I attended a local Con this weekend that had a 40K tournament, at 1850 pts. After witnessing the armies duking it out on the battlefield, I'm very glad I didn't get involved in it.
While I imagine the folks playing had fun (or they wouldn't be doing it), the scope of things on the battlefield was personally, a turn-off. I remember one army fielding a Warhound Titan; another was fielding nothing but Tau Riptides (plus a couple Forgeworld variants I wasn't falimiar with); the funniest was the 5-man "Hello Kitty" Knight formation. Another person was running some sort of IG-Genestealer cult with a dozen or so Earthshaker batteries (?!?). A few others were either running drop pod marine lists (5 man squads per pod, about a dozen pods) or Eldar scatbikes (that somehow appeared to be arriving by Deep Strike) - backed up by a Wraithknight.
Looking at the games going on, I now understand why everyone hates regular infantry - the game has turned into a tankfest. It's like Epic in 28mm scale, and with the armies I own and play at home (which are primarily infantry, with 1-2 transports and 1 tank at best), I wouldn't stand a chance against them.
When did this shift to titan-scale armies occur? Has it been due to the points level? Is it because of the release of larger kits? Is it the rules pushing for this sort of upscaled game?
Well its just a biproduct of the hobbie being around for so long, after some what, 30 years? people amass armies quickly.
If GW does not make the shift to small elite armies at large point costs, IE knights, people wont want to get into the hobbie. Thats what happened to fantasy, in order to get into the hobby and play at normal game level you needed to drop 600+ bucks on an army.
This is the result of that same effect but mitigated. You can get into 1850 games, for around 300 bucks if you are running knights or elites.
That's the strange thing - I've been collecting 40K models since Rogue Trader days, and have about 6 or so full armies, but nothing to the extent these folks were trotting out. Of course, I tend to be a "one of everything" kind of guy; I don't have multiple copies of anything "bigger" than a Land Raider, and at best about 3 rhinos/chimeras to my collection.
The shift of accepting more of the big stuff that was previously relegated to things like apocalypse games really started in 6th.
40k still plays fine at the old levels, you just need to be sure you are on the same page of the type of game you want to play with your opponent. The biggest problem I have with 40k these days is that it’s trying to be everything from kill team skirmish to titan scaled apoc battles. So you get the big stuff filtering down into smaller games where IMHO they don’t fit/belong.
But in a tournament, where the gloves are off and the nasty stuff is hitting the table, you should expect to see those sort of things.
In a friendly game where you decide not to trot out the really nasty units/formations, a more old school list can still work.
The hard part is negotiating with your opponent to ensure a fun game for all. Power balance is so out of whack, it’s easy to get a one sided curb stomp, which isn’t really fun for anyone.
Nevelon wrote: The shift of accepting more of the big stuff that was previously relegated to things like apocalypse games really started in 6th.
40k still plays fine at the old levels, you just need to be sure you are on the same page of the type of game you want to play with your opponent. The biggest problem I have with 40k these days is that it’s trying to be everything from kill team skirmish to titan scaled apoc battles. So you get the big stuff filtering down into smaller games where IMHO they don’t fit/belong.
But in a tournament, where the gloves are off and the nasty stuff is hitting the table, you should expect to see those sort of things.
In a friendly game where you decide not to trot out the really nasty units/formations, a more old school list can still work.
The hard part is negotiating with your opponent to ensure a fun game for all. Power balance is so out of whack, it’s easy to get a one sided curb stomp, which isn’t really fun for anyone.
This, i still cringe when i see the following hit the table in non apoc games
Super heavy walkers
Super heavy tanks
GMC
D weapons of anykind
Torrent weapons
Anything larger then an 8 inch blast excluding the orbital bombardment
They just are out of place imo, also the amount of AP on the field is staggering.
As mentioned, it's because they went with "one book for everything" in a way that meant both gloves were off in each and every game. It's meant that people are only playing Apocalypse now, effectively. The idea of this being a "skirmish" game pretty much went away in 6th edition.
If I had to point at a specific moment, I'd have to say it was when Codex: Imperial Knights was released. I mean, there were already lots of issues before that, but this was the moment where "a Superheavy in Every Game" was really born. Also remember that before this, Wraithknights were Monstrous Creatures, not Gargantuan.
I noted this several years ago when the flyers showed up. I was hosted a game at a convention which was also running a 40K tournament. I walked around early in the con when everyone was showing off on display boards --- and I had never seen flyers before. Of the sixty+ people involved, I'd say 45 had flyers on the board...often more than one.
I was blown away. Fast forward a year or two and it became Knights and similarly obscenely large items. It is for this reason I can't think of a way GW can get me back into 40K with a new edition. I frequently think to myself "what would the point be of a normal Imperial Guard squad on today's tabletop...".
Martel732 wrote: Yet the Imperial Knights are less durable than a Riptide.
While that may be true, I don't believe that's when the visual of the game as a "every game is Apocalypse" started. The Riptide was merely one of the drops in the bucket of things that started spiralling out of control. For regular armies, it would devastate anything those armies put out. You needed to field much stronger stuff to take on an army of Riptides. I was very tempted to say that the Farsight Enclaves is where the change happened, as that was the whole idea of the Force Org started going out the window. Since Apocalypse is "just bring everything you have" with no worry about the Force Org chart, and now all games are like that, it was a definite step in that direction.
Elbows wrote: I frequently think to myself "what would the point be of a normal Imperial Guard squad on today's tabletop...".
The level of the game is a huge turn off for me.
As a guard player, I can tell you thst there is no point in having a guard squad. i have essentially turned my back on standard 40k and have instead turned to kill team.
They just release the new KT rules, which is a different way to play at 200pts. There are restrictions on what you can get, and no formations.
In a way there is currently three versions of 40K: skirmish level (with rules that are not really intended for that, but it's not that bad), "normal" level, and apoc.
In the past years, the line between "normal" and apoc started to become very blurry, because as you saw, GMC and superheavies are all over the place, as well as big formations.
Maybe they should introduce an official "small sized battles" level, which would be a single CAD at 1000pts with no GMC/superheavy.
40k has never been meant to be a skirmish scale ONLY. However the most powerful things used to belong their own parts and extensions such apocalypse. The issue today is that they've been shifted to the standart scaled game, like 1500 lets say, starting its real route with the maliciois imperial knights codex. Previously such an amount of point would allow for infantry and a few vehicules, or the other way round few infantrymen and lots of tanks. Nowadays, those gigantic units haven't only been added to scales they're quite messing up, but the most tragic issue has been deleting the organisation chart. As a matter of fact, you would have been limited to say 1 gigantic stuff or even none. Now, the formation system is totally unbalanced as everyone has and still rightly complain, and it allows for an ashaming number of too big guns to get fielded. And may even make them most powerful.
In fact i entirely agree with your . GW conveys the impression of getting jorribly over scaled znd of course' even more expensive. What's more they basiczlly locked the turnaments for casual players: NO OP NO WAY YOU WIN is knd of a new motto by now...
fresus wrote: They just release the new KT rules, which is a different way to play at 200pts. There are restrictions on what you can get, and no formations.
In a way there is currently three versions of 40K: skirmish level (with rules that are not really intended for that, but it's not that bad), "normal" level, and apoc.
In the past years, the line between "normal" and apoc started to become very blurry, because as you saw, GMC and superheavies are all over the place, as well as big formations.
Maybe they should introduce an official "small sized battles" level, which would be a single CAD at 1000pts with no GMC/superheavy.
The focus of such should still be the common troops on each side. I have tried upscaling the HOR ruleset to around 600 points and it actually worked really well due to the squad mechanic that reduces the tedium of moving each model indepently. I suggest you try that out.
Stormonu wrote: I attended a local Con this weekend that had a 40K tournament, at 1850 pts. After witnessing the armies duking it out on the battlefield, I'm very glad I didn't get involved in it.
While I imagine the folks playing had fun (or they wouldn't be doing it), the scope of things on the battlefield was personally, a turn-off. I remember one army fielding a Warhound Titan; another was fielding nothing but Tau Riptides (plus a couple Forgeworld variants I wasn't falimiar with); the funniest was the 5-man "Hello Kitty" Knight formation. Another person was running some sort of IG-Genestealer cult with a dozen or so Earthshaker batteries (?!?). A few others were either running drop pod marine lists (5 man squads per pod, about a dozen pods) or Eldar scatbikes (that somehow appeared to be arriving by Deep Strike) - backed up by a Wraithknight.
Looking at the games going on, I now understand why everyone hates regular infantry - the game has turned into a tankfest. It's like Epic in 28mm scale, and with the armies I own and play at home (which are primarily infantry, with 1-2 transports and 1 tank at best), I wouldn't stand a chance against them.
When did this shift to titan-scale armies occur? Has it been due to the points level? Is it because of the release of larger kits? Is it the rules pushing for this sort of upscaled game?
40k has had scale issues for a while, but it exploded with 7E, where the old FoC that relegated most things to 3 or fewer is no longer a factor and you can basically just bring whatever you want, and restrictions on superheavies were tossed out the window.
7E 40k is trying to do what 3 or 4 other games used to do and roll a skirmish ruleset, a company level wargame, and an Epic scale game into one ruleset, and it just doesnt work terribly well.
40k is in dire need of a major fundamental reboot and split into at least two if not three different scales.
It's called Unbound and is the default setting for playing 40K now. Basically, it's "anything goes" and bring whatever you want to play with. As the baseline for playing 40K like this, there is no advantages or disadvantages. The intent was for newer players or people not interested in collecting a faction to basically be able to play with the models they have. It's also for those narrative campaigns/scenarios like when the Necron's and Blood Angels became bro's to stop a Tyranid invasion. You know, Forging the Narrative.
Tamwulf wrote: It's called Unbound and is the default setting for playing 40K now. Basically, it's "anything goes" and bring whatever you want to play with. As the baseline for playing 40K like this, there is no advantages or disadvantages. The intent was for newer players or people not interested in collecting a faction to basically be able to play with the models they have. It's also for those narrative campaigns/scenarios like when the Necron's and Blood Angels became bro's to stop a Tyranid invasion. You know, Forging the Narrative.
It's the Wild Wild West of Warhammer 40K.
I don't know of any tournament that would allow unbound lists.
A full IK or full Riptide list can very easily be a battleforged list. It's actually part of the problem.
Tamwulf wrote: It's called Unbound and is the default setting for playing 40K now. Basically, it's "anything goes" and bring whatever you want to play with. As the baseline for playing 40K like this, there is no advantages or disadvantages. The intent was for newer players or people not interested in collecting a faction to basically be able to play with the models they have. It's also for those narrative campaigns/scenarios like when the Necron's and Blood Angels became bro's to stop a Tyranid invasion. You know, Forging the Narrative.
It's the Wild Wild West of Warhammer 40K.
I don't know of any tournament that would allow unbound lists.
A full IK or full Riptide list can very easily be a battleforged list. It's actually part of the problem.
In the OP's original description, that's what the tournament was. And places do run Unbound tournaments. I've seen them before, and like I said, it's the Wild Wild West. The annual Ordo Fanatics Club Challenge this year allowed Unbound lists, and it proved very interesting to see what some people brought.
Most people buy into the ITC Rules and therefor never see Unbound games. However, if you go play at a GW store, it's all Unbound. And presumably when the GT's come back next year, they will be Unbound as well.
Depends, GW used to really hammer down on the GT's back in the 90's. They'd issue very arbitrary restrictions on armies. I don't know how they did in the mid 2000's (when did they run the last GW sponsored GT?).
It used to be a point of GW staffers to intentionally make each GT different with list restrictions, to avoid people creating ultra-lists and using them for several years. One year they simply outlawed the Psychic Phase...lol.
If you want an answer on when this all started I'd say the problems started to appear in 5th but didn't get out of control until 6th. New-army-wins syndrome, gun-size/model-size creep, Escalation (the 6e 'take superheavies in normal games!' supplement), and character/ally shenanigans trumping solid cores seem to have grown up slowly since.
The problem is less an intentional 'push new stuff!' plan on GW's part and more an impossibly tight playtest schedule that leads to most of the game getting pushed out the door half done at best.
Hrm, I would disagree with the idea that there are playtest issues. This implies playtesting was every really a big thing for GW, which just isnt true.
Furthermore, its painfully apparent through things like formations and the inclusion of ever larger units, coupled with gobs of rules that are obviously not balanced to even the most casual reader at a first glance (there are some things you dont need to playtest to see that theyre hideously broken, War Convocations, Skyhammer formations, Scatterbikes, etc), that it really is a "push new stuff" thing. It's all about pushing web bundles and big payoff plastic kits.
AnomanderRake wrote: If you want an answer on when this all started I'd say the problems started to appear in 5th but didn't get out of control until 6th. New-army-wins syndrome, gun-size/model-size creep, Escalation (the 6e 'take superheavies in normal games!' supplement), and character/ally shenanigans trumping solid cores seem to have grown up slowly since.
The problem is less an intentional 'push new stuff!' plan on GW's part and more an impossibly tight playtest schedule that leads to most of the game getting pushed out the door half done at best.
Army creep, with the latest being the best, has been around as long as I can remember.
Switching out what’s hot is also a staple of the game. One edition rhino-rush is king, the next transports are deathtraps. Better buy something new to be competitive.
Moving away from the FOC and the addition of allies has compounded the balance problem. It used to be the worst you could spam of any slot was 3. And needed to pay a tax of mediocre units to get that. With formations, you just get the riptide wing. No chaff, pure wheat.
Allies gives you access to a much wider range of good stuff. Not just to shore up the weak points of your own list (like adding some eldar for psychic support in a 6th ed Tau list) but it opens up the door for rules interactions that promote shenanigans and unkillable combo-deathstars. I like them for a thematic POV (hey lets have a handful of space marines supporting a guard list) but the potential for abuse is huge.
“Potential for abuse” sums up a lot of problems with 40k these day, come to think about it. A lot of things individually are not a bad idea, but toss them all into the pool, and things get funky.
Back to the topic of overpowered armies, those in the OP all sound doable as bound lists. Some of them might be counts-as. The cult with the artillery sounds like the chaos renegade guard list. I’m not sure about DSing eldar bikes, but turboboosting in from reserves might look like that to a casual observer, and I’m not up on the corsair or harli rules.
You can probably make a more powerful list via bound armies then unbound. There are enough broken formations, that by leveraging them you can do more harm then just spamming a few good units in an unstructured format.
I speculate (having never been to one) that some of the issue is that you were at a tournament, where I assume the object is to win. Therefore you bring the strongest stuff....
I reserve the right to be told "You just don't understand tournaments" (I don't) and that I've got it all wrong.
Nevelon wrote: ...Army creep, with the latest being the best, has been around as long as I can remember...
Yup. They kept it under control better back in 4th/5th, however. The degree was less excessive (the distance between the top of the pile and the bottom of the pile was smaller) and power didn't fluctuate wildly between releases (these days you have GK, DE, and Orks getting nerfed when they didn't need it, and Eldar and Marines getting buffed when they didn't, exacerbating the problem).
King Pariah wrote: It's the result of the malignant tumors originating from 6th edition known as escalation and formations.
This. 6th edition is when everything got out of hand. 7th dialed it up even more so. So what you are seeing now is years of unregulated power creep. I'd expect 8th edition to be no different sadly unless GW allows someone else to purchase the IP or they clean house over there and get someone at the helm that cares about the hobby.
I would say that it started when 6th came out with flyers and allies. Wraith Knights tilted the scales a little further and the Tau Codex started the avalanche. From there it has been down hill ever since. I gave up on 6th after playing a few games, too many fidly bits and trying to do too much at once. I have watched reports and still occasionally look to see what is going on at the 40K tables in the local shop, but these days I hardly recognize the game. I can still get a game of 5th in every now and then so I am thankful I don't need GW for my 40K fix. It is sad to see the state of things from what it was.
Echoing everyone else here, it happened as we see it today in 6th, thats when the triple whammy of the knight, riptide, and wraithknight appeared. Worst part is that they're all cool models FOR APOCALYPSE. Several players I knew, myself included, would've bought a knight for apocalypse, but didn't buy one as a protest to them being in the regular game (clearly that didn't work )
Other things, like formations, and a general decrease in points per model are to blame as well. For example, most armies have had their prices of their units go down on average. It felt like a sneaky way of GW saying "dang, they refuse to go over 2,000pts... ok screw it make most units cheaper so they just run more models anyways."
Also several formations give out free wargear and weapons. Some, like the skitarii ones, give you so many freebies you can take more pts of upgrades than the unit was base for free. This leads to blatant bloat as well since free models can just be added on.
The only way to get around it is to limit your game size and stick to players you know usually as sad as it is to say. 1,000pts still holds up alright, and kill team should be fun too. We also do a couple of gentleman's agreements that while apocalypse style stuff isnt necessarily banned, you should tell your opponent you want that kind of match well before hand so they can prepare.
Well, i've played against IK, WK, Riptides, Tyranid fmc spam, Daemon FMC spam and while all this stuff is strong, it's not gamebreaking. The IK is probably the most "not too bad to face" out of this bunch.
But keep in mind that i mostly play orks and a heavy bolter is as devastating for me as a d-cannon and a Riptide is as unkillable at range as a predator. So, my pov might get affected by this ork's specific of everything being so crappy that you can't make it worse with a 100-ton robot. A 5-ton was allready deadly enough.
That horrible filth called 6th edition happened right after Matt Ward blew out his crackpipe and Phil Kelly was coming down from a 2 year crank bender.
And, as was standard issue under Kirbys, GW instead of fixing the problem and dialing back the stupidity, they doubled down on it
Don't get me wrong, I've adapted and still love 40k, but I maintain the aforementioned never should have happened.
Honestly you could bery easily point the blame at 5th Edition for being the originator of this trend as it gave us models such as the DE Razorwing, BA & Grey Knight Stormraven, GK Dreadknight, SM Storm Talon, Ork Dakkajet, Burna Bomma & Blitza Bomma, Necron Night & Doom Scythes and Tyranid Trygon & Mawlock.
Matt.Kingsley wrote: Honestly you could bery easily point the blame at 5th Edition for being the originator of this trend as it gave us models such as the DE Razorwing, BA & Grey Knight Stormraven, GK Dreadknight, SM Storm Talon, Ork Dakkajet, Burna Bomma & Blitza Bomma, Necron Night & Doom Scythes and Tyranid Trygon & Mawlock.
IIRC, the Storm Talon, Dakkajet, and some of the bigger Tyranids came out in 6th, not 5th. Also in 5th Flyers were only part of FW, the Razorwing, Stormraven, and Scythes were skimmers back then.
Matt.Kingsley wrote: Honestly you could bery easily point the blame at 5th Edition for being the originator of this trend as it gave us models such as the DE Razorwing, BA & Grey Knight Stormraven, GK Dreadknight, SM Storm Talon, Ork Dakkajet, Burna Bomma & Blitza Bomma, Necron Night & Doom Scythes and Tyranid Trygon & Mawlock.
IIRC, the Storm Talon, Dakkajet, and some of the bigger Tyranids came out in 6th, not 5th. Also in 5th Flyers were only part of FW, the Razorwing, Stormraven, and Scythes were skimmers back then.
Nope, those were all 5th. Admittedly the Storm Talon and Ork Flyers came out close to the very end of the edition and only had rules in WD, but they were still in 5th.
Sure, the flyers were only Fast Skimmers, but they were still tall models with a fairly large foot-print.
Things went out of control in 6th, but is 5th where all started.
In 5th the difference between the top tier and the low tier armies widened (but was lesser than now).
In 5th, the biggest fluff-murders started to appear in the codices, where Hack Kelly wolfed the Wolves, the Talented Mr. Ward blooded the Blood Angels.
In 5th, new bullcrap special snowflake units were added to armies bloating the game and putting it out of control.
In 5th, the limits of what an assault weapon and a heavy weapon can do were destroyed or blended; the Talented mr. Ward went out of his head with the Necron weapons. Or the Crudd"ace" and his pratical Heavy 20 useless bullcrap.
In 6th, those hacks just started to write half-hearted stuff rushed because of the new policy "new crap out all the time". They wrote low powered codices for CSM and DA on the trail of Dark vengeance, before the [anime related word censored] Vetock wrote a tau codex absolutely not on par with the Dark Angels one, and decided that yes, those Riptide models MUST sell out. And we understood that no, GW did not decide to tone down the game, it was Codex Lottery all over again, up to 11.
Other than that, 6th edition is just erratic, and full of pointless stuff like more randumb, random warlord traits, more units or soul blaze. 6th exacerbated what 5th started but its biggest crime was to make the game longer and take away from the players as much planning and skill possible.
Then 7th came, exacerbated all of this even more, with maelstrom mission appreciated because "I want just to roll some dice and chill lol" or because "it helps underdogs" (remember kids, do not ask for things being fixed, just avoid the problem! This lesson will be useful in life! Balance, planning and tactics are out of the windows? NO PROBLEM! Codices and rules will be not fixed, let's just use a system in which victory conditions are random and kills the gameplay of low mobility armies!). And a psychic phase right from WHFB, where it was its biggest problem.
BTW, SpamHammer 40k always existed, but each iteration is worse. How many tactics thread are answered with "just spam X?" And it's what GW wants, because people will buy copies of the same kit
Unit1126PLL wrote: Oh, and as far as army scale goes, my smallest army at 3000 points has 9 models. And I love it.
While I can strongly sympathise with the folks complaining about it, bighammer is *so much fun*. 4k point games with an emphasis on super heavies can and do take less time than a game of kill team
5 knights, 3 BaneXs, 8 flyers and 1 marauder here. Getting tooled up for a 16k pt game soon.
Is this more of an issue for people who have been in the game longer? I started in RT and have ducked in and out a few times, but have played most editions. I love having infantry - not necessarily IG or Ork style hordes, but plenty of marines with a few tanks, rather than loads of vehicles, flyers etc with just the troop/infantry tax. This is purely my preference and I think it's because it's what I started with and therefore what my armies are composed of.
I've recently introduced 3 guys to the game. They're all great guys and really into the game. They don't know the older state of the game so are immediately taking about IK, riptides etc. (one already had 2 flyrants ready for his first game). They're excited by these things and there's nothing wrong with that. The problem is that at some point they'll have to rein it in, or I'll have to crank it up and join the arms race. As we're all pretty reasonable, I'm sure we'll find a compromise.
The problem is that the game is a little skitzophrenic. So for one person it's massive robots, for another it's infantry. It doesn't have to be about points limits. I can field 2000pts without any super heavies and few tanks. I'd like that. But the game allows that to happen against riptide spam, or IK or whatever.
I don't think there's a solution beyond agreeing with your opponent. Although I don't like how it's changed, that doesn't make it wrong. Unfortunately we just have to adapt. If they split into 'classic' and 'apoc' either me or my newly recruited players would still have to compromise.
Unit1126PLL wrote: Oh, and as far as army scale goes, my smallest army at 3000 points has 9 models. And I love it.
While I can strongly sympathise with the folks complaining about it, bighammer is *so much fun*. 4k point games with an emphasis on super heavies can and do take less time than a game of kill team
Yeah, this. I feel like people's resistance to the concept is so overwhelming that they won't give it a chance. 'bighammer' as you say is basically Epic without the awful models, and it's great .
Unit1126PLL wrote: Oh, and as far as army scale goes, my smallest army at 3000 points has 9 models. And I love it.
While I can strongly sympathise with the folks complaining about it, bighammer is *so much fun*. 4k point games with an emphasis on super heavies can and do take less time than a game of kill team
I do not doubt it, but it should happen in a scenario decided in advance only. Now it can happen in a pickup game. I could not have the same superheavy army with me and have 60% of my weapons/units useless.
Whittlesey40k wrote: Is this more of an issue for people who have been in the game longer? I started in RT and have ducked in and out a few times, but have played most editions. I love having infantry - not necessarily IG or Ork style hordes, but plenty of marines with a few tanks, rather than loads of vehicles, flyers etc with just the troop/infantry tax. This is purely my preference and I think it's because it's what I started with and therefore what my armies are composed of.
I've recently introduced 3 guys to the game. They're all great guys and really into the game. They don't know the older state of the game so are immediately taking about IK, riptides etc. (one already had 2 flyrants ready for his first game). They're excited by these things and there's nothing wrong with that. The problem is that at some point they'll have to rein it in, or I'll have to crank it up and join the arms race. As we're all pretty reasonable, I'm sure we'll find a compromise.
The problem is that the game is a little skitzophrenic. So for one person it's massive robots, for another it's infantry. It doesn't have to be about points limits. I can field 2000pts without any super heavies and few tanks. I'd like that. But the game allows that to happen against riptide spam, or IK or whatever.
I don't think there's a solution beyond agreeing with your opponent. Although I don't like how it's changed, that doesn't make it wrong. Unfortunately we just have to adapt. If they split into 'classic' and 'apoc' either me or my newly recruited players would still have to compromise.
I mean, I've been playing since 3rd when I ran the Tank Company list for IG from Chapter Approved. But I've always wanted to run big stuff - as soon as I got a baneblade, I was running it in 3rd. As soon as I got more than 1, I was using the 3-Baneblade scenario from the Battle Missions book in 5th.
Unit1126PLL wrote: Oh, and as far as army scale goes, my smallest army at 3000 points has 9 models. And I love it.
While I can strongly sympathise with the folks complaining about it, bighammer is *so much fun*. 4k point games with an emphasis on super heavies can and do take less time than a game of kill team
I do not doubt it, but it should happen in a scenario decided in advance only. Now it can happen in a pickup game. I could not have the same superheavy army with me and have 60% of my weapons/units useless.
If 60% of your units are useless against, say, a Baneblade company, that's on you. Even the most basic marine squads in my meta have krak grenades to engage the vehicles if they can get close,even if they have nothing else. I mean heck, Leman Russ Tank Companies have existed since 3rd edition in the game, and at least armour-wise aren't really so different from Baneblades.
The rule sets in editions 3 to 5 were really tight. But with the invention of formations and ''unbound'' the whole meta changed. The lists mentioned by the OP could be the final nail in the GW coffin.
Unit1126PLL wrote: Oh, and as far as army scale goes, my smallest army at 3000 points has 9 models. And I love it.
While I can strongly sympathise with the folks complaining about it, bighammer is *so much fun*. 4k point games with an emphasis on super heavies can and do take less time than a game of kill team
I do not doubt it, but it should happen in a scenario decided in advance only. Now it can happen in a pickup game. I could not have the same superheavy army with me and have 60% of my weapons/units useless.
And that's the rub; someone is going to have to make a compromise in advance *anyway* without pre-arrangement, and there's no small amount inertia on the part of the 'SmallHammer' faction - for the quite reasonable justification that big models are expensive and they have other priorities in life.
That's why I sympathise, the SmallHammer faction is gradually being muscled out due to lack of modern relevance, without a meaningful alternative being presented for your $x years invested. Conversely us BigHammers, through no fault of our own, are getting tarred with a hostile powergamer brush when in many cases we just like big models cuz they're fun to build and easy to paint/airbrush.
If 60% of your units are useless against, say, a Baneblade company, that's on you. Even the most basic marine squads in my meta have krak grenades to engage the vehicles if they can get close,even if they have nothing else. I mean heck, Leman Russ Tank Companies have existed since 3rd edition in the game, and at least armour-wise aren't really so different from Baneblades.
Ok, no Aspect Warrior Eldar army + vehicles with 0-1 unit each, carefully collected and painted. You already know what I am going to do instead. It will be fun.
And that's the rub; someone is going to have to make a compromise in advance *anyway* without pre-arrangement, and there's no small amount inertia on the part of the 'SmallHammer' faction - for the quite reasonable justification that big models are expensive and they have other priorities in life.
That's why I sympathise, the SmallHammer faction is gradually being muscled out due to lack of modern relevance, without a meaningful alternative being presented for your $x years invested. Conversely us BigHammers, through no fault of our own, are getting tarred with a hostile powergamer brush when in many cases we just like big models cuz they're fun to build and easy to paint/airbrush.
Is because we are playing 2 different games but GW says is the same game. This is a de facto unhealthy and unscrupulous policy of the company, is borderline fraudulent.
In the OP's original description, that's what the tournament was. And places do run Unbound tournaments. I've seen them before, and like I said, it's the Wild Wild West. The annual Ordo Fanatics Club Challenge this year allowed Unbound lists, and it proved very interesting to see what some people brought.
Most people buy into the ITC Rules and therefor never see Unbound games. However, if you go play at a GW store, it's all Unbound. And presumably when the GT's come back next year, they will be Unbound as well.
Rubbish, all of the armies described can be bound.
All riptides?
All knights?
All scatbikes and wraithknights?
All artillery?
Two warhound at 1800 points?
In the OP's original description, that's what the tournament was. And places do run Unbound tournaments. I've seen them before, and like I said, it's the Wild Wild West. The annual Ordo Fanatics Club Challenge this year allowed Unbound lists, and it proved very interesting to see what some people brought.
Most people buy into the ITC Rules and therefor never see Unbound games. However, if you go play at a GW store, it's all Unbound. And presumably when the GT's come back next year, they will be Unbound as well.
Rubbish, all of the armies described can be bound.
All riptides?
All knights?
All scatbikes and wraithknights?
All artillery?
Two warhound at 1800 points?
All completely possible in bound.
Even if these armies can be bound, it will feel like a different game.
Gw has moved away from forcing players to play a horde army. Most costumers don't enjoy collecting and painting hordes, they enjoy painting and collecting cool stuff.
So GW upscaled the game and rewards playing an elite army/
That just isn't true, the transition from 2nd to 3rd marked a big shift away from being a skirmish games. 2K marine armies in 3rd were 50-60 guys with transports plus multiple tanks, etc. That is not a skirmish game.
There needs to two official rule sets, skirmish/small force level and then the grand size bring anything (formerly apocalypse) level. I also think the rules could be tailored to each of the games.
Huron black heart wrote: There needs to two official rule sets, skirmish/small force level and then the grand size bring anything (formerly apocalypse) level. I also think the rules could be tailored to each of the games.
I think this is the motivation behind the Killteam release.
If 60% of your units are useless against, say, a Baneblade company, that's on you. Even the most basic marine squads in my meta have krak grenades to engage the vehicles if they can get close,even if they have nothing else. I mean heck, Leman Russ Tank Companies have existed since 3rd edition in the game, and at least armour-wise aren't really so different from Baneblades.
Ok, no Aspect Warrior Eldar army + vehicles with 0-1 unit each, carefully collected and painted. You already know what I am going to do instead. It will be fun.
For one of us.
See the problem?
How did you deal with Leman Russ tank companies in 3rd, 4th, 5th, and 6th?
Huron black heart wrote: There needs to two official rule sets, skirmish/small force level and then the grand size bring anything (formerly apocalypse) level. I also think the rules could be tailored to each of the games.
We already have had this distinction. I wish the tight rulle set of 5th ed (or something similar) back for games up to 2000 pts. Then at a larger scale, starting with 2000 pts, the game could be of apocalypse type with super heavies and whatnot.
King Pariah wrote: It's the result of the malignant tumors originating from 6th edition known as escalation and formations.
This is pretty much it. The game has gotten to the point where you take infantry only as a "tax", and the main part of your force are big things.
Unless you're playing Guard. Good luck leaving the infantry at home, especially when faced with crap like the Skyhammer Annihilation Force or other such nonsense.
How did you deal with Leman Russ tank companies in 3rd, 4th, 5th, and 6th?
Never had personal experience in 3rd. IIRC, was a White Dwarf list circumscribed to the guard, at least in 3rd.
Later , I was the tanks, I had a veterans plus tanks guard in 5th, but I had to stop because I moved.
And correct me if I am wrong, but then even glances could destroy a tank. And assault tanks was easier.
And 3 Leman russ are not 1 super-heavy, we discussed this to death.
Assaulting tanks was harder. Glances could in 3rd and 4th but could not in 5th and 6th. And 3 tanks is absolutely equal to one superheavy for the price - we may have discussed this but I don't think I ever agreed with this premise.
I think this is the motivation behind the Killteam release.
I thikn there should be a middle ground behind Kill Team and Apocalypse.
Why? If people want to bring an IG infantry company, they should also be able to bring other IG company types. If people want to bring an IG infantry squad, then play KT.
So what is the problem with 3 Baneblades vs 10 Russes? Is Av12 really that much worse than AV11?
Look as an example at the targeting, what you can shoot if you shoot artillery, the likelihood of disable a weapon, and so on.
Now do not misunderstand me - I would happily play against 3 Baneblades (and yes, the models ARE indeed very good), I just need to be prepared and there is way,way worse out there.
But IMHO it kills many pickup games and damages the hobby the way GW handles it. and the solution is not simple - you could "fix" it with special rules but this could lead to dilution of the flavour of units and roles (fast attack/heavy support, assault/heavy) and increase the bloat.
Why? If people want to bring an IG infantry company, they should also be able to bring other IG company types. If people want to bring an IG infantry squad, then play KT.
let's just say that skewing is detrimental in general.
They are forcing the scale of the games on us with the formations in the codexes.
I wanted to get some Wraithguard and a Wraithlord into the Eldar Warhost I have, but the only way to do that is with a Wraithknight. There are no formations with Wraith units that do not have the knight. The only way is to add a CAD or ally them in, or go unbound of course.
The problem now is that you either have to find a like minded opponent (good luck) or have to try and match what they bring. Unless that is, your willing to be heavily beaten.
I don't particularly like super heavies, gigantic creatures or D-weapons and would be happy to play my games without them. Many players do like them and I don't expect to have to try and force my opinion on them. If there was a pre set restriction in place by way of different levels of aggression, (defcon 1, 2 and 3 for example) I can at least offer a game without trying to sound like I'm tailoring a game to my own preferences.
I'm perhaps sounding a bit hypocritical I know.
Skinnereal wrote: They are forcing the scale of the games on us with the formations in the codexes.
I wanted to get some Wraithguard and a Wraithlord into the Eldar Warhost I have, but the only way to do that is with a Wraithknight. There are no formations with Wraith units that do not have the knight. The only way is to add a CAD or ally them in, or go unbound of course.
Its the problem of GW letting their "marketing" influence the rules design and not focusing on good gameplay. The "Decurions" for the Orks having 6 units of boyz with the mob rule version that only really works with large blobs or the guard core that has 170 guardsmen at a minimum is trying to push these massive armies onto the player base but has no regard that their bloated rules make massive games take zogging forever to play. If its not unwieldy number of models then its big stompy stuff that is expensive in both points and dollars. Sometimes they get it right with stuff like the Tau Hunter Contingent/Cadre which is incredibly flexible and fun but its adding powerful rules to an already powerful army.
The Dread Mob in the Ghazz Supplement is extremely restrictive in how many dreads and kans you can take while forcing you to take one of the Orkanauts which is generally considered a bad unit and overpriced in terms of dollars when compared to the Stompa. If they didn't try to push the Gorkanaut on every formation then they might see some uptick in sales of their Deffdreads and Killa Kans if they offered a Kan/Dread formation.
Elbows wrote: I see we've now escalated to "I have superheavies...you should just play killteam..."
Grand.
I wonder when it will become "I have my Mega-Titan costume and enjoy walking on the table and stomping on models... you should just play whatever".
Super-heavies and gargantuan creatures are just out of place in a 28mm scale, 180x120 gaming table. I don't mind apocalypse nor escalation, but those things should have never been brought to regular 40k. Wanna play with your big toys? Fine, just do it in an appropiate environment.
malamis wrote: I'm rather attached to BigHammer & SmallHammer, so as a suggestion:
Kill team: as it is
SmallHammer: <2k pts, 1 CAD & up to 1 Ally, no detachments, limit of 1 flyer OR LoW (6th, basically)
BigHammer: 40k as written
I think SmallHammer would actually be an interesting tournament format.
Cool concept but the game balance is still gak while having an ally still allows for things like Dark Angel Thunder Stars. Eldar, Tau, Space Wolves, and Daemons will still be fully capable of dominating while the lack of formations would be detrimental to armies like Dark Eldar, Orks, CSM, Guard, etc.
Also 1 Flyer OR LoW? How is a flyer even remotely in the same ballpark as a LoW. Even some of the better flyers like the Vulture isn't nearly as disruptive to the game as things like Knights, WK, Stormsurge, etc.
There is no quick and dirty solution to 40k's problem as its a mixture of the BRB and individual codexes that throw game balance out the window.
Unit1126PLL wrote: How did you deal with Leman Russ tank companies in 3rd, 4th, 5th, and 6th?
Armoured companies in 3rd? They were definitely a sight to behold! However, the way vehicles worked in 3rd also made them riskier (as was everything in 3rd - the game's rules were sometimes just as deadly as your opponent).
First, there were no hull points. If you penned a tank, you have a 50/50 shot of destroying it (4-6). A roll of 3 destroyed a weapon, and a roll of 2 immobilized it. That's a lot of potentially very bad stuff! Even a roll of 1 would make it unable to move or shoot on its next turn (Crew Stunned). Even glancing hits were no picnic. They got their own table too, though only a 6 destroyed the tank. 5 was weapon destroyed, 4 was immobilized, 3 was stunned, and 2 and 1 were Shaken (couldn't shoot, but could still move... or was it the other way around...). Most people took "Extra Armour" on everything because it allowed you to ignore the Shaken result, or otherwise reduced a Stunned to a Shaken. In effect, the game had a bit of the opposite problem - for Imperial armies, the Autocannon was seen as useless, and the Lascannon was king. Being able to reliable penetrate vehicle armour to get those bigger effects was the name of the game against vehicles.
As such, most armies had ways of dealing with an Armoured Company, though it was definitely a tough nut to crack. Generally, you had to start hitting their side armours in order to not be rolling against AV14 all day - going head to head just wasn't something you could rely on. Only Fire Dragons, Tyranid Carnifexes (all Monstrous Creatures had Armourbane in those days, but hit whatever armour they attacked on), and Tau Railguns stood a chance against that front armour consistently enough for it to matter. If you're wondering why so many Lascannons cost so many points, this was the edition that did it. Imperial Guard Weapons Teams with tons of Lascannon shots each turn could wipe out nearly any vehicle on the table quickly.
Here's the things from each army that were effective against Armoured Companies:
Tyranids: Warp Blast (was just a shooting attack, and a Ld test made it the S10, AP1, Lance that you now know it as), Hive Tyrants (Armourbane, better if hitting sides or rear), Carnifexes. GENESTEALERS (could run + charge, and penetration rolls of 6 allowed you to roll an additional D6 - not just a D3). Note, Tyranid Monstrous Creatures could upgrade to 2+ saves, making the basic Battlecannon nearly worthless against them.
Imperial Guard: Lascannons. All the Lascannons. Plus their own tanks.
Space Marines: Likely the reason people complained, Space Marines didn't have a great way to tackle these. Drop Pods were only introduced towards the end of 3rd edition, and were Forge World only. Outside of this, Space Marines were trying to Infiltrate units close by with meltas, deep striking Assault Marines (risky, due to pie plates, but a 5-man squad with a melta cost less than the tank they might kill), deep striking Land Speeders with meltas, and deep striking terminators with Cyclone Missile Launchers. It wasn't a sure thing, and deep strike mishaps were a lot more dangerous than they are now, making it a risky play - but rewarding. Popping a few tanks would quickly turn the tides against an Armoured Company.
Eldar: Did the Eldar thing. The ACTUAL Eldar thing. They used psychic powers to mask and hide and give cover saves to stuff, used advanced tech and positioning with their skimmers to force Glancing Hits (and then reduce those Glancing Hits to null results), and used powerful Bright Lances to make the max armour of these tanks AV12 to pop them, assuming they weren't already hitting side armour. Wraithlords were tough enough to survive a while against the tanks, but not all game long. Eldar were the only folks with Haywire grenades, which were still quite effective at turning vehicles into useless armour boxes (lots of glancing hits would eventually immobilize them and strip them of their guns), and Fire Dragons in a Falcon were always a force.
Dark Eldar: Take everything I just said about the Eldar's weapons, but replace psychic powers with insane levels of speed.
Tau: They were really the new kids on the block when released in 3rd. Hammerheads and Crisis Suits were the way to go, supported by Broadside suits. Railguns were what was needed, and smart use of move-shoot-move with the suits could keep the big guns from slaughtering the suits. Again, Deep Strike & Melta was a major contributor.
Orks: Throw boyz at 'em! Nobz with Power Klaws would rip them apart, and keeping your models spread out reduced the impact of so many large blast templates to the point that they didn't really kill enough. If you wanted to have other kinds of fun, Tank Bustas rolling up in a Battlewagon was also an option, Zzap guns auto-hit but dealt random Strength damage (making them good, but unreliable), and Warbikes were fast enough to get the jump on a tank.
Sisters: Hey, they were a real force back then with a Codex and everything! Litanies of Faith could keep the sisters alive, as having an Inv save for a turn was much better than what Space Marines could do. Again, meltas were the name of the game for them, as they mostly still are now. The vehicle that could shoot d6 Krak Missile each turn was actually considered very strong. The Inquisitors that could be purchased alongside the sisters could also bring some of that zany weaponry with them, and assassins.
