you need a very 'specific' answer (Ie 'I need unit x!' to a question your opponent gives you.

"Forging the Narrative" works in an RPG where there is a GM that is playing one "side" and the other players are playing the other "side". In such a scenario, it is fine for the GM to "lose" almost every battle, because he/she is there to tell a story involving the heroics of the player-characters.

This is less-valid when you are talking about 2 players setting up a game where each has spent $500 dollars on their "side" and when Timmy says "My Blue Marines are the best in the galaxy, they never lose!" and Tommy says, "Feth you, my Evil Marines are going to win today"... but Tommy's Evil Marines are *designed* to lose the game. This is not fun for Tommy and, pretty soon, Timmy has no one to play against.... until Tommy returns (having spent another $500) and says, "Feth you and your Blue Marines, Timmy, I have Space-Cows and Giant Robots."

Now Timmy is sad that his Blue Marines are dying in droves to the long-range firepower of the Space-Cows and their untouchable Giant Robots. Timmy doesn't have another $300 to spent on the Yellow Marines needed to beat Tommy's Giant Robots, and so, as far as he is concerned, the narrative being forged is Not Fun... so now Tommy (having spent $1000 on this game) has no one to play with.

 Psienesis wrote:
"Forging the Narrative" works in an RPG where there is a GM that is playing one "side" and the other players are playing the other "side". In such a scenario, it is fine for the GM to "lose" almost every battle, because he/she is there to tell a story involving the heroics of the player-characters.

This is less-valid when you are talking about 2 players setting up a game where each has spent $500 dollars on their "side" and when Timmy says "My Blue Marines are the best in the galaxy, they never lose!" and Tommy says, "Feth you, my Evil Marines are going to win today"... but Tommy's Evil Marines are *designed* to lose the game. This is not fun for Tommy and, pretty soon, Timmy has no one to play against.... until Tommy returns (having spent another $500) and says, "Feth you and your Blue Marines, Timmy, I have Space-Cows and Giant Robots."

Now Timmy is sad that his Blue Marines are dying in droves to the long-range firepower of the Space-Cows and their untouchable Giant Robots. Timmy doesn't have another $300 to spent on the Yellow Marines needed to beat Tommy's Giant Robots, and so, as far as he is concerned, the narrative being forged is Not Fun... so now Tommy (having spent $1000 on this game) has no one to play with.

And yet the co-operative, think-like-a-gm approach that you dismiss as unworkable for Timmy and Tommy would in fact make most of their arms race irrelevant, and solve a lot of the issues when you think about it. In other words, it's just as true to state that their petty games of pay to win and one-upsmanship is what is actually 'less valid' as an approach.

You are essentially saying that 'forging the narrative' is incompatible with a toxic, self-centred, self-defeating, and fundamentally hostile approach to wargaming and community. Yeah, that sounds like a good thing to me, being perfectly honest.

'Forging the narrative' works just fine. With the right approach and mentality, along with a bit of emotional intelligence and maturity. historical players have been 'forgive the narrative' for decades, telling the stories of the heroics of their Normans and Saxons and Romans and celts. I mean, we do the same thing as 40k players - folks name their space marine captains and far seers, and our chapters, guard regiments and craft worlds. It's not 'just' a game if you don't want to to be.

players can also wear gm hats. Once the dice are rolling, fair enough - go for the throat. But there is no reason thst two players can't co-operate pre-game in terms of 'game-building' and game design and work out an interesting scenario, and good match ups that fit the theme of the scenario. You'd be surprised - wargamers have been doing this for decades, and it predates the idea of points, pugs, and tournaments. All it takes is a change in perception in how you approach wargames.

As for your two players - it's certainly less valid for the simple reason that they are self centred, entitled idiots. Timmy and Tommy need to grow the hell up and step out of the arms race, petty one-upsmanship and 'pay to win' mentality. Assuming tommy's army is curpstomping timmy's, and assuming that they're friends (shocking, I know - nerds socialising and building connections with other people?! Gasp!) Couldn't thry just as easily have a chat, and work out a compromise in terms of making a fair game? Drop some stuff (hey, you've proved you can best me with that list, let's move on) Or build it up against an interesting story or scenario. I mean, if they're mates and all, surely it's not beyond the realm of possibility that they'll (gasp!) talk, and (gasp!)co-operate if they want to have fair, fun games, if thst arms race means one of them is miserable. If they insist on the pay to win approach, then they're the ones that are wrong, it's their approach that is the problem and all they're doing is destroying their own hobby and probably friendship. But I suppose though that I'm probably expecting too much though when I talk about gamers having emotional maturity .

I think a lot of people get burned in 40k because they rightfully assume that it's a "versus" game and expect an army of Space Orks to have a fighting chance of beating an army of Eldar. They expect a unit of IG Veterans with grenade launchers to be 83% as effective as a unit of IG Veterans with melta guns, because, ya know, they are 83% the points value.

But then they actually start playing the army they spend the past few months and several hundred dollars building and start to realise, oh, the Orks they spent so much time, effort and money on are actually just the punching bags of the game.

Or they realise, oh, the points values are actually completely whack, high Str low AP weapons are worth more than their points would suggest, so Veterans are simply a vehicle for carrying 3 melta guns or plasma guns while grenade launchers degrade the value of taking the unit in the first place.

Deadnight wrote:

 Psienesis wrote:
"Forging the Narrative" works in an RPG where there is a GM that is playing one "side" and the other players are playing the other "side". In such a scenario, it is fine for the GM to "lose" almost every battle, because he/she is there to tell a story involving the heroics of the player-characters.

This is less-valid when you are talking about 2 players setting up a game where each has spent $500 dollars on their "side" and when Timmy says "My Blue Marines are the best in the galaxy, they never lose!" and Tommy says, "Feth you, my Evil Marines are going to win today"... but Tommy's Evil Marines are *designed* to lose the game. This is not fun for Tommy and, pretty soon, Timmy has no one to play against.... until Tommy returns (having spent another $500) and says, "Feth you and your Blue Marines, Timmy, I have Space-Cows and Giant Robots."

Now Timmy is sad that his Blue Marines are dying in droves to the long-range firepower of the Space-Cows and their untouchable Giant Robots. Timmy doesn't have another $300 to spent on the Yellow Marines needed to beat Tommy's Giant Robots, and so, as far as he is concerned, the narrative being forged is Not Fun... so now Tommy (having spent $1000 on this game) has no one to play with.

And yet the co-operative, think-like-a-gm approach that you dismiss as unworkable for Timmy and Tommy would in fact make most of their arms race irrelevant, and solve a lot of the issues when you think about it. In other words, it's just as true to state that their petty games of pay to win and one-upsmanship is what is actually 'less valid' as an approach.

'Forging the narrative' works just fine. With the right approach and mentality, along with a bit of emotional intelligence and maturity. historical players have been 'forgive the narrative' for decades, telling the stories of the heroics of their Normans and Saxons and Romans and celts. I mean, we do the same thing as 40k players - folks name their space marine captains and far seers, and our chapters, guard regiments and craft worlds. It's not 'just' a game if you don't want to to be.

players can also wear gm hats. Once the dice are rolling, fair enough - go for the throat. But there is no reason thst two players can't co-operate pre-game in terms of 'game-building' and game design and work out an interesting scenario, and good match ups that fit the theme of the scenario. You'd be surprised - wargamers have been doing this for decades, and it predates the idea of points, pugs, and tournaments. All it takes is a change in perception in how you approach wargames.

While this is all true, it's not how 90% of the people play this game, or tabletop wargames in general. "Tournament-style" play, even if not actually at a tournament, is the predominant style of play for most tabletop games. What I mean by that is people build and army around a list (sometimes with extra stuff for change it up, sometimes they literally buy and build a specific list), and bring that (or some variant thereof) to play against other people's similar armies with the idea that they can decide on a commonly-played points level, pick a mission, set up a board in a few minutes, and play a relatively "standard" game.

The missions and army construction are based around this philosophy, just very poorly, with all the "narrative" stuff piled on top to disguise the poor state of the rules, the game doesn't really actually support "narrative" style play well at all, it basically leaves it all up to the players to create that experience themselves...which basically means they need to throw out most of the rules and write their own.

For the type of well thought out narrative play you're talking about, that typically requires close, long term gaming pals and regular playgroups with highly concentrated similar views on the game, which is rarer than one might think. In playing 40k through 4...5, however many editions, I've never really seen people "GM" a game themselves in this sense, at least not outside of a couple Apocalypse games. Other games I've seen it, games like Battletech put out truly excellent campaign material the likes of which 40k has never had. 40k's "narrative" stuff largely boils down to a couple extra random tables, lots of pre-posed pictures, and some absurd one-sided bonuses for otherwise "tournament" -style missions.

There are wargames where players play co-operatively, but 40k has never been well suited to it (well, at least 3rd ed onwards).

When it comes to co-operative games, I usually think of games where one person builds both sides of the game or historics where you are trying to recreate specific events.

Yes, wargames have often traditionally been played that way going back 25+ years ago, but making a game so it can only be played that way massively reduces the size of your potential audience.

Vaktathi wrote:
While this is all true, it's not how 90% of the people play this game, or tabletop wargames in general. "Tournament-style" play, even if not actually at a tournament, is the predominant style of play for most tabletop games. What I mean by that is people build and army around a list (sometimes with extra stuff for change it up, sometimes they literally buy and build a specific list), and bring that (or some variant thereof) to play against other people's similar armies with the idea that they can decide on a commonly-played points level, pick a mission, set up a board in a few minutes, and play a relatively "standard" game.

Is it? I'm always wary of claims as to how '90%' of people plat, or how things are a 'predominant style'. 'Tournament style' far less of a thing within the historical sphere, and that sphere is quite a bit bigger than a lot of people realise, for example. Pick up games and tournaments are certainly a feature of the flgs culture, but in a lot of clubs and amongst groups that primarily play at home, it's far less of a done thing. And yet again, those circles are quite a bit bigger than people realise; they're often just less visible, especially on the Internet.

Now, let's be clear - I don't disagree with what your saying here in terms of hoe some people build and play their armies. I do it myself for pugs and tournaments. I just don't necessarily agree with it as being the 'gold standard' or the 'de facto' way of doing things.

Vaktathi wrote:
The missions and army construction are based around this philosophy, just very poorly, with all the "narrative" stuff piled on top to disguise the poor state of the rules, the game doesn't really actually support "narrative" style play well at all, it basically leaves it all up to the players to create that experience themselves...which basically means they need to throw out most of the rules and write their own.

Oh, I don't disagree with you here vak. 40k is a schitzofrenic mess of a game that is essentially a ramshackle space hulk at this point. It's old, dated, cobbled together from scraps and built upon over years with no thoughts of consequences or direction. And then there are all the 'gene stealers' running around causing havoc. As you say, 'forge the narrative' is GW shrugging their shoulders and saying don't take it so seriously, be a spectator. Not a participant (which isn't a bad approach to take, to be fair).

What I am defending though, specifically, is the attitude of 'forging narratives'. Essentially, not viewing it soley through the lens of 'winners or losers', being engaged with the story, with player driven game-building and enjoying the game for its own sake instead of viewing it soley as some kind of duel to prove who has the biggest nerd-penis.

That said, I will disagree with you on one point - the idea that the rules don't support narrative style play. The rules don't need to. The rules just need to provide you with the tools to resolve in-game actions and say how units interact and what not. Players are the ones that are responsible for supporting narrative play and bringing it to life.

Vaktathi wrote:
For the type of well thought out narrative play you're talking about, that typically requires close, long term gaming pals and regular playgroups with highly concentrated similar views on the game, which is rarer than one might think. In playing 40k through 4...5, however many editions, I've never really seen people "GM" a game themselves in this sense, at least not outside of a couple Apocalypse games. Other games I've seen it, games like Battletech put out truly excellent campaign material the likes of which 40k has never had. 40k's "narrative" stuff largely boils down to a couple extra random tables, lots of pre-posed pictures, and some absurd one-sided bonuses for otherwise "tournament" -style missions.

It's rarer in certain circles, but I don't think it's 'rare' per se. It's quite common in historical groups and amongst those who primarily play at home. Not everyone is into the pug/tournament scene. And with respect, you not seeing gm'ing in action doesn't mean it doesn't happen, or can't happen or that 40k players can't broaden their horizons in how they play, and step up to the plate and take it on board.

I make the point myself though - it helps enormously to have a close group of friends. But being honest, what is stopping current groups trying to build towards this? I mean, hell, this is the age of Facebook and internets. It's never been easier to connect with people and communicate. There is nothing stopping this kind of thing happening, bar sheer bloody intertia and laziness.

I'll make the point again - you don't necessarily need random tables, or one sided bonuses to build a narrative structure. Literally, at its core all it needs is 'hey guys, I have this really cool idea for a scenario! It goes like this, and for the game, I was thinking the forces involved would be x and y'. From there, just embrace the story, and enjoy it for its own sake. We did a scenario a few months back which was great fun which was based on one of the running battles in Simon scarrow's Eagle series and pitted a bunch of cavalry and skirmishers, along with some terrain obstacles and choke points guarded by guerrillas, against a large column of heavy infantry (and their King) whose job was to get the King past all the ambushing parties and into the base camp. It ended up being a very tense and exciting game.

AllSeeingSkink wrote:There are wargames where players play co-operatively, but 40k has never been well suited to it (well, at least 3rd ed onwards).

You don't need rules to tell you to co-operate. All you need is a bit of communication and desire on the part of the players. The gsme rules are essentially just resolution mechanics.

AllSeeingSkink wrote:
When it comes to co-operative games, I usually think of games where one person builds both sides of the game or historics where you are trying to recreate specific events.

This always bothers me that people only view historicals in the context of 'recreating specific events'.historicals are as much of an open tapestry as anything from 40k in terms of what you can do and where you can go. maybe it's a lack of exposure to historicals skink, but they're not really all like that. Thst said, you are right in thinking one person builds both sides is a part of it, or at the very least, the start of the conversation. We always start with a 'I have a cool idea for a scenario guys. How about...' And take ideas and input from the others in terms of what would make good ideas and additions to the scenario or what gets put down on the board. It's not a unipolar approach.

AllSeeingSkink wrote:
Yes, wargames have often traditionally been played that way going back 25+ years ago, but making a game so it can only be played that way massively reduces the size of your potential audience.

Maybe the audience needs to evolve and broaden its horizons in terms of how they view and play games? The funny thing is, this way of playing is quite enjoyable, and quite a bit of fresh air (in my experience) to those that are exposed to it. Players just need to open up.

Deadnight wrote:

AllSeeingSkink wrote:There are wargames where players play co-operatively, but 40k has never been well suited to it (well, at least 3rd ed onwards).

You don't need rules to tell you to co-operate. All you need is a bit of communication and desire on the part of the players. The gsme rules are essentially just resolution mechanics.

I never said you did need rules to tell you to co-operate. I said 40k is not well suited to it, there is a difference.

AllSeeingSkink wrote:
When it comes to co-operative games, I usually think of games where one person builds both sides of the game or historics where you are trying to recreate specific events.

This always bothers me that people only view historicals in the context of 'recreating specific events'.historicals are as much of an open tapestry as anything from 40k in terms of what you can do and where you can go. maybe it's a lack of exposure to historicals skink, but they're not really all like that. Thst said, you are right in thinking one person builds both sides is a part of it, or at the very least, the start of the conversation. We always start with a 'I have a cool idea for a scenario guys. How about...' And take ideas and input from the others in terms of what would make good ideas and additions to the scenario or what gets put down on the board. It's not a unipolar approach.

I play historics, there's a bunch of people who are happy to invent lots of new stuff when playing historicals, there's also a bunch of people who will be unhappy if you mix and match forces in a non-historic way and won't play games which historically never happened.

I'd say the "old" historic players fall more in to the latter category.

It's games like Bolt Action that tend to be more open I've found, funnily enough they are picking up a lot of ex-GW customers.

AllSeeingSkink wrote:
Yes, wargames have often traditionally been played that way going back 25+ years ago, but making a game so it can only be played that way massively reduces the size of your potential audience.

Maybe the audience needs to evolve and broaden its horizons in terms of how they view and play games? The funny thing is, this way of playing is quite enjoyable, and quite a bit of fresh air (in my experience) to those that are exposed to it. Players just need to open up.

You need to not assume you are evolved for playing the way you do, and that just because you find it a bit of fresh air that other people will also. Some people simply do not want to or do not have a community that supports that type of play.

People aren't wrong for wanting a balanced game. 40k presents itself as a game that SHOULD be balanced. There are very few narrative components to the actual gameplay, there's nothing to suggest co-operative play, the game comes with points values which implies those points values should be somewhat balanced and the way armies are presented in stand-alone rather than campaign books or compilation books entirely suggests that you should be an army to X points to play against an opponent who themselves has built an army to X points. At least AoS in their wisdom has just given up on lying to customers with regard to dropping points.... though I'm not sure it's for the better as far as people wanting to start the game.

Don't get me wrong, I'm all for co-operative play. The majority of games I played of WHFB were set up co-operatively, we'd make up a scenario and use the points as a guideline not a hard and fast rule. But it's silly to think everyone wants to or indeed can play that way. Most my 40k games haven't been co-operative because it's not what my opponents wanted to do.

I love seeing people talk about 'fluffy' lists as if eldar jetbike spam isn't a fluffy list. Fluffy lists can be just as broken as competitive lists, because the problem with 40k has nothing to do with the tourney scene and people trying to break the game, the problem with 40k is that the rules suck.

As for the 'is Warmachine really that balanced' debate, Australia apparently has a very strong presence at world championships, and the best Cygnar player in the country frequents my local FLGS. He seems to really enjoy bringing things people say are 'no good' or 'not worth taking' because when it comes down to it, yes the game is balanced.

 kodos wrote:
Because accepting that the separation of "good/balanced rules are for tournaments only and bad/imbalanced/highly random rules are for funny games at home", does not exist would destroy the illusion of the whole 40k gameplay.

I can understand this, investing 600€ just to realise that there is actually no game to play, but just putting your minis on the table, move them around and put them back in the shelf (and roll a D6 at the end to see who won) let people ignore the facts and come up with "I don't need good rules to have fun".

Similar to "I don't need to drive fast on the highway, I like to drive slow and watch the landscape" after they get tricked into buying a broken car

Spot on, every single word.

It's still possible to have a good time while playing 40k. I usually enjoy my two or three hours games at the weekend. But in order for that to happen, you need to have a friendly, relaxed and comprehensive group to play with. And I'm not trying to draw a discriminatory line here between "casual" and "competitive" players, because I play in what could be described as a "semi-competitive" environment, where several players do attend tournaments with a certain frequency. We however try to keep things civil as much as possible, run some campaigns, etc. And when someone wants to try a tournament-level list... he issues the warning in advance so a proper match can be made.

When you need to restrict yourself to such extremes in order to enjoy the game, you know the game sucks.

Coming from WM/H... I'd say its more expensive if you want to play competitively because of the multi-list system in place for many tournaments. For certain factions, the models you run in 1 list are completely different than your other list.

Its also not as balanced as people claim it is. It is often the same 1-2 factions (cryx/legion) dominating the big tournaments, and the same few casters at that. In the rare situation where a rules errata changes the meta some previously competitive casters are nerfed the players of those casters often have to go re purchase nearly brand new armies, and so do the players that have lists to counter the meta and all that. Its insane. The army comp rules don't have troop tax or anything like that so there are few units that are mainstays in all lists of a certain faction. Good for variety, bad for $ and painting time investment.

On top of that the factions feel flavourless fluff wise. The story is non existent compared to 40k. And if you don't love the steampunk robot stuff you won't be particularly attached to your miniatures, the way we are emotionally attached to our 40k factions.

There is also the small detail of model quality....I cant even describe how frustrating assembling the metal WMH models are, and how many mould lines the plastics have.

When fantasy died (rip) I looked for a new game to play and as a tournament player the internet naturally directed me to WMH. Never did I make a bigger mistake, because deep down in my gut I knew that I didn't particularly like the feel of the game and was only playing because of the supposed balance and ruleset. I couldn't understand it... I had the models and the rulebook of this superior game but I couldn't be arsed to paint and couldn't be arsed to play, even online or with proxies. Many $ and time units later I changed to 40k (just recently), and am completely aware of the problems it has on a competitive level. But, I'm prepared to overlook that and rely on community based fixes to balance it out because for whatever overall the game is simply fun. A fun mess, but fun (as someone above stated).