Chaos Space Marines: As I'm sure you've heard, the Chaos Space Marine codex in 3rd (technically in 3.5) was OP. Generally, speaking though, you could take lots of vehicles that had some extra layers of protection to pop a couple, the Defiler was able to Run & charge to sprint across the field and into combat, Obliterators were armed with very powerful guns same as now, and there were lots of tricks to set up the Chaos Space Marines in extra-good/extra-evil ways.
Necrons: Their big return started in 3rd, but their model line was far thinner. You either tried to glance them out with Gauss (though, as stated, this was harder to do back then unless you just got a lucky hit), or the Monolith would devastate stuff (AV14 all around, and it ignored all the special rules of everything, making it very very very difficult to kill). Also, the C'tan, while slow enough to keep away from, would wreck the tanks if they got too close (which wasn't easy, and moving and shooting with tanks was far more difficult).
Grey Knights: Depending on how many Demolishers the Armoured Company had, Grey Knight Terminators may or may not have been the answer. Definitely was a tricky match for them, but their psychic powers could save the day.
malamis wrote: I'm rather attached to BigHammer & SmallHammer, so as a suggestion:
Kill team: as it is
SmallHammer: <2k pts, 1 CAD & up to 1 Ally, no detachments, limit of 1 flyer OR LoW (6th, basically)
BigHammer: 40k as written
I think SmallHammer would actually be an interesting tournament format.
Cool concept but the game balance is still gak while having an ally still allows for things like Dark Angel Thunder Stars. Eldar, Tau, Space Wolves, and Daemons will still be fully capable of dominating while the lack of formations would be detrimental to armies like Dark Eldar, Orks, CSM, Guard, etc.
Also 1 Flyer OR LoW? How is a flyer even remotely in the same ballpark as a LoW. Even some of the better flyers like the Vulture isn't nearly as disruptive to the game as things like Knights, WK, Stormsurge, etc.
There is no quick and dirty solution to 40k's problem as its a mixture of the BRB and individual codexes that throw game balance out the window.
I quite agree there isn't an easy way to solve the overarching issues of independent design concepts being mashed together into a single product (we're still arguing over OpenGL and DirectX in IT for example), but what GW should have provided is a baseline of expectations - what they apparently did with the general's handbook for AoS. What we all want, I think, is an easy way to make pickup games easy and satisfying, since Apoc will generally be with people you know, or organised through the venue that's hosting.
To the other points, a flyer is in the same ballpark (at the low end admittedly) as LOW because it has portable invisibility, and invisibility in that format is not a given any more - no conclaves and 2+ casts. Eldar still dominate because they have unfettered access to the best options in nearly everything, but that, i'd suggest, is a codex design issue and not a army structure issue. This way though at least they'd be working within the same structure as the rest which did damp down the power levels a *bit* back when it applied. There will still be bad matchups under SmallHammer to be sure, but there would at least be a point in playing them instead of 3+ Wraithknights and auto-porting Wraithguard.
As an aside, IG do genuinely benefit from CaD only, because the cost to qualify for it is either practically negligible, or a genuine army asset and it hinders the majority of their 'hard' matchups. That and the majority of their formations are of trivial value unless heavily exploited.
Limiting flyers I can see for the same reasons as super heavies.
They promote rock/paper/scissor play.
One of anything is OK. A TAC should be able to handle it. I have no problems with a single flyer, or a single Imperial knight/baneblade/etc. (just talking about the "reasonable” LoW type stuff here.) But once the spamming starts, even if you have the tools to deal with one of something, can you deal with 3+? Especially when some of the tools you need work poorly vs. everything else (AA).
I’m not saying we need to rigidly enforce WD battle report style army lists (One of everything!), but as the game drifts towards the extremes, the RPS-style of game play become more evident. I’d rather see battle determined on the table, then at the list building stage.
Nevelon wrote: Limiting flyers I can see for the same reasons as super heavies.
They promote rock/paper/scissor play.
One of anything is OK. A TAC should be able to handle it. I have no problems with a single flyer, or a single Imperial knight/baneblade/etc. (just talking about the "reasonable” LoW type stuff here.) But once the spamming starts, even if you have the tools to deal with one of something, can you deal with 3+? Especially when some of the tools you need work poorly vs. everything else (AA).
I’m not saying we need to rigidly enforce WD battle report style army lists (One of everything!), but as the game drifts towards the extremes, the RPS-style of game play become more evident. I’d rather see battle determined on the table, then at the list building stage.
Once, both WHFB and 40k had units, for balance and flavour, that had a "0-1" tag (rarely 0-2). This gave you tools and avoided spamming.
But people complained. And GW did see a way to sell more models, and the evil limitations started to have exceptions, generally for flavour, again.
An example of this is the night lords in 3.5 CSM: they did lose a lot of stuff compared to Black Legion, but removed the 0-1 for the raptors.
But this was not enough for the greedy GW - because this mindset, still rooted in the concept that a list is interesting not only for what has access to, but even for what has not access to, still limits the impulse buy.
Once, both WHFB and 40k had units, for balance and flavour, that had a "0-1" tag (rarely 0-2). This gave you tools and avoided spamming.
But people complained. And GW did see a way to sell more models, and the evil limitations started to have exceptions, generally for flavour, again.
An example of this is the night lords in 3.5 CSM: they did lose a lot of stuff compared to Black Legion, but removed the 0-1 for the raptors.
But this was not enough for the greedy GW - because this mindset, still rooted in the concept that a list is interesting not only for what has access to, but even for what has not access to, still limits the impulse buy.
Flash forward now.
Yup. And special characters used to require your opponent’s permission to field. But all those pesky restrictions on what you could field impacted sales. I’d love to see a return of that kind of limits, but frankly I think that genie is out of the bottle, and nothing can get it back in.
I do think the rules guys need to step on the marketing people a little bit though. Things like the fact that every eldar bike kit comes with the options to make a heavy weapon does not mean that every one in an army list should be allowed to. If we want to have a game worth playing, there needs to be some checks and balances.
Elbows wrote: I noted this several years ago when the flyers showed up. I was hosted a game at a convention which was also running a 40K tournament. I walked around early in the con when everyone was showing off on display boards --- and I had never seen flyers before. Of the sixty+ people involved, I'd say 45 had flyers on the board...often more than one.
I was blown away. Fast forward a year or two and it became Knights and similarly obscenely large items. It is for this reason I can't think of a way GW can get me back into 40K with a new edition. I frequently think to myself "what would the point be of a normal Imperial Guard squad on today's tabletop...".
The level of the game is a huge turn off for me.
There hasn't been a point to having normal Imperial Guard squads(or Imperial Guard as a faction in general) for at least two editions now.
The old Armored Company lists were pretty easy to deal with. Very slow, easy to lock down and suppress with older edition damage tables, really the only edition they ever worked halfway competently in was 5th and by then their rules were out of date and didnt get a proper update until 6E when the core rules slammed tanks again.
Looking at a hyper-competitive tournament and judging that the entire game is now irredeemably ruined because people use extreme strategies in tournaments...yawn.
Ever seen a Warmahordes tournament? Armies that bring enormous swathes of LOS blocking terrain vs armies that buff all their models up to nigh-invulnerable levels of durability vs armies that can sprint half the board and one-shot casters. Just because previously, 40k could only muster up a list that spams the most powerful units available and couldn't stack rules and allies to create a true skew list, doesn't mean that skew lists existing mean the game is "dead."
Yes, it is possible to create far more powerful gamed-up lists than in previous editions. It is also more easy to create armies with a very cool theme throughout. In 5th, people wanted to be able to play their chapter, their theme, weird armies like Genestealers Harlequins and Admech, and they had to just fake it.
the_scotsman wrote: Looking at a hyper-competitive tournament and judging that the entire game is now irredeemably ruined because people use extreme strategies in tournaments...yawn.
The problem, which has plagued every edition, is that such lists dont stay in tournaments, and casual play for leagues or pickup gaming has become something of a nightmare to sort out.
Yes, it is possible to create far more powerful gamed-up lists than in previous editions. It is also more easy to create armies with a very cool theme throughout. In 5th, people wanted to be able to play their chapter, their theme, weird armies like Genestealers Harlequins and Admech, and they had to just fake it.
I dont think anyone has an issue with seeing genestealer cults back or AdMech finally introduced. What people have issues with is the way GW seemingly goes out of their way to half ass these releases and then push insanely overpowered stuff while allowing and incentivizing stupid army builds that are either completely divorced from the background material outside of the most forcibly contrived fantasies, or horribly broken, or commonly both.
Yes, it is possible to create far more powerful gamed-up lists than in previous editions. It is also more easy to create armies with a very cool theme throughout. In 5th, people wanted to be able to play their chapter, their theme, weird armies like Genestealers Harlequins and Admech, and they had to just fake it.
The fact that is easier and easier to screw-up the game with a certain army combination is a good reason to be mad or at least concerned.
Furthermore, none says that genestealer cult is not awesome. But if you add formations and minidex, at the very least, you add them in a well thought manner without skyhammers, or tempestus lacking of half of the needed tools and with 5 units, 4 of which have been errataed like 4 days later (sign of complete disregard for the customer, lazyness, tight time schedule, underpaid workers, and other bad stuff).
Want to add units? And campaigns? Good. Release ONE book every long time, with loads of units, better rules, and better fluff because for each faction the authors would write just few thing and would be encouraged to do not spam grimderp Scheiße (again, tempestus, part of the fluff is really cringeworthy).
Think about Admech. I love admech, the aesthetic and so on. But WHY in the name of the Omnissiah is in 2 books if not for money-grabbing?
And this, conseidering what they add. Because other factions have the codex written as we were in 5th edition. CSM? The guard? The guard codex in 6th looked like a nice tuning down for 5th edition guard. One, almost two, editions too late.This is, at best, sloppy.
Oh christ the Tempestus book was awful. It basically read like "Hostel Hogwarts". How anyone thought that was good enough to submit to an editor, much less be approved, printed and sold, is beyond me.
And to cap ot all off...despite being raised in such a place, Stormtroopers are still the same Ld as basic putz Guardsmen
In what way is gw "pushing" the kind of extreme builds you see at tournaments? When was the last time any bit of GW promotional material featured even an unbound army much less something like flyramts and riptides?
Gw doesn't push overpowered models. They just don't care about competitive balance. A company that wanted to push new stuff by making it op would never shoot themselves in the foot with stuff like Electropriests, Sicarians, the Deathwatch rules from DWO, the Harlequins release immediately followed by the eldar release, etc
If the releases being good or being garbage seems largely arbitrary (which it is) it's better and more reasonable to assume balance isn't taken into account at all and gw is just sitting in their studio playing basic fluffy armies like we see in every one of their batreps.
the_scotsman wrote: In what way is gw "pushing" the kind of extreme builds you see at tournaments? When was the last time any bit of GW promotional material featured even an unbound army much less something like flyramts and riptides?
Gw doesn't push overpowered models. They just don't care about competitive balance. A company that wanted to push new stuff by making it op would never shoot themselves in the foot with stuff like Electropriests, Sicarians, the Deathwatch rules from DWO, the Harlequins release immediately followed by the eldar release, etc
If the releases being good or being garbage seems largely arbitrary (which it is) it's better and more reasonable to assume balance isn't taken into account at all and gw is just sitting in their studio playing basic fluffy armies like we see in every one of their batreps.
Did we talk about turnament exclusively? Do not think so. With Unit1126PLLMade in gb and Malamis we discussed abuout the fact that we like 2 different warhammers.
And if GW is stupid, instead of evil, does not make the problem lesser. It makes it worse actually: you can smite or redeem evil, but stupidity is the stronger force in the universe.
malamis wrote: I'm rather attached to BigHammer & SmallHammer, so as a suggestion:
Kill team: as it is
SmallHammer: <2k pts, 1 CAD & up to 1 Ally, no detachments, limit of 1 flyer OR LoW (6th, basically)
BigHammer: 40k as written
I think SmallHammer would actually be an interesting tournament format.
Nailed it.
I'd have nothing against some formations in SmallHammer, but without changing up rules and formations the above is spot on.
No one is forbidden from playing with the units they have/like, but you're also less likely to get an unbalanced game.
Of course, BigHammer is just Apoc and SmallHammer is 'classic' 40k, so we're just renaming what we previously had.
This is exactly the kind of tournaments that I run at my FLGS.
1850 points. CAD + Allied Detachment. That's generally it. Sometimes we let a LoW come in at a points limit. Sometimes we let in a single formation with a points limit. It's created a fairly good environment.
the_scotsman wrote: In what way is gw "pushing" the kind of extreme builds you see at tournaments? When was the last time any bit of GW promotional material featured even an unbound army much less something like flyramts and riptides?
Formations that give tons of freebjes for taking a clutch of Riptides? Formations that require one to buy 3 different books (for what should ostensibly one army) to field but then grt literally hundreds of points of free upgrades, wargear and special rules, particularly the War Convocation. Rules available only through webstore sales bundles that allow for Deep Strike Assault and Relentless heavy wrapons usage from Drop Pod units. Jetbike rules that allow evety model to take a heavy weapon just because the kit comes with them on the sprue. Need I go on?
Yes GW pushes a lot of stinkers too, as you noted, and those are their own issues that but in general GW is certainly making available a tremendous number of tools to break the game with a heavy sales emphasis. That GW doesnt take into account balance at all, resulting in many OP and UP units is probably a good call on many accounts, but there are also clear instances of them introducing things that clearly are powerful and designed to move product.
the_scotsman wrote: In what way is gw "pushing" the kind of extreme builds you see at tournaments? When was the last time any bit of GW promotional material featured even an unbound army much less something like flyramts and riptides?
Formations that give tons of freebjes for taking a clutch of Riptides?
Sure, the Riptide Wing is ridiculous...but fun fact:
None of the Tau big detachments can actually take it as part of them! The only way to field a Riptide Wing is with no way for it to get bonuses from the Detachments.
Formations that require one to buy 3 different books (for what should ostensibly one army) to field but then grt literally hundreds of points of free upgrades, wargear and special rules, particularly the War Convocation.
The fact that Skitarii upgrades were expensive to begin with be damned, I guess...
25 points for a Transauranic Arqebus? 30 points for a Plasma Caliver?
And that is not even taking into consideration the fact that the Skitarii portion of the War Convocation is incredibly restrictive. One unit of Rangers, one unit of Vanguard, one unit of Infiltrators, one unit of Ruststalkers, one unit of Onagers, and one unit of either Dragoons or Ironstriders.
So sure, a War Convocation can get "hundreds of points of free upgrades"...while basically being able to only really pick and choose the rest of the army by using the Cult Mechanicus bits.
Rules available only through webstore sales bundles that allow for Deep Strike Assault and Relentless heavy wrapons usage from Drop Pod units.
"Angels of Death" supplement contains those rules now, just so you know. I wouldn't be surprised to see the War Convocation coming in a Warzone featuring Skitarii/Cult Mechanicus.
Jetbike rules that allow every model to take a heavy weapon just because the kit comes with them on the sprue. Need I go on?
I've actually had a theory about this for awhile. They weren't intending on them being strictly Guardian Wind Riders, but rather they were going to have an option for a "Veteran" Wind Rider unit featuring more options for specials. Like the difference between Veteran Guardsmen and standard Guardsmen or Kabalite Trueborn and Kabalite Warriors.
the_scotsman wrote: Gw doesn't push overpowered models. They just don't care about competitive balance.
I think its a little bit of both. Take the recent IG Taurox release for example. Is it really coincidence that the point cost of the chimera increased dramatically this edition with the arrival of the Taurox which shares the same role and comes in almost 23% cheaper? GW knows most IG players already own Chimeras. So to incentivize players to purchase Taurox, they price chimeras out of the market. At their current cost, its just absurd to field them. I still do out of spite, and will never purchase a Taurox.
I completely agree that they do not care about competitive balance. Half the codices are not even viable in a competitive format. Point costs are all over the place. Half the units in almost every codex are never fielded, due to outrageous point costs, poor rules. Most of the codices warlord traits are awful. There is little to no reasons to follow CAD/bonus is trivial. RNG on top of RNG on top of RNG that impacts nearly every faucet of the game now where you might as well save yourself the trouble of setting up anything and just flip a coin. All of these factors combined make the existing ruleset pretty unplayable outside of niche gaming groups that houserule almost everything.
the_scotsman wrote: In what way is gw "pushing" the kind of extreme builds you see at tournaments? When was the last time any bit of GW promotional material featured even an unbound army much less something like flyramts and riptides?
Formations that give tons of freebjes for taking a clutch of Riptides?
Sure, the Riptide Wing is ridiculous...but fun fact:
None of the Tau big detachments can actually take it as part of them! The only way to field a Riptide Wing is with no way for it to get bonuses from the Detachments.
Sure, but that doesnt mean that it's any less ridiculous, just not as ridiculous as it otherwise could have been. The option to spam the big expensive plastic kit and get bonuses for doing so is there either way
Formations that require one to buy 3 different books (for what should ostensibly one army) to field but then grt literally hundreds of points of free upgrades, wargear and special rules, particularly the War Convocation.
The fact that Skitarii upgrades were expensive to begin with be damned, I guess...
25 points for a Transauranic Arqebus? 30 points for a Plasma Caliver?
30pts for an Assault 3 18" S7 AP2 nigh impossible to miss with weapon (due to Skitarii army rules) that could effectively ignore most Overheats due to rerolls was not too ridiculous. That the formation also removes Gets Hot to boot on top doesnt help things
And that is not even taking into consideration the fact that the Skitarii portion of the War Convocation is incredibly restrictive. One unit of Rangers, one unit of Vanguard, one unit of Infiltrators, one unit of Ruststalkers, one unit of Onagers, and one unit of either Dragoons or Ironstriders.
So sure, a War Convocation can get "hundreds of points of free upgrades"...while basically being able to only really pick and choose the rest of the army by using the Cult Mechanicus bits.
that doesnt mean its not hugely abusive and powerful, it just means its going to be cookie cutter is all. The first time I played against one it was my 1850pt IG vs an 1850py WC that effectively was playing with like 2300 or 2400pts once all the special rules and free wargear was factored in. The game was predictably stilted.
Rules available only through webstore sales bundles that allow for Deep Strike Assault and Relentless heavy wrapons usage from Drop Pod units.
"Angels of Death" supplement contains those rules now, just so you know.
Ah I missed that. That said, I'm not sure thats any better. Making them an exclusive web bundle item then rereleasing it a year or more later to drive new book sales is pretty cheeky
I wouldn't be surprised to see the War Convocation coming in a Warzone featuring Skitarii/Cult Mechanicus.
Entirely possible, sure.
Jetbike rules that allow every model to take a heavy weapon just because the kit comes with them on the sprue. Need I go on?
I've actually had a theory about this for awhile. They weren't intending on them being strictly Guardian Wind Riders, but rather they were going to have an option for a "Veteran" Wind Rider unit featuring more options for specials. Like the difference between Veteran Guardsmen and standard Guardsmen or Kabalite Trueborn and Kabalite Warriors.
An interesting theory, and would make for a more interesting play option , but I think the simpler explanation was they just fit everything on one sprue so they didnt have to include the second HW sprue and then just gave every model the option since they all came with it.
That just isn't true, the transition from 2nd to 3rd marked a big shift away from being a skirmish games. 2K marine armies in 3rd were 50-60 guys with transports plus multiple tanks, etc. That is not a skirmish
In fact i wanted to write its never been a skirmish game only but well tiping with a pad is not that easy as far as im concerned
the_scotsman wrote: In what way is gw "pushing" the kind of extreme builds you see at tournaments? When was the last time any bit of GW promotional material featured even an unbound army much less something like flyramts and riptides?
Formations that give tons of freebjes for taking a clutch of Riptides?
Sure, the Riptide Wing is ridiculous...but fun fact:
None of the Tau big detachments can actually take it as part of them! The only way to field a Riptide Wing is with no way for it to get bonuses from the Detachments.
Sure, but that doesnt mean that it's any less ridiculous, just not as ridiculous as it otherwise could have been. The option to spam the big expensive plastic kit and get bonuses for doing so is there either way
*shrug* Just calling it like I see it. The only real thing that they did was make it so that a Riptide Wing can be an army in and of itself.
Formations that require one to buy 3 different books (for what should ostensibly one army) to field but then grt literally hundreds of points of free upgrades, wargear and special rules, particularly the War Convocation.
The fact that Skitarii upgrades were expensive to begin with be damned, I guess...
25 points for a Transauranic Arqebus? 30 points for a Plasma Caliver?
30pts for an Assault 3 18" S7 AP2 nigh impossible to miss with weapon (due to Skitarii army rules) that could effectively ignore most Overheats due to rerolls was not too ridiculous. That the formation also removes Gets Hot to boot on top doesnt help things
Skitarii army rules are once per turn, once per game.
The formation removing Gets Hot is great, but it should tell you that those are the only times Skitarii players really seem to go for that weapon as the Arc Rifle dominates it otherwise. And my poor Arqebus is just looked at for cool factor...
And that is not even taking into consideration the fact that the Skitarii portion of the War Convocation is incredibly restrictive. One unit of Rangers, one unit of Vanguard, one unit of Infiltrators, one unit of Ruststalkers, one unit of Onagers, and one unit of either Dragoons or Ironstriders.
So sure, a War Convocation can get "hundreds of points of free upgrades"...while basically being able to only really pick and choose the rest of the army by using the Cult Mechanicus bits.
that doesnt mean its not hugely abusive and powerful, it just means its going to be cookie cutter is all. The first time I played against one it was my 1850pt IG vs an 1850py WC that effectively was playing with like 2300 or 2400pts once all the special rules and free wargear was factored in. The game was predictably stilted.
Okay, and?
It still doesn't change the fact that a lot of that stuff is stupidly costed to start with.
Rules available only through webstore sales bundles that allow for Deep Strike Assault and Relentless heavy wrapons usage from Drop Pod units.
"Angels of Death" supplement contains those rules now, just so you know.
Ah I missed that. That said, I'm not sure thats any better. Making them an exclusive web bundle item then rereleasing it a year or more later to drive new book sales is pretty cheeky
Truthfully, the book would have sold fine well without it. It contained all the existing supplemental material, ranging from Kauyon's White Scars and Raven Guard stuff to the IF/IH stuff, along with some new Salamanders stuff and some new Detachments/formations.
For $33.
I wouldn't be surprised to see the War Convocation coming in a Warzone featuring Skitarii/Cult Mechanicus.
Entirely possible, sure.
More than possible, it seems like they want to make sure that stuff gets out into the wild now.
Jetbike rules that allow every model to take a heavy weapon just because the kit comes with them on the sprue. Need I go on?
I've actually had a theory about this for awhile. They weren't intending on them being strictly Guardian Wind Riders, but rather they were going to have an option for a "Veteran" Wind Rider unit featuring more options for specials. Like the difference between Veteran Guardsmen and standard Guardsmen or Kabalite Trueborn and Kabalite Warriors.
An interesting theory, and would make for a more interesting play option , but I think the simpler explanation was they just fit everything on one sprue so they didnt have to include the second HW sprue and then just gave every model the option since they all came with it.
*shrug* Like I said, it's a theory I've been ruminating over.
The original Apocalypse release happened way back in 2007 (around 4th edition).
If you want to look anywhere to blame for formations, this and the supplement is what started it.
Back then, it was a huge success, there were formation bundles that were a good deal, booming revenue for GW.
Then it's update / re-release 2013 (around 6th edition in 2012).
2014 with 7th edition just formalized where they were heading: make the big games part of official rules rather than a separate system.
It is funny how Kill Team is a separate rule set like Apocalypse was when it used to be part of the main rulebook.
If there was anything to point a finger to for official combining armies it would have been the "Daemon Hunters" codex around 3rd edition (2003).
It allowed having allies of SM or IG/AM from their respective codices in an Inquisition list.
The 6th edition BRB came up with the unholy alliances list and 7th just blew the doors open with unbound.
So yeah, it is all free and clear, remember that Forgeworld rules are valid as well!
You know, if I wanted to field my daemon / necron army: I can!
Slanesh daemons teaming up with Eldar? Why not!
What happened is that any hope to balance or enforce that armies sit within a certain narrative is out the window and I am unsure where GW can go from here.
Titans were available in 2nd edition, but only through Armorcast and almost nobody ran them. They were reasonably costed in points and you still had to abide by the 50% or less of your army consisting of support units.
I don't understand detachments and formations, but the idea of any army receiving anything for free is pretty stupid to me, considering the only vague form of game balance introduced by GW is the points system (here's a point system...aaaaaand...throw it out the window).
They're trying way too hard to make too many models/units/armies and trying even harder to make them hugely different than each other. Within the confines of what is (at its core) a very thin game system. Add to that the beginnings of sales struggles and a large impetus at moving more plastic and then current situation was inevitable.
Talizvar wrote: ...If there was anything to point a finger to for official combining armies it would have been the "Daemon Hunters" codex around 3rd edition (2003)...
Give me back my standalone Daemonhunters book so I don't have to use four Codexes to field my collection and I'll stop using Allies.
Allies were also a thing possible in 2E, but in a far more limited form, they had greater limitations than what we see now. The Daemonhunters allies rules were extremely restrictive in function as well. The issue isnt so much with the concept of allies, but in the way GW has executed that concept by basically going "yeah just take whatever you want in whatever quantities, nothing really matters, it'll all work together just fine" whereas previously it was more "yeah you can take like 4 units from a couple specific factions, and you have to load up on Troops first and we're limiting the good stuff".
Titans were available in 2nd edition, but only through Armorcast and almost nobody ran them. They were reasonably costed in points and you still had to abide by the 50% or less of your army consisting of support units.
And right now, you need to abide by the rule of your army having access to a Lord of War(whether as part of a Combined Arms Detachment, a unique Force Organizational Chart that has LoW, or a large detachment that features a Superheavy element as an option) or you're going Unbound.
So either you play the way a normal FOC goes or you're losing your benefits of playing that normal way.
I don't understand detachments and formations
How do you not understand Detachments?
They have pretty specific guidelines.
Combined Arms Detachment:
1 HQ 2 Troops
Optional HQ Optional 4 Troops
Optional 3 Elites, Fast Attack, and Heavy Supports
Allied Detachment:
1 HQ 1 Troops
Optional 1 Troop, Elite, Fast Attack, and Heavy Support.
The big "Megadetachments" made up of formations break things down in a similar fashion, dependent upon book
Command, Core, and Auxiliary
but the idea of any army receiving anything for free is pretty stupid to me, considering the only vague form of game balance introduced by GW is the points system (here's a point system...aaaaaand...throw it out the window).
There are very few things out there that grant anything truly "for free". The Marines and free transport one in the Gladius is pretty much the Big One, but even that is really restrictive.
You're looking at 6 Tactical Squads, 2 Infantry based Heavy Supports, 2 Infantry based Elites, and 2 Infantry or Bike based Fast Attacks along with a Captain and a Chaplain being necessary in order to unlock that benefit.
You get the Dedicated Transports for those squads within the Formation labelled "Battle Demi-Company"(Razorback, Rhino, or Drop Pods) at no points cost but any and all upgrades to them cost you.
There's a similar formation for Space Wolves in Fenris Warzone, but it is restricted to free upgrades to the vehicles instead of the vehicles themselves.
They're trying way too hard to make too many models/units/armies and trying even harder to make them hugely different than each other. Within the confines of what is (at its core) a very thin game system. Add to that the beginnings of sales struggles and a large impetus at moving more plastic and then current situation was inevitable.
Why does this always seems to be the statement coming from the "Back in my day..." crowd?
You don't even know what you're really talking about and yet you can claim to know why it was being done?
Lets be fair, it took most regular players 6 months to almost a year to really get 7E's detachment and formation rules down, most people did nit immediately or intuitively grasp them, theyre the single most convoluted and complicated army construction rules I can think of for any tabletop game out there by far.
Vaktathi wrote: Lets be fair, it took most regular players 6 months to almost a year to really get 7E's detachment and formation rules down, most people did nit immediately or intuitively grasp them, theyre the single most convoluted and complicated army construction rules I can think of for any tabletop game out there by far.
Oh please.
If you had a basic understanding of the way the FOC worked before, it absolutely was not difficult for someone to understand the way the Detachment system worked.
Formations, sure that's a different story...but Formations also weren't exceedingly widespread.
You don't even know what you're really talking about and yet you can claim to know why it was being done?
Yep, sure do. Been around GW since the mid-90s. Don't currently play 40K, don't need to. Was friends with numerous store and region GW employees when the shifts came to the company around 3rd-4th edition. It's incredibly obvious to see the huge changes to the game/the sales approach, the books and model count etc. It's even easier to break down the game system and its components and why you have a lot of the struggles you do. Sorry if any of this offends your all-knowing sensibilities.
but in a highly limiting way.
I felt it was more a carryover from Rogetrader than anything else.
Titans were available in 2nd edition, but only through Armorcast and almost nobody ran them. They were reasonably costed in points and you still had to abide by the 50% or less of your army consisting of support units.
Again somewhat limited.
I still have my "Cannon of Khorn" from those days.
Spoiler:
I don't understand detachments and formations, but the idea of any army receiving anything for free is pretty stupid to me, considering the only vague form of game balance introduced by GW is the points system (here's a point system...aaaaaand...throw it out the window).
They always toyed with the idea of a combined unit would be worth more than the sum of it's parts.
The three vindicators combining their shots into one big Apocalypse blast was an interesting "perk".
Free transports and things become a Monty Haul when some perks would have sufficed.
The case could be easily made that many models were not appropriately costed in points for what they do anyway.
They're trying way too hard to make too many models/units/armies and trying even harder to make them hugely different than each other. Within the confines of what is (at its core) a very thin game system. Add to that the beginnings of sales struggles and a large impetus at moving more plastic and then current situation was inevitable.
Armies tended to be more balanced in their own way but had an overarching flavor to them.
Now due to allies, entire armies can fill the classic role of HQ, Elites, Fast Attack etc.
They can specialize.
Please excuse me as I try to put together an army of daemons to field with my Grey Knights and watch people's heads explode.
Vaktathi wrote: Lets be fair, it took most regular players 6 months to almost a year to really get 7E's detachment and formation rules down, most people did nit immediately or intuitively grasp them, theyre the single most convoluted and complicated army construction rules I can think of for any tabletop game out there by far.
Oh please.
If you had a basic understanding of the way the FOC worked before, it absolutely was not difficult for someone to understand the way the Detachment system worked.
Formations, sure that's a different story...but Formations also weren't exceedingly widespread.
Whether or not they're easy for you is besides the point. Empircally, people have issues with them. I know I have one friend whom I've had to describe the rules on detachments probably over a dozen times. He's only just know understanding it, and he finally understood now why he shouldn't be calling a CAD attached to his formation an "allied detachment". Once you understand it, it clicks, and perhaps it makes sense for new folks getting into the game even, but a lot of returning players get very confused because the core army composition of the game from the rest of the history of the game they can remember was "1 HQ, 2 Troops, and then I build from there..."
Vaktathi wrote: Lets be fair, it took most regular players 6 months to almost a year to really get 7E's detachment and formation rules down, most people did nit immediately or intuitively grasp them, theyre the single most convoluted and complicated army construction rules I can think of for any tabletop game out there by far.
Oh please.
If you had a basic understanding of the way the FOC worked before, it absolutely was not difficult for someone to understand the way the Detachment system worked.
Formations, sure that's a different story...but Formations also weren't exceedingly widespread.
its easy to understand the CAD, since that was the old FOC, but then dealing with multiple detachments, allied detachments, fortification detachments, etc could all get really very confusing. The idea that you could run a SMCAD, an IG allied detachment, and an Eldar CAD, or a GK Nemesis Strike Force detachment with an INQ allied detachment and a Tyranid CAD with a Fortification detachment to boot, all as one legal army, took a while to sink in. That was not something the entire community picked up on right away, and something I still routinely see people having issues with, because it is really overcomplex and vague.
You don't even know what you're really talking about and yet you can claim to know why it was being done?
Yep, sure do. Been around GW since the mid-90s. Don't currently play 40K, don't need to. Was friends with numerous store and region GW employees when the shifts came to the company around 3rd-4th edition. It's incredibly obvious to see the huge changes to the game/the sales approach, the books and model count etc. It's even easier to break down the game system and its components and why you have a lot of the struggles you do. Sorry if any of this offends your all-knowing sensibilities.
You realize that 3rd and 4th edition were how long ago now?
And you try to act as though I'm the one behaving as though I am "all-knowing".
You are trying to act as the all-knowing. Which is why I'm enjoying poking you with a stick.
3rd edition was the basis for the way all editions through 7th have run. They're just continually re-hashed and edited. It was also the start of the corporate era, the introduction of the new armies and the slow creep toward the size of armies and models you see now. Like it or not that was the genesis for where we've ended up today.
I'm not sure what exactly you're trying to argue about, but if you think 40K is a good game, good for you. The rest of us are discussing why the changes have occurred for better or for worse.
Vaktathi wrote: Lets be fair, it took most regular players 6 months to almost a year to really get 7E's detachment and formation rules down, most people did nit immediately or intuitively grasp them, theyre the single most convoluted and complicated army construction rules I can think of for any tabletop game out there by far.
Oh please.
If you had a basic understanding of the way the FOC worked before, it absolutely was not difficult for someone to understand the way the Detachment system worked.
Formations, sure that's a different story...but Formations also weren't exceedingly widespread.
Whether or not they're easy for you is besides the point. Empircally, people have issues with them. I know I have one friend whom I've had to describe the rules on detachments probably over a dozen times. He's only just know understanding it, and he finally understood now why he shouldn't be calling a CAD attached to his formation an "allied detachment". Once you understand it, it clicks, and perhaps it makes sense for new folks getting into the game even, but a lot of returning players get very confused because the core army composition of the game from the rest of the history of the game they can remember was "1 HQ, 2 Troops, and then I build from there..."
I've got that friend too. And it took me a bit as well, I understood the CAD just fine when I started in January, but other detachments took me a bit, mostly the Decurion-style ones, because I didn't know they even existed, since my first codex didn't have one.
Vaktathi wrote: Lets be fair, it took most regular players 6 months to almost a year to really get 7E's detachment and formation rules down, most people did nit immediately or intuitively grasp them, theyre the single most convoluted and complicated army construction rules I can think of for any tabletop game out there by far.
Oh please.
If you had a basic understanding of the way the FOC worked before, it absolutely was not difficult for someone to understand the way the Detachment system worked.
Formations, sure that's a different story...but Formations also weren't exceedingly widespread.
Whether or not they're easy for you is besides the point. Empircally, people have issues with them. I know I have one friend whom I've had to describe the rules on detachments probably over a dozen times. He's only just know understanding it, and he finally understood now why he shouldn't be calling a CAD attached to his formation an "allied detachment". Once you understand it, it clicks, and perhaps it makes sense for new folks getting into the game even, but a lot of returning players get very confused because the core army composition of the game from the rest of the history of the game they can remember was "1 HQ, 2 Troops, and then I build from there..."
I've got that friend too. And it took me a bit as well, I understood the CAD just fine when I started in January, but other detachments took me a bit, mostly the Decurion-style ones, because I didn't know they even existed, since my first codex didn't have one.
We have a guy whos been in the hobby since like 2nd, and even he still needs to remember that formations are a thing, The CAD was so ingranded in his understanding of the game for so long, he forgets that you dont need to follow it anymore.
Apocalypse rules and formations came along when GW was trying to push for a bigger game, i.e. sell more models. The first few editions had the flaw that players wouldn't need to buy much when they already own a full CAD.
The new rules, formations, decurions, and titans of 7th are meant for a much larger scale game than what players are bringing them for. The game wasn't made with balance or tournament play in mind yet players will use every excuse to field their quintuple Knight formation as acceptable use. Really, the only that's changed is the community.
GW still encourages the old troops and transports style of play. The special super detachments include hoards of troops as possible core choices. You can still field formations from them that are primarily troops too. It's the players that are choosing to take the minimum troop tax and field three Wraithknights instead. These decisions aren't exactly encouraged or supported by the fluff despite being technically permitted by the rules. The game now allows for diverse battles unrestricted from what they once were and players are milking it for all its worth.
The new Traitor's Hate book has core Chaos Warbands with plenty of troop choices. Yet you'll still see people taking the bare minimum just to field 6 sorcerers or some gimmick formation for their deathstars. None of the screenshots or fluff in the book are about five chaos imperial knights stomping their way through an army of riptides.
Apocalypse rules and formations came along when GW was trying to push for a bigger game, i.e. sell more models. The first few editions had the flaw that players wouldn't need to buy much when they already own a full CAD.
The new rules, formations, decurions, and titans of 7th are meant for a much larger scale game than what players are bringing them for. The game wasn't made with balance or tournament play in mind yet players will use every excuse to field their quintuple Knight formation as acceptable use. Really, the only that's changed is the community.
GW still encourages the old troops and transports style of play. The special super detachments include hoards of troops as possible core choices. You can still field formations from them that are primarily troops too. It's the players that are choosing to take the minimum troop tax and field three Wraithknights instead. These decisions aren't exactly encouraged or supported by the fluff despite being technically permitted by the rules. The game now allows for diverse battles unrestricted from what they once were and players are milking it for all its worth.
Hrm, this is driven by the game rules however. There's no point to bringing great masses of infantry when they cannot perform. No matter how many guardsmen I put on a table, they're not going to break a TWC deathstar or kill Necron Wraiths (or Necron anything really) or defeat an army of Knights and they'll just be slaughtered without recourse. GW has written rules and designed units that make traditional infantry troops largely pointless for many if not most armies.
That players adapt to that in the ways they do is simple human nature. People will do what is rewarded and avoid that which is punished. That's not rocket science, other games manage this issue, GW chooses not to.
This isnt new, armies taking two five man tac squads as their only troops were the standard for many 3E and 4E armies, the issue is the scale of gap GW has introduced.
Vaktathi wrote: Hrm, this is driven by the game rules however. There's no point to bringing great masses of infantry when they cannot perform. No matter how many guardsmen I put on a table, they're not going to break a TWC deathstar or kill Necron Wraiths (or Necron anything really) or defeat an army of Knights and they'll just be slaughtered without recourse. GW has written rules and designed units that make traditional infantry troops largely pointless for many if not most armies.
That players adapt to that in the ways they do is simple human nature. People will do what is rewarded and avoid that which is punished. That's not rocket science, other games manage this issue, GW chooses not to.
This isnt new, armies taking two five man tac squads as their only troops were the standard for many 3E and 4E armies, the issue is the scale of gap GW has introduced.
I think this is due to the players not grasping that scale is a thing. They're playing 1850 battles and do they bring something of appropriate scale? No. They bring something that absolutely demolishes any standard 1850 army. A trio of Wraithknights or a TWC deathstar is far less scary when it's merely a single cog in a massive war machine. Kyu's right, Apocalypse is the style of these new rules yet they're being used for ordinary skirmishes. That's ultimately a player decision just as whether or not to use Unbound is. Modified rules or nerfing Invisibility are common player decisions too and it just supports the idea that this game is ours to do with what we choose to do.
It's not uncommon now to hear of stores banning formations from competitive play purely to attempt to restore the CAD to its original function and pull away from these giant mechas. Debatable whether it works but short of rewriting the rules entirely there aren't many ways to force people to take a complement of infantry nowadays.
It's a player decision, but one driven by the product GW designs. 40k is the only game I've ever seen blame players for massive balance issues. Yeah its not nice to bring a Decurion list to stomp the poor thematic CSM army, but if GW really wanted to stop that, they would have written different rules to prevent such forces becoming disproportionately powerful. Every other tabletop wargame gets that. If you allow people to be jerks, then they will be jerks, at least some of them. This is game design 101 stuff. Hell, not even all of it is Apoc level stuff, theres nothing about something like a TWC deathstar or Wraiths that relies on anything from an Apocalypse level, GW has simoly allowed the scale of resiliency and killing power to explode even at these otherwise "mundane" levels.
Yes, some places put house rules in, but these vary wildly and are massively inconsistent in application. That said, if people are having to introduce house rules on a wide scale, thats usually an indication that the rules were written poorly and others are having to do GW's work for them and rewrite them, as opposed to thete being something fundamentally wrong with the playerbase.
Kinda like the recent Wells Fargo thing. Yeah tons of employees were doing scummy stuff...but it wasnt an issue with the employees being fundamentally scummy, it was what they had to do to keep their jobs based on rules and directives from management. Same thing with 40k, people like winning, and hate losing, and will bring what they are allowed to achieve wins and avoid losses.
Elbows wrote:I noted this several years ago when the flyers showed up. I was hosted a game at a convention which was also running a 40K tournament. I walked around early in the con when everyone was showing off on display boards --- and I had never seen flyers before. Of the sixty+ people involved, I'd say 45 had flyers on the board...often more than one.
I was blown away. Fast forward a year or two and it became Knights and similarly obscenely large items. It is for this reason I can't think of a way GW can get me back into 40K with a new edition. I frequently think to myself "what would the point be of a normal Imperial Guard squad on today's tabletop...".
The level of the game is a huge turn off for me.
And this is specifically why I've gone back to 3rd Edition.
Vaktathi wrote: It's a player decision, but one driven by the product GW designs. 40k is the only game I've ever seen blame players for massive balance issues.