As a final note I leave this thought: We often talk about a fun list vs a tuned list, well obviously the game is going to be one sided. In any game system the fine tuned list will have an advantage. (Don't think for a moment going to WMH is going to let you pick out whatever nice models and give you real chance of winning vs a tournament list). In the situation of 2 fine tuned lists, that is where the skill emerges. And before someone says "well then it comes down to some key dice rolls", that is also the case in WMH in many situations.






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AllSeeingSkink wrote:
I think a lot of people get burned in 40k because they rightfully assume that it's a "versus" game and expect an army of Space Orks to have a fighting chance of beating an army of Eldar. They expect a unit of IG Veterans with grenade launchers to be 83% as effective as a unit of IG Veterans with melta guns, because, ya know, they are 83% the points value.

But then they actually start playing the army they spend the past few months and several hundred dollars building and start to realise, oh, the Orks they spent so much time, effort and money on are actually just the punching bags of the game.

Or they realise, oh, the points values are actually completely whack, high Str low AP weapons are worth more than their points would suggest, so Veterans are simply a vehicle for carrying 3 melta guns or plasma guns while grenade launchers degrade the value of taking the unit in the first place.

I think in the real world people do research online to see in general whats good and what isn't before purchasing a single model, and those that don't instead play escalation style games to get a feel of units and troops at the 500-1000 level to see whats going on. I don't know anyone (in 15 years of war-gaming) who has collected and painted "several hundred dollars worth" without having a general idea what they were buying.

Anathir wrote:
I think in the real world people do research online to see in general whats good and what isn't before purchasing a single model, and those that don't instead play escalation style games to get a feel of units and troops at the 500-1000 level to see whats going on. I don't know anyone (in 15 years of war-gaming) who has collected and painted "several hundred dollars worth" without having a general idea what they were buying.

I'm sure a lot of people in the real world do research as well, and I'm sure that's what drives some people who have gone off GW games to keep posting about it.

I don't know how many people you've met in 15 years of wargaming, but I'm sure there's plenty of people (and I know several, so it's not based on nothing) that have started an army and not realised until part way through that it's a crap army, like Orks or CSM, or bought lots of crappy units, say Raveners, and didn't realise until later. The example of Vets with grenade launchers was based on a thread on Dakka where someone made a post asking why they were always losing, they posted their list and it was an infantry heavy army where almost all the special weapons were grenade launchers (likely because that's what came in the box) and we had to explain how taking a Vet squad with grenade launchers is wasting points. You can even look at it from the other side, there are people who collected an Eldar army then shelved it because of the bad balance.

Maybe I was slightly off on "several hundred dollars" given that I live in Australia, but even at US pricing a "Start collecting" box is $85 and is only a few hundred points, so add an extra couple of boxes, a codex and a rulebook (well hopefully they got one off a friend or small one off ebay), but it's very easy to spend $200-400 before you really start playing more than intro games

From there if you didn't read a whole heap of negative comments on internet forums about how 40k is horribly unbalanced and specifically picked an army that wasn't crap, it can take you a while to learn enough about the game to realise the reason you're losing all the time is because you picked a crap army or crap units.

I do honestly believe if 40k was upfront about being a "narrative" game (which frankly, it's not very good at either) and terrible for tournaments, terrible for pick up games and terrible for playing games with predetermined balance, then there'd be far less hate towards it simply because there'd be far less people who would start it in the first place.

AllSeeingSkink wrote:I never said you did need rules to tell you to co-operate. I said 40k is not well suited to it, there is a difference.

I'm on the fence. I think approaching the game with the right attitude is a huge help towards it. I think all wargames can be approached as narrative games - 40k is no better or worse in that regard (if you can build a story, and homebrew a scenario with an interesting armies facing off, you are half way there) but if your point is that 40k doesn't help because of its schitzofrenic, all-over-the-place design, then I will agree with you here. Games with a more 'universal' structure are probably a bit easier to do this with.

AllSeeingSkink wrote:
I play historics, there's a bunch of people who are happy to invent lots of new stuff when playing historicals, there's also a bunch of people who will be unhappy if you mix and match forces in a non-historic way and won't play games which historically never happened.

To be fair to them, I would raise my eyebrows towards a game of celts versus mughals, or Mongols for example as well, but even within an 'accurate' or 'semi-accurate' historical context, there is no end of variety in scenarios or potential approaches you can take to your game. This is a far cry from reenacting specific battles, which was my point.

AllSeeingSkink wrote:
It's games like Bolt Action that tend to be more open I've found, funnily enough they are picking up a lot of ex-GW customers.

I've seen the same - bolt action is picking up a lot of steam here in Edinburgh.

AllSeeingSkink wrote:
You need to not assume you are evolved for playing the way you do, and that just because you find it a bit of fresh air that other people will also. Some people simply do not want to or do not have a community that supports that type of play.

Well, let's out it this way - I've had my horizons broadened since I've fallen in with a couple of guys who primarily play home brews and narrative scenarios, and to be honest, it's done nothing but make me appreciate my hobby even more. I think it's a shame that folks aren't willing to give it s go, or that they have communities that aren't. They're missing out on a lot of fun, if you ask me.

AllSeeingSkink wrote:
People aren't wrong for wanting a balanced game. 40k presents itself as a game that SHOULD be balanced. There are very few narrative components to the actual gameplay, there's nothing to suggest co-operative play, the game comes with points values which implies those points values should be somewhat balanced and the way armies are presented in stand-alone rather than campaign books or compilation books entirely suggests that you should be an army to X points to play against an opponent who themselves has built an army to X points. At least AoS in their wisdom has just given up on lying to customers with regard to dropping points.... though I'm not sure it's for the better as far as people wanting to start the game.

As you say, people aren't wrong for wanting s balanced game. When I play pugs or tournaments, it's what I look for. I think, like you do, apparently that 40k falls well short of the mark. It can be home brewed and it can be fixed to a lesser extent with a co-operative and laid back approach, but whether it is worth the effort is another question. Oh, And I'll agree on Aos - it's getting finally being honest and marketing a game thst conforms to their vision and how they play and approach their games.

That said, with regard to what you say about there being no narrative components and no suggestion to co-operative play, part of me feels thst like 'good sportsmanship' it's one of those things that doesn't really need to be stated. Players can easily bring thst kind of stuff to the table themselves, of their own free will. You don't need the gsme rules to tell you how to do this. I think needing this takes a lot of the creative spark out of what the players could do.

AllSeeingSkink wrote:
Don't get me wrong, I'm all for co-operative play. The majority of games I played of WHFB were set up co-operatively, we'd make up a scenario and use the points as a guideline not a hard and fast rule. But it's silly to think everyone wants to or indeed can play that way. Most my 40k games haven't been co-operative because it's not what my opponents wanted to do.

And I don't want you to get me wrong either - I think surprisingly we are more or less on the same page. I genuinely enjoy the homebrew/diy/collaborative approach. But I acknowledge its limitations. It's not practical all of the time - it requires time, space, like minded opponents and a co-operative approach to the gsme. I enjoy pugs and tournaments in equal measure, but in the same way, I acknowledge their weaknesses and limitations, and simply feel whilst useful, they are the 'arcade setting' in a lot of ways, and while fun, don't provide all of the things that the diy approach can do. In other words, in my mind, there is value in both approaches and I genuinely believe both have their place. I just feel gamers are better off embracing both thst just sticking to one.

Anathir wrote:
On top of that the factions feel flavourless fluff wise. The story is non existent compared to 40k. And if you don't love the steampunk robot stuff you won't be particularly attached to your miniatures, the way we are emotionally attached to our 40k factions.

I disagree. For what it's worth, check out the rpg material, especially the older d20 stuff! if you can find it. The lore is excellent. Plenty story. Real hidden gem.

Anathir wrote:


On top of that the factions feel flavourless fluff wise. The story is non existent compared to 40k. And if you don't love the steampunk robot stuff you won't be particularly attached to your miniatures, the way we are emotionally attached to our 40k factions.

I agree, it's been the biggest barrier to my committing to WMH. I often compare the game to the miniatures version of a CCG, and it seems to be players of the same mindset that really seem to connect with it. That said, GW have a massive head start on PP in this regard, and I can't believe PP are not aware. Whether they have the will or ability to do anything about it, is a different question.

There is also the small detail of model quality....I cant even describe how frustrating assembling the metal WMH models are, and how many mould lines the plastics have.

This is no different to GW, again, go back to the same point in GW's life as PP are at in theirs, and my memories are they were much worse. Tech may have improved in plastics, but the economic realities of the different production methods haven't all that much.

If you've not experienced building a metal Land Speeder, only to have the small peg flying base topple the first time you place it on, causing said LS to explode back into its component parts, you don't even know what frusttrating looks like!

As a final note I leave this thought: We often talk about a fun list vs a tuned list, well obviously the game is going to be one sided. In any game system the fine tuned list will have an advantage. (Don't think for a moment going to WMH is going to let you pick out whatever nice models and give you real chance of winning vs a tournament list). In the situation of 2 fine tuned lists, that is where the skill emerges. And before someone says "well then it comes down to some key dice rolls", that is also the case in WMH in many situations.

There's no rule that says a tuned list vs a fun list needs to be a foregone conclusion though, which is more often than not the situation with 40K. The key difference between 40K right now alongside those other games which are held up as better examples of what people are looking for is that the emphasis on decision making in-game is generally much higher, which in turn de-emphasises the importance of list building. A better built list will be at an advantage, which is as it should be, but, unlike 40K, I can, and have, throw down any old rubbish vs a world championship winning list in X Wing and still make a decent fist of beating it.

There's still room for a little of this in 40K, but honestly, once you've learned the stuff that poses your list difficulties and prioritise the elimination of those units, most games will play very similarly, unless you encounter the rock to your list's scissors, at which point there's little you can do.

That's not to say these issues don't exist outside of 40K, it's just in 40K they seem to be so much worse and occur much more frequently, and the creators seem much less bothered about addressing them.

@AllSeeingSkink

I'm not sure about that last paragraph. There were 200 players at adepticon... GWs in the UK always have a strong 40k presence. If its terrible why do we play?

When I first entered fantasy at the beginning of 6th, my army (high elves) was one of the weakest...and it only became apparent to me after I had a full army painted. I did ok in tournaments, made me a better player. I was a bit bitter sure, but mostly I was ok with the challenge of it...I had FUN. Even in a competitive environment, its not the end of the world to have one of the lower tiered factions. And if you're not competitive you can just simply decline playing any list you don't like.