This. I have many hobbies and play several tabletop games. 40k is the only game I play where the playerbase is constantly attacked for the massive balance issues that exist. When the people writing the rules don't give one iota of care about competitive balance is it really any wonder that when players meet across the table that there is none? I can't think of another hobby I am involved in, that requires as much preparation and negotiation before a game than 40k does just to create a remotely balanced scenario where the outcome isn't decided before deployment.
If players are permitted to bring titans in 1000 pt games, you can be certain there will be one. If players are allowed to take formations/decurion that gives them hundreds of free points in units above what their opponent is fielding, you can be certain they will do it. Is this the players fault? Maybe, or perhaps GW shouldn't allow it to happen in the first place.
Ultimately the underlying cause of almost all of 40k's problems right now is at the codex level. Point costs, what should be the balancing measure in the game are all over the place. Two codices with nearly identical units often see point cost differences in the double, sometimes triple digits. When disparities such as this exist there can be no hope for balance.
I wonder if they've made any progress on point-costing units. They freely admitted back in the early editions that there was no mathematical approach to creating the cost of a unit (this article mentioned an Ork vehicle I believe). They said they simply played four or five games and had a discussion on how much they believed the unit should be worth.
Something tells me this is still occurring. I find this odd when you have a game which is based on a stat-line, which offers up a silver platter of creating a formula for unit costs.
This is all due to the horrible, horrible decision when GW switched gears late 4th edition/ early 5th edition, where they started prioritizing their bottom line over the Customer.
While I won't get into the details of this slow transition over the course of almost a decade now, it should be pretty obvious the game is trying to be something it's not. The one fact I keep repeating is that D-Weapons, Superheavies and Gargantuan Creatures shouldn't exist in the core rulebook. Those rules, by their very definition, exists to break the system 40k was set for (with D-Weapons being the literal definition of "up to 11", since it's quite literally a "Strength 11" weapon).
I blame Apocalypse for all of this, since that's when most of this stuff started leaking into "mainstream" 40k; before that the casual players I know of didn't even know what superheavy rules were or what vehicles had that rule. The concept of fielding an army composed of more than one faction was also alien (not unheard of, but it was usually done as a special-occasion thing, not the norm). And of course formations didn't exist at all.
What followed was GW's own pricing issues pushing newbies away; with them clamping down on cheap retailers, raising prices and making their store managers aggressively push product instead of doing intro games and events, it made the game extremely inaccessible to newbies. With no newbies joining in, they only had one source of revenue: the oldbloods. But you can't sell an oldblood the same tank he already has probably 9 copies of, so the only solution is to lower the point cost, nerf what he has while buffing the newest kit no one can possibly have before the next codex update, and allowing you to legitimately field multiple factions within an army. This means that existing players who wanted to use their collection will HAVE to pay each edition to keep up or be left in the dust. And of course any existing unit of use generally are only useful because they're cheap, so now you have incentive to go buy more of those models to fill up the points that one of them use to. Necron Immortals and warriors are the biggest offenders here; while Immortals lost one point of toughness and warriors got a weaker save, they got dramatically cheaper (Immortals use to be 28 points a piece, while Warriors were 18. That's about a 1/3rd of a price drop. And Immortals weren't overcosted at the time either).
This ended up not being enough to prop up the company, as it's unsustainable; the same people can only pay so much before they leave, so GW was trying to squeeze the same profit out of a slowly depleting fanbase. Which is why we have price hikes; they first started with incremental price hikes each year on existing product. When that backfired, they started updating products with higher prices instead, which is why they had even more incentive to push newer sets. Which are generally big vehicles (like flyers) or monsters because even if they're the same point-to-dollar ratio as any other set, the actual amount of money you drop on one is substantial (Yes, people plan out their purchases so in theory this shouldn't matter, but when the only option you have is to drop a huge amount or drop none at all, it pushes up your overall planned purchases as well.).
Scale in the game was smashed to sell bigger and better miniatures and models. So units that suited a 6mm or 10mm game were shoehorned into a 28mm game. Losing Epic didn't help as players now had no outlet for lots of cool units they knew existed in the setting.
Take Battletech. For a standard Assault Mech rocking in at 2000 BV (battle value) an opponent could field in the region of twenty 30-man platoons - such platoons could be mechanised or on bikes as well. So one Mech in points cost is equal to in the region of 600 infantry with heavy weapons support and organic transport for all those men. Mech sized/power units in 40K are worth a fraction of that. It simply isn't possible to counter their power level with ordinary units in a 28mm scale game.
Elbows wrote: I find this odd when you have a game which is based on a stat-line, which offers up a silver platter of creating a formula for unit costs.
RT had that, waayyy back, being an RPG crossover game.
If you wanted to give a costed model an extra point in WS, it would cost X amount. There were points for almost every stat, ability and every piece of wargear.
Since then, it has been the finger-in-the-air method of costing models and units. 25 points for any Imperial model to get a power fist, despite the model's S value, the wargear being swapped out, or the reasons why the character being represented should have it.
Oh, and to boost sales of that kit.
niall78 wrote: --snip--Mech sized/power units in 40K are worth a fraction of that. It simply isn't possible to counter their power level with ordinary units in a 28mm scale game.
That does depend significantly on what you call 'ordinary' units, haywire skitarii/warp spiders do appear as core troops in many arrangements, but the gist of your statement is correct. Equivalent point of Guardsmen and in some cases marines don't really stand a chance in a 1-1 comparison.
Unit1126PLL wrote: If people want to bring an IG infantry squad, then play KT.
Wow. So 40K has basically reached the point of "oh you old guys want to use your old models, well this isn't your game anymore". This is why I will stick with 5th at least back then nobody told us to take our models an play a different game.
niall78 wrote: --snip--Mech sized/power units in 40K are worth a fraction of that. It simply isn't possible to counter their power level with ordinary units in a 28mm scale game.
That does depend significantly on what you call 'ordinary' units, haywire skitarii/warp spiders do appear as core troops in many arrangements, but the gist of your statement is correct. Equivalent point of Guardsmen and in some cases marines don't really stand a chance in a 1-1 comparison.
Again scale plays a part - in 6mm Battletech any platoon of infantry can potentially damage a Mech. In 40K many basic units can't touch the big stuff. Their 28mm personal weapons can't take on 6mm city killing units. Many Epic players would remember the power of some of the units that have creeped into 40K - many of these could kill half a company of grunts or level a 20 story tower block in one turn. You can't represent that power level in a 28mm game - especially a D6 game like 40K - and expect any form of balance to remain.
What can be done? Frankly I don't know at this stage. Players have spent millions between them on these units over the years and will want to play them. Maybe a complete rewrite of the rules based on 2D6 or D100 to add more granularity to the rules. Even then - in my opinion - gigantic 6mm scale units have no place on a 28mm board.
40K these days is trying for Battletech or Dropzone Commander scale fights in 28mm. Madness for everyone involved.
Nevelon wrote: Limiting flyers I can see for the same reasons as super heavies.
They promote rock/paper/scissor play.
One of anything is OK. A TAC should be able to handle it. I have no problems with a single flyer, or a single Imperial knight/baneblade/etc. (just talking about the "reasonable” LoW type stuff here.) But once the spamming starts, even if you have the tools to deal with one of something, can you deal with 3+? Especially when some of the tools you need work poorly vs. everything else (AA).
I’m not saying we need to rigidly enforce WD battle report style army lists (One of everything!), but as the game drifts towards the extremes, the RPS-style of game play become more evident. I’d rather see battle determined on the table, then at the list building stage.
Once, both WHFB and 40k had units, for balance and flavour, that had a "0-1" tag (rarely 0-2). This gave you tools and avoided spamming.
But people complained. And GW did see a way to sell more models, and the evil limitations started to have exceptions, generally for flavour, again.
An example of this is the night lords in 3.5 CSM: they did lose a lot of stuff compared to Black Legion, but removed the 0-1 for the raptors.
But this was not enough for the greedy GW - because this mindset, still rooted in the concept that a list is interesting not only for what has access to, but even for what has not access to, still limits the impulse buy.
Flash forward now.
It's not just greed. 0-1 have bad side effect of being UNSCALABLE. You have one unit whether it's 500, 1000, 1500 or 5000 pts game. That's bad game design. It basically leads to game only really working at one point level.
I think this is the motivation behind the Killteam release.
I think there should be a middle ground behind Kill Team and Apocalypse.
Agreed, imo, killteam is garbage (40k ruleset just doesn't work well for a skirmish game) and I don't want to play godzila vs megatron. My idea of 40k is armies composed mostly of troops units. Sadly, it seems like it's less and less the case.
The thing is GW has always written crappie rules and then said it's on the players to take responsibility. While I agree that is the wrong approach to game Design This is the approach they have been doing pretty much forever. I remember white dwarf articles specifically say if you took a minimum of troops and then a lot of the elite choices, this was for Fantasy back in 5th edition I want to say, you were not playing in the correct Spirit of the game even though you were legally allowed to do so by the rules. That is how they operate they will not balance the game because it is assumed by default that you and your opponent are talking about what would make a fun game or as they put it now Forge the narrative, and decide for yourself so you don't have any anti-air I will not bring a flyer because it would unbalance the game or you have nothing that can deal with my Imperial Knight so it's staying out of this. So yes in a way it is on the players because the assumption is that the players are talking among themselves to balance what the rules will not do to allow maximum flexibility.
Warhammer is not and has never been the type of game like war machine or infinity or what-have-you where it's just a question of how many points. It has always been the default assumption that game is going to be as flexible as possible and it is on you to impose restrictions, and the problem with their heads is most players especially in pickup game culture are lazy and don't want to even discuss anything with their opponent Beyond want an1850 point game, ok let's deploy.
Do not get me wrong I do not think their approach to game design is a good thing but I feel that it works if you have people that understand it and this is why gaming clubs and actually having a community rather than a bunch of random people who go to the same game shop is so important for a game like Warhammer.
EDIT: Going to expand this thought a bit more. Warhammer has always been a "social game". Now by virtue of requiring an opponent, all wargames are social games to some extent, but Warhammer has always been much more. It's never been the type of game where you just go down to a game store and play, even when that was more feasible than now (i.e. prior editions) it was never really the intention. Warhammer has always been the type of social game more akin to historical gaming, where you actually talk about a specific scenario/mission with a "narrative" story (never had to be complex, could have been as simple as "Space Marines are assaulting an Ork stronghold" or "Eldar are attacking an Imperial Guard convoy") and then make decisions on army construction and the like based on that, with an eye towards having an enjoyable game. For evidence of this just look at basically any White Dwarf battle report ever, but especially the older issues. There almost always was a little fluff blurb about a battle, and often the choices taken were because they made thematic sense to the battle not because they were the most optimal choices. The army lists were always designed to be as unrestrictive as possible (this is part of the reason we no longer see 0-1 choices in the actual army lists) to allow for the most of potential scenarios (and the studio has even said on occasion that it can be fun sometimes to do something like an entire army versus a superheavy as a scenario), and then shift the onus of what's acceptable or not to the players. But the issue here comes when you have competitive-minded players that immediately look for what is "best" without regard for the army background or theme for their force (and often don't even bother with such things) because they are approaching it as a competition and not a collaborative experience.
Again, I'm not trying to defend this. I think it's absolutely gakky game design to not do any balance and then say it's on the players, but I honestly feel that Warhammer requires a completely different approach to gaming than virtually any other wargame (for good or ill) short of oldschool historical wargaming (i.e. not the modern ones like Bolt Action that are still made to be fairly balanced for competitive games, I mean like old 70s-80s Napoleonic type games that had little or no balance and required forethought) in how you approach it. Points and balance are essentially a bone thrown; look at General's Handbook as an example of this. The points are clearly intended as a rough estimate/guideline, yet some take it as gospel when GW doesn't even bother with it; the latest White Dwarf has a AoS batrep using a special scenario, and they basically say they both agreed to take like 4-5 heroes, about 10 units but the Chaos guy can take a couple more because he's defending a fortress. Yet you don't really see min-maxed armies among them, even though if you ask players here you'll get the answer of well without points, what's to stop you from taking nothing but X and Y because they are better? The answer is because you're not playing a game just to win, you're playing to have an interesting game that can tell a story, so you purposely don't take nothing but X and Y.
That's always been how Warhammer is meant to be played and I will be completely honest I do feel that some of the responsibility (not necessarily "blame") falls on the players for not wanting to engage in fostering a community, but basically want what is the real life equivalent to a matchmaking service you see in MOBAs and other online gaming, where it matches you with a random opponent to simply have a game, rather than immerse yourself in the story and background. When I see people who play armies with only the "best" units, or who decry what should be basic choices as a "tax" to get the good stuff, or who really don't care one lick why they are fighting their opponent or why the battlefield is set up the way it is, I can't help but feel that they are doing something wrong and not enjoying the game, because Warhammer can and should be so much more than simply making the "best" 1850 point list you can and playing it against a random person who also just happens to have an 1850 point army.
And that makes me sad because I know I'll never get to experience the game the way it's meant to be :(
Nevelon wrote: Limiting flyers I can see for the same reasons as super heavies.
They promote rock/paper/scissor play.
One of anything is OK. A TAC should be able to handle it. I have no problems with a single flyer, or a single Imperial knight/baneblade/etc. (just talking about the "reasonable” LoW type stuff here.) But once the spamming starts, even if you have the tools to deal with one of something, can you deal with 3+? Especially when some of the tools you need work poorly vs. everything else (AA).
I’m not saying we need to rigidly enforce WD battle report style army lists (One of everything!), but as the game drifts towards the extremes, the RPS-style of game play become more evident. I’d rather see battle determined on the table, then at the list building stage.
Once, both WHFB and 40k had units, for balance and flavour, that had a "0-1" tag (rarely 0-2). This gave you tools and avoided spamming.
But people complained. And GW did see a way to sell more models, and the evil limitations started to have exceptions, generally for flavour, again.
An example of this is the night lords in 3.5 CSM: they did lose a lot of stuff compared to Black Legion, but removed the 0-1 for the raptors.
But this was not enough for the greedy GW - because this mindset, still rooted in the concept that a list is interesting not only for what has access to, but even for what has not access to, still limits the impulse buy.
Flash forward now.
It's not just greed. 0-1 have bad side effect of being UNSCALABLE. You have one unit whether it's 500, 1000, 1500 or 5000 pts game. That's bad game design. It basically leads to game only really working at one point level.
This is a fair point - but for that, is enough to scale in the way 6th introduced (1 FOC every 2000) and say that a 0-1 can be taken per FOC. Leave heavy stuff like LOW 0-1.
WayneTheGame wrote: The thing is GW has always written crappie rules and then said it's on the players to take responsibility. While I agree that is the wrong approach to game Design This is the approach they have been doing pretty much forever. I remember white dwarf articles specifically say if you took a minimum of troops and then a lot of the elite choices, this was for Fantasy back in 5th edition I want to say, you were not playing in the correct Spirit of the game even though you were legally allowed to do so by the rules. That is how they operate they will not balance the game because it is assumed by default that you and your opponent are talking about what would make a fun game or as they put it now Forge the narrative, and decide for yourself so you don't have any anti-air I will not bring a flyer because it would unbalance the game or you have nothing that can deal with my Imperial Knight so it's staying out of this. So yes in a way it is on the players because the assumption is that the players are talking among themselves to balance what the rules will not do to allow maximum flexibility.
Warhammer is not and has never been the type of game like war machine or infinity or what-have-you where it's just a question of how many points. It has always been the default assumption that game is going to be as flexible as possible and it is on you to impose restrictions, and the problem with their heads is most players especially in pickup game culture are lazy and don't want to even discuss anything with their opponent Beyond want an1850 point game, ok let's deploy.
Do not get me wrong I do not think their approach to game design is a good thing but I feel that it works if you have people that understand it and this is why gaming clubs and actually having a community rather than a bunch of random people who go to the same game shop is so important for a game like Warhammer.
I quite agree with what your saying but the issue sometimes becomes less about players trying to break the game by exploiting rules (wolf star and super friends lists in general) but just outright the way they write their rules. Decurion alone is extremely strong as is Canoptek Harvest which is 100% following the rules as written and not even trying to power game. The rules/points for the Wraithknight are incredibly undercosted and yet GW published it (along with all the potentially OP Eldar rules) while being fully aware that this codex is replacing the 6th edition Eldar codex that was basically defined by broken gak like Wave Serpent spam. GW's rules writing is so laughably bad that its amazing that a company who's entire business model is to produce content for a game is unable to have a shred of common sense when it comes to making rules or even learn from their past mistakes. I don't expect StarCraft level of game balance but the spectrum of rules power is so wide that it feels like the different ends are playing entirely different games.
WayneTheGame wrote: The thing is GW has always written crappie rules and then said it's on the players to take responsibility. While I agree that is the wrong approach to game Design This is the approach they have been doing pretty much forever. I remember white dwarf articles specifically say if you took a minimum of troops and then a lot of the elite choices, this was for Fantasy back in 5th edition I want to say, you were not playing in the correct Spirit of the game even though you were legally allowed to do so by the rules. That is how they operate they will not balance the game because it is assumed by default that you and your opponent are talking about what would make a fun game or as they put it now Forge the narrative, and decide for yourself so you don't have any anti-air I will not bring a flyer because it would unbalance the game or you have nothing that can deal with my Imperial Knight so it's staying out of this. So yes in a way it is on the players because the assumption is that the players are talking among themselves to balance what the rules will not do to allow maximum flexibility.
Warhammer is not and has never been the type of game like war machine or infinity or what-have-you where it's just a question of how many points. It has always been the default assumption that game is going to be as flexible as possible and it is on you to impose restrictions, and the problem with their heads is most players especially in pickup game culture are lazy and don't want to even discuss anything with their opponent Beyond want an1850 point game, ok let's deploy.
Do not get me wrong I do not think their approach to game design is a good thing but I feel that it works if you have people that understand it and this is why gaming clubs and actually having a community rather than a bunch of random people who go to the same game shop is so important for a game like Warhammer.
I quite agree with what your saying but the issue sometimes becomes less about players trying to break the game by exploiting rules (wolf star and super friends lists in general) but just outright the way they write their rules. Decurion alone is extremely strong as is Canoptek Harvest which is 100% following the rules as written and not even trying to power game. The rules/points for the Wraithknight are incredibly undercosted and yet GW published it (along with all the potentially OP Eldar rules) while being fully aware that this codex is replacing the 6th edition Eldar codex that was basically defined by broken gak like Wave Serpent spam. GW's rules writing is so laughably bad that its amazing that a company who's entire business model is to produce content for a game is unable to have a shred of common sense when it comes to making rules or even learn from their past mistakes. I don't expect StarCraft level of game balance but the spectrum of rules power is so wide that it feels like the different ends are playing entirely different games.
I think they ARE, that's the thing. I don't think GW realizes it because GW doesn't think like that. I don't doubt the designers costed the Wraithknight lower (that is 100% on them) but I also think they might have felt you'd see only one at best, and only infrequently at that (IIRC the fluff is that they are very rare because you need twins or something?), so it's okay because you aren't always going to take one, especially if your opponent would have trouble facing one. The theme of an army would determine if you took a Wraithknight, not its stats/point cost.
I honestly don't know, but I do agree that they don't seem to really test anything beyond "Is this cool". Their army building, especially in batreps that we've seen, has always been dubious at best and laughably bad at worst.
WayneTheGame wrote: The thing is GW has always written crappie rules and then said it's on the players to take responsibility. While I agree that is the wrong approach to game Design This is the approach they have been doing pretty much forever. I remember white dwarf articles specifically say if you took a minimum of troops and then a lot of the elite choices, this was for Fantasy back in 5th edition I want to say, you were not playing in the correct Spirit of the game even though you were legally allowed to do so by the rules. That is how they operate they will not balance the game because it is assumed by default that you and your opponent are talking about what would make a fun game or as they put it now Forge the narrative, and decide for yourself so you don't have any anti-air I will not bring a flyer because it would unbalance the game or you have nothing that can deal with my Imperial Knight so it's staying out of this. So yes in a way it is on the players because the assumption is that the players are talking among themselves to balance what the rules will not do to allow maximum flexibility.
Warhammer is not and has never been the type of game like war machine or infinity or what-have-you where it's just a question of how many points. It has always been the default assumption that game is going to be as flexible as possible and it is on you to impose restrictions, and the problem with their heads is most players especially in pickup game culture are lazy and don't want to even discuss anything with their opponent Beyond want an1850 point game, ok let's deploy.
Do not get me wrong I do not think their approach to game design is a good thing but I feel that it works if you have people that understand it and this is why gaming clubs and actually having a community rather than a bunch of random people who go to the same game shop is so important for a game like Warhammer.
I quite agree with what your saying but the issue sometimes becomes less about players trying to break the game by exploiting rules (wolf star and super friends lists in general) but just outright the way they write their rules. Decurion alone is extremely strong as is Canoptek Harvest which is 100% following the rules as written and not even trying to power game. The rules/points for the Wraithknight are incredibly undercosted and yet GW published it (along with all the potentially OP Eldar rules) while being fully aware that this codex is replacing the 6th edition Eldar codex that was basically defined by broken gak like Wave Serpent spam. GW's rules writing is so laughably bad that its amazing that a company who's entire business model is to produce content for a game is unable to have a shred of common sense when it comes to making rules or even learn from their past mistakes. I don't expect StarCraft level of game balance but the spectrum of rules power is so wide that it feels like the different ends are playing entirely different games.
I think they ARE, that's the thing. I don't think GW realizes it because GW doesn't think like that. I don't doubt the designers costed the Wraithknight lower (that is 100% on them) but I also think they might have felt you'd see only one at best, and only infrequently at that (IIRC the fluff is that they are very rare because you need twins or something?), so it's okay because you aren't always going to take one, especially if your opponent would have trouble facing one.
I honestly don't know, but I do agree that they don't seem to really test anything beyond "Is this cool". Their army building, especially in batreps that we've seen, has always been dubious at best and laughably bad at worst.
That sounds about right. I mean, we're talking about the same designers who flat out said they buffed Librarians because everyone in their office only ever played using Chaplains... even though in the real world no one was taking Chaplains competitively because Librarians were so much better for the points cost.
Elbows wrote: I wonder if they've made any progress on point-costing units. They freely admitted back in the early editions that there was no mathematical approach to creating the cost of a unit (this article mentioned an Ork vehicle I believe). They said they simply played four or five games and had a discussion on how much they believed the unit should be worth.
Something tells me this is still occurring. I find this odd when you have a game which is based on a stat-line, which offers up a silver platter of creating a formula for unit costs.
I find it shocking that a company as big as GW doesn't have a statistician to balance out points cost. Sure, it wouldn't be perfect, but iIt would resolve a lot of the major issues with the game and reduce rage-quit. For example, I was so disgusted by how much superior the wulfen were compared to my nobz (not even counting their buffing abilities and greater mobility) that it made me take a 6 months hiatus from the game (this of course, means less $$$ for them).
That sounds about right. I mean, we're talking about the same designers who flat out said they buffed Librarians because everyone in their office only ever played using Chaplains... even though in the real world no one was taking Chaplains competitively because Librarians were so much better for the points cost.
I want to hear the story about why the 7th edition Ork Codex writers decided that Killa Kans needed to be heavily nerfed. Maybe the Kanz just kept killing those Chaplains they seemed to love over there.
I think this is the motivation behind the Killteam release.
I think there should be a middle ground behind Kill Team and Apocalypse.
Agreed, imo, killteam is garbage (40k ruleset just doesn't work well for a skirmish game) and I don't want to play godzila vs megatron. My idea of 40k is armies composed mostly of troops units. Sadly, it seems like it's less and less the case.
Kill Team as a concept is good. What GW should have done is gotten the guys who made Heralds of Ruin to consult/give advice (like Heelanhammer did with General's Handbook) and used that as the basis. Squads don't work correctly in Kill Team, there needs to be IMHO like four different sizes:
1) "Kill Team": basically HoR style with individual models (think Deathwatch Codex style applied to everyone). Lots of individual model customization. NOT squad based. 2) "Combat Patrol": Very small skirmish/squad level combat, like 1-2 units and maybe 1 light vehicle or walker. This would basically be like the current version of Kill Team, only slightly larger. Squad based. 3) "Eternal War": The default 40k size, company/platoon level. Handful of units, couple of vehicles, no flyers or anything (Flyers can stay as purchased air support, basically doing like a bombardment or something but don't stay on the battlefield) 4) "Apocalypse": Large scale, Epic-like game. Rules would need to be very abstract, likely incorporating movement trays and basically different statlines for an entire unit, not a model.
And of course the caveat: You can adapt for your own scenarios. So if you want to have like a titan or knight versus a horde of dudes, you can do it, but it's no longer just flat out allowed unless you exclude it. In fact, I think that can sum up the main problem and answer the original question succinctly: 40k used to be about exclusion without explicit inclusion. For instance, in 3rd edition you could not field a special character without your opponent's permission. When Chapter Approved added the IG Armored Company, it was specifically called out as experimental and needed your opponent's permission to field, because it was so unlike anything else at the time (it even needed its own special rule allowing any 6 to glance to give some armies a chance against it). Back in the day when Armorcast made resin superheavies, it needed permission to be used. Now, that's changed to being included by default. Want a titan? You can field it if you have the points. Want to take 2-3 special characters? Go ahead. Want to field all tanks in some crazy formation? Be our guest. It's now on the players to exclude what they don't want, rather than have the person who wants it to ask if it's okay.
This has the psychological effect of shunting responsibility. Before, someone wanting to field an OP superheavy in a game would feel as though they are being unfair by wanting to take it, because the opponent might not have anything to deal with it. Now though, the person who has nothing to deal with sounds like a wimp/whiner for not wanting to play it (because it's now legally allowed by default, so you are instituting a "house rule" for that game by not wanting it), and it puts the veto power on the person who wants to use it, rather than the person who has to play against it. It reverses the power.
MechaEmperor7000 wrote: This is all due to the horrible, horrible decision when GW switched gears late 4th edition/ early 5th edition, where they started prioritizing their bottom line over the Customer.
While I won't get into the details of this slow transition over the course of almost a decade now, it should be pretty obvious the game is trying to be something it's not. The one fact I keep repeating is that D-Weapons, Superheavies and Gargantuan Creatures shouldn't exist in the core rulebook. Those rules, by their very definition, exists to break the system 40k was set for (with D-Weapons being the literal definition of "up to 11", since it's quite literally a "Strength 11" weapon).
I blame Apocalypse for all of this, since that's when most of this stuff started leaking into "mainstream" 40k; before that the casual players I know of didn't even know what superheavy rules were or what vehicles had that rule. The concept of fielding an army composed of more than one faction was also alien (not unheard of, but it was usually done as a special-occasion thing, not the norm). And of course formations didn't exist at all.
What followed was GW's own pricing issues pushing newbies away; with them clamping down on cheap retailers, raising prices and making their store managers aggressively push product instead of doing intro games and events, it made the game extremely inaccessible to newbies. With no newbies joining in, they only had one source of revenue: the oldbloods. But you can't sell an oldblood the same tank he already has probably 9 copies of, so the only solution is to lower the point cost, nerf what he has while buffing the newest kit no one can possibly have before the next codex update, and allowing you to legitimately field multiple factions within an army. This means that existing players who wanted to use their collection will HAVE to pay each edition to keep up or be left in the dust. And of course any existing unit of use generally are only useful because they're cheap, so now you have incentive to go buy more of those models to fill up the points that one of them use to. Necron Immortals and warriors are the biggest offenders here; while Immortals lost one point of toughness and warriors got a weaker save, they got dramatically cheaper (Immortals use to be 28 points a piece, while Warriors were 18. That's about a 1/3rd of a price drop. And Immortals weren't overcosted at the time either).
This ended up not being enough to prop up the company, as it's unsustainable; the same people can only pay so much before they leave, so GW was trying to squeeze the same profit out of a slowly depleting fanbase. Which is why we have price hikes; they first started with incremental price hikes each year on existing product. When that backfired, they started updating products with higher prices instead, which is why they had even more incentive to push newer sets. Which are generally big vehicles (like flyers) or monsters because even if they're the same point-to-dollar ratio as any other set, the actual amount of money you drop on one is substantial (Yes, people plan out their purchases so in theory this shouldn't matter, but when the only option you have is to drop a huge amount or drop none at all, it pushes up your overall planned purchases as well.).
That sounds about right. I mean, we're talking about the same designers who flat out said they buffed Librarians because everyone in their office only ever played using Chaplains... even though in the real world no one was taking Chaplains competitively because Librarians were so much better for the points cost.
I want to hear the story about why the 7th edition Ork Codex writers decided that Killa Kans needed to be heavily nerfed. Maybe the Kanz just kept killing those Chaplains they seemed to love over there.
I can imagine it now....
[imagination transition sound effect]
They probably routinely found that when they made Chaplains have power mauls that they were good at killing light vehicles... but then found they couldn't kill enough grot kans in the Assault phase to win and were disappointed by that.
They probably also found that the remains kans were able to kill him with ID.
So they made them cowardly so the run away from the Chaplain and removed their ability to ID T4 models so that it's harder for them to kill him in return.
WayneTheGame wrote: The thing is GW has always written crappie rules and then said it's on the players to take responsibility. While I agree that is the wrong approach to game Design This is the approach they have been doing pretty much forever. I remember white dwarf articles specifically say if you took a minimum of troops and then a lot of the elite choices, this was for Fantasy back in 5th edition I want to say, you were not playing in the correct Spirit of the game even though you were legally allowed to do so by the rules. That is how they operate they will not balance the game because it is assumed by default that you and your opponent are talking about what would make a fun game or as they put it now Forge the narrative, and decide for yourself so you don't have any anti-air I will not bring a flyer because it would unbalance the game or you have nothing that can deal with my Imperial Knight so it's staying out of this. So yes in a way it is on the players because the assumption is that the players are talking among themselves to balance what the rules will not do to allow maximum flexibility.
Warhammer is not and has never been the type of game like war machine or infinity or what-have-you where it's just a question of how many points. It has always been the default assumption that game is going to be as flexible as possible and it is on you to impose restrictions, and the problem with their heads is most players especially in pickup game culture are lazy and don't want to even discuss anything with their opponent Beyond want an1850 point game, ok let's deploy.
Do not get me wrong I do not think their approach to game design is a good thing but I feel that it works if you have people that understand it and this is why gaming clubs and actually having a community rather than a bunch of random people who go to the same game shop is so important for a game like Warhammer.
EDIT: Going to expand this thought a bit more. Warhammer has always been a "social game". Now by virtue of requiring an opponent, all wargames are social games to some extent, but Warhammer has always been much more. It's never been the type of game where you just go down to a game store and play, even when that was more feasible than now (i.e. prior editions) it was never really the intention. Warhammer has always been the type of social game more akin to historical gaming, where you actually talk about a specific scenario/mission with a "narrative" story (never had to be complex, could have been as simple as "Space Marines are assaulting an Ork stronghold" or "Eldar are attacking an Imperial Guard convoy") and then make decisions on army construction and the like based on that, with an eye towards having an enjoyable game. For evidence of this just look at basically any White Dwarf battle report ever, but especially the older issues. There almost always was a little fluff blurb about a battle, and often the choices taken were because they made thematic sense to the battle not because they were the most optimal choices. The army lists were always designed to be as unrestrictive as possible (this is part of the reason we no longer see 0-1 choices in the actual army lists) to allow for the most of potential scenarios (and the studio has even said on occasion that it can be fun sometimes to do something like an entire army versus a superheavy as a scenario), and then shift the onus of what's acceptable or not to the players. But the issue here comes when you have competitive-minded players that immediately look for what is "best" without regard for the army background or theme for their force (and often don't even bother with such things) because they are approaching it as a competition and not a collaborative experience.
Again, I'm not trying to defend this. I think it's absolutely gakky game design to not do any balance and then say it's on the players, but I honestly feel that Warhammer requires a completely different approach to gaming than virtually any other wargame (for good or ill) short of oldschool historical wargaming (i.e. not the modern ones like Bolt Action that are still made to be fairly balanced for competitive games, I mean like old 70s-80s Napoleonic type games that had little or no balance and required forethought) in how you approach it. Points and balance are essentially a bone thrown; look at General's Handbook as an example of this. The points are clearly intended as a rough estimate/guideline, yet some take it as gospel when GW doesn't even bother with it; the latest White Dwarf has a AoS batrep using a special scenario, and they basically say they both agreed to take like 4-5 heroes, about 10 units but the Chaos guy can take a couple more because he's defending a fortress. Yet you don't really see min-maxed armies among them, even though if you ask players here you'll get the answer of well without points, what's to stop you from taking nothing but X and Y because they are better? The answer is because you're not playing a game just to win, you're playing to have an interesting game that can tell a story, so you purposely don't take nothing but X and Y.
That's always been how Warhammer is meant to be played and I will be completely honest I do feel that some of the responsibility (not necessarily "blame") falls on the players for not wanting to engage in fostering a community, but basically want what is the real life equivalent to a matchmaking service you see in MOBAs and other online gaming, where it matches you with a random opponent to simply have a game, rather than immerse yourself in the story and background. When I see people who play armies with only the "best" units, or who decry what should be basic choices as a "tax" to get the good stuff, or who really don't care one lick why they are fighting their opponent or why the battlefield is set up the way it is, I can't help but feel that they are doing something wrong and not enjoying the game, because Warhammer can and should be so much more than simply making the "best" 1850 point list you can and playing it against a random person who also just happens to have an 1850 point army.
And that makes me sad because I know I'll never get to experience the game the way it's meant to be :(
Very well written - basically my point of view since 2nd ed. It is trully sad, that such view on WH40k is so rare these days… WH40K in RT, 2nd, 6th and 7th ed is more akin to a RPG game designed for narrative scenarios, than to a competitive wargame. It has been redesigned and functioned more competitive like in between 3rd and 5th editions, but in doing so lost a lot of "feel" and flexibility of previous years of its existence. Current view, that 5th was "the best edition" comes (at least partially) not from rules design, but from demographics of WH40k - by the time 5th came out, most of the "oldschool 2nd ed" players has already quit, so there were less and less raging about how they miss "good old times" and most folks started not earlier than 3rd, so community was more homogenous. Now, as more and more active players have started in 6th or 7th editions and have not experienced WH40K without flyers and gargantuans, we see more people pleased with all those Wraithknights and Riptides. And it is probably a quite natural consequence of WH40K being a game that spans over 30 years and tries to attract different, ever changing generations of players… [One basic example on how "entry point" defines point of view on Warhammer - for old, 2nd ed players, Wraithguard and D-cannons "just finally came back to what they were meant to work like", while for 3rd-and-later-starters are "an abomination that should only be allowed in Apoc".]
And really, at this moment, after 30 years of existence and after a couple of paradigm shifts, it is only a choice between "who to enrage with upcoming changes this time" on GW part - they simply cannot please every player, from every generation simultanously, as the scope of expectations from 40k is so vast and contradictory...
WayneTheGame wrote: The thing is GW has always written crappie rules and then said it's on the players to take responsibility. While I agree that is the wrong approach to game Design This is the approach they have been doing pretty much forever. I remember white dwarf articles specifically say if you took a minimum of troops and then a lot of the elite choices, this was for Fantasy back in 5th edition I want to say, you were not playing in the correct Spirit of the game even though you were legally allowed to do so by the rules. That is how they operate they will not balance the game because it is assumed by default that you and your opponent are talking about what would make a fun game or as they put it now Forge the narrative, and decide for yourself so you don't have any anti-air I will not bring a flyer because it would unbalance the game or you have nothing that can deal with my Imperial Knight so it's staying out of this. So yes in a way it is on the players because the assumption is that the players are talking among themselves to balance what the rules will not do to allow maximum flexibility.
Warhammer is not and has never been the type of game like war machine or infinity or what-have-you where it's just a question of how many points. It has always been the default assumption that game is going to be as flexible as possible and it is on you to impose restrictions, and the problem with their heads is most players especially in pickup game culture are lazy and don't want to even discuss anything with their opponent Beyond want an1850 point game, ok let's deploy.
Do not get me wrong I do not think their approach to game design is a good thing but I feel that it works if you have people that understand it and this is why gaming clubs and actually having a community rather than a bunch of random people who go to the same game shop is so important for a game like Warhammer.
I quite agree with what your saying but the issue sometimes becomes less about players trying to break the game by exploiting rules (wolf star and super friends lists in general) but just outright the way they write their rules. Decurion alone is extremely strong as is Canoptek Harvest which is 100% following the rules as written and not even trying to power game. The rules/points for the Wraithknight are incredibly undercosted and yet GW published it (along with all the potentially OP Eldar rules) while being fully aware that this codex is replacing the 6th edition Eldar codex that was basically defined by broken gak like Wave Serpent spam. GW's rules writing is so laughably bad that its amazing that a company who's entire business model is to produce content for a game is unable to have a shred of common sense when it comes to making rules or even learn from their past mistakes. I don't expect StarCraft level of game balance but the spectrum of rules power is so wide that it feels like the different ends are playing entirely different games.
I think they ARE, that's the thing. I don't think GW realizes it because GW doesn't think like that. I don't doubt the designers costed the Wraithknight lower (that is 100% on them) but I also think they might have felt you'd see only one at best, and only infrequently at that (IIRC the fluff is that they are very rare because you need twins or something?), so it's okay because you aren't always going to take one, especially if your opponent would have trouble facing one. The theme of an army would determine if you took a Wraithknight, not its stats/point cost.
I honestly don't know, but I do agree that they don't seem to really test anything beyond "Is this cool". Their army building, especially in batreps that we've seen, has always been dubious at best and laughably bad at worst.
When they were discussing End Times introducing Unbound into WFB, there was a great quote describing gamer mentality when it comes to unit choice from fluff vs. ability. "There are only 7 Steam Tanks in existence? Here, face 12." 40K currently is just as bad.
It's not just greed. 0-1 have bad side effect of being UNSCALABLE. You have one unit whether it's 500, 1000, 1500 or 5000 pts game. That's bad game design. It basically leads to game only really working at one point level.
Not true. When this was the case you could agree to play "two force organization charts" etc. Incredibly easy to scale actually if you decided you wanted to do that. Want to play 3-5000 points? Run two force organization charts, or whatever. Problem solved.
WayneTheGame wrote: The thing is GW has always written crappie rules and then said it's on the players to take responsibility. While I agree that is the wrong approach to game Design This is the approach they have been doing pretty much forever. I remember white dwarf articles specifically say if you took a minimum of troops and then a lot of the elite choices, this was for Fantasy back in 5th edition I want to say, you were not playing in the correct Spirit of the game even though you were legally allowed to do so by the rules. That is how they operate they will not balance the game because it is assumed by default that you and your opponent are talking about what would make a fun game or as they put it now Forge the narrative, and decide for yourself so you don't have any anti-air I will not bring a flyer because it would unbalance the game or you have nothing that can deal with my Imperial Knight so it's staying out of this. So yes in a way it is on the players because the assumption is that the players are talking among themselves to balance what the rules will not do to allow maximum flexibility.
Warhammer is not and has never been the type of game like war machine or infinity or what-have-you where it's just a question of how many points. It has always been the default assumption that game is going to be as flexible as possible and it is on you to impose restrictions, and the problem with their heads is most players especially in pickup game culture are lazy and don't want to even discuss anything with their opponent Beyond want an1850 point game, ok let's deploy.
Do not get me wrong I do not think their approach to game design is a good thing but I feel that it works if you have people that understand it and this is why gaming clubs and actually having a community rather than a bunch of random people who go to the same game shop is so important for a game like Warhammer.
EDIT: Going to expand this thought a bit more. Warhammer has always been a "social game". Now by virtue of requiring an opponent, all wargames are social games to some extent, but Warhammer has always been much more. It's never been the type of game where you just go down to a game store and play, even when that was more feasible than now (i.e. prior editions) it was never really the intention. Warhammer has always been the type of social game more akin to historical gaming, where you actually talk about a specific scenario/mission with a "narrative" story (never had to be complex, could have been as simple as "Space Marines are assaulting an Ork stronghold" or "Eldar are attacking an Imperial Guard convoy") and then make decisions on army construction and the like based on that, with an eye towards having an enjoyable game. For evidence of this just look at basically any White Dwarf battle report ever, but especially the older issues. There almost always was a little fluff blurb about a battle, and often the choices taken were because they made thematic sense to the battle not because they were the most optimal choices. The army lists were always designed to be as unrestrictive as possible (this is part of the reason we no longer see 0-1 choices in the actual army lists) to allow for the most of potential scenarios (and the studio has even said on occasion that it can be fun sometimes to do something like an entire army versus a superheavy as a scenario), and then shift the onus of what's acceptable or not to the players. But the issue here comes when you have competitive-minded players that immediately look for what is "best" without regard for the army background or theme for their force (and often don't even bother with such things) because they are approaching it as a competition and not a collaborative experience.
Again, I'm not trying to defend this. I think it's absolutely gakky game design to not do any balance and then say it's on the players, but I honestly feel that Warhammer requires a completely different approach to gaming than virtually any other wargame (for good or ill) short of oldschool historical wargaming (i.e. not the modern ones like Bolt Action that are still made to be fairly balanced for competitive games, I mean like old 70s-80s Napoleonic type games that had little or no balance and required forethought) in how you approach it. Points and balance are essentially a bone thrown; look at General's Handbook as an example of this. The points are clearly intended as a rough estimate/guideline, yet some take it as gospel when GW doesn't even bother with it; the latest White Dwarf has a AoS batrep using a special scenario, and they basically say they both agreed to take like 4-5 heroes, about 10 units but the Chaos guy can take a couple more because he's defending a fortress. Yet you don't really see min-maxed armies among them, even though if you ask players here you'll get the answer of well without points, what's to stop you from taking nothing but X and Y because they are better? The answer is because you're not playing a game just to win, you're playing to have an interesting game that can tell a story, so you purposely don't take nothing but X and Y.
That's always been how Warhammer is meant to be played and I will be completely honest I do feel that some of the responsibility (not necessarily "blame") falls on the players for not wanting to engage in fostering a community, but basically want what is the real life equivalent to a matchmaking service you see in MOBAs and other online gaming, where it matches you with a random opponent to simply have a game, rather than immerse yourself in the story and background. When I see people who play armies with only the "best" units, or who decry what should be basic choices as a "tax" to get the good stuff, or who really don't care one lick why they are fighting their opponent or why the battlefield is set up the way it is, I can't help but feel that they are doing something wrong and not enjoying the game, because Warhammer can and should be so much more than simply making the "best" 1850 point list you can and playing it against a random person who also just happens to have an 1850 point army.
And that makes me sad because I know I'll never get to experience the game the way it's meant to be :(
Very well written - basically my point of view since 2nd ed. It is trully sad, that such view on WH40k is so rare these days… WH40K in RT, 2nd, 6th and 7th ed is more akin to a RPG game designed for narrative scenarios, than to a competitive wargame. It has been redesigned and functioned more competitive like in between 3rd and 5th editions, but in doing so lost a lot of "feel" and flexibility of previous years of its existence. Current view, that 5th was "the best edition" comes (at least partially) not from rules design, but from demographics of WH40k - by the time 5th came out, most of the "oldschool 2nd ed" players has already quit, so there were less and less raging about how they miss "good old times" and most folks started not earlier than 3rd, so community was more homogenous. Now, as more and more active players have started in 6th or 7th editions and have not experienced WH40K without flyers and gargantuans, we see more people pleased with all those Wraithknights and Riptides. And it is probably a quite natural consequence of WH40K being a game that spans over 30 years and tries to attract different, ever changing generations of players… [One basic example on how "entry point" defines point of view on Warhammer - for old, 2nd ed players, Wraithguard and D-cannons "just finally came back to what they were meant to work like", while for 3rd-and-later-starters are "an abomination that should only be allowed in Apoc".]
And really, at this moment, after 30 years of existence and after a couple of paradigm shifts, it is only a choice between "who to enrage with upcoming changes this time" on GW part - they simply cannot please every player, from every generation simultanously, as the scope of expectations from 40k is so vast and contradictory...
The problem with viewing things like D-cannons "going back to what they were meant to work like" and other such stuff is that 2E ultimately faced the same problems 7E did, humongous power gaps and and insanely broken capabilities coupled with widely dispersed and rules across a multitude of sources that few could keep up with, and the game started to collapse under its own weight, requiring a radical reboot that ultimately gave us 3E. The people excited about these sorts of things forget that 2E turned into an unholy mess by its end, and GW appears intent on making in some cases literally the exact same mistakes.
Vaktathi wrote: The problem with viewing things like D-cannons "going back to what they were meant to work like" and other such stuff is that 2E ultimately faced the same problems 7E did, humongous power gaps and and insanely broken capabilities coupled with widely dispersed and rules across a multitude of sources that few could keep up with, and the game started to collapse under its own weight, requiring a radical reboot that ultimately gave us 3E. The people excited about these sorts of things forget that 2E turned into an unholy mess by its end, and GW appears intent on making in some cases literally the exact same mistakes.
That is very true from competitive/pickup play point of view. But for more-RPG like aproach 3rd ed reboot was more like castration than "sorting out the bloated mess". And personally, it made me quit WH40k halfway through 3rd ed because 3rd ed Eldar (my army at that time) have lost all their previous character and charm. I have returned only when the gameplay began to at least resemble 2nd ed flexibility. And yours and mine point of views are fine examples of what my post was really about - different mindsets and goals. Preagreed, narrative scenarios can have much more depth in 2nd and 7th editions than in 3rd… And for that role, there is absolutely no problem with "broken capabilities" - quite the opposite really: you can create great scenarios built around those very "broken" things as centerpieces. At the same time, "low power gap" of 3rd ed (internally within codex, between least and most powerfull units. Under 3rd ed mechanics lots of units lost their unique feel and role...) made games more "flat" and quite frankly dull. It was, of course mitigated over time with increasing "bloated mess" of subsequent editions...
And to be clear - I'm just giving an example of one of possible approaches to 40K, not by any means "the only true way". And I'm writing this only because "public debate" here on dakka is so much competitive/pick-up centric, that it is easy to fell into trap of thinking, that deathstars and gargantuans and all this "broken bull gak" is all there is to 40K and nothing else is possible and no one plays this game differently and that absolutely everyone would be happy with return to early 5th ed...
WayneTheGame wrote: The thing is GW has always written crappie rules and then said it's on the players to take responsibility. While I agree that is the wrong approach to game Design This is the approach they have been doing pretty much forever. I remember white dwarf articles specifically say if you took a minimum of troops and then a lot of the elite choices, this was for Fantasy back in 5th edition I want to say, you were not playing in the correct Spirit of the game even though you were legally allowed to do so by the rules. That is how they operate they will not balance the game because it is assumed by default that you and your opponent are talking about what would make a fun game or as they put it now Forge the narrative, and decide for yourself so you don't have any anti-air I will not bring a flyer because it would unbalance the game or you have nothing that can deal with my Imperial Knight so it's staying out of this. So yes in a way it is on the players because the assumption is that the players are talking among themselves to balance what the rules will not do to allow maximum flexibility.
Warhammer is not and has never been the type of game like war machine or infinity or what-have-you where it's just a question of how many points. It has always been the default assumption that game is going to be as flexible as possible and it is on you to impose restrictions, and the problem with their heads is most players especially in pickup game culture are lazy and don't want to even discuss anything with their opponent Beyond want an1850 point game, ok let's deploy.
Do not get me wrong I do not think their approach to game design is a good thing but I feel that it works if you have people that understand it and this is why gaming clubs and actually having a community rather than a bunch of random people who go to the same game shop is so important for a game like Warhammer.
I quite agree with what your saying but the issue sometimes becomes less about players trying to break the game by exploiting rules (wolf star and super friends lists in general) but just outright the way they write their rules. Decurion alone is extremely strong as is Canoptek Harvest which is 100% following the rules as written and not even trying to power game. The rules/points for the Wraithknight are incredibly undercosted and yet GW published it (along with all the potentially OP Eldar rules) while being fully aware that this codex is replacing the 6th edition Eldar codex that was basically defined by broken gak like Wave Serpent spam. GW's rules writing is so laughably bad that its amazing that a company who's entire business model is to produce content for a game is unable to have a shred of common sense when it comes to making rules or even learn from their past mistakes. I don't expect StarCraft level of game balance but the spectrum of rules power is so wide that it feels like the different ends are playing entirely different games.
I think they ARE, that's the thing. I don't think GW realizes it because GW doesn't think like that. I don't doubt the designers costed the Wraithknight lower (that is 100% on them) but I also think they might have felt you'd see only one at best, and only infrequently at that (IIRC the fluff is that they are very rare because you need twins or something?), so it's okay because you aren't always going to take one, especially if your opponent would have trouble facing one. The theme of an army would determine if you took a Wraithknight, not its stats/point cost.
I honestly don't know, but I do agree that they don't seem to really test anything beyond "Is this cool". Their army building, especially in batreps that we've seen, has always been dubious at best and laughably bad at worst.
When they were discussing End Times introducing Unbound into WFB, there was a great quote describing gamer mentality when it comes to unit choice from fluff vs. ability. "There are only 7 Steam Tanks in existence? Here, face 12." 40K currently is just as bad.
I completely understand part of the notion of as little restrictions as possible, to allow for potential situations. Maybe you're playing a game back when there were more steam tanks, or in your version more have been built. I totally get that. What the problem is, though, is that I find the players absolutely more focused on what's good or bad for the sake of winning a game, not having an enjoyable time and making things cool. Like, I was listening to a podcast the other day with a rather ironic name talk about how the CSM (I think this was pre-Traitor's Hate even) book could make a "better Gladius than Gladius". The reasoning was that in a Gladius you need to take "garbage units" like Assault and Devastators to get free Rhinos. I about facepalmed. That's the problem with the current mentality. A battle company (demi or otherwise) should be fielding assault and devastator and tactical squads because that's what the Codex Astartes says they field, those units should never be considered a "tax" to get the good stuff and IMHO that shows a fundamental issue with the playerbase: The fluff and lore and background of the army is nigh meaningless, it's just about what it brings to the table that counts, and like I said in my lengthy post above that's a problem because the only redeeming quality 40k has to me is the immense breadth and depth of the background material. If you are going to ignore the backstory and lore for armies just to field what is best, then IMHO you aren't playing Warhammer right. Now I'm not one to usually invoke the concept of "badwrongfun" but in this case I have no such qualms because playing to the spirit of the game, taking fluffy armies that match the background is really the only compelling reason to play 40k as a game.
I get some people like competitive minded games, I really do (it's why I initially picked up Warmachine). What I don't get though is why the competitive crowd feel it's okay to essentially bastardize the game by twisting it into a way that it's obviously not intended to be played, simply because they can. I used to rail against a lot of GW's stuff, and I still think a lot of it is boneheaded, but I understand now. I understand the reason for things like Unbound, I understand why AoS didn't have points. I still think that, for example, forcing Apocalypse and Escalation and Flyers into "base" 40k is a mistake, but I understand the reason why, and I'll flat out say with zero regrets that IMHO it's because most (in my experience YMMV) 40k players are unimaginative philistines who don't want to take the time to hash out a quick scenario overview (again as I said before this doesn't have to be anything major, just a rough outline of why this battle is happening), don't want to maybe allow flexibility because it's not in the "rules" (e.g. sure you can field X even though it's technically not allowed, because it makes a lot of sense your force would have X for this fight), and ultimately don't want to think of anything outside of what the books say, when in 40k more than any other wargame (again except maybe some historical games) are a guideline and not a bible.
That right there is your problem. I go to a game (and yes I'm hypothetically speaking since I have yet to actually play 40k) and I have a rough idea for a force, with named characters and a bit of backstory, and when I find an opponent I immediately start to formulate a brief narrative for just why I'm fighting them (which granted as I am building a KDK army can be as as simple as "Hey look, there are people there SKULLS FOR KHORNE!"), and already start to lament the fact we aren't customizing things to suit that narrative, whether that's a custom scenario or special rules or anything to make it more than just a random game versus a random person. I am certain I'm in the minority versus those who roll up with some min/maxed force that barely adheres to the backstory, could care less about names or fluff, and could care less about the whys of the game.
I feel 40k is best played not only as a casual game (no "competitive" list approaches that only take the best performing units) but also one where you are willing to add special rules or come up with your own scenarios to make the game fun.
People aren't rewarded for playing within "the spirit of the game". As such, plenty of the customers for GW might genuinely enjoy tabling someone in 40 minutes and moving on to whatever else they want to do that afternoon. Those people spend money on GW products as much as the rest of us.
What sucks is that some people don't have like-minded friends, or are reliant on pick-up games or want to compete in a tournament without that mentality. That's the shame of it - some people are forced to only play "that guy" etc .if they want to get a game of 40K in. In a perfect world everyone would have 3-4 buddies who agree on the spirit of the game they wish to play (ie. fun/narrative or beat-face etc.). I feel exceptionally fortunate that the folks I normally game with all share the same spirit of gamin that I do.
We have close, hard fought games (not 40K by the way) and we'll frequently agree to bend a rule if it makes sense or not do something because it's gakky. If playing historical games we self-restrict ourselves to not do stuff that's too silly or gamey. No one ever leaves the table mad...simple as that.
Elbows wrote: People aren't rewarded for playing within "the spirit of the game". As such, plenty of the customers for GW might genuinely enjoy tabling someone in 40 minutes and moving on to whatever else they want to do that afternoon. Those people spend money on GW products as much as the rest of us.
What sucks is that some people don't have like-minded friends, or are reliant on pick-up games or want to compete in a tournament without that mentality. That's the shame of it - some people are forced to only play "that guy" etc .if they want to get a game of 40K in. In a perfect world everyone would have 3-4 buddies who agree on the spirit of the game they wish to play (ie. fun/narrative or beat-face etc.). I feel exceptionally fortunate that the folks I normally game with all share the same spirit of gamin that I do.
We have close, hard fought games (not 40K by the way) and we'll frequently agree to bend a rule if it makes sense or not do something because it's gakky. If playing historical games we self-restrict ourselves to not do stuff that's too silly or gamey. No one ever leaves the table mad...simple as that.
This is definitely a valid point. The biggest thing 40k encourages is playing with like-minded people, so don't have someone who wants a "competitive style game" come up against the fluff player with a true-to-backstory list only to get demolished. That's again why I state unequivocally that 40k is not in any way intended for pick-up games or tournaments, not because it can't do so naturally (albeit more difficult) but because the very nature of the game seems to want discussion and customization, not just blandly following what's in the book. Again while this is a 40k thread I feel AoS demonstrates this perfectly: The rules themselves were so minor that it all but required agreement, and even then people didn't seem to show interest until GW decided to throw a bone and add point values, and even now you have people who doggedly follow it as though it was gospel, and not a rough estimate and guide even knowing that you can't really fluctuate with them due to purchasing units in fixed sizes. I recall I was talking to someone at my local GW who was saying how they wouldn't have looked at AoS at all until General's Handbook came out, and then I mentioned how the points are really guidelines not intended to be adhered to like in 40k, and cited the example batrep where the Stormcast player had IIRC 2040 points and the Daemon player had 1980 because of inflexible points. The response? "Oh no that's too much difference". Again not meaning to bring AoS up but pointing out that there needs to be more community and discussion about "approximately balanced" instead of striving for something arbitrary that indicates balance even when it's not.
In fact, to bring this back to 40k, it's long established that the points costs don't even do a good job of balancing (e.g. Wraithknights). So why bother with them as a balancing tool? I'm not saying for 40k it should be like Core AOS style of "take whatever until you run out of room" which is just absolutely silly, but I find too many players are too caught up in X points instead of what is being fielded. This is, interestingly enough, one of the reasons I hope that 8th edition goes closer to (but not exactly like) AoS in the sense that upgrades and the like should be just there, not necessarily with a point cost, even down to unit costs being inflexible to eliminate the mathhammer people who are like "Well if you take 7 guys, it's X% better than taking 6 guys". This would, I think, also have the interesting effect of, hopefully, encouraging that sort of rough balance from AoS e.g. I'm fielding a demi-company so 5 units (i.e. 3x Tacticals, 1x Assault, 1x Devastator), with 2-3 vehicles as support, and two HQs, so my opponent can field something similar to that and it's "approximate balance". In fact, I think that the concept of "approximate balance" is something that 40k adheres to but the playerbase constantly ignores.
I apologize if I am getting ranty, I love talking about my thoughts on things
Vaktathi wrote: The problem with viewing things like D-cannons "going back to what they were meant to work like" and other such stuff is that 2E ultimately faced the same problems 7E did, humongous power gaps and and insanely broken capabilities coupled with widely dispersed and rules across a multitude of sources that few could keep up with, and the game started to collapse under its own weight, requiring a radical reboot that ultimately gave us 3E. The people excited about these sorts of things forget that 2E turned into an unholy mess by its end, and GW appears intent on making in some cases literally the exact same mistakes.
That is very true from competitive/pickup play point of view. But for more-RPG like aproach 3rd ed reboot was more like castration than "sorting out the bloated mess". And personally, it made me quit WH40k halfway through 3rd ed because 3rd ed Eldar (my army at that time) have lost all their previous character and charm. I have returned only when the gameplay began to at least resemble 2nd ed flexibility. And yours and mine point of views are fine examples of what my post was really about - different mindsets and goals. Preagreed, narrative scenarios can have much more depth in 2nd and 7th editions than in 3rd… And for that role, there is absolutely no problem with "broken capabilities" - quite the opposite really: you can create great scenarios built around those very "broken" things as centerpieces. At the same time, "low power gap" of 3rd ed (internally within codex, between least and most powerfull units. Under 3rd ed mechanics lots of units lost their unique feel and role...) made games more "flat" and quite frankly dull. It was, of course mitigated over time with increasing "bloated mess" of subsequent editions...
I can understand a lot of that, but the problem is that 40k doesnt really offer anything to support that kind of gameplay and fundamentally functions as a pickup game. The game is built around two players showing up with army lists constrained by points costs and playing generic missions. The rules for narrative gaming are either nonexistent or phoned in minor modifications to standard missions. There's no mention of prebuilt campaign supplements offering detailed battle scenarios or a 3rd party GM coming up with custom scenarios with prebuilt armies for both sides the way RT did and most other games that ostensibly offer that kind of experience do.
"Narrative" in 40k almost always ends up meaning "play this bloated mess of an RNG simulator where one side is given an arbitrary advantage over a slightly modified standard rulebook pickup mission with whatever you want to bring". The campaign books pretty much just give us a handful of formations that give silly freebies for taking X configuration of units and maybe some missions minorly deviated from the core rulebook, the substance is extremely lacking. It's all just poorly modified pickup play. Contrast this with other games that offer narrative battles and they'll predfine the forces to a far greater level with very purposefully built missions.
One can look at OGRE for instance, a *far* simpler game with *way* more narrative detail missions. Want your superheavy cybertank equipped with micronuke cannons to stomp all over a lightly defended truck convoy? Ok, but your Supertank type Z enters the map at point X, if the trucks make it to point Y they escape, the map and terrain is set up such that you can only really engage at points A, B or C, and the escort contingent is made up of units D, E and F travelling with the convoy. Supertank Z will have a tough time accomplishing its mission and the game becomes interesting at this point. 40k offers literally nothing to support this kind of play.
If people want their insanely overgunned Wraithguard for "flavor", well, ok, but then lets also acknowledge that nothing else about the gameplay is really built to support "flavor" in that way, and it just ends up coming off as a lame excuse for poor balance and to overpower things for its own sake.
Additionally, with the vast issues of scale the game currently suffers from, such as trying to make what type of blade an individual IG sergeants powerweapon a relevant issue in a game where he may literally be incapable of hurting anything either way because they're facing an army of Knights or dealing with individual close combat challenges in a game involving an entire tank company, makes so much of that "flavor" end up just being irrelevant noise except when its ultra powerful (and then that type of "flavor" is what you suspiciously start seeing lots of).
The game is trying to be far too many things and doing none of them well or even merely adequately. It really needs to be broken into 3 or 4 different systems.
And to be clear - I'm just giving an example of one of possible approaches to 40K, not by any means "the only true way". And I'm writing this only because "public debate" here on dakka is so much competitive/pick-up centric, that it is easy to fell into trap of thinking, that deathstars and gargantuans and all this "broken bull gak" is all there is to 40K and nothing else is possible and no one plays this game differently and that absolutely everyone would be happy with return to early 5th ed...
I get that, and most people acknowledge that 5E was far from perfect. I hated it at the time, for some of the reasons you mentioned as well. But compared to what we've gotten since it was far more playable.
I think the reason 40k tries to add more "randumb" is to force those random things/special rules that players are unwilling to include themselves. Now granted they don't do it in any good way, but I feel that was the intention, to take those "generic missions" and add extras to make up for the narrative stuff that isn't being done in its place.
The random objectives, for example, seems like they are meant to capture that sort of narrative scenario that hypothetically speaking two players could decide to play (e.g. I am trying to obtain X and Y, you are trying to stop me but also get Z and W) but generally don't. Sort of "forcing one's hand" similar to the perceived reason why Unbound and Apocalypse/Escalation became a thing; since people were not really wanting to do that themselves, GW changed the rules to "make" them.
What I think, and this is getting slightly offtopic to wishlisting, is a return to the 2nd edition Mission Cards and Strategy Cards (minus Virus Outbreak of course lol). Those were flavorful AND narrative; my mission might be to get units into my opponent's zone and off the table, while his might be to assassinate my commander. That's pretty easy to spin a narrative from, and pairing them up made for awesome ways to string out campaigns. They could even be paired with predetermined narrative approaches to make mission pairs that better flow with each other. The Strategy Cards I always thought were an amazing idea; some were way too strong and needed to be toned down (the aforementioned Virus Outbreak, and Orbital Bombardment could be pretty nasty too) but the concept was cool that you had these little extra things at your disposal.
I think that's meant to be the purpose of the special missions in codexes (Altar of War, I think?) but I don't usually see those used either, it's always a "stock" mission so I think a better approach would be to have each side generating a customized mission for that game, which also makes it better to tie into a campaign, and then have a book combining the altar type missions into like historical campaign scenarios.
Vaktathi wrote: The problem with viewing things like D-cannons "going back to what they were meant to work like" and other such stuff is that 2E ultimately faced the same problems 7E did, humongous power gaps and and insanely broken capabilities coupled with widely dispersed and rules across a multitude of sources that few could keep up with, and the game started to collapse under its own weight, requiring a radical reboot that ultimately gave us 3E. The people excited about these sorts of things forget that 2E turned into an unholy mess by its end, and GW appears intent on making in some cases literally the exact same mistakes.
That is very true from competitive/pickup play point of view. But for more-RPG like aproach 3rd ed reboot was more like castration than "sorting out the bloated mess". And personally, it made me quit WH40k halfway through 3rd ed because 3rd ed Eldar (my army at that time) have lost all their previous character and charm. I have returned only when the gameplay began to at least resemble 2nd ed flexibility. And yours and mine point of views are fine examples of what my post was really about - different mindsets and goals. Preagreed, narrative scenarios can have much more depth in 2nd and 7th editions than in 3rd… And for that role, there is absolutely no problem with "broken capabilities" - quite the opposite really: you can create great scenarios built around those very "broken" things as centerpieces. At the same time, "low power gap" of 3rd ed (internally within codex, between least and most powerfull units. Under 3rd ed mechanics lots of units lost their unique feel and role...) made games more "flat" and quite frankly dull. It was, of course mitigated over time with increasing "bloated mess" of subsequent editions...
I can understand a lot of that, but the problem is that 40k doesnt really offer anything to support that kind of gameplay and fundamentally functions as a pickup game. The game is built around two players showing up with army lists constrained by points costs and playing generic missions. The rules for narrative gaming are either nonexistent or phoned in minor modifications to standard missions. There's no mention of prebuilt campaign supplements offering detailed battle scenarios or a 3rd party GM coming up with custom scenarios with prebuilt armies for both sides the way RT did and most other games that ostensibly offer that kind of experience do.
"Narrative" in 40k almost always ends up meaning "play this bloated mess of an RNG simulator where one side is given an arbitrary advantage over a slightly modified standard rulebook pickup mission with whatever you want to bring". The campaign books pretty much just give us a handful of formations that give silly freebies for taking X configuration of units and maybe some missions minorly deviated from the core rulebook, the substance is extremely lacking. It's all just poorly modified pickup play. Contrast this with other games that offer narrative battles and they'll predfine the forces to a far greater level with very purposefully built missions.
One can look at OGRE for instance, a *far* simpler game with *way* more narrative detail missions. Want your superheavy cybertank equipped with micronuke cannons to stomp all over a lightly defended truck convoy? Ok, but your Supertank type Z enters the map at point X, if the trucks make it to point Y they escape, the map and terrain is set up such that you can only really engage at points A, B or C, and the escort contingent is made up of units D, E and F travelling with the convoy. Supertank Z will have a tough time accomplishing its mission and the game becomes interesting at this point. 40k offers literally nothing to support this kind of play.
If people want their insanely overgunned Wraithguard for "flavor", well, ok, but then lets also acknowledge that nothing else about the gameplay is really built to support "flavor" in that way, and it just ends up coming off as a lame excuse for poor balance and to overpower things for its own sake.
Additionally, with the vast issues of scale the game currently suffers from, such as trying to make what type of blade an individual IG sergeants powerweapon a relevant issue in a game where he may literally be incapable of hurting anything either way because they're facing an army of Knights or dealing with individual close combat challenges in a game involving an entire tank company, makes so much of that "flavor" end up just being irrelevant noise except when its ultra powerful (and then that type of "flavor" is what you suspiciously start seeing lots of).
The game is trying to be far too many things and doing none of them well or even merely adequately. It really needs to be broken into 3 or 4 different systems.
And to be clear - I'm just giving an example of one of possible approaches to 40K, not by any means "the only true way". And I'm writing this only because "public debate" here on dakka is so much competitive/pick-up centric, that it is easy to fell into trap of thinking, that deathstars and gargantuans and all this "broken bull gak" is all there is to 40K and nothing else is possible and no one plays this game differently and that absolutely everyone would be happy with return to early 5th ed...
I get that, and most people acknowledge that 5E was far from perfect. I hated it at the time, for some of the reasons you mentioned as well. But compared to what we've gotten since it was far more playable.
While I can agree, that current 40K does not directly deliver such scenarios, let me rephrase my point of view: given the current state of rules (and WH40K history, starting as a RPG system with MG), it takes a lot less effort to make a great narrative scenario (less rule bending, less fiddling with unit balance etc, less houseruling) than to houserule a viable, broadly ballanced competitive system out of current edition with all possible builds and rule/unit interactions. Good narrative game (using any pair of factions) is doable by anyone with any RPG experience really, given of course, that you do not have to convince a sworn WAAC tournament TFG to participate… At the same time, with all that "rules mess" and "imbalance", competitive 40K is really a mind boggling phenomenon to me, as everybody (myself included) accurately argue, that WH40K is and was very much ill-suited to play competetively in any of it's iterations…
To me I guess it does neither well, or even remotely passably. For narrative games, everything in the game is still built fundamentally around a competitive pickup game style of play, and, at least in my experience over many editions and in many different places, pickup style play is what the majority of the playerbase engages in. For competitive games, while its basics are built around this, the execution is simply nonfunctional.
Either way the game does not really function and requires extensive rewriting, deletion, and addition of rules and mechanics, and at that point, particularly for narrative play, why use GW's rules at all?
Vaktathi wrote: To me I guess it does neither well, or even remotely passably. For narrative games, everything in the game is still built fundamentally around a competitive pickup game style of play, and, at least in my experience over many editions and in many different places, pickup style play is what the majority of the playerbase engages in. For competitive games, while its basics are built around this, the execution is simply nonfunctional.
Either way the game does not really function and requires extensive rewriting, deletion, and addition of rules and mechanics, and at that point, particularly for narrative play, why use GW's rules at all?
To be fair though to GW (shock!) they did try moving away from the competitive pickup game style of play with AoS, and it was lambasted and people didn't bother to look at it until they added a hamfisted competitive pickup game style of play to it. Although to be fair I think a lot of that was because they basically gave little/no guidelines for it. I think AoS might (big might) have been better received without General's Handbook if they had had straightforward guidelines for picking forces like they do in White Dwarf for their own games (e.g. something as simple as "To ensure a good battle, decide with your opponent around how many heroes and units you both should field"), but really again I think this is a playerbase problem. The players are the ones who immediately start theorycrafting what is mathematically superior choices and going by the approach if there are no limits, then anything is game regardless of the thematic sense it makes. Again, a little talking about a scenario goes a long way to fixing this so you don't have TFG who takes a bunch of fast moving things and ignores basics just because he can or who abuses summoning just because the rules let him. That is 100% a player problem. Could GW have not allowed those rules? Yes I'm sure, but I imagine it was deliberately for a scenario where you have a BBEG who is summoning things while the heroes try to stop him, not so Bob the WAAC Gamer can summon a ton of extra guys.
Again, I do not mean to completely demonize the players but I think they bear some responsibility on things. A lot of these issues go away if you DON'T want to just set up a game with a minimum of fuss and actually try to be part of the community and not just a random dude who shows up every week at the game shop to play.
To me, AoS didnt so much try to do narrative play so much as it was simply an incomplete ruleset that precluded almost anything but people having to make everything up. It still didnt really have narrative scenarios, but prepackaged pickup style battle guidelines without any sort of army construction framework other than "bring whatever you want". It had many of the same issues and pitfalls 40k had. I havent looked at it in months so I dont know what the points system looks like and cant comment, but even for narrative pla, AoS just didnt bring anything, it was effectively a sandbox pickup game, which was the big problem as that doesn't really work.
Had they provided lots of guidance for building narrative scenarios and constructing forces the way OGRE does or many old Battletech supplements did or somr Flames of War scenarios, I think it would have been better received, but GW did none of that.
Whats worse is that even the events GW ran had these same issues. They ran tournaments at Warhammer World...for a game with army construction guidelines, and just had people bring whatever they wanted, and thus the only play events they offered (at lease AFAIK) were still competitive/pickup style affairs for an ostensibly narrative ruleset, but with no functionality for either playstyle really.
Either way the game does not really function and requires extensive rewriting, deletion, and addition of rules and mechanics, and at that point, particularly for narrative play, why use GW's rules at all?
Which part of the rules are we talking about though? IMO the rules work quite well for more "controlled environment" style of games. I just had a 1500 point Loyalist vs. Chaos game where I culled the hypercompetetive stuff from my army and we agreed to no superheavies and no flyers, and honestly the game was very smooth.
Someone said earlier I think that the majority of problems result from the almost anarchic freedom of army selection and the codexes themselves, and I agree. If you play a game with good terrain, and pit a platoon or two of guardsmen against a couple modest marine squads, good times are easy to be had.
It's been suggested before that a good way to reign things in a bit is to have certain requirements based on the scale of the game. I think that would be enough to achieve some normalcy of expectations for pick up games.
Vaktathi wrote: To me, AoS didnt so much try to do narrative play so much as it was simply an incomplete ruleset that precluded almost anything but people having to make everything up. It still didnt really have narrative scenarios, but prepackaged pickup style battle guidelines without any sort of army construction framework other than "bring whatever you want". It had many of the same issues and pitfalls 40k had. I havent looked at it in months so I dont know what the points system looks like and cant comment, but even for narrative pla, AoS just didnt bring anything, it was effectively a sandbox pickup game, which was the big problem as that doesn't really work.
Had they provided lots of guidance for building narrative scenarios and constructing forces the way OGRE does or many old Battletech supplements did or somr Flames of War scenarios, I think it would have been better received, but GW did none of that.
Whats worse is that even the events GW ran had these same issues. They ran tournaments at Warhammer World...for a game with army construction guidelines, and just had people bring whatever they wanted, and thus the only play events they offered (at lease AFAIK) were still competitive/pickup style affairs for an ostensibly narrative ruleset, but with no functionality for either playstyle really.
What is also funny on that note is that for a narrative game, GW doesn't really do anything to help. I skimmed through that "Crusade of Fire" book they had in 6th, hoping to see like actual guidelines for running a campaign, maybe even an example campaign that was pretty much "plug and play". Instead it was basically go buy three of our Planetary Empires set, oh and it's a Game Mastered campaign but we're not going to really go into anything about that, and here's our guys who played in it by the way other than one player they're all Marines or Chaos Marines because who needs variety, and here's some weird scenarios but we aren't really going in depth but look at the pretty pictures, oh and by the way at least one mission is completely custom and specifically designed for this cool piece of terrain that we have and nobody else has unless you try and build it too, and then some silly extra rules for Gladiatorial combat and dogfights (which weren't bad, I admit). It was pretty much useless, the kind of crap you'd expect to see spread out over a few White Dwarf issues not sold as a book with a hefty price tag but gave barely any sort of tips or framework for running your own campaign.
Sorry this is going off tangent again but what I'd love to see is an actual, thought out campaign for 40k. The sort of thing that can easily be done without a lot of fuss or paperwork, just get some people together and string it out.
Back on size though, I really think the ultimate solution is they need to split the game into different sizes again, it's the only way to not have everything bogged down or turn the game into just vehicle and superheavies battling while troops do nothing.
Either way the game does not really function and requires extensive rewriting, deletion, and addition of rules and mechanics, and at that point, particularly for narrative play, why use GW's rules at all?
Which part of the rules are we talking about though? IMO the rules work quite well for more "controlled environment" style of games. I just had a 1500 point Loyalist vs. Chaos game where I culled the hypercompetetive stuff from my army and we agreed to no superheavies and no flyers, and honestly the game was very smooth.
That seems to follow pretty closely with what I was saying, you're rewriting your acceptable army construction rules to exlude large numbers of units and unit types (and their associated mechanics) and playing armies that have similar characteristics, and playing at the lower end of what most would consider a "typical" points level that allows for fewer crazy toys.
That said I should also ask, were you guys also doing the full rulebook rules for things like mission type, mysterious objectives and terrain, unmodified maelstrom, any changes to things like detachmentd or Invisibility, etc? These are things I see people organically ignore or change all the time.
Someone said earlier I think that the majority of problems result from the almost anarchic freedom of army selection and the codexes themselves, and I agree. If you play a game with good terrain, and pit a platoon or two of guardsmen against a couple modest marine squads, good times are easy to be had.
Sure, and I wouldnt totally disagree, but thats also about as basic and stripped down as you can get, cutting out huge amounts of game content.
It's been suggested before that a good way to reign things in a bit is to have certain requirements based on the scale of the game. I think that would be enough to achieve some normalcy of expectations for pick up games.
In some cases that would help very much, but it's also not just an issue of things like Flyers and Superheavies, but stuff like TWC's or Necron Wraiths that can take nearly a thousand lasgun shots to put down and armies just arent capable of mustering that kind of firepower. Formation freebies and spam functionality through multiple detachments along with unintended allies synergy also are huge factors.
What is also funny on that note is that for a narrative game, GW doesn't really do anything to help. I skimmed through that "Crusade of Fire" book they had in 6th, hoping to see like actual guidelines for running a campaign, maybe even an example campaign that was pretty much "plug and play". Instead it was basically go buy three of our Planetary Empires set, oh and it's a Game Mastered campaign but we're not going to really go into anything about that, and here's our guys who played in it by the way other than one player they're all Marines or Chaos Marines because who needs variety, and here's some weird scenarios but we aren't really going in depth but look at the pretty pictures, oh and by the way at least one mission is completely custom and specifically designed for this cool piece of terrain that we have and nobody else has unless you try and build it too, and then some silly extra rules for Gladiatorial combat and dogfights (which weren't bad, I admit). It was pretty much useless, the kind of crap you'd expect to see spread out over a few White Dwarf issues not sold as a book with a hefty price tag but gave barely any sort of tips or framework for running your own campaign.
Sorry this is going off tangent again but what I'd love to see is an actual, thought out campaign for 40k. The sort of thing that can easily be done without a lot of fuss or paperwork, just get some people together and string it out.
Back on size though, I really think the ultimate solution is they need to split the game into different sizes again, it's the only way to not have everything bogged down or turn the game into just vehicle and superheavies battling while troops do nothing.
Aye, the Crusade of Fire is an excellent point about how truly garbage 40k is for narrative play, the stuff GW puts out is minimal and mostly pointless.
Also yes, splitting the game into multiple systems is desperately needed.
Vaktathi wrote: To me, AoS didnt so much try to do narrative play so much as it was simply an incomplete ruleset that precluded almost anything but people having to make everything up. It still didnt really have narrative scenarios, but prepackaged pickup style battle guidelines without any sort of army construction framework other than "bring whatever you want". It had many of the same issues and pitfalls 40k had. I havent looked at it in months so I dont know what the points system looks like and cant comment, but even for narrative pla, AoS just didnt bring anything, it was effectively a sandbox pickup game, which was the big problem as that doesn't really work.
Had they provided lots of guidance for building narrative scenarios and constructing forces the way OGRE does or many old Battletech supplements did or some Flames of War scenarios,
I'm sorry but this just smacks of not actually having played AoS or read any of the books that had rules in them.
There absolutely was stuff for narrative play. It just wasn't "The attacker brings X, Y, and Z units while the defender brings A, B, C units".
Vaktathi wrote: To me, AoS didnt so much try to do narrative play so much as it was simply an incomplete ruleset that precluded almost anything but people having to make everything up. It still didnt really have narrative scenarios, but prepackaged pickup style battle guidelines without any sort of army construction framework other than "bring whatever you want". It had many of the same issues and pitfalls 40k had. I havent looked at it in months so I dont know what the points system looks like and cant comment, but even for narrative pla, AoS just didnt bring anything, it was effectively a sandbox pickup game, which was the big problem as that doesn't really work.
Had they provided lots of guidance for building narrative scenarios and constructing forces the way OGRE does or many old Battletech supplements did or some Flames of War scenarios,
I'm sorry but this just smacks of not actually having played AoS or read any of the books that had rules in them.
There absolutely was stuff for narrative play. It just wasn't "The attacker brings X, Y, and Z units while the defender brings A, B, C units".
do you have an example? I'm at work and dont have access to anything to reread right now, but from memory (at least the stuff I read) was pretty much "here's a new mission, have anything from factions A and B fight it out, but it also works with anyone else", which essentially was just more pickup gaming material.
I have to agree with Vaktathi (this might warrant a side discussion?). A lot of the "narrative" missions were still just basically scenarios, with a footnote saying that X and Y fought, but even the terms were generic so that it wasn't really faction specific, like there was a Flesh-Eater Court scenario that was based around a narrative of them coming out of the woodwork to attack Stormcasts, and IIRC the attacker was called "Hunter" and the defender was "Prey" or something like that, it was a cool themed scenario, I will admit, but nothing about it was narrative, it was just another mission you could play if you wanted to do something different. Problem is that people generally don't want to do something different, because it might not be "balanced".
It's basically the AoS version of the custom scenarios that you find in Codex supplements; generic stuff that could be good if people actually used them for narrative scenarios.
I'm not saying they are bad, they are cool little extras that you can use, but people don't want to bother with a "special" mission from a specific book, they want to use what's in the main book and that's it.
Vaktathi wrote: That seems to follow pretty closely with what I was saying, you're rewriting your acceptable army construction rules to exlude large numbers of units and unit types (and their associated mechanics) and playing armies that have similar characteristics, and playing at the lower end of what most would consider a "typical" points level that allows for fewer crazy toys.
That said I should also ask, were you guys also doing the full rulebook rules for things like mission type, mysterious objectives and terrain, unmodified maelstrom, any changes to things like detachmentd or Invisibility, etc? These are things I see people organically ignore or change all the time.
Well, I was really just wondering where you (personally) draw the line. In the case of my recent game "large numbers of units and unit types" were not culled, just flyers and superheavies, so maybe 5% of total units? That's not a big change. Beyond that I decided to pass on my usual Drop Pods and Grav-Cannons. (though that wasn't part of our negotiation, just me doing something more traditional. For SM, Drop Pods change the game more than Flyers)
Our first mission roll was "the Relic", and we re-rolled it. But otherwise full rulebook.
Someone said earlier I think that the majority of problems result from the almost anarchic freedom of army selection and the codexes themselves, and I agree. If you play a game with good terrain, and pit a platoon or two of guardsmen against a couple modest marine squads, good times are easy to be had.
Sure, and I wouldnt totally disagree, but thats also about as basic and stripped down as you can get, cutting out huge amounts of game content.
It's just an example of compatability of the army baselines. Obviously not the limit, as the previous anecdote (Chaos vs. Loyalists) used ~95% of units. This follows the common statement of "30K doesn't have the same problems with balance." Right? 30K uses the same core rules.
The problem (like 2nd edition) is the creep of special rules/combinations of units available, slowly eroding the usefulness of the basic stuff for which the system was written for. Allies aren't inherently a problem, it's Allies in combination with the special rules/abilities for a number of units all combined together.
It's been suggested before that a good way to reign things in a bit is to have certain requirements based on the scale of the game. I think that would be enough to achieve some normalcy of expectations for pick up games.
In some cases that would help very much, but it's also not just an issue of things like Flyers and Superheavies, but stuff like TWC's or Necron Wraiths that can take nearly a thousand lasgun shots to put down and armies just arent capable of mustering that kind of firepower. Formation freebies and spam functionality through multiple detachments along with unintended allies synergy also are huge factors.
It all depends on how you write up those requirements. Using percentages for Troops/HQ/Heavy Support is handy since it scales with the point size of the game. Limiting Formations to higher point games does something else. Giving units a "Tier Level" or "Tech Level" (like RTS games) has yet another effect on the game. It's not an unsolvable problem.
Vaktathi wrote: To me I guess it does neither well, or even remotely passably.
I think it's more a case of a clunky interface than anything else. A more straight forward, intuitive and elegant system would be preferable. If anything, I'd put this higher up my wish list than balance. Because I can deal with the latter
Vaktathi wrote: . For narrative games, everything in the game is still built fundamentally around a competitive pickup game style of play, and, at least in my experience over many editions and in many different places,
I disagree.