Dex imbalance is not ideal but there are ways around it. There is also the added benefit that if your said dex of an underpowered unit gets buffed...you have everything ready to go at your disposal.

In the end though its down to people's mentalities. If they want to find a fault in something they will find it. If they want to have fun they will also find it.

@Azrael
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This is no different to GW, again, go back to the same point in GW's life as PP are at in theirs, and my memories are they were much worse. Tech may have improved in plastics, but the economic realities of the different production methods haven't all that much.

That's my point They're at different levels of quality.

There's no rule that says a tuned list vs a fun list needs to be a foregone conclusion though, which is more often than not the situation with 40K. The key difference between 40K right now alongside those other games which are held up as better examples of what people are looking for is that the emphasis on decision making in-game is generally much higher, which in turn de-emphasises the importance of list building. A better built list will be at an advantage, which is as it should be, but, unlike 40K, I can, and have, throw down any old rubbish vs a world championship winning list in X Wing and still make a decent fist of beating it.

There's still room for a little of this in 40K, but honestly, once you've learned the stuff that poses your list difficulties and prioritise the elimination of those units, most games will play very similarly, unless you encounter the rock to your list's scissors, at which point there's little you can do.

That's not to say these issues don't exist outside of 40K, it's just in 40K they seem to be so much worse and occur much more frequently, and the creators seem much less bothered about addressing them.

Yeah, you're right. Yet somehow I and many others still want to play 40k and don't care at all about any other game right now. Funny how that works. I'd definitely prefer a tight ruleset with balanced factions and I will remember that the next time I buy from ebay and not GW online store, but its not going to stop me from enjoying myself.

You keep playing a terrible game because your heavily invested and switching systems means those hundreds or thousands were wasted.

That's human nature, people defend bad video games for the same reason they spent £100 on the special edition so they have to like it because admitting it's bad is admitting you were taken as a fool.

Colonial marines is a great example it's a terrible game that lacks features that were promised and has atrocious A.I but still some defend it.

So you keep playing 40k because you're afraid to try other games in case you like them and show you the flaws of the creaking mess it's become.

Yet he clearly stated he's been playing WMH.

For gods sake, stop letting your venom get in the way of making logical arguments, not only does it make you look like a rabid hater it pollutes the arguments of anyone else who wishes to be critical by being tarred with the same brush.

Its ok he hasn't been reading my posts.

Are you up to date with WMH though?
Not knocking you in particular, but I see that someone mentioned Cryx and Legion win the most tournaments, without mentioning that Circle and Trolls were up there for a long while.

Even so, it is not like 40k where Eldar dominate with a few other factions joining in. In WMH most armies are able to win a tournament (you'll find minions and skorne winning occasionally, good luck finding CSM winning a major tournament).

WMH also has faqs. For example, someone mentioned 15% free (I think the real percent is much higher but ok) and its true that this list, EE, was a problem. But then an faq came out that nerfed the list without making it unplayable. The same thing happened to the strongest casters in the game, H2 and Denny2, to make them a lot more playable. No game is perfect, but at least WMH releases fixes and has been getting a lot better about boosting bad units and merging strong ones to create a more balanced game.

You really can't compare 40k and WMH from a balance perspective if you actively play both. I do and it's completely night and day.

Deadnight wrote:

 Psienesis wrote:
"Forging the Narrative" works in an RPG where there is a GM that is playing one "side" and the other players are playing the other "side". In such a scenario, it is fine for the GM to "lose" almost every battle, because he/she is there to tell a story involving the heroics of the player-characters.

This is less-valid when you are talking about 2 players setting up a game where each has spent $500 dollars on their "side" and when Timmy says "My Blue Marines are the best in the galaxy, they never lose!" and Tommy says, "Feth you, my Evil Marines are going to win today"... but Tommy's Evil Marines are *designed* to lose the game. This is not fun for Tommy and, pretty soon, Timmy has no one to play against.... until Tommy returns (having spent another $500) and says, "Feth you and your Blue Marines, Timmy, I have Space-Cows and Giant Robots."

Now Timmy is sad that his Blue Marines are dying in droves to the long-range firepower of the Space-Cows and their untouchable Giant Robots. Timmy doesn't have another $300 to spent on the Yellow Marines needed to beat Tommy's Giant Robots, and so, as far as he is concerned, the narrative being forged is Not Fun... so now Tommy (having spent $1000 on this game) has no one to play with.

And yet the co-operative, think-like-a-gm approach that you dismiss as unworkable for Timmy and Tommy would in fact make most of their arms race irrelevant, and solve a lot of the issues when you think about it. In other words, it's just as true to state that their petty games of pay to win and one-upsmanship is what is actually 'less valid' as an approach.

You are essentially saying that 'forging the narrative' is incompatible with a toxic, self-centred, self-defeating, and fundamentally hostile approach to wargaming and community. Yeah, that sounds like a good thing to me, being perfectly honest.

'Forging the narrative' works just fine. With the right approach and mentality, along with a bit of emotional intelligence and maturity. historical players have been 'forgive the narrative' for decades, telling the stories of the heroics of their Normans and Saxons and Romans and celts. I mean, we do the same thing as 40k players - folks name their space marine captains and far seers, and our chapters, guard regiments and craft worlds. It's not 'just' a game if you don't want to to be.

players can also wear gm hats. Once the dice are rolling, fair enough - go for the throat. But there is no reason thst two players can't co-operate pre-game in terms of 'game-building' and game design and work out an interesting scenario, and good match ups that fit the theme of the scenario. You'd be surprised - wargamers have been doing this for decades, and it predates the idea of points, pugs, and tournaments. All it takes is a change in perception in how you approach wargames.

As for your two players - it's certainly less valid for the simple reason that they are self centred, entitled idiots. Timmy and Tommy need to grow the hell up and step out of the arms race, petty one-upsmanship and 'pay to win' mentality. Assuming tommy's army is curpstomping timmy's, and assuming that they're friends (shocking, I know - nerds socialising and building connections with other people?! Gasp!) Couldn't thry just as easily have a chat, and work out a compromise in terms of making a fair game? Drop some stuff (hey, you've proved you can best me with that list, let's move on) Or build it up against an interesting story or scenario. I mean, if they're mates and all, surely it's not beyond the realm of possibility that they'll (gasp!) talk, and (gasp!)co-operate if they want to have fair, fun games, if thst arms race means one of them is miserable. If they insist on the pay to win approach, then they're the ones that are wrong, it's their approach that is the problem and all they're doing is destroying their own hobby and probably friendship. But I suppose though that I'm probably expecting too much though when I talk about gamers having emotional maturity .

Why should Tommy have to agree to lose the game to have fun? The game is not written with that in mind, it is not presented with that in mind, and it, most importantly, includes no suggestions, rules, concepts or ideas to play in that manner.

I think you will find that most people are self-centered idiots, especially when they're teenagers. That is a hallmark of that age-range, and has been since humanity crawled out of the seas.

Telling someone to "forge the narrative" is all well and good, but absolutely worthless advice when there are no tools provided (other than crappy list options and sub-par units for the predefined losers of the game) to actually forge that narrative. This, then, becomes a game where one player puts his models on the table... and then just picks them back up to put back into the box. Gee, that certainly sounds like fun! Again, returning to Timmy and Tommy, they are both equally invested (money-wise) in the game at the outset. Even if we let Tommy take twice the number of models than Timmy, Tommy is going to lose the game because he plays CSM and they, in three words, suck out loud. This is not a particularly interesting game, for either player.

In the historic gaming community, let us say that the rules for the game are written in such a manner that, no matter what the Celts, Saxons, Goths, Visi-Goths or Teutons do... Rome beats them in every game. I mean, not just winning the game, but loses 2 models to the barbarians' 300. You would not see many people choosing to play the barbarians in this situation. However, this is the situation we find ourselves in with certain lists in 40K.

Couldn't thry just as easily have a chat, and work out a compromise in terms of making a fair game?

Could they? Sure. But why the feth would you spend $500 on a game that you have to re-write? This is where GW fails as a company. I should not have to spend $50 on one of their books and then re-write the book to create a balanced, fun game for me and my friends. I would much rather just make up the rules myself/with friends and 3D print the models (which, thanks to Poser and 3DS, I can now do. I can even custom-build models and wargear, given enough time in designing the OBJ files in 3DS.)

Further, having to house-rule every game one plays, especially when one plays in a FLGS or similar environment where there are new people arriving, or PUGs are the norm, is... impractical. You will always encounter someone who is going to say "Eh, no... I mean, I bought this army and its rules to play it like this. It sucks that your army isn't better, but I didn't create the rules to the game." In a lot of areas, this will be the difference between playing and not-playing, and, in general, it is not possible to say that either player is being unreasonable. After all, these are premium products, at premium prices, one expects to "get what they paid for".

As for the "pay to win" approach? No, not really. After all, the models for 40K are similarly priced for the roles they have in a given list (troops are troops, HS is HS, etc), but one can be extremely disadvantaged (or heavily advantaged) because you spent $50 on the Blue Guys instead of the Red Guys. After all, in the scenario, again, Timmy and Tommy come into the game equally-invested... but GW failed, utterly, to provide equal value for Tommy's Evil Marines compared to Timmy's Blue Marines.

Anathir wrote:
Its also not as balanced as people claim it is. It is often the same 1-2 factions (cryx/legion) dominating the big tournaments, and the same few casters at that. In the rare situation where a rules errata changes the meta some previously competitive casters are nerfed the players of those casters often have to go re purchase nearly brand new armies, and so do the players that have lists to counter the meta and all that. Its insane. The army comp rules don't have troop tax or anything like that so there are few units that are mainstays in all lists of a certain faction. Good for variety, bad for $ and painting time investment.

You say that, and yet at Adeptionon Convergence, a side faction, took 1st, mercenaries, another faction that is not intended to be a 'full' faction, took 2nd. Yes Cryx took 3rd, but that sounds rather different from the game you described. Las Vegas Open was Retubution, Trollbloods, and Mercenaries. Smogcon was Cygnar, Circle, Cygnar.
Everyone can check the numbers for themselves right here: http://www.discountgamesinc.com/tournaments/
I suspect it is a much wider field than the 40k equivalent.