Is that just because the player base has conditioned itself to only one style of play, regardless of its suitability. Since it's all they know, it's all they expect, and it's the only way they know how to play. narrative gaming takes effort, and gamers are lazy. Gamers are very conservative and terrified of change/new things as a general rule, and will rarely step out of their bubble of accepted thinking and the 'right way to play'. I don't think the game is based around either pick up and play or competitive styles at all American gsming culture is, and the phrase 'square peg. Round hole' comes to mind with regard to playing 40k. Games are like tools. They can be used a variety of ways. Let's not mistake the mechanics of a game, and the approach of various members of the player base to how they insist on thr use of said game. They can be mutually exclusive.
Vaktathi wrote: For competitive games, while its basics are built around this, the execution is simply nonfunctional.
Projection. 40k isn't a competitive game, and hasn't been for a longer time. If it ever was. Like I said, fundamentally, gsmes are just a series of resolution mechanisms tied up together.
Back In the day, when gw ran tourneys, they ran, and suggested various other approaches at the same time, so even when competitive 40k was a thing, it was one thing amongst many. Gamers insisting on trying to make it into a competitive game now doesn't necessarily make it true. It's dressing up a donkey as a race horse.
Either way the game does not really function and requires extensive rewriting, deletion, and addition of rules and mechanics, and at that point, particularly for narrative play, why use GW's rules at all?
Because Why not?
Rules are just abstract game mechanics. They don't comprise an 'identity'. They're just a series of resolution mechanics. Like actors for a role in a script.
Because it's useful to start somewhere, use some set of rules as a baseline to work with, take what you want and ignore the rest. For what it's worth, we do this with flames of war and infinity in our group. Use the 'main gsme' as a base line, and chop and choose from there. One of the advantages of 40k, still, is that there is a kind of universality to it, in that most of us have some experience of it. It's like Windows. It's not perfect, but you can use it and get what you need out of it with a bit of fuss.
Vaktathi wrote: That seems to follow pretty closely with what I was saying, you're rewriting your acceptable army construction rules to exlude large numbers of units and unit types (and their associated mechanics) and playing armies that have similar characteristics, and playing at the lower end of what most would consider a "typical" points level that allows for fewer crazy toys.
That said I should also ask, were you guys also doing the full rulebook rules for things like mission type, mysterious objectives and terrain, unmodified maelstrom, any changes to things like detachmentd or Invisibility, etc? These are things I see people organically ignore or change all the time.
Well, I was really just wondering where you (personally) draw the line. In the case of my recent game "large numbers of units and unit types" were not culled, just flyers and superheavies, so maybe 5% of total units? That's not a big change. Beyond that I decided to pass on my usual Drop Pods and Grav-Cannons. (though that wasn't part of our negotiation, just me doing something more traditional. For SM, Drop Pods change the game more than Flyers)
To me I guess, Grav and Drop Pods are amongst the most powerful tools in the SM arsenal (I agree they have more impact than flyers) and by leaving those out you dramatically level the playing field. So if you're leaving out two of the most powerful tools available, along with associated units that utilize them heavily, along with flyers and SH units, you're cutting a lot out.
Our first mission roll was "the Relic", and we re-rolled it. But otherwise full rulebook.
mmk, was just curious.
It's just an example of compatability of the army baselines. Obviously not the limit, as the previous anecdote (Chaos vs. Loyalists) used ~95% of units. This follows the common statement of "30K doesn't have the same problems with balance." Right? 30K uses the same core rules.
I think 30k is *better* but does have its issues as well. That said having additional limits on LoW units and mostly similar armies helps a lot
The problem (like 2nd edition) is the creep of special rules/combinations of units available, slowly eroding the usefulness of the basic stuff for which the system was written for.
Aye, it is for sure a huge issue.
It all depends on how you write up those requirements. Using percentages for Troops/HQ/Heavy Support is handy since it scales with the point size of the game. Limiting Formations to higher point games does something else. Giving units a "Tier Level" or "Tech Level" (like RTS games) has yet another effect on the game. It's not an unsolvable problem.
in some ways sure, but that also adds additional layers of complexity, and there are just certain things that will probably never balance right in their current incarnation (e.g. Necron Wraiths)
Vaktathi wrote: To me I guess it does neither well, or even remotely passably.
I think it's more a case of a clunky interface than anything else. A more straight forward, intuitive and elegant system would be preferable. If anything, I'd put this higher up my wish list than balance. Because I can deal with the latter
Balance usually accompanies such systems much better as an inherent part of that, but I'd won't disagree that clunky rules form a gigantic part of the problem.
Vaktathi wrote: . For narrative games, everything in the game is still built fundamentally around a competitive pickup game style of play, and, at least in my experience over many editions and in many different places,
I disagree.
Is that just because the player base has conditioned itself to only one style of play, regardless of its suitability. Since it's all they know, it's all they expect, and it's the only way they know how to play. narrative gaming takes effort, and gamers are lazy. Gamers are very conservative and terrified of change/new things as a general rule, and will rarely step out of their bubble of accepted thinking and the 'right way to play'.
I don't think that's quite fair. There are a huge number of mini's games out in the market with all sorts of styles, and most of the people that play those games have played 40k at one point or another, the players are willing to try new experiences. I think the big issue with 40k is that the rules really don't offer anything for that style of play, and the few attempts that have been made have quite simply been lazily phoned-in garbage (e.g. the old 5E Battle Missions book, Crusade of Fire campaign book, all the 7E campaign books really have just offered more pickup options and nothing exclusively tied to a specific setting or story). When the rules don't really support something and the few releases have all been duds, it's no surprise that people don't expect any such thing from 40k.
I don't think the game is based around either pick up and play or competitive styles at all American gsming culture is, and the phrase 'square peg. Round hole' comes to mind with regard to playing 40k. Games are like tools. They can be used a variety of ways. Let's not mistake the mechanics of a game, and the approach of various members of the player base to how they insist on thr use of said game. They can be mutually exclusive.
I may be missing your point, but when I said the game is built fundamentally around a competitive pickup style of play, I'm talking about super basic stuff like misions, army construction, etc. Players have very free form army lists built around some sort of common standard (points), use standardized missions from rulebooks that are sport-like in nature most of the time (e.g. take the enemy home objective, keep control of your own, GOOOOAAAALLLL!) or are almost entirely random and arbitrary (Maelstrom), and have general guidelines but no hard standards for terrain. This is how the rulebook spells out how to play. This is a very pickup game oriented approach. It's not giving you detailed scenarios (e.g. time and place with detailed force breakdowns) or linked campaign battles with dynamic cause and effect results on subsequent games or really anything more than very basic sport-like mission objectives and model deployment zones (again, in a generally very sportfield like manner).
There is no game supplement material that really is built around thought out, narrative play. It's all modifications of basic rulebook stuff, stuff that's built around easy pickup games. Even the ostensibly "narrative" AoS stuff was really just variations on existing pickup missions, same thing with the "Battle Missions" supplement that came out in 5th.
Again, one can see my OGRE reference above for a game that really builds around scenario/narrative play. Or something like old school Battletech that would dictate specific maps that had detailed and pre-arranged terrain along with detailed starting forces and gave players backgroun adherent resources (such as mercenary outfits receiving pay and buying new machines off open markets with their own systems and rules) to recruit new units and replace losses through linked mission campaigns. 40k does none of these things. Every example of narrative play from GW is basically "two players bring whatever they happen to have on hand and a standard pickup mission or some variant thereof" that's then spruced up with comments and some story bits, but is fundamentally still basically pickup play.
The last time 40k could really have been said to be built on a narrative platform is RT, where the game recommended a 3rd player GM to design scenarios and make terrain for games. That was well over 20 years ago now however.
Projection. 40k isn't a competitive game, and hasn't been for a longer time.
I agree, it's not a competitive game, but the basic mechanics of play are built around pickup style competitive play. That doesn't mean it works as a competitive game, it doesn't, but it's certainly not a ruleset that offers much to narrative play either.
If it ever was. Like I said, fundamentally, gsmes are just a series of resolution mechanisms tied up together.
Back In the day, when gw ran tourneys, they ran, and suggested various other approaches at the same time, so even when competitive 40k was a thing, it was one thing amongst many. Gamers insisting on trying to make it into a competitive game now doesn't necessarily make it true. It's dressing up a donkey as a race horse.
What sort of other events did they run that weren't ultimately pickup play or something silly? I remember stuff like a Chaos Spawn gladiator pit thing, but that was basically just everyone paying $10 to split a box of Chaos Spawn and built and painted them and threw them all on a board and had them fight, and that's about as "pickup" as it gets. I don't recall any sort of narrative or campaign play offered at a GW tournament. "Narrative" at events largely just means that you don't have unit restrictions but may have comp restrictions and some weird mission rules and is otherwise played the same way the "competitive" matches are. I just don't recall any real sort of "narrative" play offered by GW ever that wasn't just slightly less competitive pickup play of some sort.
Either way the game does not really function and requires extensive rewriting, deletion, and addition of rules and mechanics, and at that point, particularly for narrative play, why use GW's rules at all?
Because Why not?
Rules are just abstract game mechanics. They don't comprise an 'identity'. They're just a series of resolution mechanics. Like actors for a role in a script.
Because it's useful to start somewhere, use some set of rules as a baseline to work with, take what you want and ignore the rest. For what it's worth, we do this with flames of war and infinity in our group. Use the 'main gsme' as a base line, and chop and choose from there. One of the advantages of 40k, still, is that there is a kind of universality to it, in that most of us have some experience of it. It's like Windows. It's not perfect, but you can use it and get what you need out of it with a bit of fuss.
To me 40k is a whole lot more like Linux. You can do almost anything with it, but out of the box it won't do much of anything well, the system will require a very large amount of setup and modification to do what you want it to do, everyone using it has to be an expert or it fails miserably because of the vast array of configuration involved and a bewildering array of modules that few but the most invested can keep track of, and lots of people try to hamfist into doing things it's can kinda make a pass at doing, but isn't an ideal system for, just because, and ultimately is best suited to a narrow range of uses and run by both experienced and closely like minded people
Again, one can see my OGRE reference above for a game that really builds around scenario/narrative play. Or something like old school Battletech that would dictate specific maps that had detailed and pre-arranged terrain along with detailed starting forces and gave players backgroun adherent resources (such as mercenary outfits receiving pay and buying new machines off open markets with their own systems and rules) to recruit new units and replace losses through linked mission campaigns. 40k does none of these things. Every example of narrative play from GW is basically "two players bring whatever they happen to have on hand and a standard pickup mission or some variant thereof" that's then spruced up with comments and some story bits, but is fundamentally still basically pickup play.
The last time 40k could really have been said to be built on a narrative platform is RT, where the game recommended a 3rd player GM to design scenarios and make terrain for games. That was well over 20 years ago now however.
Modern Battletech offers a decent points system that can be used for the most cut-throat of play. It also offers linked campaign scenario books and campaign systems for the narrative player. It also scales up from small battle, to large battle, to planetary conquest, to galactic conquest battles all supported by decent rule-sets. There's also a main rulebook - Tactical Operations - that adds hundreds of pages of optional fluff rules for the narrative gamer. Lets not forget you can plug the Battletech RPG into standard games and campaigns for extra narrative goodness.
Modern Battletech publisher - Catalyst Game Labs - employs about three people directly yet they can manage to scale their games properly, have a decent system for pick-up or tournament games and have reams of stuff for the narrative gamer. Why can GW with a hundred plus people in the 'design studio' not manage the same basic standard? GW play lip service to things like narrative while never actually delivering products that promote narrative play to any meaningful extent. A battle with slightly changed deployment or objective rules seems to be the height of their imagination when it comes to narrative.
Vaktathi wrote: To me I guess it does neither well, or even remotely passably.
I think it's more a case of a clunky interface than anything else. A more straight forward, intuitive and elegant system would be preferable. If anything, I'd put this higher up my wish list than balance. Because I can deal with the latter
Balance usually accompanies such systems much better as an inherent part of that, but I'd won't disagree that clunky rules form a gigantic part of the problem.
I don't disagree either, but even intuitive, the more straight forward systems I play tend to be built with balance in mind, however, many still have balance issues. It's just the nature of the medium, unfortunately. My point was that I'm happy to deal with imbalance (the negotiation phase - I play in one of those 'likeminded groups'), but having more elegant and intuitive game systems for 40k would go a long, long way to make me look at it again as a proper game rather than what it is now (various modelling projects thst when complete, sit in a foam tray). If the system itself is enjoyable, in my mind, then I'll happily jig the rest.
I don't think that's quite fair. There are a huge number of mini's games out in the market with all sorts of styles, and most of the people that play those games have played 40k at one point or another, the players are willing to try new experiences. I think the big issue with 40k is that the rules really don't offer anything for that style of play, and the few attempts that have been made have quite simply been lazily phoned-in garbage (e.g. the old 5E Battle Missions book, Crusade of Fire campaign book, all the 7E campaign books really have just offered more pickup options and nothing exclusively tied to a specific setting or story). When the rules don't really support something and the few releases have all been duds, it's no surprise that people don't expect any such thing from 40k.
New gsmes doesn't necessarily equal new experiences. People can play dozens of wargames, and yet still play every single one of them in the same way, with the same attitude. Different language, same conversation.
Frostgrave and aos are about the only ones that started a conversation about playing games in a non pick up and play manner. Although mechanically, I had no time for aos, I did enjoy how, for seemingly the first time, it opened up a lot of people to the idea/conversation of playing games outside of the '1500pts? Deploy army. Roll for initiative and go!' blind match up kind of games bubble that people seemed to feel were 'how' you played.
To be honest, I don't think the rules can really support the narrative type of gaming and it's a mistake to zero in on them as the source for 'narrative'.. It's more of an attitude thing than a mechanic thing, if you ask me. It's far more nebulous.
I may be missing your point, but when I said the game is built fundamentally around a competitive pickup style of play, I'm talking about super basic stuff like misions, army construction, etc. Players have very free form army lists built around some sort of common standard (points), use standardized missions from rulebooks that are sport-like in nature most of the time (e.g. take the enemy home objective, keep control of your own, GOOOOAAAALLLL!) or are almost entirely random and arbitrary (Maelstrom), and have general guidelines but no hard standards for terrain. This is how the rulebook spells out how to play. This is a very pickup game oriented approach. It's not giving you detailed scenarios (e.g. time and place with detailed force breakdowns) or linked campaign battles with dynamic cause and effect results on subsequent games or really anything more than very basic sport-like mission objectives and model deployment zones (again, in a generally very sportfield like manner).
What you describe above as 'detailed scenarios' are re-enactments. Please, let's not make the mistake of equating narrative games with reenactments. They're not the same thing. Reenactments can be narrative gsmes, but not all narrative gaming is reenactments.
What you describe further above are structural tools - how to build an army. Standardised missions/structure are there to facilitate communication and playability- as you say, it's a common ground/language. I mean, you'll probably use those exact things you equate to 'pick up gsmes' in narrative games, because you Still need structure and game mechanics to make things happen. What those things dont tell you how to play. It's not necessarily pick up and play. Pick up and play means i can take whatever I want out of the box, plug it in and play it immediately against whatever you pulled out of the box, with no problems.
I'd actually argue Where you play (ie in stores etc) often has more of an impact on defining gaming culture than the rules of the gsme - in effect it defined how people approach their games in terms of time constraints etc- you get tables for a short amount of time. You don't necessarily have time to chat or 'negotiate'. You need to sort out your mission quick. You need to set up and just go. This attitude then imposes itself and colours 'how' you perceive 'how' your games are played. Whatever game you play will be coloured in in exactly the same way by the exact same influences, regardless of the character of th game itself. Play the same game under different circumstances and constraints (eg, at home with a mate, over a weekend with a few beers) and the same core game becomes something completely different, even when defined by the same 'rules'.
Gw also make frequent references to take what you want, chop/change/ignore etc, as well as make stuff up yourselves. What I'm trying to say is those structural tools you describe above as for 'pick up and play' are fundamentally the same structural tools you'd use for narrative play. Game mechanics are just for resolution. Nothing more. Everything else is attitude.
There is no game supplement material that really is built around thought out, narrative play. It's all modifications of basic rulebook stuff, stuff that's built around easy pickup games. Even the ostensibly "narrative" AoS stuff was really just variations on existing pickup missions, same thing with the "Battle Missions" supplement that came out in 5th.
Because the stuff that makes narrative gaming narrative is not necessarily well done when codified by 'rules'- it's far more nebulous, and if you ask me, is best left outside of the structure defined by the rules (which I simply see as resolution mechanics, nothing more). Narrative gaming requires a different perspective towards gaming, rather than different rules. Again, like I said earlier, it's 'how' you approach your gaming. Although aos isn't a 'new' type of game, it did, for the first time, expose a lot of people to this attitude, and more than one liked what they saw.
Red adding no game supplement material - I recently bought a load of lotr stuff for historical games, and reading through the rulebook (surprisingly intuitive and elegant system, and seriously under appreciated in my mind!) they gave loads of ideas for narrative play with optional missions, coastal raids, sieges, various mission ideas (looting, assassination, raiding, burning, etc) as well as ideas for linking in successive scenarios. Codifying it would defeat the purpose - these things need to be nebulous to allow choice and options the second you codify it, people stop being inventive and creative and will not budge from the official 'proper' way of playing
Again, one can see my OGRE reference above for a game that really builds around scenario/narrative play. Or something like old school Battletech that would dictate specific maps that had detailed and pre-arranged terrain along with detailed starting forces and gave players backgroun adherent resources (such as mercenary outfits receiving pay and buying new machines off open markets with their own systems and rules) to recruit new units and replace losses through linked mission campaigns. 40k does none of these things. Every example of narrative play from GW is basically "two players bring whatever they happen to have on hand and a standard pickup mission or some variant thereof" that's then spruced up with comments and some story bits, but is fundamentally still basically pickup play.
Like I said, the Lord of the rings books were a treasure trove of ideas. Again, none of the things described here are necessary 'narrative' more so than 'reenactment'. 40k is open ended. It's up to you.
The last time 40k could really have been said to be built on a narrative platform is RT, where the game recommended a 3rd player GM to design scenarios and make terrain for games. That was well over 20 years ago now however.
Gw won't send inquisitors If you choose to have a gm these days either...
I agree, it's not a competitive game, but the basic mechanics of play are built around pickup style competitive play. That doesn't mean it works as a competitive game, it doesn't, but it's certainly not a ruleset that offers much to narrative play either.
Basic mechanics are basic mechanics, nothing more. They can be used any way you want. See above. Store/club culture has far more of an effect in defining 'how' games are played than the resolution mechanics.
And again. I will raise the point that so much of what makes narrative games comes outside the scope of the rules.
[What sort of other events did they run that weren't ultimately pickup play or something silly? I remember stuff like a Chaos Spawn gladiator pit thing, but that was basically just everyone paying $10 to split a box of Chaos Spawn and built and painted them and threw them all on a board and had them fight, and that's about as "pickup" as it gets. I don't recall any sort of narrative or campaign play offered at a GW tournament. "Narrative" at events largely just means that you don't have unit restrictions but may have comp restrictions and some weird mission rules and is otherwise played the same way the "competitive" matches are. I just don't recall any real sort of "narrative" play offered by GW ever that wasn't just slightly less competitive pickup play of some sort.
You were at a tournament and expecting a not-tournament?
Anyway, I wasn't necessarily taking about events - I was talking about approaches to gsming. Narrative gaming isn't necessarily compatible with tournament gaming. It's more time consuming, free form etc. And gw have always encouraged doing your own thing. there are plenty examples throughout white dwarf etc of different ways of approaching your games. It's not all pick up. Pick up gsmes are just gaming 101.
Any ways, let's not make the other mistake of assuming that pick up gsmes and narrative games are somehow resolved differently. You'll put stuff on the board, aim for an objective, try and kill stuff etc - just like in what you call a 'pick up game'. It's the attitude and perception behind it that's different.
To me 40k is a whole lot more like Linux. You can do almost anything with it, but out of the box it won't do much of anything well, the system will require a very large amount of setup and modification to do what you want it to do, everyone using it has to be an expert or it fails miserably because of the vast array of configuration involved and a bewildering array of modules that few but the most invested can keep track of, and lots of people try to hamfist into doing things it's can kinda make a pass at doing, but isn't an ideal system for, just because, and ultimately is best suited to a narrow range of uses and run by both experienced and closely like minded people
Then aim to become an expert. The more you do, the more you learn from your experiences, the better you'll be. Games aren't just fun when they're 'solved'. Gaming can be a hell of a lot of fun when you are tinkering, Experimenting and exploring, and trying out weird and wacky stuff too. It doesn't necessarily even need experience, just a bit of will, and effort, and a desire to be creative. As to like minded people - this is a niche hobby - surely it makes sense to build a community of people you like spending time with anyway? It's not necessarily a barrier.
Deadnight wrote: Because it's useful to start somewhere, use some set of rules as a baseline to work with, take what you want and ignore the rest. For what it's worth, we do this with flames of war and infinity in our group. Use the 'main gsme' as a base line, and chop and choose from there. One of the advantages of 40k, still, is that there is a kind of universality to it, in that most of us have some experience of it. It's like Windows. It's not perfect, but you can use it and get what you need out of it with a bit of fuss.
Don't even remember when I have played ANY game from ANY company straight off the box. Maybe WM tournament around when mk2 game? At home games every single game(yes even WM) we have changed games.
Quality of game is subjective. Nobody but me can make game that I'm 100% happy. Of course if I make game I'm 100% happy that means opponents won't be 100% happy with it so we compromise.
Since companies need to appeal to larger group than I need they have to make more compromises than I have to do. Therefore odds of any company making game that I would be happy enough straight off the box that we can't customize even more to our taste is...Well nothing is zero%(except finding non-dependant existance in anything) in probabilities won't say impossible but extremely unlikely. Chess is about only thing I can think of where I haven't house ruled ever anything.
Either way the game does not really function and requires extensive rewriting, deletion, and addition of rules and mechanics, and at that point, particularly for narrative play, why use GW's rules at all?
Deadnight already answered this quite nicely, but I'll like to reiterate, as this is one of the most important aspects in narrative community building: you have to have common ground to start with. Take languages as an example - Esperanto was designed with the goal of being the most intuitive and easy to learn language, yet it is English, with all its irregularities and spelling monstrosities, that is lingua franca of the modern world. Simply because it was popular enough when globalisation kicked in (first with Pax Britannica, then continued by Pax Americana). And this is the same story with GW rules - they are around for three decades and the basics of their system hasn't been changed since 3rd ed. Of course there are far better rulesets out there, but if your goal is to play narrative games in 40K universe using 40K miniatures, it is much easier to build a group based on people familiar with 40K rules and then introduce incremental changes to suit your needs, than to homebrew something ideal from the ground up and then try to convince people to devote their time and effort to learn and play with rules not broadly applicable. This is really why Horus Heresy uses the same mechanics as 40K - Forgeworld could have easily went "full overhaul" on everything....
I don't think that's quite fair. There are a huge number of mini's games out in the market with all sorts of styles, and most of the people that play those games have played 40k at one point or another, the players are willing to try new experiences. I think the big issue with 40k is that the rules really don't offer anything for that style of play, and the few attempts that have been made have quite simply been lazily phoned-in garbage (e.g. the old 5E Battle Missions book, Crusade of Fire campaign book, all the 7E campaign books really have just offered more pickup options and nothing exclusively tied to a specific setting or story). When the rules don't really support something and the few releases have all been duds, it's no surprise that people don't expect any such thing from 40k.
New gsmes doesn't necessarily equal new experiences. People can play dozens of wargames, and yet still play every single one of them in the same way, with the same attitude. Different language, same conversation.
I guess, but this is not my experience by and large.
Frostgrave and aos are about the only ones that started a conversation about playing games in a non pick up and play manner. Although mechanically, I had no time for aos, I did enjoy how, for seemingly the first time, it opened up a lot of people to the idea/conversation of playing games outside of the '1500pts? Deploy army. Roll for initiative and go!' blind match up kind of games bubble that people seemed to feel were 'how' you played.
In my experience it just ended up being dead on arrival, for the reasons I listed in previous posts, being more an incomplete ruleset than something really pushing narrative gameplay.
I may be missing your point, but when I said the game is built fundamentally around a competitive pickup style of play, I'm talking about super basic stuff like misions, army construction, etc. Players have very free form army lists built around some sort of common standard (points), use standardized missions from rulebooks that are sport-like in nature most of the time (e.g. take the enemy home objective, keep control of your own, GOOOOAAAALLLL!) or are almost entirely random and arbitrary (Maelstrom), and have general guidelines but no hard standards for terrain. This is how the rulebook spells out how to play. This is a very pickup game oriented approach. It's not giving you detailed scenarios (e.g. time and place with detailed force breakdowns) or linked campaign battles with dynamic cause and effect results on subsequent games or really anything more than very basic sport-like mission objectives and model deployment zones (again, in a generally very sportfield like manner).
What you describe above as 'detailed scenarios' are re-enactments. Please, let's not make the mistake of equating narrative games with reenactments. They're not the same thing. Reenactments can be narrative gsmes, but not all narrative gaming is reenactments.
Then how exactly would you define "narrative" play otherwise? Tossing a bunch of stuff that you just think looks cool on a table just because doesn't really seem to fit that, which is what GW appears to be pushing.
I'd actually argue Where you play (ie in stores etc) often has more of an impact on defining gaming culture than the rules of the gsme - in effect it defined how people approach their games in terms of time constraints etc- you get tables for a short amount of time. You don't necessarily have time to chat or 'negotiate'. You need to sort out your mission quick. You need to set up and just go. This attitude then imposes itself and colours 'how' you perceive 'how' your games are played. Whatever game you play will be coloured in in exactly the same way by the exact same influences, regardless of the character of th game itself. Play the same game under different circumstances and constraints (eg, at home with a mate, over a weekend with a few beers) and the same core game becomes something completely different, even when defined by the same 'rules'.
I've played at my home and other people's homes, I've played in stores and clubs, yes there can be differences, but we're not suddenly playing a radically different game because we're playing at Kevin's house over beers instead of the Club. We might try a different mission than one we'd try at league night because we have a bit more time, but we're not suddenly deciding to radically rewrite the rules either
Because the stuff that makes narrative gaming narrative is not necessarily well done when codified by 'rules'- it's far more nebulous, and if you ask me, is best left outside of the structure defined by the rules (which I simply see as resolution mechanics, nothing more). Narrative gaming requires a different perspective towards gaming, rather than different rules. Again, like I said earlier, it's 'how' you approach your gaming. Although aos isn't a 'new' type of game, it did, for the first time, expose a lot of people to this attitude, and more than one liked what they saw.
I'm not sure I understand what you're getting at in this way. I'm getting a lot about "mindset", but nothing actually detailing how that actually looks on a table.
You were at a tournament and expecting a not-tournament?
No, but you brought up GW tournaments talking about different types of play, and my point was I certainly don't remember GW actually offering any such thing. When GW puts on events, what do they do? They hold tournaments. For all the talk about not being a competitive game, their event offerings don't seem to reflect that.
Then aim to become an expert. The more you do, the more you learn from your experiences, the better you'll be. Games aren't just fun when they're 'solved'. Gaming can be a hell of a lot of fun when you are tinkering, Experimenting and exploring, and trying out weird and wacky stuff too. It doesn't necessarily even need experience, just a bit of will, and effort, and a desire to be creative. As to like minded people - this is a niche hobby - surely it makes sense to build a community of people you like spending time with anyway? It's not necessarily a barrier.
I've been playing this game through many editions and many years in many different places. I'm as much of a meganerd expert as the next guy, who's played 40k at all different levels from ultra competitive to super casual, from laid back "bring whatever you want" to strictly regimented list based armies and wacky weird game modes, this is hardly my first rodeo. This is all besides the point.
The game rules fundamentally do nothing well. The game fundamentally plays poorly and has no real vision of what it wants to be. Putting the onus on the player to fix everything is ridiculous. If I have to go out of my way to re-write the ruleset that cost $70 just for the core rulebook and over three or four thousand dollars for the games complete rules through three of four different sales channels (all the codex books, dataslates, Imperial Armour books, White Dwarf stuff, etc), I don't expect to have to build my own niche community within said niche community and rewrite the rules we paid so much for to fit that niche within a niche in order to have pleasant and functional gaming experiences, when I can pick up half a dozen other tabletop mini's games, or an older edition like 5th...and not *have* to do any of that. The option is always there if I want, but I don't want to have to sustain a microcosm within a niche community for playing a custom ruleset just because the actual game rules are awful.
Again, this is the only game or hobby I've seen where the players and consumers are blamed for problems with the rules and for not going out of their way to fix the rules they paid so much for themselves.
That may partially explain why GW's revenues have been dropping year over year for 12 years and why (adjusted for inflation) they're at they're lowest since the late 90's and 40k dethroned as the best selling tabletop miniatures game and why competition has been growing rapidly.
Again, one can see my OGRE reference above for a game that really builds around scenario/narrative play. Or something like old school Battletech that would dictate specific maps that had detailed and pre-arranged terrain along with detailed starting forces and gave players backgroun adherent resources (such as mercenary outfits receiving pay and buying new machines off open markets with their own systems and rules) to recruit new units and replace losses through linked mission campaigns. 40k does none of these things. Every example of narrative play from GW is basically "two players bring whatever they happen to have on hand and a standard pickup mission or some variant thereof" that's then spruced up with comments and some story bits, but is fundamentally still basically pickup play.
The last time 40k could really have been said to be built on a narrative platform is RT, where the game recommended a 3rd player GM to design scenarios and make terrain for games. That was well over 20 years ago now however.
Modern Battletech offers a decent points system that can be used for the most cut-throat of play. It also offers linked campaign scenario books and campaign systems for the narrative player. It also scales up from small battle, to large battle, to planetary conquest, to galactic conquest battles all supported by decent rule-sets. There's also a main rulebook - Tactical Operations - that adds hundreds of pages of optional fluff rules for the narrative gamer. Lets not forget you can plug the Battletech RPG into standard games and campaigns for extra narrative goodness.
Modern Battletech publisher - Catalyst Game Labs - employs about three people directly yet they can manage to scale their games properly, have a decent system for pick-up or tournament games and have reams of stuff for the narrative gamer. Why can GW with a hundred plus people in the 'design studio' not manage the same basic standard? GW play lip service to things like narrative while never actually delivering products that promote narrative play to any meaningful extent. A battle with slightly changed deployment or objective rules seems to be the height of their imagination when it comes to narrative.
This is pretty much my view. Other games manage this stuff well, GW just puts out what fundamentally amounts to phoned-in minimal effort garbage, increasingly designed for sales pushes (particularly formations). Their "campaign" supplements largely are just formations.
Either way the game does not really function and requires extensive rewriting, deletion, and addition of rules and mechanics, and at that point, particularly for narrative play, why use GW's rules at all?
Deadnight already answered this quite nicely, but I'll like to reiterate, as this is one of the most important aspects in narrative community building: you have to have common ground to start with. Take languages as an example - Esperanto was designed with the goal of being the most intuitive and easy to learn language, yet it is English, with all its irregularities and spelling monstrosities, that is lingua franca of the modern world. Simply because it was popular enough when globalisation kicked in (first with Pax Britannica, then continued by Pax Americana). And this is the same story with GW rules - they are around for three decades and the basics of their system hasn't been changed since 3rd ed. Of course there are far better rulesets out there, but if your goal is to play narrative games in 40K universe using 40K miniatures, it is much easier to build a group based on people familiar with 40K rules and then introduce incremental changes to suit your needs, than to homebrew something ideal from the ground up and then try to convince people to devote their time and effort to learn and play with rules not broadly applicable.
Mostly the question was rhetorical, I get the practical reasons for still using the 40k ruleset, but my point was more about if the ruleset doesn't do anything well and requires a ton of investment both to acquire and then subsequently make work, there's a problem.
This is really why Horus Heresy uses the same mechanics as 40K - Forgeworld could have easily went "full overhaul" on everything....
Well, given that they're not a completely autonomous group, I'm sure management would have something to say about them offering a competing core ruleset based entirely around their most successful product line.
I guess, but this is not my experience by and large.
In my experience, people who tend to play one Wargame a certain way (say, competitive or whatever) will approach other wargames in the same way. The scale of the game is completely separate - say, you play dropzone, infinity and warmachine. I know a lot of people that will take the same mentality into whatever fame they play.
In my experience it just ended up being dead on arrival, for the reasons I listed in previous posts, being more an incomplete ruleset than something really pushing narrative gameplay.
Oh don't get me wrong - aos is a howler. Dead on arrival here too. And I personally have a lot of issues with it, despite being very sympathetic to the kind of game/game mentality to tries to push. When I talk about the conversations it started, and how it opened people you to different views, I'm mainly talking about what I've seen online etc.
Then how exactly would you define "narrative" play otherwise? Tossing a bunch of stuff that you just think looks cool on a table just because doesn't really seem to fit that, which is what GW appears to be pushing.
It's part of it.i mean, wouldn't you like to play a game where you can put a bunch of stuff you just think looks cool on the table?
But narrative gaming is more than just plonking stuff down - it's about being creative in terms of what you want to play, and how you want to play with it - having a story/hook first, having thematic units that fit/represent that story, and playing that story out, rather than just seeing it as some kind of duel of one-upsmanship to see who has the biggest nerd-wiener, with a winner/loser as the aim. which is what a lot of blind pick up gsmes boil down to. They sacrifice a lot of creativity on the altar of what some would call pragmatism, and I think it goes too far. We do this with flames of war, and after three years of playing that game, I can't tell you the points costs or a single 'proper' mission type for it. We've always just approached it our own way.
In terms of pushing it, I mean, rules can't really tell you 'how' to focus on storey first, and match thematic units against that story. You just have to have it in mind when you're doing it. I find that having an rpg-esque mentality towards evoking story, game-building and playing out story rather than focusing in singly on 'power' goes a lot way towards opening up this way of playing wargames.
I've played at my home and other people's homes, I've played in stores and clubs, yes there can be differences, but we're not suddenly playing a radically different game because we're playing at Kevin's house over beers instead of the Club. We might try a different mission than one we'd try at league night because we have a bit more time, but we're not suddenly deciding to radically rewrite the rules either
You are basically describing yourself perfectly as the type of gamer I talked about earlier.
So like I said, you approach all your games the same way. Different language, same conversation. For my part, and from what I've seen from a lot of people into narrative gsmes, I play differently both with different groups, and different games. Warmachine is my go-to pick up game. Flames of war, lotr and to an extent, infinity are my casual or home brew games.
With respect, reading what you've said suggests, you've never stepped out of the mentality of 'organised play' and seeing one-off pick up gsmes as being the 'proper'/only way to play. You 'take it home with you'.This is not a bad thing, nor is it a criticism- for my part, I only ever got into narrative gaming by accident, through introducing two crusty old historical wargamers into infinity, and they corrupted me with their homebrewing and their narrative games. narrative does fundamentally require a different perspective on 'how' to gsme, and you don't seem to have been exposed to it. Leave organised play at the store. Start being creative! Damn the rules, damn the points. Come up with a good story, match up two interesting opposing forces that would fit the universe, and play it out like it would do in the lore.
I'm not sure I understand what you're getting at in this way. I'm getting a lot about "mindset", but nothing actually detailing how that actually looks on a table.
I'm not sure what you want me to say. I mean, we'll put down the same units that you might put down. There is just a different focus on 'what' gets put down. Story trumps raw power/efficiency, and stuff is played out in a war to evoke the character of the universe (berserkers charging across looking for skulls, not hiding behind cover guarding an objective, space marine captains stepping out to duel their opposite numbers, thst sort of thing) rather than pure in game efficiency and picking either the power lists, or the power play. Beyond that, talk of underpowered units is kind of irrelevant since the competitive meta doesn't apply. we would field units appropriate to the theme, or else what would be considered interesting, and points be damned.
No, but you brought up GW tournaments talking about different types of play, and my point was I certainly don't remember GW actually offering any such thing. When GW puts on events, what do they do? They hold tournaments. For all the talk about not being a competitive game, their event offerings don't seem to reflect that.
Bit of a Reading comprehension fail then on your part. What I said was : Back In the day, when gw ran tourneys, they ran, and suggested various other approaches at the same time, so even when competitive 40k was a thing, it was one thing amongst many.
That's not about different types of tournaments. This includes anything from leagues to homebrews, and suggestions for campaigns and unique scenarios. Early white dwarf was loaded with this kind of stuff. For what it's worth, talk to mongoosematt - he often writes up reports of the game days and get together soon that gw organise for aos - not really tournaments there.
I've been playing this game through many editions and many years in many different places. I'm as much of a meganerd expert as the next guy, who's played 40k at all different levels from ultra competitive to super casual, from laid back "bring whatever you want" to strictly regimented list based armies and wacky weird game modes, this is hardly my first rodeo. This is all besides the point.
As have I. And with respect (because I genuinely enjoy your posts a lot of the time!), for all that, narrative gaming still seems somewhat alien to you. So for all that you say, different language, same conversation.
The game rules fundamentally do nothing well. The game fundamentally plays poorly and has no real vision of what it wants to be. Putting the onus on the player to fix everything is ridiculous. If I have to go out of my way to re-write the ruleset that cost $70 just for the core rulebook and over three or four thousand dollars for the games complete rules through three of four different sales channels (all the codex books, dataslates, Imperial Armour books, White Dwarf stuff, etc), I don't expect to have to build my own niche community within said niche community and rewrite the rules we paid so much for to fit that niche within a niche in order to have pleasant and functional gaming experiences, when I can pick up half a dozen other tabletop mini's games, or an older edition like 5th...and not *have* to do any of that. The option is always there if I want, but I don't want to have to sustain a microcosm within a niche community for playing a custom ruleset just because the actual game rules are awful.
Again, this is the only game or hobby I've seen where the players and consumers are blamed for problems with the rules and for not going out of their way to fix the rules they paid so much for themselves.
Firstly, no argument on 40k being a clunky, unwieldy mess of a game.
However, while I don't necessarily expect players to fix everything, players do have a part to play. You can't just blame the parent company for poor rules when players are quite happy to inflict said rules on their opponents to stroke their own nerd-weiners, whilst handing off any sense of shame or self responsibility, for example. They're both sides of the exact same coin. Fundamentally, I would argue players have an onus to make sure they are playing with like minded folks, because when different people who want different things out of the gsme collide, there can easily be bad feelings on both sides.
Furthermore, I would argue that while putting the onus on the players to fix everything is partially ridiculous, I do think it's fair to suggest to players to think about a community driven approach - everyone wants something different out of their gAmes - there is nothing wrong with individual groups tweaking the game to suit their own wants, needs and desires, whether that is 'no super heavies and fliers', a 'negotiation phase', or 'terminators and tac squads only'.
Thirdly, why are you talking about spending thousands on rules. If you don't want to, don't bother. Gw won't send inquisitors after you. Anyway, talking about custom rules sets can be as simple as 'no random charges- let's use fifth ed charge rules' - it doesn't necessarily mean a full make over. Play what's in front of you. You don't need to worry about everything else. As to building your own niche community as a problem - surely you should be doing thst anyway, as a matter of course? Play with like minded people, etc. It's called making friends. Find some folks that want the same thing as you do (there's more than you realise) and build from there.
This conversation has been enlightening for me, lads. Keep up the back and forth! It's given me a lot to think about, especially the bit where Deadnight said that players go to different games with the same attitude; it's what turned me off to Warmachine.
I'm a narrative player, all of my stuff is named and has a backstory that I'm excited to tell anyone who asks or will hear. That means that when I tried Warmachine, I was sorely disappointed; if you asked for a 'narrative' game where, say, there is a cortex-crippled jack that one side must rescue or something, people give you a very strange look, and even i they play it, they play to caster kill. It's wombo-combo bam-thwack "play like you've got a pair" competitive gaming, and I hated it. Quit after probably a year of playing.
Same thing with X-wing; I love the idea of a Corellian Corvette, but I haven't bought any X-wing because all I would buy is one Corellian vessel and because it's not "tournament standard" I wouldn't get any games.
40k is the only game in my local area 'wobbly' enough that when you say "Let's play a game where all the objectives are wild creatures that move 2d6+Scatter per turn" people don't look at you like you've just had a seizure.
Unit1126PLL wrote: This conversation has been enlightening for me, lads. Keep up the back and forth! It's given me a lot to think about, especially the bit where Deadnight said that players go to different games with the same attitude; it's what turned me off to Warmachine.
I'm a narrative player, all of my stuff is named and has a backstory that I'm excited to tell anyone who asks or will hear. That means that when I tried Warmachine, I was sorely disappointed; if you asked for a 'narrative' game where, say, there is a cortex-crippled jack that one side must rescue or something, people give you a very strange look, and even i they play it, they play to caster kill. It's wombo-combo bam-thwack "play like you've got a pair" competitive gaming, and I hated it. Quit after probably a year of playing.
Same thing with X-wing; I love the idea of a Corellian Corvette, but I haven't bought any X-wing because all I would buy is one Corellian vessel and because it's not "tournament standard" I wouldn't get any games.
40k is the only game in my local area 'wobbly' enough that when you say "Let's play a game where all the objectives are wild creatures that move 2d6+Scatter per turn" people don't look at you like you've just had a seizure.
Lucky. I'm in an area where basically everything has to be played "standard". Not necessarily competitive only, but like the notion of coming up with custom scenarios or letting someone use something that isn't 100% legally allowed in their army but really fits their fluff/army is unheard of.