Anathir wrote:
On top of that the factions feel flavourless fluff wise. The story is non existent compared to 40k. And if you don't love the steampunk robot stuff you won't be particularly attached to your miniatures, the way we are emotionally attached to our 40k factions.

You should try the Iron Kingdom's RPG material. Puts anything GW has done fluffwise recently to shame.

I have always been curious about the IK RPG, what would be the best way to start?

 kodos wrote:
I have always been curious about the IK RPG, what would be the best way to start?

Old d20 material, if you can find it. The world guide is immense.

The current 'series' with pp's proprietary system is the ikrpg core rules (the city/urban side), and the iron kingdoms unleashed (adventuring in the wilds), with kings,nations and gods being the expansion specifically for the warmachine 'nations', urban adventures being set in the city of five fingers and great for, ready, urban campaigns. Oh, and you have the skorne supplement if you fancy a campaign in the east. Further releases are planned - the next one is 'wild adventures'.

Well worth investing in - the books do a great job of bringing the continent to life.

 Psienesis wrote:

Why should Tommy have to agree to lose the game to have fun?

Never said he had to lose to have fun, I said if he is winning so effortlessly, they should think about changing things up for a fair or interesting game. Because it very much implies that something isn't right in that scenario.

 Psienesis wrote:

The game is not written with that in mind, it is not presented with that in mind, and it, most importantly, includes no suggestions, rules, concepts or ideas to play in that manner.

I'd argue that when you read between the lines, the intent of all gw games is a fundamentally co-operative approach.
If you need rules to tell you how to be nice to your opponents or how to co-operate, then frankly, you're doing it wrong and it doesn't say much for you (btw I'm not saying this about you psi!) as a person in terms of empathy or creativity. The the whole idea of friendship itself must go over their heads if this is the case. I mean, when we all were kids, we just did this kind of stuff in the playground naturally. It's not really that hard to do, nor is it incomprehensible either.

 Psienesis wrote:

I think you will find that most people are self-centered idiots, especially when they're teenagers. That is a hallmark of that age-range, and has been since humanity crawled out of the seas.

Which, like I said, doesnt invalidating the idea of 'forging the narrative'.

 Psienesis wrote:

Telling someone to "forge the narrative" is all well and good, but absolutely worthless advice when there are no tools provided (other than crappy list options and sub-par units for the predefined losers of the game) to actually forge that narrative. This, then, becomes a game where one player puts his models on the table... and then just picks them back up to put back into the box. Gee, that certainly sounds like fun! Again, returning to Timmy and Tommy, they are both equally invested (money-wise) in the game at the outset. Even if we let Tommy take twice the number of models than Timmy, Tommy is going to lose the game because he plays CSM and they, in three words, suck out loud. This is not a particularly interesting game, for either player.

Then they should try and make it interesting. if their games suck because the game mode they're planning is bad, unbalanced, or unsustainable, and they do nothing about it, then they are both also partly to blame for it. Being a bit more pro-active goes a long, long way to mitigating, or resolving a lot of these issues.

I agree that gw could do more to give ideas and suggestions as to 'how' to spproach this, but fundamentally its not really all that difficult to do in the first place. I mean, we learned about playing together, playing nice, sharing, working together and all that way back in kindergarten. It really is not beyond anyone, and you don't necessarily really need an instruction manual, just an imagination, some creativity, and a desire to co-operate and build something together with your mate. It boils down to just homebrewing an interesting scenario involving a specific, or even themed/interesting and fair match up, rather than a scenario out of the book, and just pitting two 'blind' lists against each other. (Eg Wouldn't it be cool to run a scenario where your half company of tactical marines, And maybe some terminators are trying to clear out an underground complex from, say, waves of gene stealers and gaunts. We could put in traps, ambushes, and maybe some units get the 'endless' special rule if it looks like it's one sided'?' Make it into a story, make it fun. and make it more than 'just' a 'line em up, move em forward, and kill em all in the middle' game, Rather than the usual pug-based 'blind' match up thst involves some 1500pts of my (overpowered) codex - and typically the top 0.5% of that codex, just spammed to the point of ridiculousness versus 1500points of some bottom of the heap mess.

If it's the kind of game where you're putting models on the table onto to put them straight back into the bag, it's not much of a game, is it? So why are you wasting your time approaching games in this manner? There are better ways of spending your time, and using these pieces. Especially if they're both equally invested in the gsme in terms of money, then surely it makes sense to try and maximise your return in terms of hobby enjoyment? Personally I just wouldn't play those kinds of skewed one-sided games in the first place - my gaming time is too precious and limited. My first recourse will always be the work around.

Regarding Timmy and Tommy, how about Timmy leave some of the op stuff at home, if the other guys army suck out loud? Being 'honest' about the game and it's issues and limitations is the first thing you should do, and the second thing is seeing if there is some way of working around it.

 Psienesis wrote:

In the historic gaming community, let us say that the rules for the game are written in such a manner that, no matter what the Celts, Saxons, Goths, Visi-Goths or Teutons do... Rome beats them in every game. I mean, not just winning the game, but loses 2 models to the barbarians' 300. You would not see many people choosing to play the barbarians in this situation. However, this is the situation we find ourselves in with certain lists in 40K.

So seemingly, The situation in 40k is a crumby rules set played by people who have no interest in approaching their games in a different manner to try and get the most out of them? Ok, gotcha.

Well, firstly you'll have to show me this terribly designed historical game. and I'll show you a way to work around it.

But to answer your question, the first thing most historical players will do is either home brew That game, or use a different rules set for their Romans, celts, Saxons and whatever. The second thing they'd probably do is look towards tweaking, and modifying scenarios and writing specific lists to have some interesting match ups and scenarios. That's the great thing about historicals - there are a lot of rules sets out there, models are interchangeable between them and celts, frankly, are celts (or in my case, warriors and riders of Rohan are celts, Germans, Saxons, Franks, Normans, Roman auxiliaries), Whatever rules set you use.

 Psienesis wrote:

Could they? Sure. But why the feth would you spend $500 on a game that you have to re-write? This is where GW fails as a company. I should not have to spend $50 on one of their books and then re-write the book to create a balanced, fun game for me and my friends. I would much rather just make up the rules myself/with friends and 3D print the models (which, thanks to Poser and 3DS, I can now do. I can even custom-build models and wargear, given enough time in designing the OBJ files in 3DS.)

BecauseThere is a difference between 're-writing a game' and having a chat about putting down an interesting match up, or having a gentleman a agreement about 'leaving the Knights at home for this game' or 'let's do a skirmishers-only kind of battle!' ultimately, it's just a change in perception. You have rules for infantry, vehicles, super heavy vehicles, walkers, aircraft, monstrous and gigantic creatures, along with whether your guy has a pistol or a chain-whip. And options are just thst. All of these things exist, and they all have value, but they don't necessarily always 'fit' in every single game or match up, every time together. They don't necessarily need to all be lumped in together into some horrible paste - no, just pick and choose. Play what's interesting.

And also, because bring creative, and being in the driving seat of your own hobby, doing your own things and not slavishly defining how you play by the 'book', and 'how' you play can be an immensely rewarding and enjoyable experience.

 Psienesis wrote:

Further, having to house-rule every game one plays, especially when one plays in a FLGS or similar environment where there are new people arriving, or PUGs are the norm, is... impractical. You will always encounter someone who is going to say "Eh, no... I mean, I bought this army and its rules to play it like this. It sucks that your army isn't better, but I didn't create the rules to the game." In a lot of areas, this will be the difference between playing and not-playing, and, in general, it is not possible to say that either player is being unreasonable. After all, these are premium products, at premium prices, one expects to "get what they paid for".

It can be impractical, but this is also the age of Facebook and the internets. What's stoping you organising a game ahead of time and working things out from there's. If pugs are the norm, and pugs aren't working, as per your examples, then why are people continuing to play in a broken manner? In this scenario,The players aren't entirely without blame here either psi.

Second issue is that whilst playing at flgs's is fine, and fun, it's not the only way of playing your wargames. We usually play at my mates house for example. And I've been through in Glasgow for 'all day gaming' at a friends house, rather than an lgs. Far more of a laid back and friendly setting, if you ask me.

Third issue - guy says no. Fair enough, as you say, he's not being unreasonable. If he likes power lists, then fair enough. But if he's talking down to me like that, with that attitude, handwaving away any sense of responsibility, or community spirit, it's probably not a game I'm actually interested in playing either, or a player for that matter. I dislike people who shrug off their own responsibility towards others in a game that is based around social interaction. Amusingly - even Page 5, has a bit about all that. Not playing beats playing rubbish games, if you ask me. If he wants to play a broken list against someone whose codex is nowhere near his level of power, then it doesn't say a lot about him, Either as a player or as a person, does it? But By all means, he's not nessessarily wrong for wanting a powerful list - hr should play his super powered list against something equally super powered, (and that's perfectly fair and reasonable, and more power to him) whilst I go and play mine in the equivelant of the lower leagues. But surely that just reinforces what I was saying earlier, about designing specific, and fair match ups between the forces in the game, and playing 'what's appropriate' rather than a 'blind' pug?

 Psienesis wrote:

As for the "pay to win" approach? No, not really. After all, the models for 40K are similarly priced for the roles they have in a given list (troops are troops, HS is HS, etc), but one can be extremely disadvantaged (or heavily advantaged) because you spent $50 on the Blue Guys instead of the Red Guys. After all, in the scenario, again, Timmy and Tommy come into the game equally-invested... but GW failed, utterly, to provide equal value for Tommy's Evil Marines compared to Timmy's Blue Marines.

Ah but their story is about one upsmanship and 'pay to win' too, which is what I was referring to! Remember the part where he went out and spent another £500 to curb stomp his mate? Pay to win. Like I said, they could have tried to act like adults, and had a discussion about it.

Gw failed in producing a balanced game. I don't know about 'equal value' though. Value is what you make of it. I mean, if you are a painter, and love the sculpts, then the value is the painting, and not the in-game relevance. Speaking about value though, Gw aren't the only ones here who failed.Timmy and Tommy also failed 'utterly' to step up to the plate as mates,cseemingly happy to just play oneupsmanship. They also failed in their approach to their game. They played a broken game in a broken manner and it didn't work. And they didn't do anything about it.They failed in thinking a little bit out of the box, and the failed in considering an alternative approach to their gsmes, and their friendship, which could very easily have provided the 'value' they sought in their wee plastic doods.

Here's the thing. Gw's points costs are all over the place, and the gsme is a schitzofrenic mess. Playing it 'as is' is literally an exercise in frustration. If 40k is what you want, for whatever the reason (and there are plenty legitimate ones - love the lore, lore the models, all your friends play, you've invested plenty already and it would be a shame to not get anything out of it...) then, at the very least, a consideration towards the approach I'm suggesting is merited.

 kodos wrote:
I have always been curious about the IK RPG, what would be the best way to start?

I know that Unleashed has a starter adventure with soft plastic models and tiles if you're interested in the more beastly aspects, if you want a proper Urban Adventure you're best off with this PDF: http://files.privateerpress.com/ironkingdoms/documents/adventures/IKRPG_Scenario_Fools_Rush_In.pdf
It has the quickstart rules, premade characters, and an into adventure.
The Full Metal Fantasy book, along with Nations, Kings and Gods are both great sources of fluff, as is the Unleashed book (which had to have a whole faction cut from it and released as a softback supplement because otherwise the core book would have had to be far too big).

Akiasura wrote:
Are you up to date with WMH though?
Not knocking you in particular, but I see that someone mentioned Cryx and Legion win the most tournaments, without mentioning that Circle and Trolls were up there for a long while.

Even so, it is not like 40k where Eldar dominate with a few other factions joining in. In WMH most armies are able to win a tournament (you'll find minions and skorne winning occasionally, good luck finding CSM winning a major tournament).

WMH also has faqs. For example, someone mentioned 15% free (I think the real percent is much higher but ok) and its true that this list, EE, was a problem. But then an faq came out that nerfed the list without making it unplayable. The same thing happened to the strongest casters in the game, H2 and Denny2, to make them a lot more playable. No game is perfect, but at least WMH releases fixes and has been getting a lot better about boosting bad units and merging strong ones to create a more balanced game.

You really can't compare 40k and WMH from a balance perspective if you actively play both. I do and it's completely night and day.

I'm not up-to-date entirely. But I understand what you're saying and I agree... WMH is way more balanced and supported, and the range of armies that win is greater than 40k. The point I'm making in particular is that it is supposed to be the main attraction of the game, as a whole the game lacks (my opinion) in story/theme, aesthetics and model quality. I felt that the balance was not enough to offset the these other issues. Its a totally subjective point of view, but that was how I felt after my experience with it. Those last 3 issues is why we play tabletop games right? Or else we'd play computer games or stuff like chess that are pure tests of wit without any of the extra stuff. Its the 3D spectacle that is the defining feature of a tabletop game compared to other kinds of games. 40k for me excels in those last 3 points, but struggles in rules/balance....the difference being that community comp can help marginally rectify that issue whereas community can't fix a game a player finds ugly.

Deadnight wrote:
BecauseThere is a difference between 're-writing a game' and having a chat about putting down an interesting match up, or having a gentleman a agreement about 'leaving the Knights at home for this game' or 'let's do a skirmishers-only kind of battle!' ultimately, it's just a change in perception. You have rules for infantry, vehicles, super heavy vehicles, walkers, aircraft, monstrous and gigantic creatures, along with whether your guy has a pistol or a chain-whip. And options are just thst. All of these things exist, and they all have value, but they don't necessarily always 'fit' in every single game or match up, every time together. They don't necessarily need to all be lumped in together into some horrible paste - no, just pick and choose. Play what's interesting.

And also, because bring creative, and being in the driving seat of your own hobby, doing your own things and not slavishly defining how you play by the 'book', and 'how' you play can be an immensely rewarding and enjoyable experience.

The point of having a ruleset is to have a common ground with anyone else who knows the game. Certainly any organised or tightly knit playgroup will tweak things to suit them but with good rules you shouldn't have to do that. You should be able to have a decent game with anyone else by following the rules as written. That people can do whatever they want is not a reason to accept bad rules.

When I hear about adjusting the game in accord to the imbalances the company puts into it (willingly or out of negligence), I cannot help smiling.

Is something I can do now, because I am a veteran, but it was not something I would have been able to do properly as a beginner. Actually at the beginning I was really naive and assumed that the system provided by the company was the bestest evar and if something was not working, it was because it was my fault.
Moreover, I was surrounded by people (like me) less mature and less prone to such compromises. Compromises come with maturity. If you want new blood, a game for kids, better it works out of the box.

You know, now that I think about it... better that it works out of the box anyway, because with maturity I am more prone to compromise and I have more money, but my time is a rare currency. So is not that this crap GW keeps churning out is acceptable right now, either.

Rosebuddy wrote:
The point of having a ruleset is to have a common ground with anyone else who knows the game. Certainly any organised or tightly knit playgroup will tweak things to suit them but with good rules you shouldn't have to do that. You should be able to have a decent game with anyone else by following the rules as written. That people can do whatever they want is not a reason to accept bad rules.

I don't disagree with you rosebuddy. But even with good rules, you'll sometimes come at cross purposes with people. And it's not that people 'shouldn't have to do that', with regard to tweaking rules or homebrewing it's that if you chose to approach your wargames in this way, you'd be surprised at how enjoyable the approach can be by doing things a little bit different. Despite my stance on diy gaming, I also appreciate and enjoy pick-up-games and tournaments, and enjoy organised formats in gsmes like warmachine immensely. Having a common ground to play on is certainly a good thing, but bear in mind, the 'forge the narrative' gaming I speak about is not necessarily incompatible with it either. I mean, we're using the same rules and everything, I'm just saying that playing 'blind' lists into blind lists isn't always clever, playing the same scenarios out of the book gets boring, and having a chat and organising things beforehand can go a long way towards keeping your hobby interesting. Doubly so if a game has structural issues or has such a varied mix of things in it that it's easy for things to get skewed.

And I'm not accepting or comdoning bad rules. I'm working around them. It's the eternal battle between idealism and pragmatism. The ideal would be nice, certainly, but when you get down into the blood and guts in the trenches, ideals are of very little use frankly, and pragmatism carries more weight and is the order of the day. Gw won't fix their rules, and really, they don't care about my enjoyment of their products. Our relationship ended the second money changed hands. And honestly, I'm quite ok with that. What it means though is that gw isn't going to fix the problems. So I either (a) suck it up, play the game as is, and get more and more frustrated, (b) walk away and play my other wargames, of which I'll happily play warmachine, infinity or lately Lord of the rings sbg/historicals (which is altogether a shame as it makes my ten years of 40k purchases pointless, and dammit I like my marines, I love the lore, and would love to do something fun with them!) meaning (c) I will work around the issues in the game, adapt to the landscape, find and co-operate with a bunch of like minded folks (not necessarily as hard as you'd imagine - I'm probably not the only horse in town with issues with the current state of affairs of game x or y)and build 40k into the game we want to play. And like I said, in my experience, home brewing, and adding that 'personal touch' has added a lot of value and extended the lifespan to a lot of the gsmes I play, as well as broadening my gaming horizons. It's why I encourage this approach.

At the end of the day, I believe in pragmatism. I believe it goes further I also play competitive sports (and the eyes would pop out of my teachers' heads if they heard I run marathons and enjoy boxing these days, considering the book worm that I was!) and competitive wargames like warmachine, and funnily enough, what they've taught me, and what I've learned to love and embrace is the idea of self responsibility, self-respect, self-motivation, self improvement and above all else, made me appreciate the value of a proactive approach to whatever I do, rather than to wallow in inertia (that marathn won't run itself! And no one other than me can do the work for it) I am quite ok with the idea of putting in the legwork myself in what I do.

In other words, the question I always ask myself with regard to gaming is lifted straight from American history x and is this: 'what have you done to make your gaming experience/community better?' My gaming happiness is, at the end of the day, entirely in my own hands, and it's entirely within my power to improve it, or destroy it. And if I haven't stepped up, and if I haven't reached out and made the attempt to make sure both me and my opponents have had a good time, then the simple fact is I have not done enough. And I don't want to be that person.

Kaiyanwang wrote:When I hear about adjusting the game in accord to the imbalances the company puts into it (willingly or out of negligence), I cannot help smiling.

Is something I can do now, because I am a veteran, but it was not something I would have been able to do properly as a beginner. Actually at the beginning I was really naive and assumed that the system provided by the company was the bestest evar and if something was not working, it was because it was my fault.
Moreover, I was surrounded by people (like me) less mature and less prone to such compromises. Compromises come with maturity. If you want new blood, a game for kids, better it works out of the box.

You know, now that I think about it... better that it works out of the box anyway, because with maturity I am more prone to compromise and I have more money, but my time is a rare currency. So is not that this crap GW keeps churning out is acceptable right now, either.

I dunno kaiyanwang. Things 'working out of the box' is a lot harder than you think. I mean, even warmachine, which is (rightfully) held up as an example of being a very well balanced game is flat out broken out of the box. it's their specific formats, like steamroller, journeyman, and the recent abc that 'twist' the game into a well balanced product, with various shock absorbers and what not being built in. But if we're being technical, steamroller is a distinct entity to warmachine.

I'm like you - I'm a bit older, have a bit more life experience and some might say, maturity. Like you, time is a rare currency for gaming (Work/travel is fifty hours a week, and the after work cooking for the missus, Ten-k jogs and whatever, along with a big run at the weekend and all the usual little things in life that need done means my gaming time is limited, and quite valuable to me - I want to get the most out if it that I can.)

I think a lot of it depends on how you were introduced to wargames, and what your 'wargaming upbringing' and 'wargaming exposure' was.
When I got into wargames as an eighteen year old, it was, like a lot of people, via 40k. And in my group, it was all about the competitive. pugs and tournaments were the order of the day. Gaming out of the box was the done thing, and there was no alternative viewpoint. As you say, if it didn't work, the assumption was it was my fault - it's funny to think back to then!