Which ironically is one of the reasons that I wanted to pick up Warmachine; the appeal of a tight-knit game with a focus on competitive gaming sounded like a good idea at the time.
Unit1126PLL wrote: This conversation has been enlightening for me, lads. Keep up the back and forth! It's given me a lot to think about, especially the bit where Deadnight said that players go to different games with the same attitude; it's what turned me off to Warmachine.
I'm a narrative player, all of my stuff is named and has a backstory that I'm excited to tell anyone who asks or will hear. That means that when I tried Warmachine, I was sorely disappointed; if you asked for a 'narrative' game where, say, there is a cortex-crippled jack that one side must rescue or something, people give you a very strange look, and even i they play it, they play to caster kill. It's wombo-combo bam-thwack "play like you've got a pair" competitive gaming, and I hated it. Quit after probably a year of playing.
Same thing with X-wing; I love the idea of a Corellian Corvette, but I haven't bought any X-wing because all I would buy is one Corellian vessel and because it's not "tournament standard" I wouldn't get any games.
40k is the only game in my local area 'wobbly' enough that when you say "Let's play a game where all the objectives are wild creatures that move 2d6+Scatter per turn" people don't look at you like you've just had a seizure.
Lucky. I'm in an area where basically everything has to be played "standard". Not necessarily competitive only, but like the notion of coming up with custom scenarios or letting someone use something that isn't 100% legally allowed in their army but really fits their fluff/army is unheard of.
Which ironically is one of the reasons that I wanted to pick up Warmachine; the appeal of a tight-knit game with a focus on competitive gaming sounded like a good idea at the time.
Everywhere I've ever lived I've been lucky. Heck, here, people are appalled at the idea of tournament lists XD.
This thread has been seriously heartlifting lately, with all that narrative talk. Quite refreshing after all those competetively focused and complaint oriented weekly discussions here on dakka.
May I suggest a side thread, in which we could share some custom scenarios and narrative ideas? Judging from flags in your profiles we will (sadly) never encounter each other IRL, and discussion with Vaktathi has clearly shown, that even veteran players could benefit from some direct examples on how to approach narrative games in 40K. [I would start it myself, but I'm on mobile for a week and making new thread would be, or even writing this reply is, quite painfull for me...]
nou wrote: This thread has been seriously heartlifting lately, with all that narrative talk. Quite refreshing after all those competetively focused and complaint oriented weekly discussions here on dakka.
May I suggest a side thread, in which we could share some custom scenarios and narrative ideas? Judging from flags in your profiles we will (sadly) never encounter each other IRL, and discussion with Vaktathi has clearly shown, that even veteran players could benefit from some direct examples on how to approach narrative games in 40K. [I would start it myself, but I'm on mobile for a week and making new thread would be, or even writing this reply is, quite painfull for me...]
Shoot me a link to the thread in a PM and I'll gladly participate!!
Unit1126PLL wrote: This conversation has been enlightening for me, lads. Keep up the back and forth! It's given me a lot to think about, especially the bit where Deadnight said that players go to different games with the same attitude; it's what turned me off to Warmachine.
I'm a narrative player, all of my stuff is named and has a backstory that I'm excited to tell anyone who asks or will hear. That means that when I tried Warmachine, I was sorely disappointed; if you asked for a 'narrative' game where, say, there is a cortex-crippled jack that one side must rescue or something, people give you a very strange look, and even i they play it, they play to caster kill. It's wombo-combo bam-thwack "play like you've got a pair" competitive gaming, and I hated it. Quit after probably a year of playing.
Same thing with X-wing; I love the idea of a Corellian Corvette, but I haven't bought any X-wing because all I would buy is one Corellian vessel and because it's not "tournament standard" I wouldn't get any games.
40k is the only game in my local area 'wobbly' enough that when you say "Let's play a game where all the objectives are wild creatures that move 2d6+Scatter per turn" people don't look at you like you've just had a seizure.
This was my experience with WMH as well. Our local 40k scene in 6th basically improved drastically because all the competitive jerks with their WAAC tournament netlists finally got frustrated and shipped off, and when I decided to try out WMH and showed up to that game night, theeeere they all were. Of all the people there, only little ol' me who'd been playing for exactly a month had more than 2 minis painted, all the terrain was felt cutouts, and everyone was just talking about practically everything in a string of near incomprehensible short-form metagaming gibberish.
"Oh yeah Phaleys so op with tftz, I run her with 2 shifts of erd so I can tag the boost right off the bat." "Yeah, so what do you do about duraskew lists? Eborka with his stupid GLB always rages so high I cant scratch him even with KZQ."
At this point that game should just change its tagline to "mandolls are serious business", but I suppose their current cringeworthy catchphrase says that eloquently enough.
..."Oh yeah Phaleys so op with tftz, I run her with 2 shifts of erd so I can tag the boost right off the bat." "Yeah, so what do you do about duraskew lists? Eborka with his stupid GLB always rages so high I cant scratch him even with KZQ."...
...For the record I go to WMH tournaments now and again and that's pretty incomprehensible to me, too...(Also complaining that '[x] is OP' demonstrates a fundamental misunderstanding of Warmachine; there are games where a netlist is all you need to win, but Warmachine is not one of them)
At this point that game should just change its tagline to "mandolls are serious business", but I suppose their current cringeworthy catchphrase says that eloquently enough.
Their marketing department finally realized how cringeworthy the catchphrase was and dropped it.
FWIW I think that Warmachine-speak wasn't meant to be actual stuff, just similar speech pattern. Because that made no sense to me either; the point seemed to be a lot of focusing on what works, which honestly though is one of the things I LIKE about Warmachine over 40k; there's a LOT more tactical depth. Basically everything you need to think about before you do it, what units synergize with which caster, what buffs you have and how to apply them this turn, what to do with units, it feels a lot more intense than 40k's "put stuff on table, roll a bucket of dice".
Honestly I liked Page 5. I thought it eloquently stated that this was a WARgame and you shouldn't expect to be coddled or "dumb down" what you bring, bring the best you have and expect your opponent to do the same and not whine something is "OP" or "cheese", which is something you commonly found in 40k (and I feel the original Page 5 in MkI was a direct shot at that mentality). What initially attracted me to Warmachine was the notion it was a game built to be competitive, with rules that fostered and encouraged "serious" gaming. I've since backtracked a bit on that stance, but at the time I was very much against 40k's diplomatic, casual, "narrative" approach to gaming and was hopeful to play a "real" wargame.
WayneTheGame wrote: FWIW I think that Warmachine-speak wasn't meant to be actual stuff, just similar speech pattern...
Yeah, but the density of abbreviations/nicknames (four bits of jargon per sentence, by my count) was far beyond what I've ever heard anyone actually use.
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WayneTheGame wrote: Honestly I liked Page 5. I thought it eloquently stated that this was a WARgame and you shouldn't expect to be coddled or "dumb down" what you bring, bring the best you have and expect your opponent to do the same and not whine something is "OP" or "cheese", which is something you commonly found in 40k (and I feel the original Page 5 in MkI was a direct shot at that mentality). What initially attracted me to Warmachine was the notion it was a game built to be competitive, with rules that fostered and encouraged "serious" gaming. I've since backtracked a bit on that stance, but at the time I was very much against 40k's diplomatic, casual, "narrative" approach to gaming and was hopeful to play a "real" wargame.
The problem with Page 5 is that there were people who read half of rule 2 (play aggressively) and the bit at the bottom that said 'play like you've got a pair' and skipped the rest. Page 5 was intended to say 'play well and be mature about it', but it got read as 'be a tough-guy jerk about it' so often the devs dropped it.
Again, this is the only game or hobby I've seen where the players and consumers are blamed for problems with the rules and for not going out of their way to fix the rules they paid so much for themselves.
Well, that's because it is partially on them. You are responsible for the game you bring to the table, both in terms of what you put down and want to play, and how you play (ie the attitude behind it)". 40k is about the only game/hobby I've seen where players moan and complain endlessly about problems and then simultaneously do absolutely nothing proactive about it, whilst happily inflicting those same problems on their peers. You know, - it's also in their hands to make their games better. And when you have the power to effect changes and improvements, but you don't, then yes, you are part of the problem. Great quote from American history x - 'what have you done to make your life better'? Apply it to gaming.
Gamers can be incredibly lazy and selfish. Inertia is one of the greatest sins of our community. Let's not be so disingenuous as to suggest that we as a community, and as individuals have no responsibilities either to ourselves, or to the person across the board from us. That is selfish, short sighted and ultimately self destructive. And I see it all the time - gamers try to absolve themselves and shrug off any sort of responsibility, and any sense of shame and lay it as the feet of 'the rules'. That's blind faith in an angry God. That is no better than those deplorable individuals who involve scripture to an almighty power to justify appalling behaviours actions, intolerance or attitudes towards other people. It is no better than those individuals, who when charged with heinous crimes said 'we are not responsible. We were just following orders'. and while being a prick in wargames is a far cry from the deplorable acts I mention, the fundamental truths in what I say are identical. You are responsible for your actions, you are responsible for the game you bring to the table. You are responsible for who you play, what you play and how you play. Don't think for a moment your responsibilities as a gamer extend no further than what you plonk down on your side of the table with nary a word, token effort or anything like that towards the other guy. You are responsible for so much more than just the army you bring. Let's make the hobby more than just that, shall we?
Unit1126PLL wrote:This conversation has been enlightening for me, lads. Keep up the back and forth! It's given me a lot to think about, especially the bit where Deadnight said that players go to different games with the same attitude; it's what turned me off to Warmachine.
I'm a narrative player, all of my stuff is named and has a backstory that I'm excited to tell anyone who asks or will hear. That means that when I tried Warmachine, I was sorely disappointed; if you asked for a 'narrative' game where, say, there is a cortex-crippled jack that one side must rescue or something, people give you a very strange look, and even i they play it, they play to caster kill. It's wombo-combo bam-thwack "play like you've got a pair" competitive gaming, and I hated it. Quit after probably a year of playing.
Depends on who you play with though. If anything, it sounds like different expectations with regard to what you wanted and what thry wanted. There are narrative focused warmachine players. I wish you had found them. My first proper opponent for warmachine posted as paddyalexander on warseer (not sure if he posts elsewhere...) and he was one of those mythical narrative players. He did it for all his wargames from 40k onwards (I remember he told me how he filled out three or four 80 page copy books with hand amendments and fixes for 40k, for him and the people that he played with) - he was seriously into homebrewing and diy gaming. He approached WMH in exactly the same way. We never played steamroller, but while we always used 'regular' force construction, the scenarios were a lot more 'real' that just grab the geometric shape in the centre of the board. I remember one game where the big scrap was happening over a bridge that spanned a big river, and stuff kept getting chucked to their deaths over the side. Lots of fun, and it forced us both to step out of the comfort zone of 'ordinary' gaming.
Lucky. I'm in an area where basically everything has to be played "standard". Not necessarily competitive only, but like the notion of coming up with custom scenarios or letting someone use something that isn't 100% legally allowed in their army but really fits their fluff/army is unheard of.
Which ironically is one of the reasons that I wanted to pick up Warmachine; the appeal of a tight-knit game with a focus on competitive gaming sounded like a good idea at the time.
Everywhere I've ever lived I've been lucky. Heck, here, people are appalled at the idea of tournament lists XD.
To be fair, there are narrative players everywhere. In my experience, They tend to just get on with it at home, and don't tend to be very vocal or visible online or in your local stores.
nou wrote:This thread has been seriously heartlifting lately, with all that narrative talk. Quite refreshing after all those competetively focused and complaint oriented weekly discussions here on dakka.
Those things have value to, but agreed - I like the idea of another narrative focused thread.
WayneTheGame wrote: FWIW I think that Warmachine-speak wasn't meant to be actual stuff, just similar speech pattern...
Yeah, but the density of abbreviations/nicknames (four bits of jargon per sentence, by my count) was far beyond what I've ever heard anyone actually use.
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WayneTheGame wrote: Honestly I liked Page 5. I thought it eloquently stated that this was a WARgame and you shouldn't expect to be coddled or "dumb down" what you bring, bring the best you have and expect your opponent to do the same and not whine something is "OP" or "cheese", which is something you commonly found in 40k (and I feel the original Page 5 in MkI was a direct shot at that mentality). What initially attracted me to Warmachine was the notion it was a game built to be competitive, with rules that fostered and encouraged "serious" gaming. I've since backtracked a bit on that stance, but at the time I was very much against 40k's diplomatic, casual, "narrative" approach to gaming and was hopeful to play a "real" wargame.
The problem with Page 5 is that there were people who read half of rule 2 (play aggressively) and the bit at the bottom that said 'play like you've got a pair' and skipped the rest. Page 5 was intended to say 'play well and be mature about it', but it got read as 'be a tough-guy jerk about it' so often the devs dropped it.
Yep, agreed 100%. Too many people saw it as an excuse to be a dbag and basically call out "wimps" and not to bring their A-game but be respectful and help others improve.
For those who argue that the overly competitive nature is the issue: how many of you think that the MLB teams playing the All-Stars should include the worst players that year in the spirit of fair play? A competition is a competition whether it is a ball and bat or it's little plastic statues. OR cards, or whatever. Anybody not bringing their A game to anything other than specific scenarios that sound fun is an insult, and even then I would expect the player in the scenario play to do his absolute best as well.
Again, this is the only game or hobby I've seen where the players and consumers are blamed for problems with the rules and for not going out of their way to fix the rules they paid so much for themselves.
Well, that's because it is partially on them. You are responsible for the game you bring to the table, both in terms of what you put down and want to play, and how you play (ie the attitude behind it)". 40k is about the only game/hobby I've seen where players moan and complain endlessly about problems and then simultaneously do absolutely nothing proactive about it, whilst happily inflicting those same problems on their peers. You know, - it's also in their hands to make their games better. And when you have the power to effect changes and improvements, but you don't, then yes, you are part of the problem. Great quote from American history x - 'what have you done to make your life better'? Apply it to gaming.
Gamers can be incredibly lazy and selfish. Inertia is one of the greatest sins of our community. Let's not be so disingenuous as to suggest that we as a community, and as individuals have no responsibilities either to ourselves, or to the person across the board from us. That is selfish, short sighted and ultimately self destructive. And I see it all the time - gamers try to absolve themselves and shrug off any sort of responsibility, and any sense of shame and lay it as the feet of 'the rules'. That's blind faith in an angry God. That is no better than those deplorable individuals who involve scripture to an almighty power to justify appalling behaviours actions, intolerance or attitudes towards other people. It is no better than those individuals, who when charged with heinous crimes said 'we are not responsible. We were just following orders'. and while being a prick in wargames is a far cry from the deplorable acts I mention, the fundamental truths in what I say are identical. You are responsible for your actions, you are responsible for the game you bring to the table. You are responsible for who you play, what you play and how you play. Don't think for a moment your responsibilities as a gamer extend no further than what you plonk down on your side of the table with nary a word, token effort or anything like that towards the other guy. You are responsible for so much more than just the army you bring. Let's make the hobby more than just that, shall we?
I guess my go to response here would be that we're talking about an expensive leisure hobby we pay someone else a whole lot of money to develop a whole lot rules for, and not geopolitics or the depths of human depravity. Likewise, why does this seemingly apply mostly to 40k while most other wargames, even narrative focused wargames, not seem to have these same issues, at least not to anything near the same degree?
GW makes every opportunity available for abuse, seemingly intentionally pushing rules and abilities tailor made to be broken in fact, then makes noises about deploring it but does nothing to actually curb or stop it. No errata, late and incomolete FAQ (that often reinforces/confirms abusable mechanisms), armies that go multiple editions without updates (or updates that reapond to issues from an older edition than the current one just before we get a new edition), and few to zero rules for supporting alternative and narrative play that is something more than a slight "reskin" of existing pickup options and almost always some sort of random table of often wildly different but ultimately usually irrelevant results.
People's idea of fun varies wildly and if you give people the freedom to do anything then they will, and we are not so large a community that most people can freely pick and choose specific opponents who share similiar mindsets, particularly if we want to play regularly and not just half a dozen games a year against the same couple armies.
The parameters the game provides simply do not mesh with the vision, and thats not the fault of the players for getting it "wrong". Yes there is some responsibility not to being the ultra OP list to everything, but its GW's fault that stuff is Ultra OP to begin with and perceptions of where that line is varies wildly, particularly as the game offers no guidance. The overwhelmingly vast majority of the responsibility is on GW, not the playerbase in this case.
I agree but I feel the playerbase is also willfully not doing anything when they know GW won't. It's been common knowledge the GW team does things weirdly, from how they design armies to their battle reports where they purposely change rules or take specific things just because they like them.
Yet the playerbase refuses to accomodate that mindset. As I've said, I can count on one hand the number of games I've seen where people are willing to discuss extra rules for a scenario, do something not "in the book" or even talk about a reason behind why their armies are fighting, despite that being the approach to the game that GW themselves encourage doing and says as much in their own battle reports (how often do they customize the mission or set their own restrictions on armies that aren't present in any rules?). So yes, GW is to blame for poor rules but the players know GW's rules are poor and still refuse to do anything to fix it. That's on them. Not the most responsibility because yes we pay a lot for shoddy rules, but the players aren't innocent either because they actively seem to want an "out of the box" experience that will never happen.
In some cases that is true, but the playerbase has also been conditioned that way in many respects. Look at the 5E Battle Missions and Planetstrke supplements, these ostensibly were there to support new styles of play with story components and whatnot, and they turned out to largely be utter garbage that usually just resulted in one side getting huge bonuses to curbstomp the other, or just addint lots of extra table rolls that didnt really change the experience except to add additional.hassle to the game.
A game I think that gets both competitive and narrative play right is Dropzone Commander. They do regular errata and FAQ, they offer tournament scenarios and rules, but also have very thoughtfully laid out narrative scenarios with meaningful environmental conditions and things like native hostile wildlife, something thats more than just an arbitrary objective token with a random table to determine what it is.
Ill post an example later after work if anyone is interested.
Regardless, I think the issue is that most 40k players don't want to bother. I get it's hard, but the base stuff is pretty garbage and most of us know it, so I feel the onus gets put on the players somewhat to at least some up with things. But instead, at least here in the US, it's like nobody wants to bother beyond asking for a point size for a game. I far too frequently see posts on social media that run like "Looking for a game of 40k on Saturday afternoon; 1850 points, I play competitively" and that's about the extent of it. It's almost like, to use a pretty bad analogy but still somewhat apt, using Tinder or similar for a fling. Don't really care who you get, as long as you get some.
On the contrary I'd much rather have a regular game day, and spin things into a narrative approach and actually discuss with my opponent about oh I don't know why don't we come up with a custom scenario or something like that so we aren't just playing a random game that means nothing. My viewpoint is that becomes so much better because then it has the possibility of branching out. Maybe I have a regular opponent that shows up every week, so boom right there we can develop a sort of ongoing narrative campaign as we play our games, and it's not just me facing Bob's Marines week in or week out, we're stringing together a narrative of my warband invading an Imperial world and Bob's chapter has been sent to deal with it, and each week we can sort of theme stuff or tweak our lists to better represent the ongoing campaign and at the end, we are both satisfied that we've had a great game series.
Sadly though that does not seem to happen :( I would 100% say that is the fault of the players. It's not that hard to take what would be pickup games and add some one-off narrative flavor to them, even if they aren't strung out as part of a series.
I agree with Wayne, and I don't "blame" players. I get it. A lot of players are younger males who share a number of other hobbies.
I bet there is a large cross-over between say, 40K gamers and Call of Duty/Battlefield players. I do think that mindset carries over. A quick, relatively simple, organized game where your goal is to defeat your opponent with the best "unlocked" weapons you have etc. Rinse, repeat.
Whereas, say a long term MMO gamer from a guild (?) etc. might be more prone to wanting to enjoy a 6 hour quest with friends...speaking in character, etc. etc. They're two totally different mindsets. Sadly they don't mingle that well when put on the table opposite each other.
I'm not pretending their is a violent schism between types of 40K players, but the rulebooks etc. are not overly kind to either set of players. This makes the entire thing awfully confusing, particularly for new players. I doubt most new players are joining the game with a half dozen of their friends at the same time. It's normally somebody trying it out first and maybe they've never even gamed anything beyond a board game with another person.
I can see where the rulebook/forums/meta/discussion would be hugely confusing. If the new player is taken under the wing of a veteran player there is a darn good chance that the mentality of that veteran gamer and his group will influence the style of game the new player will become accustomed to, etc.
I design games for fun, and as a solo outfit it's pretty difficult. My current game is very open to player's decisions and I encourage house rules in the rulebook. I still get questions from people which seem overly concerned with "well, what happens in this instance!?". I give them a few ideas and suggest they do what they believe is the most cool/interesting - and then I remind them the rule set is not for competition or tournaments, it's for fun! Some people have a hard time even understanding that!
Part of the thing is there are much better games that cater better to that CoD/Battlefield approach. Warmachine, for example, lends to that "I want a hard, grueling game where we both bring our best" mentality (not saying that's a bad thing). Virtually every other game does that. The problem is 40k tries to appeal to everyone, to the narrative fluffbunny, the WAAC powergaming TFG, the guy who loves big stompy robots and wants to field as man as he can, the guy who is anti-social and just goes to the shop every week, says barely anything while playing and then leaves without a word, everyone. And fails at everything because it does nothing to help any of those people.
The fluff gamer gets curbstomped because they want to play a fluffy Ork army or play Eldar and not spam jetbikes, or on the flip side they steamroll everyone because they play Saim-Hann Eldar and field a horde of Jetbikes (which is fluffy for them) through no fault of their own.
The powergamer throws down a Gladius with a ton of free stuff, plus LIbrarian Conclave, and for good measure Coteaz and a Knight without regard to the fluff or anything else, as long as they win, and how dare you suggest they do anything less.
The stompy robot guy fields an army of Knights because he likes them, and maybe some Riptides or Wraithknight allies because again he wants a Pacific Rim or Gundam type of force, and inadvertently crushes anyone who isn't prepared.
The pickup gamer plays without any thought at all to why they're playing or what they field, so long as they get their one game a week in.
None of these people end up happy.
40k actively punishes the narrative gamers by having such a wide disparity in army power. A fluffy Saim-Hann Eldar player is automatically better than a fluffy Ork player, because reasons. This is not good game design.
Just Tony wrote:For those who argue that the overly competitive nature is the issue: how many of you think that the MLB teams playing the All-Stars should include the worst players that year in the spirit of fair play? A competition is a competition whether it is a ball and bat or it's little plastic statues. OR cards, or whatever. Anybody not bringing their A game to anything other than specific scenarios that sound fun is an insult, and even then I would expect the player in the scenario play to do his absolute best as well.
Thankfully, not every game is, nor needs to be the all stars. A competitition might be a competitition, competitive isn't the only way, or the only proper way to play. There is every league and match up from uefa cup finals to non league and grassroots to kicking the ball around in the park with your mates, and it's all good. Take it from me, you don't need to bring your a game to every game, all the time. Life's too short. Your nerd weiner isn't so small that you need to feel like youve got something to prove, or take on the whole world all the time. This is a hobby, and for many, it's to unwind and chill out, not take the ante up to 11 and aim to crush everyone in the room. You're not wrong for wanting this, but this isn't the only way to play. And If that sounds like an insult to you, then you need to grow up.
Vaktathi wrote:
I guess my go to response here would be that we're talking about an expensive leisure hobby we pay someone else a whole lot of money to develop a whole lot rules for, and not geopolitics or the depths of human depravity.
Oddly enough, I thought I paid them to produce pretty models that I paint up. How I choose to play with them is up to me. As to geopolitics, for me, enjoying my time with my mates and having a good game whilst scratching that creative itch by making a cool homebrew is what I'm after.
Vaktathi wrote:
Likewise, why does this seemingly apply mostly to 40k while most other wargames, even narrative focused wargames, not seem to have these same issues, at least not to anything near the same degree?
Biggest game, biggest community, by several orders of magnitude is a factor. It's also partly the fact that it tries (or tried, historically) to cater to everyone, hence the schitzofrenic approaches at times.
And if you think these issues don't occur in other games, you're very uninformed - look at all the WMH mk3 or infinity n3 chat at the moment. theyre the most broken. Unprofessional, unworkable, haphazard, terrible designed crapfests ever in the history of gaming, according to those doing the complaining.
Ever think gamers are like Icarus. And just get to close to the sun for comfort?
Vaktathi wrote:
GW makes every opportunity available for abuse, seemingly intentionally pushing rules and abilities tailor made to be broken in fact, then makes noises about deploring it but does nothing to actually curb or stop it. No errata, late and incomolete FAQ (that often reinforces/confirms abusable mechanisms), armies that go multiple editions without updates (or updates that reapond to issues from an older edition than the current one just before we get a new edition), and few to zero rules for supporting alternative and narrative play that is something more than a slight "reskin" of existing pickup options and almost always some sort of random table of often wildly different but ultimately usually irrelevant results.
GW certainly do not help themselves, but what there couldn't, in theory be solved with a pre game discussion with your mate? Furthermore, GW might make every opportunity available for abuse, but the players also lap it all up and and for seconds, whilst still complaining about it. Both sides of the same coin.
Vaktathi wrote:
People's idea of fun varies wildly and if you give people the freedom to do anything then they will, and we are not so large a community that most people can freely pick and choose specific opponents who share similiar mindsets, particularly if we want to play regularly and not just half a dozen games a year against the same couple armies.
Then plan better. And make better friends. To be honest, You only need a few people to make this work. My narrative group is four core people, with a few occasionals. In terms of stuff, We can put together a lot of flames of war stuff, infinity, dropzone, firestorm and various historicals. And we play every Friday. We're all quite happy to put the effort it. If all you are seeing is the same couple of armies, you need to bite the bullet and expand your collection a bit. Narrative gaming does expand the pool of what's worth playing enormously.
And for what it's worth, I will pick and choose, even from a small community. I don't owe you just because you play the same game as me. I'll happily refuse games, and thankfully, I don't have to do it very often. Because for me at least, no gsme beats a bad game against an opponent I don't enjoy playing (yes, we have Waac WMH players here that poison the community that I refuse to play).
Vaktathi wrote:
The parameters the game provides simply do not mesh with the vision, and thats not the fault of the players for getting it "wrong". Yes there is some responsibility not to being the ultra OP list to everything, but its GW's fault that stuff is Ultra OP to begin with and perceptions of where that line is varies wildly, particularly as the game offers no guidance. The overwhelmingly vast majority of the responsibility is on GW, not the playerbase in this case.
No.
The parameters of the gsme do not mesh because it is a clunky, unwieldy mess of a game. But it can be said that players are wrong for insisting on playing 40k in a game mode thst isn't fit for purpose and then doing absolutely Bugger all to make things better, even though they know there's a problem. Like I said, inertia.
The responsibility is an even split between gw and the players. I will agree - gw could make a far better game. But the players could also be better and show a lot more cop on and empathy to their fellows. Gw's imbalances wouldn't be an issue if players didn't just pick them up, roll with them, and happily inflict thrm on their fellows with no shame, remorse and just shrug off any sense of self responsibility or community.
Regarding guidance, i think the whole point is that the gsme is in your hands. Make of it what you will. Gw have always encouraged a more player driven approach - whether to chop, change or alter things and to make it up as you go along. Them providing 'Guidance' and holding your hand kind of defeats the purpose of the players themselves organising and building their own games. Gw washed their hands of organised play a long time ago. They left it up to the players (because it was cheaper for them/kirby) to self regulate. This isn't a bad thing, since everyone wants something different out of their gsme, some people make it work. Some people walk. Others complain. Gw make money.
The problem is they left it up to the players, but the players aren't willing to do it. Most people I know of don't want to "whether to chop, change or alter things and to make it up as you go along", they want to just follow the most basic guidelines in the book and that's that.
In short: The playerbase does not want to self-regulate that i can see, because they have the chances to do it, hell are even basically encouraged to do so by glaring inconsistencies in the rules or just things not being covered, and still refuse to do it.
Oddly enough, I thought I paid them to produce pretty models that I paint up. How I choose to play with them is up to me.
Are you buying their rulebooks just for pretty pictures? Those books arent cheap, and unless you're just pirating everything, you're paying GW lots of money for game rules.
If you are pirating, well, great, but then you're operating outside the bounds of the intended market.
Biggest game, biggest community, by several orders of magnitude is a factor. It's also partly the fact that it tries (or tried, historically) to cater to everyone, hence the schitzofrenic approaches at times.
right, it tries to do everything, and ends up doing nothing well, 40k has no idea what it really wants to be.
And if you think these issues don't occur in other games, you're very uninformed - look at all the WMH mk3 or infinity n3 chat at the moment. theyre the most broken. Unprofessional, unworkable, haphazard, terrible designed crapfests ever in the history of gaming, according to those doing the complaining.
You'll aways get some level of discomfort and dissatisfaction in any game, but with GW there's a clear loss of market position across multiple systems and a universal acknowledgement of the lack of functionality of the rules. I cannot confess to know the issues with Warmachine Mk3, but I didnt see anything near what we currently have with GW back when I played, or with games like Dropzone Commander, Infinity, Flames of War, etc.
Ever think gamers are like Icarus. And just get to close to the sun for comfort?
theres always that factor, but I think theres a lot of clear evidence that something is just not working with GW.
GW certainly do not help themselves, but what there couldn't, in theory be solved with a pre game discussion with your mate? Furthermore, GW might make every opportunity available for abuse, but the players also lap it all up and and for seconds, whilst still complaining about it. Both sides of the same coin.
The issue here is that people have different ideas of where that line lies, what models they have available on hand, and any number of other factors. If Mike shows up with his Knight army for a game and Zack brought a Genestealer Cult list that has no way of harming the Knights, well, unless someone goes home and brings back an entirely different army (which assumes Mike and Zack have other armies they can bring), either no game will be played or its going a one sided slaughter unless they spend more than just a couple minutes brainstorming some sort of alternate mission or mechanics.
Ultimately Mike and Zack wouldnt have this quandry in the first place if GW's rules didnt allow such a matchup with vast differences in the intended scale of each army.
And yes, some do lap it up. Thats a fundamental facet of human natue that a core part of professional game design is supposedly intended to keep to a minimum, which GW refuses to do.
Then plan better. And make better friends. To be honest, You only need a few people to make this work. My narrative group is four core people, with a few occasionals. In terms of stuff, We can put together a lot of flames of war stuff, infinity, dropzone, firestorm and various historicals. And we play every Friday. We're all quite happy to put the effort it. If all you are seeing is the same couple of armies, you need to bite the bullet and expand your collection a bit. Narrative gaming does expand the pool of what's worth playing enormously.
If the answer fixing a broken game is "magically find more friends that are into this game and think like you do and spend more money on more armies", thats not going to be terribly compelling, particularly when there's ample opportunity for thr developer to fix those issues in accordance with their vision and they choose not to.
And for what it's worth, I will pick and choose, even from a small community. I don't owe you just because you play the same game as me. I'll happily refuse games, and thankfully, I don't have to do it very often. Because for me at least, no gsme beats a bad game against an opponent I don't enjoy playing (yes, we have Waac WMH players here that poison the community that I refuse to play).
I've refused my share of games as well, quite a few these days actually, but that does limit the number of games I can get in and the number of people I can play against, and if your local playgroup isnt huge, it may mean you dont get to play at all sometimes, which doesnt help engagement with the hobby. In fact, I haven't gotten to play much at all lately precisely because I have no interest in fighting another Decurion of Superfriends list.
No.
The parameters of the gsme do not mesh because it is a clunky, unwieldy mess of a game. But it can be said that players are wrong for insisting on playing 40k in a game mode thst isn't fit for purpose and then doing absolutely Bugger all to make things better, even though they know there's a problem. Like I said, inertia.
The question I guess there is what is it fit for? As far as I can tell, it's not really fit for much of anything. When thats the case, its the fault of GW. The players will try to keep using the ruleset out of inertia because they like the background universe, but laying the blame on players for not fixing something that came broken appears to be blaming the victim, aside from perhaps not realizing that 40k doesnt actually work and getting into it anyway.
The responsibility is an even split between gw and the players. I will agree - gw could make a far better game. But the players could also be better and show a lot more cop on and empathy to their fellows.
Lets look at the target market here...generally that market is not known for its stellar social awareness and functioning. GW says they want an easygoing narrative game, but dont deliver anything of the sort and its the player's responsibility to fix? Thats fairly silly to me as a consumer.
Gw's imbalances wouldn't be an issue if players didn't just pick them up, roll with them, and happily inflict thrm on their fellows with no shame, remorse and just shrug off any sense of self responsibility or community.
Ok, but thats like saying crime wouldnt be an issue if people just didnt do bad things. Yes, there should be some social awareness on what is going to make for a fun game, but if we all shared a common universal sense of what that entailed we wouldn't need GW to make rules for us. It would also help if GW stopped introducing plainly overpowered and broken rules for what ostensibly is supposed to be a game where such shouldn't have any place.
Ultimately the rules are there to tell people how to play, why is it their fault for playing how GW tells them to play with the rules they paid good money for. Having to feel out a whole additional set of highly variable subrules that can change frequently on top of the normal rules leads to all sorts of heartburn.
That line between rules exploitation is different for almost everyone, it is up to the developers to show where that line for their game is, and correct issues as required. Other games manage this just fine through Errata, something GW refuses to do. Thus the fault lies with GW. They have all the tools necessary to fix this, and choose not to utilize them.
Ultimately, if GW did its job in the first place, the responsibility falling onto the players wouldnt exist.
Regarding guidance, i think the whole point is that the gsme is in your hands.
GW's direction on this largely boils down to "dice it off" or "toss everything in this $75 book and do whatever you want", neither of which are terribly productive.
This isn't a bad thing, since everyone wants something different out of their gsme, some people make it work. Some people walk. Others complain. Gw make money.
Increasingly less money from increasingly fewer people according to their financial statements however...
Regarding guidance, i think the whole point is that the gsme is in your hands.
GW's direction on this largely boils down to "dice it off" or "toss everything in this $75 book and do whatever you want", neither of which are terribly productive.
Well, no, that's certainly hyperbolic. There is a structure provided. It's a structure that's negotiable, in some areas more than others, but it is a functioning framework that one can get fun games out of, especially if you're playing with like-minded people.
It's more expensive than it should be, that's for sure. It could be improved on, certainly. But I think you're overstating the anarchy of it.
Oddly enough, I thought I paid them to produce pretty models that I paint up. How I choose to play with them is up to me.
Are you buying their rulebooks just for pretty pictures? Those books arent cheap, and unless you're just pirating everything, you're paying GW lots of money for game rules.
If you are pirating, well, great, but then you're operating outside the bounds of the intended market.
I don't buy the rulebooks, nor do I pirate. I use my own rules. or else I stick to forth ed, with tweaks.
Biggest game, biggest community, by several orders of magnitude is a factor. It's also partly the fact that it tries (or tried, historically) to cater to everyone, hence the schitzofrenic approaches at times.
right, it tries to do everything, and ends up doing nothing well, 40k has no idea what it really wants to be.
And if you think these issues don't occur in other games, you're very uninformed - look at all the WMH mk3 or infinity n3 chat at the moment. theyre the most broken. Unprofessional, unworkable, haphazard, terrible designed crapfests ever in the history of gaming, according to those doing the complaining.
You'll aways get some level of discomfort and dissatisfaction in any game, but with GW there's a clear loss of market position across multiple systems and a universal acknowledgement of the lack of functionality of the rules. I cannot confess to know the issues with Warmachine Mk3, but I didnt see anything near what we currently have with GW back when I played, or with games like Dropzone Commander, Infinity, Flames of War, etc.
Fow is a clunky, barely functional mess. Infinity, for all its brilliance was terribly cluttered, organised and far too messy in its presentation. N3 annoyed a lot of people in its implementation, Drop Zone has all of 8 players.... And jokes aside, because I quite like dzc, I've come across a few comments pointing towards balance issues, especially with shaltari.
With gw losing market share, a lot of it is to do with bloody prices as much as anything else. Rules certainly do not help, but whilst they are a clear factor in their woes, it's far from the only one.
The issue here is that people have different ideas of where that line lies, what models they have available on hand, and any number of other factors. If Mike shows up with his Knight army for a game and Zack brought a Genestealer Cult list that has no way of harming the Knights, well, unless someone goes home and brings back an entirely different army (which assumes Mike and Zack have other armies they can bring), either no game will be played or its going a one sided slaughter unless they spend more than just a couple minutes brainstorming some sort of alternate mission or mechanics.
Ultimately Mike and Zack wouldnt have this quandry in the first place if GW's rules didnt allow such a matchup with vast differences in the intended scale of each army.
Mike and zach aren't helping themselves either. It's not,like I've not pointed out before how blind pick up gsmes tend to be hazardous. (And it's not just GW gsmes - despite its balance, WMH suffers from hard match ups too. Wrong caster, gg. Shake. Beer.)
I mean. they never thought to speak to each other before the game and say what they were thinking of bringing? Hmm, it's not like we have things like phones, and text messages or even Facebook? Pre game organisation goes a long way.
It's just as true to point out that Mike and zach wouldn't be in a quandary if they had spoken to each other before hand and organised ahead of time.
If the answer fixing a broken game is "magically find more friends that are into this game and think like you do and spend more money on more armies", thats not going to be terribly compelling, particularly when there's ample opportunity for thr developer to fix those issues in accordance with their vision and they choose not to.
nothing magic about finding/making friends. I mean, if anything, it could be fun to suggest a new approach to gaming to your older mates, and try get everyone excited in some new projects. If they don't think like you, try and sell them on the idea. Make it exciting and worth their time, a bit of salesmanship, basically. And anyway, If you consider that making friends to be not terribly compelling,byouve got issues mate (not a genuine comment meant for you for what it's worth!) and in my experience, a few minutes of chat and 'social shock absorber' is enough to mitigate the shock and revulsion of fixing some issues in the gsme that might come up. I'm capable of this. Who knew?
As to spending stuff on armies - surely that is part of the hobby? I mean, none of us buy a single squad of tactical marines and just stop. There is always scope for a new unit, project, game etc and expanding your collectiona. I'm just giving you a suggestion on how to be proactive in terms of using it all, rather than just dismissing 90% of a codex and everything other than a power build as not worth it,
The question I guess there is what is it fit for? As far as I can tell, it's not really fit for much of anything. When thats the case, its the fault of GW. The players will try to keep using the ruleset out of inertia because they like the background universe, but laying the blame on players for not fixing something that came broken appears to be blaming the victim, aside from perhaps not realizing that 40k doesnt actually work and getting into it anyway.
As I said in my original point, GW do themselves no favours with a clunky and unwieldy game system. I don't actually disagree with you here. They'd be far better off,trying to come up with a more elegant one. It's not like they can't - various specialist gsmes like epic were ace, and lotr is actually a pretty fantastic set of rules thst ticks the vast majority of my boxes.
But I will blame the players when thry knew there is something wrong, when it is entirely within their power to do something about it, and yet they don't. It's quite a bit different to victim blaming. I liken it more to the kid who complains about never being picked for the track team, but yet never goes training or trying to improve himself either.
The responsibility is an even split between gw and the players. I will agree - gw could make a far better game. But the players could also be better and show a lot more cop on and empathy to their fellows.
Lets look at the target market here...generally that market is not known for its stellar social awareness and functioning. GW says they want an easygoing narrative game, but dont deliver anything of the sort and its the player's responsibility to fix? Thats fairly silly to me as a consumer.
Thry don't deliver it because like I said earlier, this is an attitude/approach thing that really cannot be codified by rules. All you can do are suggestions.
And yes - some gsmers are not known for social graces - But chances are, even with iron clad rules, these are the same people that make competitive gsmes awkward and unenjoyable too.
Plenty people who play wargames are pretty normal, everyday folks. I am. You are. I do this kind of stuff fairly naturally now. No reason you or plenty others couldn't either.
Is it players responsibility to fix? Partly. Like I said earlier, it's up to you to make it the kind of game that you want, since every group wants something different. And if a five minute conversation, and a bit of reasonableness and maturity can overcome a problem, that's a pretty small price to pay if you ask me - we do this all the time.
Gw's imbalances wouldn't be an issue if players didn't just pick them up, roll with them, and happily inflict thrm on their fellows with no shame, remorse and just shrug off any sense of self responsibility or community.
Ok, but thats like saying crime wouldnt be an issue if people just didnt do bad things. Yes, there should be some social awareness on what is going to make for a fun game, but if we all shared a common universal sense of what that entailed we wouldn't need GW to make rules for us. It would also help if GW stopped introducing plainly overpowered and broken rules for what ostensibly is supposed to be a game where such shouldn't have any place.
Ultimately the rules are there to tell people how to play, why is it their fault for playing how GW tells them to play with the rules they paid good money for. Having to feel out a whole additional set of highly variable subrules that can change frequently on top of the normal rules leads to all sorts of heartburn.
Crime wouldn't be an issue if people didn't do bad things. Doesn't refute my point. I'm not wrong. Gamers embrace the very things they complain about. Or are you saying they should embrace these things and inlict them on their opponents a. There are a lot of things gamers can do to make their hobby more enjoyable and welcoming - this is a fact.