Anyway, Life happens, blah blah blah and I get into warmachine. I move to Scotland and get involved with gaming here (obviously non-40k!). And for the first time in my life, I met people who got into gaming through games other than 40k. Kids, teenagers and adults who were playing flames of war, and whose dads got them into the hobby with historicals. I was surprised at how large and varied the historical playing community actually was - fantasy/sci fi really felt like 'a bit on the side'. They'd never experienced the pug/tournament culture that I had grown up with, took for granted and assumed Was 'the norm'. As a tangent, The idea of getting into gaming via something other than 40k would have been hilarious more than ten years ago for our age group, I would have thought, but it's getting to be more and more of a thing. And what I saw of these guys and girls was their approach to games could not have been more different to my own at their age. They home brewed, they modified, they were happy to play unique scenarios. Essentially, they played (and always played) in the style that I speak about above, because it's what they knew, and it was how they had been brought up to Wargame and how they, and their friends had always done it at their clubs and with their parents. Thry just shrugged their shoulders when I asked them about it; it was just kind of obvious to them, to be honest, and it really got me thinking - having that attitude back when I played 40k, or even having folks in our group who played this way, and encouraged this line of thinking to make it part of our culture - well, it would have made 40k a better game, and a better experience, and I'd still probably be playing 40k if that was the case! I spoke to them about Aos recently and they just shrugged their shoulders - they actually quite liked it - 'but you have to house rule it' I was told, which is what they would automatically do, anyway, even in a game that works right out of the box.

It takes all sorts, eh?

I dont know... I get this weird feeling about GW.


It is like when they pay sculptor get new models casted ship them world wide they try to make them flashy and with better rules....so peope almost want to buy them rather then the old models....... Its like they want to make new models and keep their buisness growing....it is almost like they dont make money off of no one buying new models amd sitting in their basement playing with their rules for models they already have.

After all if everyone who played bought the updated rules every 4 years they would keep growing.

Balance cant exist because they need people to keep buying. If everyone have everything they need there would be no new sales. They make units better for people to buy them so they stay in buisness.

OgreChubbs wrote:
I dont know... I get this weird feeling about GW.


It is like when they pay sculptor get new models casted ship them world wide they try to make them flashy and with better rules....so peope almost want to buy them rather then the old models....... Its like they want to make new models and keep their buisness growing....it is almost like they dont make money off of no one buying new models amd sitting in their basement playing with their rules for models they already have.

After all if everyone who played bought the updated rules every 4 years they would keep growing.

Balance cant exist because they need people to keep buying. If everyone have everything they need there would be no new sales. They make units better for people to buy them so they stay in buisness.

The problem is that this isn't how they always operate. They often come out with stinker rules for new units or new kit (Pyrovore, Ogryns, Scions, etc) and then make rules for existing units and kits markedly over the top (e.g. Wave Serpents, Wraithguard, etc).

OgreChubbs wrote:
I dont know... I get this weird feeling about GW.


It is like when they pay sculptor get new models casted ship them world wide they try to make them flashy and with better rules....so peope almost want to buy them rather then the old models....... Its like they want to make new models and keep their buisness growing....it is almost like they dont make money off of no one buying new models amd sitting in their basement playing with their rules for models they already have.

After all if everyone who played bought the updated rules every 4 years they would keep growing.

Balance cant exist because they need people to keep buying. If everyone have everything they need there would be no new sales. They make units better for people to buy them so they stay in buisness.

Except this theory has so many exceptions as to be self evidently false.

For every Wraithknight there's half a dozen Nephilims.

A weird thing happens when you produce a game that people are excited about and enjoy playing - it makes them happy.

Happy people spend more money.

Balance can absolutely exist, because the game that's spanking 40K right now by all accounts is a fairly decently balanced game. The makers of that game have even employed some fairly blatant methods to induce purchases, such as including popular upgrades with less popular ships, or including retrospective fixes in premium products with little regular gaming use.

Thing is, because I enjoy playing X Wing, I don't begrudge FFG making money off me, and I'll tolerate a little clumsy cash grabbing. Whereas thanks to the constant barrage of stuff that's pissed me off about 40K and GW in the 6 or 7 years since I started playing again, I'm on a hair trigger to flick the V at them for the same behavior, purely because my general disposition is so much worse.

Happy people spend more money.

I dont know maybe I am wrong, probly am I spend little to no time trying to figure out balance.

I just ordered a eldar phantom 2 reavers and a bunch of wraiths because I got a box of eldar stuff for free lol.

But I play fluffy more then anything.... Well my fluff.

My friend fields warhounds so I picked up the titans and a bunch of wraiths and hawks because... i likes them lol.

Thank heavens for China, huh?

Not even China can save 40K in my country. X-Wing became the winner.

 Azreal13 wrote:
Thank heavens for China, huh?

china sells them for 700$ each.... Where my guy sells them for 500 each

The local 40k scene here is very competitive.
We've got one player who seems to have unlimited funds, a huge Tau army and also runs a Dark Angels list with free drop pods and razorbacks. Another dude who runs double save Necrons and another still that wields Khorne Daemonkin in crazy ways.
I run Space Wolves and refuse to pay for thunderwolf cavalry because I like dreadnoughts and bikers, all of which apparently suck. Its a huge drag and I don't even go to tournaments.

Sure, there are about 4 or 5 players that indulge narrative games... but I don't get invited to those games nor do I feel comfortable enough to ask for an invitation. Asking someone to run non-cheese is either laughed at or seemingly not possible. (necrons pretty much run on autopilot anyways)

I can only hope that 8e is better.

Perhaps you should talk more with these guys that make narrative games. and if it happens that you have a good talk with them in general you can mention that you also like narrative games. usualy in my experience it is very easy to get invited to such stuff when its obvious that the people involved feel comfortable to spent time talking bout 40k in general and that it shows they share the same views of how a fun game can be played.

so there is no need to direktly ask for a invitation. just check out how you and these guys behave each other in general.

keep in mind that i dont speak english so try to get the idea behind my words although the exact wording i use could sound kinda ... weird.

 Vaktathi wrote:

OgreChubbs wrote:
I dont know... I get this weird feeling about GW.


It is like when they pay sculptor get new models casted ship them world wide they try to make them flashy and with better rules....so peope almost want to buy them rather then the old models....... Its like they want to make new models and keep their buisness growing....it is almost like they dont make money off of no one buying new models amd sitting in their basement playing with their rules for models they already have.

After all if everyone who played bought the updated rules every 4 years they would keep growing.

Balance cant exist because they need people to keep buying. If everyone have everything they need there would be no new sales. They make units better for people to buy them so they stay in buisness.

The problem is that this isn't how they always operate. They often come out with stinker rules for new units or new kit (Pyrovore, Ogryns, Scions, etc) and then make rules for existing units and kits markedly over the top (e.g. Wave Serpents, Wraithguard, etc).

This.

Moreover, if it was the case, one could argue that for WFB did not work so well...


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Deadnight wrote:


At the end of the day, I believe in pragmatism. I believe it goes further I also play competitive sports (and the eyes would pop out of my teachers' heads if they heard I run marathons and enjoy boxing these days, considering the book worm that I was!) and competitive wargames like warmachine, and funnily enough, what they've taught me, and what I've learned to love and embrace is the idea of self responsibility, self-respect, self-motivation, self improvement and above all else, made me appreciate the value of a proactive approach to whatever I do, rather than to wallow in inertia (that marathn won't run itself! And no one other than me can do the work for it) I am quite ok with the idea of putting in the legwork myself in what I do.

For me is pragmatism as well. You balance costs and benefits, you look at your time, and decide that GW does not deserve your money anymore. Is just accepting the Realität.

I dunno kaiyanwang. Things 'working out of the box' is a lot harder than you think. I mean, even warmachine, which is (rightfully) held up as an example of being a very well balanced game is flat out broken out of the box. it's their specific formats, like steamroller, journeyman, and the recent abc that 'twist' the game into a well balanced product, with various shock absorbers and what not being built in. But if we're being technical, steamroller is a distinct entity to warmachine.

true my friend - but who provided the playerbase with such rule alteration, scenarios and so on? The company (perhaps hearing the players feedback), or the players by themselves because the company could not give a flying disk?

 Kaiyanwang wrote:


For me is pragmatism as well. You balance costs and benefits, you look at your time, and decide that GW does not deserve your money anymore. Is just accepting the Realität.

Is it accepting the realitat, or is it just ‘running away’?

It’s certainly a valid way of looking at it Kai. I alluded to it myself in that walking away is a valid option – heck, six years ago, I did exactly the same thing and walked into the tender, loving arms (well, technically it was an arm/head lock!) of Warmachine/Hordes and Infinity. I do not regret it, and PP essentially were the reason that I fell in love with this hobby again.

Going back to what you said though, I’m going to play devil’s advocate for a minute. And no, I’m not dismissing what you say – I’ve walked that road myself. As you say, you balance ‘cost’ and ‘benefits’. If you decided GW doesn’t deserve your money, that’s certainly one way of looking at it. But I could argue it’s also an approach that could be seen as too one-dimensional and zero-sum. I mean, look at what I’m saying and suggesting in terms of playing 40k – I say embrace things like ‘forge the narrative’, ‘co-operative game building’and ‘chatting with your opponent, and organising ahead of time in terms of building a good game’. Fair enough?

Now, you speak about ‘costs’ and ‘benefits’.

What’s the ‘cost’? A change in attitude. That is essentially free. Speaking ‘words’? Also free. ‘Co-operating’ with people to make enjoyable games? Also free. I mean, they’re mates. It should be second nature to work with them. All it costs you is a bit of time. I doubt you are the only horse in town who is unhappy with 40k’s state of play and would like something to be done. I just suggest doing something yourselves…

What’s the benefit? You get to take charge of your own games. You’d be surprised how much fun you can have doing this. You get to do something different every time. You can ‘freshen up’ your 40k games constantly, and avoid the staleness that seeps into games when you focus on playing one game one way constantly and slavishly ‘chasing the meta’. And most importantly, your ten-plus years of 40k purchases stays valid, stays playable and has worth. I think it’s a terrible shame to just walk away from ten years of hobby, ten years of investment and joy and a universe that a lot of us genuinely enjoy, especially when a change of attitude to ‘how’ you play could be all it takes to make it all ‘fun’ again. This means you don’t necessarily have to abandon all of this investment (not just the models, but embracing the lore, and so on) It won’t just sit there on the shelf gathering dust, and frankly, stepping away from chasing the meta means you can appreciate the thoughts of purchasing other stuff for your games that wouldn’t necessarily be viable in the competitive circuits. These days, for example, when I look at units, I don’t think just in terms of their power – I think of various scenarios I could build with them in it. In other words, one of the biggest benefits as I see it is the potential that you can save ‘your’ 40k for you and your group.

Furthermore, whilst ‘walking away’ is valid, you talk about accepting the reality. What is the reality? For some, walking away might be impossible. New game. means big investment. In terms of time, hobbycraft, money, books, learning game-time and so on. It’s a legitimate consequence of picking up an entirely new game. And that’s also assuming there are people playing this other game, (that are folks you want to spend time with too!) which won’t always be the case. This should also be factored into the ‘cost’ versus benefits arguments, as the ‘cost’ concerns aren’t just on the GW end. So like I said, the reality may very well be that a change in perception, and a change in approach ends up being the ‘cheapest’ option with the most benefits. If that’s what you want. At the end of the day, I think its still worth considering.

 Kaiyanwang wrote:


true my friend - but who provided the playerbase with such rule alteration, scenarios and so on? The company (perhaps hearing the players feedback), or the players by themselves because the company could not give a flying disk?

Does it really matter?

there’s also a difference between not giving a damn, and letting the players play the game mould their games into what they themselves want to play. Perception. And really, there is no one way to do this, let alone one right way. PP offer a brilliant top-down defined and structured ‘organised play’ experience. It’s great. But not everyone wants this. Some will call it stifling. They’re not wrong. Despite all the variety in unit types, scenarios often boil down to ‘grab the geometric shape or invisible flag in the middle of the board’. Let’s be clear – I like PP’s organized play. I think it’s great for playability and for helping to get the communities organised and cohesive. But there is an alternative approach which also has merit. Like I said – ‘let the players decide’. GW’s approach has changed over the years. They used to do tournaments and all that, and then they stopped officially supporting them. When they did support them, people complained (as they always do). Gw made changes, and people still complained. In the end, they decided it wasn’t working, and it was best for them to just walk away from it with the intention that, rather than having and enforcing a top-down, defined ‘organised play’ approach like PP does, they’d be more hands-off, just focus on making shiny models and essentially leave the game in the hands of their players, and essentially let the players take control, and organise the tournaments, leagues, events, and comps and so on. They’re not wrong for feeling that maybe, the best people to organise ‘how’ they play are the players themselves.

Deadnight wrote:

 Kaiyanwang wrote:


For me is pragmatism as well. You balance costs and benefits, you look at your time, and decide that GW does not deserve your money anymore. Is just accepting the Realität.

Is it accepting the realitat, or is it just ‘running away’?

It’s certainly a valid way of looking at it Kai. I alluded to it myself in that walking away is a valid option – heck, six years ago, I did exactly the same thing and walked into the tender, loving arms (well, technically it was an arm/head lock!) of Warmachine/Hordes and Infinity. I do not regret it, and PP essentially were the reason that I fell in love with this hobby again.

Going back to what you said though, I’m going to play devil’s advocate for a minute. And no, I’m not dismissing what you say – I’ve walked that road myself. As you say, you balance ‘cost’ and ‘benefits’. If you decided GW doesn’t deserve your money, that’s certainly one way of looking at it. But I could argue it’s also an approach that could be seen as too one-dimensional and zero-sum. I mean, look at what I’m saying and suggesting in terms of playing 40k – I say embrace things like ‘forge the narrative’, ‘co-operative game building’and ‘chatting with your opponent, and organising ahead of time in terms of building a good game’. Fair enough?

I played 40k and fantasy (mainly) with people I played RPG with. We do not play competitively, we are just able to tell if something is of bad quality and the company is taking advantage of the fidelity of the customer. And this is the reality: GW is not giving us enough for the money we pay.

Now, you speak about ‘costs’ and ‘benefits’.

What’s the ‘cost’? A change in attitude. That is essentially free. Speaking ‘words’? Also free. ‘Co-operating’ with people to make enjoyable games? Also free. I mean, they’re mates. It should be second nature to work with them. All it costs you is a bit of time. I doubt you are the only horse in town who is unhappy with 40k’s state of play and would like something to be done. I just suggest doing something yourselves…

The cost is spend money and time for a company that does not care anymore and still has a margin because is the biggest animal on the market and because keeps cutting corners (and we don't know for how long).
Is the same reason people wonder why I demand good quality movies (even popcorn one, I do not talk about Dersu Uzala) and I can be pissed the Hobbit is not like the original Lotr trilogy. "LOL just turn off the brain bro". NO. Life is too short to spend it on crap. GW produces crap now.

What’s the benefit? You get to take charge of your own games. You’d be surprised how much fun you can have doing this. You get to do something different every time. You can ‘freshen up’ your 40k games constantly, and avoid the staleness that seeps into games when you focus on playing one game one way constantly and slavishly ‘chasing the meta’. And most importantly, your ten-plus years of 40k purchases stays valid, stays playable and has worth. I think it’s a terrible shame to just walk away from ten years of hobby, ten years of investment and joy and a universe that a lot of us genuinely enjoy, especially when a change of attitude to ‘how’ you play could be all it takes to make it all ‘fun’ again. This means you don’t necessarily have to abandon all of this investment (not just the models, but embracing the lore, and so on) It won’t just sit there on the shelf gathering dust, and frankly, stepping away from chasing the meta means you can appreciate the thoughts of purchasing other stuff for your games that wouldn’t necessarily be viable in the competitive circuits. These days, for example, when I look at units, I don’t think just in terms of their power – I think of various scenarios I could build with them in it. In other words, one of the biggest benefits as I see it is the potential that you can save ‘your’ 40k for you and your group.

I can do this. With well designed games. If I have the choice to do the same thing, my money go on the company that gives a damn. Or on ebay right now. I didn't take tha ball and went home crying. I just decided to stop rewarding a company made half of greedy ****** and the other half of underpaid hacks. I did with with pleasure

Furthermore, whilst ‘walking away’ is valid, you talk about accepting the reality. What is the reality? For some, walking away might be impossible. New game. means big investment. In terms of time, hobbycraft, money, books, learning game-time and so on. It’s a legitimate consequence of picking up an entirely new game. And that’s also assuming there are people playing this other game, (that are folks you want to spend time with too!) which won’t always be the case. This should also be factored into the ‘cost’ versus benefits arguments, as the ‘cost’ concerns aren’t just on the GW end. So like I said, the reality may very well be that a change in perception, and a change in approach ends up being the ‘cheapest’ option with the most benefits. If that’s what you want. At the end of the day, I think its still worth considering.

Already considered and I am super happy giving up 40k. 40k players are battered wives, especially CSM players. Look up at the rumors threads. I used to be one years ago, mind it.

Does it really matter?

It matters if the effort to make the game playable is from the part of the company, and not from the players, because the time and energy to make the game work was spent by the company (deserving my money) and not by me. How this is not obvious, is beyond me.

People complain of the changes GW makes because more often than not they have no idea what they are doing. Melee too strong? Next edition melee is pointless. Heck, I even joked some time ago that in the next Eldar codex, after all the complaints about OP Eldar, we will see the Howling Banshees nerfed Is a joke, but comparatively dumb stuff happened in the past and will keep happening.

Change for the sake of change is not enough. Changes must be fix. You do not rush the IG codex just changing the prices of vehicles in an completely illogic manner, remove the units you do not have models of, and call it a day. I bought that codex time ago. I felt, and still feel, deceived. It was a mediocre 5th edition codex in the pre-7th end of 6th edition of 40k.

How the hell one can take them seriously after the Wulfen? Or abominations of design like Grav? Or after a non-fix for CSM spread in two pointless books, one dedicated to a warband of newbs while is years people ask for legion rules?

Do you people realise they just cut what it was possible to cut in the studio? They fired the competent personnel, now what is written is written, who ha a good codex is in good shape, the others have a bad ones, and is shallow formations (encouraging spamhammer) until the end of times. Perhaps a literal one. How many times we did have evidence they do not even proofread?

LOOK AT THE SECOND CHANCE REDUX. People are praising GW for take the mick out of them. Battered wifes. "He loves me. he promised me this time is for real".

GW behaviour is inexcusable and people buying their crap justify such behaviour.

I love 40k. I don't think I've found another hobby that's brought me as much entertainment, intellectual stimulation, and time well spent. Well, so long as I avoid negative people like Kaiyanwang. The hobby is great, you just have to be careful who you share it with. Share it with negative people and like everything else you share with negative people it turns to poop.

Nomeny wrote:
I love 40k. I don't think I've found another hobby that's brought me as much entertainment, intellectual stimulation, and time well spent. Well, so long as I avoid negative people like Kaiyanwang. The hobby is great, you just have to be careful who you share it with. Share it with negative people and like everything else you share with negative people it turns to poop.

Well, after this articulated, point-by-point rebuttal, I cannot do anything else than surrender.

It's worth trying some war games outside 40K, for interest and new challenges.

 Kilkrazy wrote:
It's worth trying some war games outside 40K, for interest and new challenges.

Aye, 40k is just a game, not the whole hobby, it's always worth watching a match or two of a game you don't recognize at your FLGS or ogling some minis from a company you've never heard of.

Lol at people blaming the player base for a lack of build variety

Why doesn't everyone invest $400 into an army that will get tabled in a pickup game?

Balanced rules lead to more variety, more diversity, and more FUN!!!
People can play what they want to play and not feel left out.

I'll wave my little SAGA banner

Balanced, tactical, relatively easy to pick up, good price, lots of depth tactically, Dark Ages and Crusades with cool models.


It's my automatic go-to tabletop game now. 40K spends more time in the shelves.

My problems with 40k.

Technical aspects of rules writing..
Poor standard of writing and editing in a rule set that is usually, double or triple the cost of other rule sets that are written and edited to a professional level.

A rule set should be a clearly defined instruction on how to play a game.
The 40k rule set is JUST a collection of cool ideas that have not been fully developed into a functioning game system.

Technical aspects of game design.
Complete lack of definition in terms of scale of scope of the intended game play.
Complete lack of synergy with the background.
Complete lack of development direction.
Complete commitment to using an unsuitable set of core rules from an ancient rule set GW just abandoned .
Complete focus on boosting short term sales with 'special snowflake rules writing'.

I will not actually refer to unsuitability of the game mechanics and resolution methods used in 40k on an individual basis , as it would take far too long.


I am sure people can co-operate and spend ages fixing all the issues they may have with the books GW plc sell them as a rule set.
And after hours of negotiating and fine tuning arrive at an enjoyable game.

In the same way I could build a serviceable car from a bunch of random scrap car parts, from my local scrap yard.

However, I would not dream of selling a pile of scap parts you could have fun making into a useable car, for the same price as a fully assembled and tested road worthy car from a main dealer.