And yes, It's the fault of us gamers when the way we insist on playing a gsme isn't fit for purpose, but then we do nothing about it to help ourselves or try to resolve the situation.
And when gw suggest to chop, change or alter things to suit you and your game, as they do, then the rules stop being about 'telling people how to play'. I don't necessarily disagree with you when you say that there are things get shouldn't be doing - clearly, there are plenty of these. They do not help the situation. My only point is they are not the only ones dragging the whole cart off the track.
That line between rules exploitation is different for almost everyone, it is up to the developers to show where that line for their game is, and correct issues as required. Other games manage this just fine through Errata, something GW refuses to do. Thus the fault lies with GW. They have all the tools necessary to fix this, and choose not to utilize them.
No. It's,up to developers and players. If you and your group want to play something a bit different to how it's described or handled in the rulebook, ye should do it. If it works for you, it's fine. Different players and different groups want different things. ThAt 'line' is a gradient. Marked,with an airbrush, not a scalpel. The developers can only do so much, and see so much. Issues for one group are not necessarily issues for another. The community has a responsibility to itself, and to ensure a healthy environment.
Erratas are all well and good, but won't necessarily solve everything. Look st WMH. Plenty erratas in mk2, and it still had issues and howlers got through the gate. Look at the errata chat for mk3. Issues galore, and they haven't even issues the first one.
Regarding having the tools to fix issues and choosing not to use them - again, the exact same thing can be said about the player base. Equally culpable. Equally guilty. Equally capable.
Ultimately, if GW did its job in the first place, the responsibility falling onto the players wouldnt exist.
I disagree. Like I said, every group wants something different. There will always be a need/desire for players to tweak. And even if gw turned around and produced the best game ever, like every other gsme it would have flaws,simply due to the nature of the medium. No game captures everything in s way perfectly suitable for everyone. There will always be a need for someone somewhere to say 'hold on a second... Should we be doing this? Wouldn't it be fun to do it this way instead'?
Regarding guidance, i think the whole point is that the gsme is in your hands.
GW's direction on this largely boils down to "dice it off" or "toss everything in this $75 book and do whatever you want", neither of which are terribly productive.
It's more than just 'roll a 4+' vak. Nor do you have to toss everything in the $75 book. Sometimes it's just 'can we leave the Knights at home for once and do a tac squad only zone mortalis game instead?' It's only as productive as you make it. Zero effort, zero results. That's on you.
[This isn't a bad thing, since everyone wants something different out of their gsme, some people make it work. Some people walk. Others complain. Gw make money.
Increasingly less money from increasingly fewer people according to their financial statements however...
Undoubtedly, and sadly for them. 'Increasingly less money spent on fewer kits by fewer and fewer people' if you want to be very accurate...
Oddly enough, I thought I paid them to produce pretty models that I paint up. How I choose to play with them is up to me.
Are you buying their rulebooks just for pretty pictures? Those books arent cheap, and unless you're just pirating everything, you're paying GW lots of money for game rules.
If you are pirating, well, great, but then you're operating outside the bounds of the intended market.
I don't buy the rulebooks, nor do I pirate. I use my own rules. or else I stick to forth ed, with tweaks.
Because I don't have the time to respond to the whole post currently, I would posit that herein lies the difference between our trains of thought. To boil it down, I think what your point is basically that people just want to play with toy soldiers and should have a responsibility in coming up with their own fun with said toy soldiers. Ok, from that perspective, I get that. I'm coming it at from the perspective of the whole system, the totality of the "Games Workshop Hobby" as it were, a game and not primarily just cool models. From my perspective, I don't see the mini's as being a distinct and separate product from the rules, and with a very large investment (emotional, intellectual, social, financial, recreational, etc) in that system, and think that the issues are with the designers abandoning their responsibilities in creating that system and that it's not the fault of the players for the flaws in the total game.
If all I cared about was doing stuff with toy soldiers, sure, I get where you're coming from. That said, while I'm hardly averse to heavily modifying the rules or trying out new things and having people try out all sorts of stuff that the rules don't cover or don't do well, I bought into a game and a hobby, not just the toy soldiers. As such, the functionality of the rules, their interoperability with people in a wide array of places with a variety of different people, and their commonality matter significantly. I bought into the experience of being able to take a ruleset from the market leader that everyone was familiar with and go play at almost any gaming store or club anywhere and be on largely common ground, even if we then choose to depart radically from that. 40k as it currently functions does none of this, meaning to engage in that hobby I have hammer it all out myself with almost every new encounter and scrutinize every event and the people and factions that may be attending to see if it will be any fun, and that detracts greatly from the value of the hobby that I got into where previously, even if it wasn't perfect, it functioned ok most of the time.
I've got a huge collection of 40k models and enjoy modeling and painting, but having a functional ruleset that didn't require planning out almost every detail in advance (even if we played games that radically departed from said rules) to ensure that the game wouldn't just be a one-sided curbstomping (granted, previous editions had their issues for sure) was a huge part of what drove that collecting and modelling, and without such rules those activities have dramatically curtailed.
If I effectively *have* to run my own niche club and extensively restrict and rewrite the rules to play (as opposed to having the option of being able to choose to do so when it suits me), that's beyond what I consider reasonable effort for a hobby like this, and as such derive just as much pleasure viewing my models sitting on display on shelves, and that is something I see as the fault of the game developers at Games Workshop, and not the players.
Regarding guidance, i think the whole point is that the gsme is in your hands.
GW's direction on this largely boils down to "dice it off" or "toss everything in this $75 book and do whatever you want", neither of which are terribly productive.
Well, no, that's certainly hyperbolic. There is a structure provided. It's a structure that's negotiable, in some areas more than others, but it is a functioning framework that one can get fun games out of, especially if you're playing with like-minded people.
It's more expensive than it should be, that's for sure. It could be improved on, certainly. But I think you're overstating the anarchy of it.
My statement above was in regards to guidance for narrative play options and mechanics, not the game as a whole. There's really no structure the rules provide for narrative play being "go make it all up yourself" or "roll a bunch on these random tables" or "here's a variant of a pickup mission with a big random effect or a huge arbitrary bonus to one side".
EDIT: With regards to my reference to Dropzone Commander's narrative play earlier, here's some examples of scenarios.
In the Reconquest Phase 2 book it has a number of scenarios and rules for battles on jungle worlds, void platforms, space stations, urban centers, low/high gravity, hostile atmospheres, subzero temperatures, subterrainian caverns, multiple types of potentially hostile wildlife, placement of objectives, recommended levels and types of terrain and in some cases actual placement of terrain for each mission, the types of forces involved and their organization, links to further missions in a linked story chain (e.g. Attacking the Olympus Shipyards, Beachead - Clear the Cargo Bays- Secure Targeting Data - Hull Breach), designers notes and suggestions, and optional rules for interaction with the soon to be released Dropfleet Commander game. Random events are logical in presentation and function (e.g. you're not going to have to roll for every piece of terrain or objective to see if it does something on a chart, instead you might be playing in a Snowstorm and a blizzard may kick up for a turn on a D6 roll and then it'll make aircraft operation a bit more dangerous that turn, and that's about the extent of it). The book then has additional rules and missions specifically for tournament play and organization separately.
Regarding guidance, i think the whole point is that the gsme is in your hands.
GW's direction on this largely boils down to "dice it off" or "toss everything in this $75 book and do whatever you want", neither of which are terribly productive.
Well, no, that's certainly hyperbolic. There is a structure provided. It's a structure that's negotiable, in some areas more than others, but it is a functioning framework that one can get fun games out of, especially if you're playing with like-minded people.
It's more expensive than it should be, that's for sure. It could be improved on, certainly. But I think you're overstating the anarchy of it.
My statement above was in regards to guidance for narrative play options and mechanics, not the game as a whole. There's really no structure the rules provide for narrative play being "go make it all up yourself" or "roll a bunch on these random tables" or "here's a variant of a pickup mission with a big random effect or a huge arbitrary bonus to one side".
Ahh, I think I see what you're saying then? To paraphrase: The given structure for more narrative games doesn't exist. (?)
I can see where that's coming from, although this is fairly recent to GW. As late as the 6th Edition book, the rulebooks have provided for more specifically structured mission and scenario options. I admit I haven't looked at them in detail though. Despite 7th Ed. being released as a pack of three books, the fact that neither of the "auxiliary" books includes more scenarios or game options is really disappointing.
Fun discussion to read through: let me offer a view from a newcomer to 40K who has done a pretty good share of narrative gaming and "competitive" gaming in other systems.
The most popular RPG system right now is Pathfinder, which is based off of DnD 3.5. Pathfinder "fixed" a lot of problems with 3.5, but the problem is that the system itself is inherently broken. Casters just have so much inherent potential that even the very best physical attackers can't keep up if both sides play to "win" the game (it was also possible in 3.5 to pick the "wrong" class; certain classes were nonfunctional or just objectively worse than others). There have been supplements (codexes) that have addressed this issue a bit, but for the most part, if all parties understand the game in depth, you need some form of gentleman's agreement to avoid overshadowing other players (A Druid, for example, was a better tank than a Fighter by level 1, and the gap only got worse as they leveled). Thus the infamous Tier Lists come into play. If you are going for the nuclear arms race, you pick Tier 1 characters and play them intelligently. If you were going for a balanced game but still wanted players to have a good amount of options (or be really good at a specific niche), you pick Tier 3 characters. In other words, experienced 3.5/Pathfinder players have taken a system that has some glaring flaws and made it the most popular, enduring form of Dungeons and Dragons, simply through informal gentleman's agreements.
So I get the mindset that players should be responsible for their own fun. House rulings are part of what keeps a game running smoothly, which is why Wizards of the Coast made the latest iteration of DnD very much based on in game rulings, as opposed to a strict set of rules; it is impossible for a developer to plan for all contingencies, and the rules become unnecessarily cumbersome if they try to do so.
That being said, GW has a criminally shoddy set of rules and supplements. The primary rulebook is equal parts overwritten, redundant, and poorly organized. The base rules are unintuitive and needlessly complicated. From a balance perspective, while there are a LOT of units and unit interactions for GW to balance, the discrepancies between army and unit power smack of laziness more than anything else, as well as a lack of understanding of their own product. In other words, they're shoveling out pages of for more cash. It is possible to feel this way while still understanding that players are ultimately responsible for their own fun and health of the system. Learning that GW is pushing their super expensive, overpowered super-models as the optimal ways to play is even more damning.
Virtually every other company out there, including ones who have designed narrative games, have a functional system with rules. FATE is an example of a system where you can literally make up situations on the go, and yet, it still follows a clear set of rules. 40K is a game where you are expected to research, physically prepare, and affix the exact weapons every single one of your miniatures is wielding, a game where you are expected to invest in terrain, specialized dice, and blast markers in order to be able to even use the system, a game where every unit has its own stat block and an entire list of optional add ons, a game where you need two rulebooks at minimum to even be able to participate (and realistically, at least 4-5). This is an incredibly painstaking, high investment game to play produced by a company that should be an industry leader; it absolutely cannot and should be be viewed as a potentially "rules light" game. Giving GW a free pass and claiming the rules don't matter in a more narrative 40k game is ignoring the standards of the industry as a whole.
And you shouldn't be afraid to call a spade a spade: when the ruleset is changed to strongly favor big ticket items mechanically, power gamers who play to win aren't breaking the system, the company is. A player who plays to win at any cost will ruin games whether the cheaper or more expensive options are favored. The difference is, the former gives power gamers and narrative players a chance at parity. The latter is what has happened.
TLDR: Holding a broken system to an adequate standard does not preclude understanding the importance of being a responsible player.
Because I don't have the time to respond to the whole post currently, I would posit that herein lies the difference between our trains of thought. To boil it down, I think what your point is basically that people just want to play with toy soldiers and should have a responsibility in coming up with their own fun with said toy soldiers. Ok, from that perspective, I get that. I'm coming it at from the perspective of the whole system, the totality of the "Games Workshop Hobby" as it were, a game and not primarily just cool models. From my perspective, I don't see the mini's as being a distinct and separate product from the rules, and with a very large investment (emotional, intellectual, social, financial, recreational, etc) in that system, and think that the issues are with the designers abandoning their responsibilities in creating that system and that it's not the fault of the players for the flaws in the total game.
So you are saying that, for example, the rules are intertwined with the models to the extent that you can't/shouldn't deviate from said rules and 'official dictates'? So, no third party rules sets, no use of older rules etc? I can't get behind that. Rules are abstract changeable, malleable systems. I see 'playing games' as what isn't a distinct/separate entity. Rules are just things that get used, and things, frankly, that can be changed to suit the circumstances in front of you.
You're just being a prisoner of officialdom.
It's certainly not the fault of the players for the problems in the game itself- thst is squarely on the shoulders of the developers. However, it is the fault of the players for embracing said faults, wallowing in inertia and down damn all to help themselves when it is entirely within their own power.
You spoke to me earlier of 'victim playing'. It's the opposite. I speak of player empowerment. You are the one treating gamers as innocent victims of these terrible faults who can't and shouldn't do anything about it.
If all I cared about was doing stuff with toy soldiers, sure, I get where you're coming from. That said, while I'm hardly averse to heavily modifying the rules or trying out new things and having people try out all sorts of stuff that the rules don't cover or don't do well, I bought into a game and a hobby, not just the toy soldiers. As such, the functionality of the rules, their interoperability with people in a wide array of places with a variety of different people, and their commonality matter significantly. I bought into the experience of being able to take a ruleset from the market leader that everyone was familiar with and go play at almost any gaming store or club anywhere and be on largely common ground, even if we then choose to depart radically from that. 40k as it currently functions does none of this, meaning to engage in that hobby I have hammer it all out myself with almost every new encounter and scrutinize every event and the people and factions that may be attending to see if it will be any fun, and that detracts greatly from the value of the hobby that I got into where previously, even if it wasn't perfect, it functioned ok most of the time.
I do get the desire to have a universality to the rules - I do, I've played with various groups in various countries, and it's great to have a universal lingua Franca to 'speak'/use. However, 40k is not that game any more. As the tau say, the one constant in the universe is change. The wise adapt. I guess I just acknowledge the physical reality on the ground and have adapted.
The funny thing is, having to hammer out a game is not a bad thing. It's just a different thing, a different way of playing, and a different perspective Since I've been exposed to the whole narrative gaming thing. I've really learned to embrace and enjoy the diy approach that this entails and happily enjoy this alongside the whole universal/pick up play. WMH is that game. Various others do the diy.
I've got a huge collection of 40k models and enjoy modeling and painting, but having a functional ruleset that didn't require planning out almost every detail in advance (even if we played games that radically departed from said rules) to ensure that the game wouldn't just be a one-sided curbstomping (granted, previous editions had their issues for sure) was a huge part of what drove that collecting and modelling, and without such rules those activities have dramatically curtailed.
Do you need to plan out 'every detail' in advance, and even if you have to do, is it the burden you imagine? Theme a battle. Cast the characters. Off you go. We find to be a pretty straight forward endeavour to be perfectly honest. The problem is you are still adhering to officialdom. You are not embracing the diy approach, you are not 'letting go' and for that reason, I'm afraid you are never going to 'get it'.
If I effectively *have* to run my own niche club and extensively restrict and rewrite the rules to play (as opposed to having the option of being able to choose to do so when it suits me), that's beyond what I consider reasonable effort for a hobby like this, and as such derive just as much pleasure viewing my models sitting on display on shelves, and that is something I see as the fault of the game developers at Games Workshop, and not the players.
When you talks bout running a niche club like a bad thing, I talk about meeting up with some good friends over an evening and a cup of tea, hanging out and playing wargames. In terms of restricting and rewriting the rules, sometimes it's as straight forward as 'I have a cool scenario in mind. But we will need to leave airpower and artillery at home for this game'. Shrug. It's not hard. Not really. You are zeroing in too much on the importance of minutiae. Personally, I've never found what we've done to amount to any kind of 'effort' beyond having a chat, with all the physical effort being putting stuff on the board.
EDIT: With regards to my reference to Dropzone Commander's narrative play earlier, here's some examples of scenarios.
In the Reconquest Phase 2 book it has a number of scenarios and rules for battles on jungle worlds, void platforms, space stations, urban centers, low/high gravity, hostile atmospheres, subzero temperatures, subterrainian caverns, multiple types of potentially hostile wildlife, placement of objectives, recommended levels and types of terrain and in some cases actual placement of terrain for each mission, the types of forces involved and their organization, links to further missions in a linked story chain (e.g. Attacking the Olympus Shipyards, Beachead - Clear the Cargo Bays- Secure Targeting Data - Hull Breach), designers notes and suggestions, and optional rules for interaction with the soon to be released Dropfleet Commander game. Random events are logical in presentation and function (e.g. you're not going to have to roll for every piece of terrain or objective to see if it does something on a chart, instead you might be playing in a Snowstorm and a blizzard may kick up for a turn on a D6 roll and then it'll make aircraft operation a bit more dangerous that turn, and that's about the extent of it). The book then has additional rules and missions specifically for tournament play and organization separately.
Aside: really need to read the recon quest books!
But what you have here is hawk wargamers telling people how to play, and gw offering suggestions and essentially leaving it in the hands of the players. One is not necessarily more 'narrative', but as helpful as the hawk approach is (and it's quite useful, so thanks for describing it), it does also feel a little bit 'railroaded'. Diy gaming needs to be a bit more free form.
Well the problem with saying it's the players fault is, it's kind of like saying it's the hostages fault in a hostage situation not to take down the guy with the gun.
Sure if everyone ran at him at once, they'd overwhelm him and win. But no one is sure that others will follow and try to take him down. So everyone sits to scared to do anything.
Similarly, people want more fun, narrative games. But no one knows if anyone else would want to do the same. As well as most tournaments inviting a lot of power gamers who thwart the system and prevent players who want fun games from bringing their fun lists, forcing them to make more competitive lists over the years to even have a hope in enjoying a tournament. Not everyone has a plethora of friends who they can play at home with either and can only play at events
Regarding guidance, i think the whole point is that the gsme is in your hands.
GW's direction on this largely boils down to "dice it off" or "toss everything in this $75 book and do whatever you want", neither of which are terribly productive.
Well, no, that's certainly hyperbolic. There is a structure provided. It's a structure that's negotiable, in some areas more than others, but it is a functioning framework that one can get fun games out of, especially if you're playing with like-minded people.
It's more expensive than it should be, that's for sure. It could be improved on, certainly. But I think you're overstating the anarchy of it.
There is a structure provided, I will agree to this. The problem is that it's basically provide an extremely barebones framework with the expectation that all their players are going to build onto it, when at least from my experience the impression is that people think it's the full, out of the box system and don't want to do that. I think there's a big disconnect between GW trying to be as flexible and open as possible with their rules, but at the same time not making it abundantly clear that you are intended/expected to be modifying it to suit your needs (that they charge so much money for such a thing is another store entirely). In fact that's one thing I wish GW did more; provide actual supplements and guidelines for doing just that. They tend to constantly talk about changing things and "forging the narrative" and then provide little or no guidelines on actually doing it, so is it any wonder that people don't want to bother? It's like they are giving you a hammer, some nails, and some pre-cut wooden boards, telling you what nails go with which boards but then not providing any instructions while telling you that now you can build a house.
Automatically Appended Next Post:
Tiberius501 wrote: Well the problem with saying it's the players fault is, it's kind of like saying it's the hostages fault in a hostage situation not to take down the guy with the gun.
Sure if everyone ran at him at once, they'd overwhelm him and win. But no one is sure that others will follow and try to take him down. So everyone sits to scared to do anything.
Similarly, people want more fun, narrative games. But no one knows if anyone else would want to do the same. As well as most tournaments inviting a lot of power gamers who thwart the system and prevent players who want fun games from bringing their fun lists, forcing them to make more competitive lists over the years to even have a hope in enjoying a tournament. Not everyone has a plethora of friends who they can play at home with either and can only play at events
I get your point, but I don't quite agree if only because I see too often that people play the same opponent/opponent week in or week out and do nothing to actually make the game meaningful. I get that approach if you're playing a tournament practice game (although for some reason the term "competitive 40k list" makes me throw up in my mouth a little), but there is't that much to taking a random game and asking to add some spice to it by coming up with a custom mission or little story blurb about the battle; it doesn't have to be a novella, even a sentence or two about just why your two armies are fighting each other can, in my experience, make a game a lot more enjoyable than just two random forces fighting because reasons.
People seem unwilling to even put in an an iota of effort, that's the issue as I see it.
I get your point, but I don't quite agree if only because I see too often that people play the same opponent/opponent week in or week out and do nothing to actually make the game meaningful. I get that approach if you're playing a tournament practice game (although for some reason the term "competitive 40k list" makes me throw up in my mouth a little), but there is't that much to taking a random game and asking to add some spice to it by coming up with a custom mission or little story blurb about the battle; it doesn't have to be a novella, even a sentence or two about just why your two armies are fighting each other can, in my experience, make a game a lot more enjoyable than just two random forces fighting because reasons.
People seem unwilling to even put in an an iota of effort, that's the issue as I see it.
Yeah that's very true. I wish people were more into narrative play. Me and my bro at home often come up with some kind of narrative. It makes the game a game, as opposed to stats on a sheet and statical dice rolls.
And than the problem with people who don´t even touch stuff, that isn´t made by GW(Rules).
Even it is waaay better. Thats why I stick mostly with 30k this days and don´t even think to write rules myself.....because nobody would care.
Tiberius501 wrote: Well the problem with saying it's the players fault is, it's kind of like saying it's the hostages fault in a hostage situation not to take down the guy with the gun.
Sure if everyone ran at him at once, they'd overwhelm him and win. But no one is sure that others will follow and try to take him down. So everyone sits to scared to do anything.
No.
The problem is there is a disconnect between your scenario and the reality. This isn't a hostage situation. There are no hostages - the players are willing participants.There isn't a guy with a gun. No one is going to shoot you. You will not die if you try and things won't work out - worst case scenarios is you won't have a good game, which is the probably outcome of a gsme of 40k anyway, so what the heck do you have to lose?
Gamers are lazy. The simple truth is they don't want to do any actual work, and would rather sit there and complain and blame 'somebody' rather than take it on themselves to better themselves. Because that validates their lack of effort.
Ultimately This is about doing stuff on a 6 by 4 with your friends for an enjoyable evening. This isn't a life changing event. This isn't rocket surgery. This isn't saving the world. This isn't hard. Nor is This isn't beyond the abilities of average gamer. Christ, I don't care about football. But I bought a season ticket for my missus' team and I go to their home games to support her. If I'll make the effort for her, I'll make the same efforts for my friends when it comes to wargames. I'll make more of an effort for me. What benefit is there for me to be lazy and do nothing?
It is the players fault when there is a problem, When they are aware of said problem, when they are aware of various solutions to said problems, and when they do nothing to help themselves. They are not 'victims'. Get that crap out of your head. All you are doing is validating, and enabling apalling, negative and self destructive behaviours - they are participants. And even if you consider yourself a pawn amongst kings in a game of chess,remember thst pawns ultimately have all the power, because nothing happens until the pawns move forward.
Similarly, people want more fun, narrative games. But no one knows if anyone else would want to do the same. As well as most tournaments inviting a lot of power gamers who thwart the system and prevent players who want fun games from bringing their fun lists, forcing them to make more competitive lists over the years to even have a hope in enjoying a tournament. Not everyone has a plethora of friends who they can play at home with either and can only play at events
Then thry should ask! They should talk. Thry should make the goddamn effort. More people than you realise would like this stuff if they only gave a god damn and actually bloody well tried and put some effort into it beyond token lip service. Damn it, things have never been so easy! Texts, phone calls, Facebook. All you have to do is talk, and step forward. Bloody well man up! Stop being a coward, Put your money where your mouth is, step forward, stop complaining and actually do something about it. make the effort. and make the damned community as good as you wish it to be.
Jesus Christ, half the bloody problems this community faces are because no one talks to each other, and would rather talk past each other!
Talk to each other! Go to events. Meet people. Communicate. Organise. Expand. We have done it. Bloody hell, you are not the only horse in ton that wants this. Scottish masters 3 years ago for warmachine. Got to know a couple of opponents, and a couple of folks that were playing on boards beside me. Got talking. Realised we were all old enough to be on the same page. Realised we wanted the same thing. WMH is a great, competitive game, but all of us had life commitments that meant we couldn't WMH 24/7. I'm lucky if I get a game in twice a month! We looked at the 'Sharks' in our pond and realises that we simply could not, or would not play at that level. Or than intensity. Fair play to them! I, and we have far more going on. So we traded numbers and addresses and got together for more casual 'game days' rather than proper,tournaments. And because of our focus, and our reaching out to other people with this approach, the community has exploded in size.
All because we talked, and put some effort into our community.
And what's stopping you either making new friends, or evolving, and learning new things as friends, or doing things as a group? I play narrative games amongst a group of four people, with a few others popping In On occasion. I don't have a 'plethora of friends'. I have four friends in one group(one of whom was a guy from work who I caught 'liking' a 40k thing on Facebook. So I asked him if he wanted to come join us. He did. Within one game with us,che turned his back on 40k and what he styled as the 'play to win' pick up gsmes he had, up to that point, played his 40k games as) and about a dozen in the other. And we make it work. I don't play with everyone who plays the games I play. I play the people I enjoy playing against. And yet, I enjoy gsming, and despite not having a 'plethora' of friends, My gaming experiences over the last three years playing a handful of people with an open mind have been a magnitude greater that i ever Had playing the tournament circuits for 40k. Which goes to show that all you need so is open your mind,chit some effort in. And the rest will follow.
WayneTheGame wrote: +1 Deadnight. I don't get how people can play a social game but not want to talk to their opponent to make the game better.
Because people have different ideas about what 'better' is and enjoy being judgmental about people who disagree with them.
The only problem I see here is people being judgmental gits. Is that the only reason to not talk? Because people can't overcome their nastiness? That's a very dim view of gamers.
Not everyone plays in an environment where pre-planning games is common or practical. For people in clubs that know each other, or come from common backgrounds, then sure. But don't blame the players for wanting to play 'X' well within the rules, even if 'X' is a dramatically superior to option to a number of other players' choices. There are multiple reasons to use any given unit or army combination, and if the the forces don't match up in power levels, the options are to play a dramatically one sided game or not play at all, neither of which are acceptable and neither are the player's fault.
Think of it this way. There are two solutions to the balance issue, when speaking broadly. The first is to offer a balanced ruleset that has been professionally written and tested. The second is to enforce or stumble into a perfect gaming group where everyone agrees on a particular standard of army construction and general playstyle.
One of these solutions is universal and a hallmark of a quality product. The other is a hallmark of a poor product and generally not realistic and potentially exclusive to people looking for differing types of gameplay.
Blame the company, because if we had better rules, we wouldn't be having this discussion, or at least not to the degree and extent we're having.
Blacksails wrote: Think of it this way. There are two solutions to the balance issue, when speaking broadly. The first is to offer a balanced ruleset that has been professionally written and tested. The second is to enforce or stumble into a perfect gaming group where everyone agrees on a particular standard of army construction and general playstyle.
One of these solutions is universal and a hallmark of a quality product. The other is a hallmark of a poor product and generally not realistic and potentially exclusive to people looking for differing types of gameplay.
Blame the company, because if we had better rules, we wouldn't be having this discussion, or at least not to the degree and extent we're having.
Tiberius501 wrote: Well the problem with saying it's the players fault is, it's kind of like saying it's the hostages fault in a hostage situation not to take down the guy with the gun.
Sure if everyone ran at him at once, they'd overwhelm him and win. But no one is sure that others will follow and try to take him down. So everyone sits to scared to do anything.
No.
The problem is there is a disconnect between your scenario and the reality. This isn't a hostage situation. There are no hostages - the players are willing participants.There isn't a guy with a gun. No one is going to shoot you. You will not die if you try and things won't work out - worst case scenarios is you won't have a good game, which is the probably outcome of a gsme of 40k anyway, so what the heck do you have to lose?
Gamers are lazy. The simple truth is they don't want to do any actual work, and would rather sit there and complain and blame 'somebody' rather than take it on themselves to better themselves. Because that validates their lack of effort.
Ultimately This is about doing stuff on a 6 by 4 with your friends for an enjoyable evening. This isn't a life changing event. This isn't rocket surgery. This isn't saving the world. This isn't hard. Nor is This isn't beyond the abilities of average gamer. Christ, I don't care about football. But I bought a season ticket for my missus' team and I go to their home games to support her. If I'll make the effort for her, I'll make the same efforts for my friends when it comes to wargames. I'll make more of an effort for me. What benefit is there for me to be lazy and do nothing?
It is the players fault when there is a problem, When they are aware of said problem, when they are aware of various solutions to said problems, and when they do nothing to help themselves. They are not 'victims'. Get that crap out of your head. All you are doing is validating, and enabling apalling, negative and self destructive behaviours - they are participants. And even if you consider yourself a pawn amongst kings in a game of chess,remember thst pawns ultimately have all the power, because nothing happens until the pawns move forward.
Similarly, people want more fun, narrative games. But no one knows if anyone else would want to do the same. As well as most tournaments inviting a lot of power gamers who thwart the system and prevent players who want fun games from bringing their fun lists, forcing them to make more competitive lists over the years to even have a hope in enjoying a tournament. Not everyone has a plethora of friends who they can play at home with either and can only play at events
Then thry should ask! They should talk. Thry should make the goddamn effort. More people than you realise would like this stuff if they only gave a god damn and actually bloody well tried and put some effort into it beyond token lip service. Damn it, things have never been so easy! Texts, phone calls, Facebook. All you have to do is talk, and step forward. Bloody well man up! Stop being a coward, Put your money where your mouth is, step forward, stop complaining and actually do something about it. make the effort. and make the damned community as good as you wish it to be.
Jesus Christ, half the bloody problems this community faces are because no one talks to each other, and would rather talk past each other!
Talk to each other! Go to events. Meet people. Communicate. Organise. Expand. We have done it. Bloody hell, you are not the only horse in ton that wants this. Scottish masters 3 years ago for warmachine. Got to know a couple of opponents, and a couple of folks that were playing on boards beside me. Got talking. Realised we were all old enough to be on the same page. Realised we wanted the same thing. WMH is a great, competitive game, but all of us had life commitments that meant we couldn't WMH 24/7. I'm lucky if I get a game in twice a month! We looked at the 'Sharks' in our pond and realises that we simply could not, or would not play at that level. Or than intensity. Fair play to them! I, and we have far more going on. So we traded numbers and addresses and got together for more casual 'game days' rather than proper,tournaments. And because of our focus, and our reaching out to other people with this approach, the community has exploded in size.
All because we talked, and put some effort into our community.
And what's stopping you either making new friends, or evolving, and learning new things as friends, or doing things as a group? I play narrative games amongst a group of four people, with a few others popping In On occasion. I don't have a 'plethora of friends'. I have four friends in one group(one of whom was a guy from work who I caught 'liking' a 40k thing on Facebook. So I asked him if he wanted to come join us. He did. Within one game with us,che turned his back on 40k and what he styled as the 'play to win' pick up gsmes he had, up to that point, played his 40k games as) and about a dozen in the other. And we make it work. I don't play with everyone who plays the games I play. I play the people I enjoy playing against. And yet, I enjoy gsming, and despite not having a 'plethora' of friends, My gaming experiences over the last three years playing a handful of people with an open mind have been a magnitude greater that i ever Had playing the tournament circuits for 40k. Which goes to show that all you need so is open your mind,chit some effort in. And the rest will follow.
The problem is that not everyone has the luxury of having a close knit group of people to play with so sometimes you end up playing with some random people. I can discuss what type of game I want to play but its not exactly easy to express "fun but semi competitive" to somebody and get the same mutual understanding. To some that means maybe not bringing their recreation of their 1st company Blood Angels and mix in a bit more cost effective things while to others it means they will only bring 2 wraithknights and maybe some fire dragons instead of more warp spiders. Everybody has their own experience and interpretation of what is fair or fun in the game and its challenging enough to try and understand enough of the boat load of armies, units, formations, etc in the game. The reason for needing to understand all this stuff is to be able to relatively understand what sort of power level things sit at so I can try my best to match that for a fun game. Last thing I want to do is bring a fully kitted out Tau list to end up blowing away some fluffy Blood Angel formation or waste a few hours playing with a casual Ork list against something that is 90% the same as a winning tournament list somebody copied off the net. Social skills are often something people lack and its not always laziness, often times it a learned behavior due to negative reinforcement from past social experiences or anxiety.
Bad rules by GW is a negative no matter how you spin it. Its bad for new players trying to get their feet in the water. It is bad for trying to find pickup games that don't turn into a complete landslide. It is bad for people who want to play a close game and yet have to launch an investigation in order to figure out if 30 warp spiders, a Wraithknight, and Scatter Laser Jetbikes is playing for fun or to kick in people's teeth. Maybe one day my preferred Killa Kans, Flash Gitz, Battlewagons, and Dakkajets will be the stuff of TFG lists and makes me a power gamer for playing the models I love but today its just the stuff of casual play. Due to poor rules no amount of community goodwill, social contracting, and playing for fun is going to make Tau vs Dark Eldar an enjoyable experience for the Dark Eldar player unless they are a bit of a masochist. GW's incompetence with rules writing is not the communities fault (although we tend to try and abuse the rules) and the disparity between the weak and strong codexes is massive. It became the community's task to Band-Aid the rules and play experience as best as we can because GW is too isolated, lazy, incompetent, and/or delusional sitting in their rules tower (or more likely dungeon) to comprehend the results of their "work" on the 40k community.
I fully agree that many editions of 40K have been poorly written rules-wise and from a game balance standpoint. I agree that a nicely balanced game should be a goal when designing/play-testing.
The biggest issue with fixing this is that it runs contrary to the real goal of GW (i.e. selling lots of plastic models). I don't think anyone would have an issue if the rules said that for every 1000 or 1500 points you run, you can field one large beastie (Knight, Wraithknight, bla bla). This would solve a load of issue with that stuff.
That, however, doesn't sell 5-10 Imperial Knights to a single player. That sells one, maybe two.
As such, we're likely to never see a reversal in strategy by GW. You might see more Killteam esque projects etc., but there won't be a renaissance of common sense or more logical army lists/balance. This would have to come from the gaming community.
WayneTheGame wrote: +1 Deadnight. I don't get how people can play a social game but not want to talk to their opponent to make the game better.
Because people have different ideas about what 'better' is and enjoy being judgmental about people who disagree with them.
The only problem I see here is people being judgmental gits. Is that the only reason to not talk? Because people can't overcome their nastiness? That's a very dim view of gamers.
Human beings have a thing where they take disagreement with their position as a personal attack, get defensive, and escalate. You may have noticed this on the Internet.
I agree with Blacksails. I don't think its fair to blame the customer for GW's bad rules.
I've been doing my own work to create a ruleset that I feel works. The biggest hurdle to using it is a) it hasn't been playtested (and no one I play with wants to be a guinea pig to find out if I'm off the mark) and b) people have their own ideas about what to fix and how in the game, and it does not necessarily match with my ideas.
If GW had written good rules from the start, I wouldn't have to negotiate with my friends for a game and I could worry about the scenario instead of fearing I'll get my face whomped in because I chose "wrong" before the first model hit the board.
Blacksails wrote: Not everyone plays in an environment where pre-planning games is common or practical. For people in clubs that know each other, or come from common backgrounds, then sure. But don't blame the players for wanting to play 'X' well within the rules, even if 'X' is a dramatically superior to option to a number of other players' choices. There are multiple reasons to use any given unit or army combination, and if the the forces don't match up in power levels, the options are to play a dramatically one sided game or not play at all, neither of which are acceptable and neither are the player's fault.
So sending a text the day before a game, or face booking isn't common or practical? Or even having a chat about what you want to do the next time you meet up?clets not kid outselves here. You're talking about people being too lazy to communicate and looking for someone else to blame.
There is also the argument that gsming groups or whatever are hostile to the approach I talk about, and that gsmes should be,perfectly provided for them, because they shouldn't have to do anything. I always remember the old phrase 'if the mountain won't come to you, maybe you have to come to the mountain'. It's true to say that game companies shouod adapt to nature of their gamers. It's just as true to say that gamers should adapt to suit the nature of their games. Sometimes it's not that the games need to change, it's the communities themselves that need to.
And I don't blame the players for wanting to play x. You know me blacksails - I see the value in all gaming styles, whether casual, competitive, narrative, or whatever. There is a place for it all. However, while I wont 'blame' them, I will hold them to account, and point out the consequences of their actions. If you want to play one of the handful of top builds in the gsme, you are not wrong. But you need to realise there are maybe half a dozen other builds thst can play at thst level. It's like the champions league in football. However, when you are insisting on your right to be playing that list into a player/army that is far further down the ladder, then depending on circumstances, you could very well be becoming the villain in the story, especially when you doing what you want to do (your 'fun', as it were) is coming at the expense of the other player. You are not wrong for playing that top level army. He isn't wrong for wanting to play a lower/mid tier army. Gw could make better rules that would negative this whole discussion, but the cold hard reality on the ground is that won't happen, so sometimes you just need to step up, talk about it and make it work.
And you are wrong. There is a third choice outside of play a crap game or not plat at all. But like I said, it involves a bit of co-operative gsme building to make it work. Like I said, it's not the players fault that gw write terrible rules.it is the players fault when they insist on using said broken rules in a manner that isn't fit for purpose, when they complain about problems but yet do absolutely nothing to help themselves, even when possible solutions are presented.
Blacksails wrote: Not
Think of it this way. There are two solutions to the balance issue, when speaking broadly. The first is to offer a balanced ruleset that has been professionally written and tested. The second is to enforce or stumble into a perfect gaming group where everyone agrees on a particular standard of army construction and general playstyle.
One of these solutions is universal and a hallmark of a quality product. The other is a hallmark of a poor product and generally not realistic and potentially exclusive to people looking for differing types of gameplay.
Like I said, three solutions. You don't need a perfect gaming group. You need a bit of cop on, maturity and a will to engage in cooperative game building. It is entirely possible to smooth out the edges of issues amongst your group.
Balanced rules set would obviously be my clear favourite as well, don't get me wrong. But I have learned I can have fun with a bad rules set with good people. It's plenty realistic is ask for friends to be reasonable and work together. Regsrding excluding people - I find that the co-operative, chat about what you want approach is actually inclusive, rather than exlusive for the most part.
Blame the company, because if we had better rules, we wouldn't be having this discussion, or at least not to the degree and extent we're having.
And I can just as easily turn this on its head:
'Blame the self righteous players. If we had a more cooperative, proactive community willing to step up and help each other, we wouldn't be having this discussion either, not to the degree and extend we are having. People would just sort out their issues amongst themselves and move on.
Please don't get me wrong. I am not disagreeing with you. I'll make it clear: you are right in what you say.but so am I. The developers role in designing a gsme, and the players role in playing said gsme are both sides of the exact same coin.
Any argument involving "b-but you can just adjust the rules and set the limits" falls flat on its dirty face just widening a bit the perspective.
Currently, I am more than capable to wing a decent game, imbalances notwithstanding, because my friend and I are veterans.
But when we were just naive beginners, any imbalance led to frustration and several people quitting, at least temporarily, the hobby. If you want fresh blood, you need the game working and you need it now.
There is a way of getting around GWs great ideas but lack of playtesting.
Try to make Community Comp a thing in your area.
I doubt play testing will ever be a high priority in GWs books. The shop where I play has two Apoc games every year where two days and 5000 points of the cheesiest filth you can think of is the standard but otherwise tournaments are community comp and even though it's not enforced the players practicing for tournaments kind of make it the standard, new players are given free reign to play whatever they have but find it harder and harder to find opponents the longer it takes them to fall in with the Community Comp standard.
Elbows wrote: I fully agree that many editions of 40K have been poorly written rules-wise and from a game balance standpoint. I agree that a nicely balanced game should be a goal when designing/play-testing.
The biggest issue with fixing this is that it runs contrary to the real goal of GW (i.e. selling lots of plastic models). I don't think anyone would have an issue if the rules said that for every 1000 or 1500 points you run, you can field one large beastie (Knight, Wraithknight, bla bla). This would solve a load of issue with that stuff.
That, however, doesn't sell 5-10 Imperial Knights to a single player. That sells one, maybe two.
As such, we're likely to never see a reversal in strategy by GW. You might see more Killteam esque projects etc., but there won't be a renaissance of common sense or more logical army lists/balance. This would have to come from the gaming community.
I would have a problem with this. My lists are all 2000-3000 points in size and include at least 3 superheavies except on rare occasions.
Elbows wrote: I fully agree that many editions of 40K have been poorly written rules-wise and from a game balance standpoint. I agree that a nicely balanced game should be a goal when designing/play-testing.
The biggest issue with fixing this is that it runs contrary to the real goal of GW (i.e. selling lots of plastic models). I don't think anyone would have an issue if the rules said that for every 1000 or 1500 points you run, you can field one large beastie (Knight, Wraithknight, bla bla). This would solve a load of issue with that stuff.
That, however, doesn't sell 5-10 Imperial Knights to a single player. That sells one, maybe two.
As such, we're likely to never see a reversal in strategy by GW. You might see more Killteam esque projects etc., but there won't be a renaissance of common sense or more logical army lists/balance. This would have to come from the gaming community.
I would have a problem with this. My lists are all 2000-3000 points in size and include at least 3 superheavies except on rare occasions.
This is a type of army however that 40k really doesn't do all that well, and one that historically would be an "Apocalypse" level or really a small Epic army. As much as I love tanks, and have my own gaggle of superheavies, I'd be more than fine seeing this sort of scale relegated to a separate system (where we don't have to keep track of which individual sergeants have meltaboms or Power Axes instead of Power Swords in a game dictated by superheavy battle tanks).
Elbows wrote: I fully agree that many editions of 40K have been poorly written rules-wise and from a game balance standpoint. I agree that a nicely balanced game should be a goal when designing/play-testing.
The biggest issue with fixing this is that it runs contrary to the real goal of GW (i.e. selling lots of plastic models). I don't think anyone would have an issue if the rules said that for every 1000 or 1500 points you run, you can field one large beastie (Knight, Wraithknight, bla bla). This would solve a load of issue with that stuff.
That, however, doesn't sell 5-10 Imperial Knights to a single player. That sells one, maybe two.
As such, we're likely to never see a reversal in strategy by GW. You might see more Killteam esque projects etc., but there won't be a renaissance of common sense or more logical army lists/balance. This would have to come from the gaming community.
I would have a problem with this. My lists are all 2000-3000 points in size and include at least 3 superheavies except on rare occasions.
This is a type of army however that 40k really doesn't do all that well, and one that historically would be an "Apocalypse" level or really a small Epic army. As much as I love tanks, and have my own gaggle of superheavies, I'd be more than fine seeing this sort of scale relegated to a separate system (where we don't have to keep track of which individual sergeants have meltaboms or Power Axes instead of Power Swords in a game dictated by superheavy battle tanks).
Well, at this point they're Heresy armies. But why should they be separate? I don't mind keeping track of which sergeants have meltabombs and which don't... in fact, I base some of my maneuvering decisions on it. And it's not like whether or not a model has a power axe or power sword is hard to tell ... I do, in fact, have functioning eyeballs.
And as far as relegating it to another scale... why? Superheavies can be deployed by the Imperium or Mechanicum against regular enemy armies. They shouldn't be just restricted to fighting other Superheavies.
So sending a text the day before a game, or face booking isn't common or practical? Or even having a chat about what you want to do the next time you meet up?clets not kid outselves here. You're talking about people being too lazy to communicate and looking for someone else to blame.
Texting or facebooking someone I hardly know that I may or may not have even theoretically met yet if I wander to my local GW is not practical. Having a chat once I'm there just leads to one of the scenarios I outlined assuming each player has brought roughly enough models for one pre-designed army with some wiggle room. In a club, sure, but the issue specifically here is for people who do pick-up games at a store with people they may not know well or at all. No one is really arguing that within a group of friends communication is important and likely the standard, which alleviates some issues.
There is also the argument that gsming groups or whatever are hostile to the approach I talk about, and that gsmes should be,perfectly provided for them, because they shouldn't have to do anything. I always remember the old phrase 'if the mountain won't come to you, maybe you have to come to the mountain'. It's true to say that game companies shouod adapt to nature of their gamers. It's just as true to say that gamers should adapt to suit the nature of their games. Sometimes it's not that the games need to change, it's the communities themselves that need to.
Most players are happy to work with the rules to tweak and adjust, but again, it depends on the group and having people come to agree on certain aspects. That may or may not be practical, and for pick-up players, it is most likely not practical. Really though, its far from unreasonable to expext a game to be perfectly playable out of the box, so player attitudes need not necessarily change if they can easily jump ship to a competitor who provides that.
And I don't blame the players for wanting to play x. You know me blacksails - I see the value in all gaming styles, whether casual, competitive, narrative, or whatever. There is a place for it all. However, while I wont 'blame' them, I will hold them to account, and point out the consequences of their actions. If you want to play one of the handful of top builds in the gsme, you are not wrong. But you need to realise there are maybe half a dozen other builds thst can play at thst level. It's like the champions league in football. However, when you are insisting on your right to be playing that list into a player/army that is far further down the ladder, then depending on circumstances, you could very well be becoming the villain in the story, especially when you doing what you want to do (your 'fun', as it were) is coming at the expense of the other player. You are not wrong for playing that top level army. He isn't wrong for wanting to play a lower/mid tier army. Gw could make better rules that would negative this whole discussion, but the cold hard reality on the ground is that won't happen, so sometimes you just need to step up, talk about it and make it work.
People try to make it work, and there's obviously large amount of players who are tired with making it work and the potential fallout between players who enjoy differing ideals of what constitutes a 'normal' game of 40k. I agree GW likely won't make a serious attempt to fix that, which ultimately drives people from the game. Which of course is bad for everyone, as then your gaming group moves away from 40k and towards other better written games.
And you are wrong. There is a third choice outside of play a crap game or not plat at all. But like I said, it involves a bit of co-operative gsme building to make it work. Like I said, it's not the players fault that gw write terrible rules.it is the players fault when they insist on using said broken rules in a manner that isn't fit for purpose, when they complain about problems but yet do absolutely nothing to help themselves, even when possible solutions are presented.
Well I'm not wrong, because that third solution is based on players bringing enough models to make a significantly different army on the fly, which is far from a guarantee due to either not owning enough models, or simply not bringing more, expecting that your club standard points value is all you need to grab a game.
Plus, this brings back the issue about what 40k is particularly fit for. Its not a good narrative game, nor is it a good casual game, and it makes for a pretty poor competitive game. Players are using it for what its fit for, which frankly is anything and nothing simultaneously because its simply not a good game.
Like I said, three solutions. You don't need a perfect gaming group. You need a bit of cop on, maturity and a will to engage in cooperative game building. It is entirely possible to smooth out the edges of issues amongst your group.
As stated before, a wonderful pipe dream for many, but far from reality for most. Sure, you can attempt to be the change you want, but you'd need a good club to begin with.
Balanced rules set would obviously be my clear favourite as well, don't get me wrong. But I have learned I can have fun with a bad rules set with good people. It's plenty realistic is ask for friends to be reasonable and work together. Regsrding excluding people - I find that the co-operative, chat about what you want approach is actually inclusive, rather than exlusive for the most part.
As above, a luxury clearly many don't have. Great idea in theory, hard in practice for many, many reasons.
And I can just as easily turn this on its head:
'Blame the self righteous players. If we had a more cooperative, proactive community willing to step up and help each other, we wouldn't be having this discussion either, not to the degree and extend we are having. People would just sort out their issues amongst themselves and move on.
The issue here is defining the self righteous player. People will play what they like within the rules. Sometimes those visions among players don't match up, and no one is wrong is they can't agree or compromise. One of the possible solutions of sorting out these issues is to simply not play or agree to disagree, which I'm sure you can agree is not a positive solution.
Ultimately, the problem stems from the rules, so the rules are the issue to be addressed. It'd be great if everyone could magically hold hands and sing Hakuna Matata together, but its just not going to happen.
Please don't get me wrong. I am not disagreeing with you. I'll make it clear: you are right in what you say.but so am I. The developers role in designing a gsme, and the players role in playing said gsme are both sides of the exact same coin.
Sure, but if the game is written well enough, you don't need to worry about the players. Your only concern at that point is just how much of a personal donkey-cave your opponent may be, or how much he smells, not what his idea of an acceptable force is.
To make it clear where I'm coming from, I have a small gaming group of people who didn't know eachother, but all worked for the same orginaztion, so we have a common background. The 40k games are organized ahead of time and stated what kind of game it will be (tournament prep, casual, warning of large models, so on) and generally have similar power levels. I've personally been pushing BFG (a dead game at the moment) which is slowly picking up, and because I dislike some of the balance issues in the base game, I explained to the group I intended to use a fan modified version that tweaks, clarifies, and fixes balance issues. They all agreed and that's what we do. I personally understand all that it takes to create, build, and nurture an excellent gaming group. I'm also very aware of the challenges some people face who either don't have a FLGS or club and look for pick up games elsewhere. I've been in both scenarios for years on end at times. I know that in both scenarios, a well written ruleset would fix any problem that would have or did arise.
In short, while it'd be great if people were generally friendlier, more open to compromise, understood game design and balance better, and had universally larger and wider variety of models on hand at all times, its likely not going to happen in the grand scheme which is why a game company needs to produce a well written game so we don't have to worry about people sharing the same vision of an ideal match. Its a matter of universality in application for the solution. So while people could work with GW's rules and try and make a go of it, you'll find most people are going to either stop playing, or find greener pastures where they don't have to put in the extra effort just to get a mediocre experience anyways.
[quote=Unit1126PLL 702240 8910476 [c9a48eea3a19d5ac01c579465c0b4bd1.jpg]
Well, at this point they're Heresy armies. But why should they be separate? I don't mind keeping track of which sergeants have meltabombs and which don't... in fact, I base some of my maneuvering decisions on it. And it's not like whether or not a model has a power axe or power sword is hard to tell ... I do, in fact, have functioning eyeballs.
Dont understand how or why you think it's reasonable or realistic to think your superheavy tank commanders could or should know platoon sgt Bubba is the guy carrying a meltabomb so that you might kill him or avoid it, tbh...but thats what the rules currently allow (open information) so that's another kettle of fish. The problem is how wildly that becomes exacerbated when said chump carrying a melta grenade is literally the only thing your opponent's list has that has a prayer against your superheavy. Of which you apparently bring multiples? Yeah...
And as far as relegating it to another scale... why? Superheavies can be deployed by the Imperium or Mechanicum against regular enemy armies. They shouldn't be just restricted to fighting other Superheavies.
That's the problem. Lots of things CAN be deployed against regular armies. Are we going to start making room for orbital vehicles next? Where does it stop? The is the slippery slope GW put us on when they decided flyers werent going to be fast attack/skimmers anymore, that they were going to be their own vehicle type. FASA was smart enough to make Aerotech and Battletech two separate games, back in the day...hell, Fantasy Flight knew enough to say "this scale is for small ship combat (X-Wing) and this scale is for large ship combat (Armada)". Why does the 40k community continue to stick it's head in the sand?
EDIT - I know why, actually...for having played multiple systems over the years, for all the whinging the 40k community puts out about Warmahordes being the WAAC "page 5 play like you got a pair" toolbags, the 40k community has the largest per capita volume of powergaming d-bags in the entire mini-gaming hobby. As soon as GW said you could put 4 Wraithknights in a list, 40k players were more than happy to oblige. And that's on the community, not on GW. If that bald-faced negative play experience escalation doesnt single-handedly choke game groups, I cant imagine what would.
Well, at this point they're Heresy armies. But why should they be separate? I don't mind keeping track of which sergeants have meltabombs and which don't... in fact, I base some of my maneuvering decisions on it. And it's not like whether or not a model has a power axe or power sword is hard to tell ... I do, in fact, have functioning eyeballs.
Dont understand how or why you think it's reasonable or realistic to think your superheavy tank commanders could or should know platoon sgt Bubba is the guy carrying a meltabomb so that you might kill him or avoid it, tbh...but thats what the rules currently allow (open information) so that's another kettle of fish. The problem is how wildly that becomes exacerbated when said chump carrying a melta grenade is literally the only thing your opponent's list has that has a prayer against your superheavy. Of which you apparently bring multiples? Yeah...
Scanners, man. Meltabombs are weapons that utilize fusion hydrogen... they ought to be comparatively easy to detect even when not detonating. It's science fiction! XD. I mean, realistically, how would anyone's weapons know where any enemy troops are when they're out of LOS? Did their artillery just happen to shoot at exactly the right spot behind the building? Out of all the other buildings in the area?
And most people bring more than one meltabomb to fight me, considering I tell them my list in advance.
And as far as relegating it to another scale... why? Superheavies can be deployed by the Imperium or Mechanicum against regular enemy armies. They shouldn't be just restricted to fighting other Superheavies.
That's the problem. Lots of things CAN be deployed against regular armies. Are we going to start making room for orbital vehicles next? Where does it stop? The is the slippery slope GW put us on when they decided flyers werent going to be fast attack/skimmers anymore, that they were going to be their own vehicle type. FASA was smart enough to make Aerotech and Battletech two separate games, back in the day...hell, Fantasy Flight knew enough to say "this scale is for small ship combat (X-Wing) and this scale is for large ship combat (Armada)". Why does the 40k community continue to stick it's head in the sand?
*shrugs* It stops when the players stop it. There are already rules for orbital strikes in both the Heresy and regular 40k, as well as rules for surface-to-orbit battle vessels such as the Manta and the Sokar Stormbird. So... never? Hopefully? I'd love it if the scale kept increasing. Next year my enemy can bring a cruiser but my deep-striking troops can board it, and the year later, he'll bring a battleship, but my superheavies will be landed straight into the cargo hold after some defensive fire rolls. Honestly I think that'd be a fun scenario.
Unit1126PLL wrote: *shrugs* It stops when the players stop it. There are already rules for orbital strikes in both the Heresy and regular 40k, as well as rules for surface-to-orbit battle vessels such as the Manta and the Sokar Stormbird. So... never? Hopefully? I'd love it if the scale kept increasing. Next year my enemy can bring a cruiser but my deep-striking troops can board it, and the year later, he'll bring a battleship, but my superheavies will be landed straight into the cargo hold after some defensive fire rolls. Honestly I think that'd be a fun scenario.
Or, y'know, they could make a game for that and you could actually play it instead? Because meanwhile the people that want to play a skirmish level game with impactful squad and platoon sized units are wondering why they have to give up their game so you can have yours...
Unit1126PLL wrote: *shrugs* It stops when the players stop it. There are already rules for orbital strikes in both the Heresy and regular 40k, as well as rules for surface-to-orbit battle vessels such as the Manta and the Sokar Stormbird. So... never? Hopefully? I'd love it if the scale kept increasing. Next year my enemy can bring a cruiser but my deep-striking troops can board it, and the year later, he'll bring a battleship, but my superheavies will be landed straight into the cargo hold after some defensive fire rolls. Honestly I think that'd be a fun scenario.
Or, y'know, they could make a game for that and you could actually play it instead? Because meanwhile the people that want to play a skirmish level game with impactful squad and platoon sized units are wondering why they have to give up their game so you can have yours...
Do they have to give it up? I have two friends that play 1000 points constantly. I cannot participate, for obvious reasons, but that's okay - no one is forcing me to.
Just like how you could play 1000 points, or 500, or 400 Combat Patrol, and aren't forced to play at my size.
That's literally the point of 40k and its points limits.
Unit1126PLL wrote: *shrugs* It stops when the players stop it. There are already rules for orbital strikes in both the Heresy and regular 40k, as well as rules for surface-to-orbit battle vessels such as the Manta and the Sokar Stormbird. So... never? Hopefully? I'd love it if the scale kept increasing. Next year my enemy can bring a cruiser but my deep-striking troops can board it, and the year later, he'll bring a battleship, but my superheavies will be landed straight into the cargo hold after some defensive fire rolls. Honestly I think that'd be a fun scenario.
Or, y'know, they could make a game for that and you could actually play it instead? Because meanwhile the people that want to play a skirmish level game with impactful squad and platoon sized units are wondering why they have to give up their game so you can have yours...
Do they have to give it up? I have two friends that play 1000 points constantly. I cannot participate, for obvious reasons, but that's okay - no one is forcing me to.
Just like how you could play 1000 points, or 500, or 400 Combat Patrol, and aren't forced to play at my size.
That's literally the point of 40k and its points limits.
Yeah, apparently they do. Because if they are playing 1000 points, they arent playing the same game the rest of the 40k community has accepted as a "standard game" (1500-2000 pts, typically 1750 or 1850). So you've successfully warped your game group by essentially forcing them to adopt a game scale half the size of the rest of the community, in order to avoid having to play against your overpowered/underpointed filth. Congrats, I guess? I mean, you've clearly indicated you're just in this for yourself and dont care what negative play experience you inflict on the rest of the community. As you say, we can "just go play killteam"...right?
Unit1126PLL wrote: *shrugs* It stops when the players stop it. There are already rules for orbital strikes in both the Heresy and regular 40k, as well as rules for surface-to-orbit battle vessels such as the Manta and the Sokar Stormbird. So... never? Hopefully? I'd love it if the scale kept increasing. Next year my enemy can bring a cruiser but my deep-striking troops can board it, and the year later, he'll bring a battleship, but my superheavies will be landed straight into the cargo hold after some defensive fire rolls. Honestly I think that'd be a fun scenario.
Or, y'know, they could make a game for that and you could actually play it instead? Because meanwhile the people that want to play a skirmish level game with impactful squad and platoon sized units are wondering why they have to give up their game so you can have yours...
Do they have to give it up? I have two friends that play 1000 points constantly. I cannot participate, for obvious reasons, but that's okay - no one is forcing me to.
Just like how you could play 1000 points, or 500, or 400 Combat Patrol, and aren't forced to play at my size.
That's literally the point of 40k and its points limits.
Yeah, apparently they do. Because if they are playing 1000 points, they arent playing the same game the rest of the 40k community has accepted as a "standard game" (1500-2000 pts, typically 1750 or 1850). So you've successfully warped your game group by essentially forcing them to adopt a game scale half the size of the rest of the community, in order to avoid having to play against your overpowered/underpointed filth. Congrats, I guess? I mean, you've clearly indicated you're just in this for yourself and dont care what negative play experience you inflict on the rest of the community. As you say, we can "just go play killteam"...right?
I didn't inflict it upon them, actually. They play 1000 points and have only played 1000 points long before I moved to Swansea and they will continue long after I leave. Why would you suspect I forced them to play 1000?
And who cares what the 'standard game' is according to the 'rest of the 40k community'? Some people like 400 points. Just last week there were six people at the FLGS playing combat patrol, not because I (or anyone else) forced them to but because they love it. Then there was me and my 4 buddies playing 3000 point Heresy games, and the remaining eight or ten players played various things, including my two buddies and a friend playing a 3-way 1000 point game, and a team game going on that I think was 1500 per person.
Whatever 'community' you're talking about obviously doesn't exist here.
Automatically Appended Next Post: Also I will note that I, too, play outside of the 'Standard Range' that you assert in all but my smallest games.
Automatically Appended Next Post: Also, I think the Baneblade is universally regarded as one of the least overpowered, certainly not undercosted, units in the game. So please don't be so impolite as to accuse me of using 'overpowered undercosted filth.' That's just unnecessary!
So sending a text the day before a game, or face booking isn't common or practical? Or even having a chat about what you want to do the next time you meet up?clets not kid outselves here. You're talking about people being too lazy to communicate and looking for someone else to blame.
Texting or facebooking someone I hardly know that I may or may not have even theoretically met yet if I wander to my local GW is not practical. Having a chat once I'm there just leads to one of the scenarios I outlined assuming each player has brought roughly enough models for one pre-designed army with some wiggle room. In a club, sure, but the issue specifically here is for people who do pick-up games at a store with people they may not know well or at all. No one is really arguing that within a group of friends communication is important and likely the standard, which alleviates some issues.
How is texting/fb'ing someone 'not practical'? That's you being lazy, nothing more. If you don't know them, then get to know them. Get over yourself (not you, I'm talking in general). Bloody hel, our WMH group exploded with mk3, and some guys started up a Fb chat group for us all to organise games. There's names I don't know, and it doesn't matter - i just natter away until I meet them in person. Then I shake hands and it's all good
And I'm not talking about having a chat pre-game. Or after your first gsme after you've done what you've done and you're talking about what you like and what you'd like to do next time. I'm talking about having a chat at the store, hanging out. Getting to know them. You know. Putting in some effort, socially. Goes a long way in a social hobby, surprisingly enough...
There is also the argument that gsming groups or whatever are hostile to the approach I talk about, and that gsmes should be,perfectly provided for them, because they shouldn't have to do anything. I always remember the old phrase 'if the mountain won't come to you, maybe you have to come to the mountain'. It's true to say that game companies shouod adapt to nature of their gamers. It's just as true to say that gamers should adapt to suit the nature of their games. Sometimes it's not that the games need to change, it's the communities themselves that need to.
Most players are happy to work with the rules to tweak and adjust, but again, it depends on the group and having people come to agree on certain aspects. That may or may not be practical, and for pick-up players, it is most likely not practical. Really though, its far from unreasonable to expext a game to be perfectly playable out of the box, so player attitudes need not necessarily change if they can easily jump ship to a competitor who provides that.
Like I said. Pick up players are playing a game mode not fit for purpose. If the gsmes you choose to play for your pick up games are ultimately not fit for purpose, then you need to play games that are more suitable for pick up games. Or you need to adjust the approach you bring to your games and not 'pick up game'. Here's the thing - the former I would recommend. Go play WMH. But it will cost you. New armies. New rules. New investment in terms of time, models to paint, money to spent etc. The latter I would also recommend. What will it cost you? A change of perspective. Maybe a conversation. At worst, swallow your pride a bit in terms of matching up what you are bringing to the table to allow for the other guy (and that goes both ways).
People try to make it work, and there's obviously large amount of players who are tired with making it work and the potential fallout between players who enjoy differing ideals of what constitutes a 'normal' game of 40k. I agree GW likely won't make a serious attempt to fix that, which ultimately drives people from the game. Which of course is bad for everyone, as then your gaming group moves away from 40k and towards other better written games
I agree with you entirely here.
That said. If my mate likes something a bit different to you in gaming, will you go there? Chances are he'll do the same for you. You don't necessarily need to be perfectly in line in your wishes. You just need to be wiling to be accommodating. Like I mentioned earlier, I don't care about sportsball, but I bought a season ticket for my missus' team and I go to all the games for her. To me, if you want to do something a bit different for 40k, but ultimately you're a mate then yeah, why not.
And you are wrong. There is a third choice outside of play a crap game or not plat at all. But like I said, it involves a bit of co-operative gsme building to make it work. Like I said, it's not the players fault that gw write terrible rules.it is the players fault when they insist on using said broken rules in a manner that isn't fit for purpose, when they complain about problems but yet do absolutely nothing to help themselves, even when possible solutions are presented.
Well I'm not wrong, because that third solution is based on players bringing enough models to make a significantly different army on the fly, which is far from a guarantee due to either not owning enough models, or simply not bringing more, expecting that your club standard points value is all you need to grab a game.
Third solution is based on talking and communicating to each other. No need to bring 5000pts of stuff to your games.
Now it's not a guarantee, but being brutally honest, neither of the other two options are 'guarantees' either. Gaming is 'soft' in a lot of ways, hard lines are not helpful.
Plus, this brings back the issue about what 40k is particularly fit for. Its not a good narrative game, nor is it a good casual game, and it makes for a pretty poor competitive game. Players are using it for what its fit for, which frankly is anything and nothing simultaneously because its simply not a good game.
Oh I agree! It's a clunky unwieldy mess, but it still has a degree of universality about it. And to be fair to it, it has everything in it from Titans to guys with chain swords. It has 'scope'. There are lots of things to do.
Like I said, three solutions. You don't need a perfect gaming group. You need a bit of cop on, maturity and a will to engage in cooperative game building. It is entirely possible to smooth out the edges of issues amongst your group.
As stated before, a wonderful pipe dream for many, but far from reality for most. Sure, you can attempt to be the change you want, but you'd need a good club to begin with.
So like I said. It's on the players. Lazy gamers. Come to the mountain instead. The gsme will only ever be what you are willing to put into it. And having cop on, maturity and cooperative gsme building is not a pipe dream. That's lazy gamer talk. Man up!
Balanced rules set would obviously be my clear favourite as well, don't get me wrong. But I have learned I can have fun with a bad rules set with good people. It's plenty realistic is ask for friends to be reasonable and work together. Regsrding excluding people - I find that the co-operative, chat about what you want approach is actually inclusive, rather than exlusive for the most part.
As above, a luxury clearly many don't have. Great idea in theory, hard in practice for many, many reasons.
You say a luxury many people don't have, I say effort people can't be arsed making. Or they've never actually tried. It's on them.
And I can just as easily turn this on its head:
'Blame the self righteous players. If we had a more cooperative, proactive community willing to step up and help each other, we wouldn't be having this discussion either, not to the degree and extend we are having. People would just sort out their issues amongst themselves and move on.
The issue here is defining the self righteous player. People will play what they like within the rules. Sometimes those visions among players don't match up, and no one is wrong is they can't agree or compromise. One of the possible solutions of sorting out these issues is to simply not play or agree to disagree, which I'm sure you can agree is not a positive solution.
Ultimately, the problem stems from the rules, so the rules are the issue to be addressed. It'd be great if everyone could magically hold hands and sing Hakuna Matata together, but its just not going to happen.
Easy. They're the people thst do nothing for themselves or their community, and want the perfect experience handed to them on a plate whilst not having to lift a finger on their part. Lazy gamers.
Not playing people is not playing people. I don't see it as positive or negative. If you're visions for what you want are so different that there is no common ground, then don't play. No reason you can't be mates outside of the 6 by 4. You don't owe ever one a gsme. Geek social fallacies 101.
The rules don't help. NeYou her does the playerbase. The problems stem from where the rules and the players interact. Both are woven into each other like a tapestry. Either one can fail and destroy the experience. And if the rules need to be addressed, then surely the players are just as capable of addressing them amongst themselves?
Please don't get me wrong. I am not disagreeing with you. I'll make it clear: you are right in what you say.but so am I. The developers role in designing a gsme, and the players role in playing said gsme are both sides of the exact same coin.
Sure, but if the game is written well enough, you don't need to worry about the players. Your only concern at that point is just how much of a personal donkey-cave your opponent may be, or how much he smells, not what his idea of an acceptable force is.
So you don't need to worry about the players but you do still need to worry about the players? Ultimately I play people. Not games.
I always worry about the players. Doesn't matter if I'm playing the perfect game, or a monstrosity. If the other guy isn't someone I can work with, the game doesn't happen.
To make it clear where I'm coming from, I have a small gaming group of people who didn't know eachother, but all worked for the same orginaztion, so we have a common background. The 40k games are organized ahead of time and stated what kind of game it will be (tournament prep, casual, warning of large models, so on) and generally have similar power levels. I've personally been pushing BFG (a dead game at the moment) which is slowly picking up, and because I dislike some of the balance issues in the base game, I explained to the group I intended to use a fan modified version that tweaks, clarifies, and fixes balance issues. They all agreed and that's what we do. I personally understand all that it takes to create, build, and nurture an excellent gaming group. I'm also very aware of the challenges some people face who either don't have a FLGS or club and look for pick up games elsewhere. I've been in both scenarios for years on end at times. I know that in both scenarios, a well written ruleset would fix any problem that would have or did arise.
In short, while it'd be great if people were generally friendlier, more open to compromise, understood game design and balance better, and had universally larger and wider variety of models on hand at all times, its likely not going to happen in the grand scheme which is why a game company needs to produce a well written game so we don't have to worry about people sharing the same vision of an ideal match. Its a matter of universality in application for the solution. So while people could work with GW's rules and try and make a go of it, you'll find most people are going to either stop playing, or find greener pastures where they don't have to put in the extra effort just to get a mediocre experience anyways.
Then more,people need to act like you.
Is it more likely that a game company will come along an produce that perfect gsme for everyone so you don't have to worry about people wanting the same thing? That's as much of a pipe dream.
Universality is all well and good, but you aren't talking about universality - you are talking about 'imposed universality'. Imposed universal doesn't always work. Imposed Universal doesn't always fit. All it can do really is filter, and anything that doesn't fit is chucked. Including players wanting something different. Everyone wants something different. Things that work for x won't work for y, and if you insist that that isn't the case, thst that shouldn't be the case, that everyone needs to adhere to 'the one true way of playing', whatever that is. you are simply guilty of enormous hubris and arrogance. And you would be wrong. Ultimately, to use a soccer analogy, you play what's in from of you, not what you'd like to imagine is in front of you.
People could move on to other gsmes. Fair play to them. And I never suggested otherwise. They could stop. Again. Fair play. I just think it's a shame to do either, especially when you have invested so much in terms of money, effort and time into putting models together, painting them, devouring the lore, table time etc.i think putting in the effort to make the game yours is a perfectly valid way of enjoying your hobby and keeping it alive for you and your mates.
As much as I think Deadnight makes a great argument all by himself, I like to add one thing:
a lot of pick-up players complaints and demands here on dakka give me an impression, that a lot of gamers (curiously - mostly with north american flags beside their avatars) treat wargaming as a SERVICE provided by a company that made rules and models for it. With absolutely no regard to a simple fact, that EVERY SINGLE GAME of WH40k is a two-way social contract made by two equally important parties. No one but yourself is responsible for you to have an enjoyable time playing whatever game there is... What tight rulesets designed for a single dominant application (Warmahordes for example) are doing is basically filtering the playerbase, so more players have a similiar mindsets, because it is so "hardwired" into the game. WH40k, except for maybe 3rd and 4th ed, was never a single-focus game. And this is most true when looking at RT, 2nd and 7th ed. People often (even earlier in this very thread) seek a "universal fix" in splitting current ruleset into different army sizes, but fail to realise, that this would result ONLY in giving "named shortcuts" for what is basically doable in one sentence of pre-game chat. Seriously, is it so difficult to say "I seek an infantry oriented, 1500pt game with no deathstars or superheavies, are you interested?"? Or to say "I want a game of Warhammer themed Pacific Rim, are you in for a challenge?". And is it so hard to just put your minis back into your case when you see during deployment, that you are beeing tricked into playing a game you didn't agree to play and go seek another game? If your local players all want to play competetive bull gak and enjoy it and you are the only one who don't like it, then how on earth is it justified to expect GW to FORCE them to play your way by adjusting the official rules to suit your needs, not theirs? And if your (in general meaning) answer is "Yes, it is impossible to pre-arrange games on even such basic level." then how on earth you think, that after splittin the ruleset into smaller, better defined games in this universum you'll have more occasions to play it in your preffered scale WITH THOSE VERY SAME people in your area? They won't suddenly and magically change their taste. Recently people are so hyped with Kill Team release and expect it to shift the landscape of community, but those are THE SAME kill team rules as in 6th ed. And that died out - people complained that they could no more get Kill Team games they wanted, despite the rules being there...
To reiterate - no single point of view on "proper" or "standard" 40K is "right" - it is only "popular" in any given area. WH40k is to big for one golden standard to exist. Even ITC or ETC 1850 pt tournaments are only that - artificial (even if popular) sub variant of 40K, so you simply have to communicate your needs and preferences to your opponents, especially when picking up random strangers...
One more thing: it is completely wrong to assume, that any given stranger even got into the hobby for the same reasons you did. I see a lot of arguments like "warhammer will die out because game X has better rules" or "everyone will eventually realise, that game X is so much better/cheaper/faster/whatever", but there will always be players that got into WH40K because of setting/faction/models aesthetics or feel and other games simply do not appeal to them. I would never even look at Bolt Action or Flames of War, I will certainly not play Drop Zone, Infinity, X-wing, Warmahordes or Age of Sigmar and there is only small chance that I'll ever own a single faction from Maulifaux or Wolsung - not because they are or aren't great or crappy games, but because they simply do not fit my taste of scale/look/feel, or their setting is not interesting to me. And because this "reason to hobby" can be so different for any of us here, it is childish to think, that there will ever be a common agreement on how WH40k should work like. It is trivial to agree on "WH40k is a crap ruleset" as everyone would like at least one important rule changed, but other than that there are endless debates started almost every week on "what does exactly 'crap' mean to begin with"! And other than trivial "ballance sucks" I cannot see even a "significant minority" to definately agree on even a single factor - and that is perfectly understandable, given that 40k is not only a tabletop game, but a 30 year old phenomenon and realy a separate genre of entertainment...
On the subject of talk, I don't know about a lot of you but I'm in like at least 1-2 facebook groups (one dedicated to a store, one not) where people can easily post to discuss things about games. Problem is nobody does it beyond just saying "Anyone up for a game of 40k this weekend? 1500 points", it's like they still want to put in a minimum of effort to get a game; these same people tend to be the ones who laugh and are dismissive when even considering 40k as a narrative game (I honestly do not know why they even play 40k as opposed to the myriad of other games that are much better suited to the style of game they want; the old saw of "but [other game] doesn't have Space Marines!" kind of thing is my guess).
Still the player's fault for not doing that, and not caring about people who do. There are basically an entire subset of 40k gamer who have zero interest in anything other than competitive gaming, despite the fact 40k is probably the worst set of rules out there for competitive focused gaming. Maybe it's because 40k tends to be more of a "pay to win" and "bring the biggest guns to win" game that's why they stick with it; a lot easier to plop some cash on like 3x Wraithknights and a horde of Jetbikes and win without much thought than actually have to think in games like Warmachine or Infinity.
WayneTheGame wrote: On the subject of talk, I don't know about a lot of you but I'm in like at least 1-2 facebook groups (one dedicated to a store, one not) where people can easily post to discuss things about games. Problem is nobody does it beyond just saying "Anyone up for a game of 40k this weekend? 1500 points", it's like they still want to put in a minimum of effort to get a game; these same people tend to be the ones who laugh and are dismissive when even considering 40k as a narrative game (I honestly do not know why they even play 40k as opposed to the myriad of other games that are much better suited to the style of game they want; the old saw of "but [other game] doesn't have Space Marines!" kind of thing is my guess).
Still the player's fault for not doing that, and not caring about people who do. There are basically an entire subset of 40k gamer who have zero interest in anything other than competitive gaming, despite the fact 40k is probably the worst set of rules out there for competitive focused gaming. Maybe it's because 40k tends to be more of a "pay to win" and "bring the biggest guns to win" game that's why they stick with it; a lot easier to plop some cash on like 3x Wraithknights and a horde of Jetbikes and win without much thought than actually have to think in games like Warmachine or Infinity.
Or Starcraft, where I can react to your build. If 40K were like that, I'd rush Eldar everytime I saw heavy gas. Just like I do Protoss. Advanced units having a temporal cost is game-changing. Would the WK be so great if it didn't show up until turn 4?
I believe that 40k is a game where a lot of the money spent is by people who stick around with the game, versus players who just stick their toe in. That is, there are new players, but they fall into the category of people who leave, and people who become heavily invested.
I think the biggest spenders are the people who stick around for years, and sometimes, decades -- and over that period of time, their tendency is to build up their favorite armies, instead of build new armies. In order to sell them more stuff, GW needed to make the game accommodate more models and models of different types -- hence the move from infantry and very small vehicles (like bikes) to light tanks to flyers to walkers to heavy tanks to flyers to large stompies to giant stompies.
It basically boils down to -- if you have people who what to keep spending money on Eldar or Space Marines or Orks for years and years, how do you make that possible?
Flip side: I don't think 40k is a good choice for people who want to a casual hobby, unless all they have a like-minded group, or they just mostly want to build models at their own pace. The scale and scope and game length of typical groups other than kill team is just not ideal for anyone who wants a game to goof around on every now and then. If you ARE looking at kill team groups (there are a couple in my area), a majority of GW's catalog is irrelevant.
Just Tony wrote:For those who argue that the overly competitive nature is the issue: how many of you think that the MLB teams playing the All-Stars should include the worst players that year in the spirit of fair play? A competition is a competition whether it is a ball and bat or it's little plastic statues. OR cards, or whatever. Anybody not bringing their A game to anything other than specific scenarios that sound fun is an insult, and even then I would expect the player in the scenario play to do his absolute best as well.
Thankfully, not every game is, nor needs to be the all stars. A competitition might be a competitition, competitive isn't the only way, or the only proper way to play. There is every league and match up from uefa cup finals to non league and grassroots to kicking the ball around in the park with your mates, and it's all good. Take it from me, you don't need to bring your a game to every game, all the time. Life's too short. Your nerd weiner isn't so small that you need to feel like youve got something to prove, or take on the whole world all the time. This is a hobby, and for many, it's to unwind and chill out, not take the ante up to 11 and aim to crush everyone in the room. You're not wrong for wanting this, but this isn't the only way to play. And If that sounds like an insult to you, then you need to grow up.
Not every game is the all-stars simply because there's no real way to ensure adequate match up of player skill level without having an intimate club (which doesn't help someone randomly walking into a FLGS or GW looking for a pick up game) or comp scoring that used to be used in tournaments (This one is doable at least, if everyone agreed on the same comp. GW used to put out a comp that they used for Games Day or GT's, and our club used that comp to gauge damn near every match up unless we were running something fluffy. New gamer "This is 40K night, right? I'm looking for a game. 1,500 pts is what I brought." Store runner "Okay, welcome to the store. Fill this out if you would, please." New gamer looks at comp sheet ".. the hell is this?" Store runner "Oh, that's comp scoring. We use it so that people don't get roflstomped. Usually we'll throw the two lowest scores against each other and the two highest scores against each other. We also use that ranking in single elimination tourneys. Keeps the same dudes from racing to 1st and 2nd." New player "Coo."). However, a game should be designed from the start to be playable from both ends of the spectrum. The trick is figuring out the best starting point. AOS showed us that casual narrative easy going is the worst starting point.
Also, as far as the bolded: how is accusing me of overcompensation not an insult? And I need to grow up if I find that insulting? That's hilarious. Maybe in your country the terms "insult" and "grow up" mean drastically different things than they do in the US, but I'm going to guess they don't.
Here's the thing, everybody competes in this game. It's the nature of the game. Blanking on who said it originally, but "the objective of the game is to win, the point of the game is to have fun." Now I realize that nobody likes to lose when it comes down to it, but we can't all get participation trophies. If you want the kind of experience where there's not a decisive winner, you need to role play.
Deadnight wrote:Gamers are lazy. The simple truth is they don't want to do any actual work, and would rather sit there and complain and blame 'somebody' rather than take it on themselves to better themselves. Because that validates their lack of effort.
Ultimately This is about doing stuff on a 6 by 4 with your friends for an enjoyable evening. This isn't a life changing event. This isn't rocket surgery. This isn't saving the world. This isn't hard. Nor is This isn't beyond the abilities of average gamer. Christ, I don't care about football. But I bought a season ticket for my missus' team and I go to their home games to support her. If I'll make the effort for her, I'll make the same efforts for my friends when it comes to wargames. I'll make more of an effort for me. What benefit is there for me to be lazy and do nothing?
It is the players fault when there is a problem, When they are aware of said problem, when they are aware of various solutions to said problems, and when they do nothing to help themselves. They are not 'victims'. Get that crap out of your head. All you are doing is validating, and enabling apalling, negative and self destructive behaviours - they are participants. And even if you consider yourself a pawn amongst kings in a game of chess,remember thst pawns ultimately have all the power, because nothing happens until the pawns move forward.
And more insults and condescending attitude. Always plan for both sides of the spectrum. I work 2nd shift, and have a small window of time when the stores are open to get a game in. I don't bother anymore since I will have no time to play after spending far too long simply negotiating the type of game I WANT to play. THAT is the inherent problem with 40K currently (and AOS for those keeping track), and one that the rules SHOULD accommodate for. They actually did a few editions ago, and I guess that's the rub on my part. I can't understand how a balanced springboard was possible 19 years ago, AND for a decade at least, that is suddenly not possible now without a Geneva convention amongst the players themselves.
As for the bolded: what about Knights?
Deadnight wrote:Then thry should ask! They should talk. Thry should make the goddamn effort. More people than you realise would like this stuff if they only gave a god damn and actually bloody well tried and put some effort into it beyond token lip service. Damn it, things have never been so easy! Texts, phone calls, Facebook. All you have to do is talk, and step forward. Bloody well man up! Stop being a coward, Put your money where your mouth is, step forward, stop complaining and actually do something about it. make the effort. and make the damned community as good as you wish it to be.
Jesus Christ, half the bloody problems this community faces are because no one talks to each other, and would rather talk past each other!
Talk to each other! Go to events. Meet people. Communicate. Organise. Expand. We have done it. Bloody hell, you are not the only horse in ton that wants this. Scottish masters 3 years ago for warmachine. Got to know a couple of opponents, and a couple of folks that were playing on boards beside me. Got talking. Realised we were all old enough to be on the same page. Realised we wanted the same thing. WMH is a great, competitive game, but all of us had life commitments that meant we couldn't WMH 24/7. I'm lucky if I get a game in twice a month! We looked at the 'Sharks' in our pond and realises that we simply could not, or would not play at that level. Or than intensity. Fair play to them! I, and we have far more going on. So we traded numbers and addresses and got together for more casual 'game days' rather than proper,tournaments. And because of our focus, and our reaching out to other people with this approach, the community has exploded in size.
All because we talked, and put some effort into our community.
And what's stopping you either making new friends, or evolving, and learning new things as friends, or doing things as a group? I play narrative games amongst a group of four people, with a few others popping In On occasion. I don't have a 'plethora of friends'. I have four friends in one group(one of whom was a guy from work who I caught 'liking' a 40k thing on Facebook. So I asked him if he wanted to come join us. He did. Within one game with us,che turned his back on 40k and what he styled as the 'play to win' pick up gsmes he had, up to that point, played his 40k games as) and about a dozen in the other. And we make it work. I don't play with everyone who plays the games I play. I play the people I enjoy playing against. And yet, I enjoy gsming, and despite not having a 'plethora' of friends, My gaming experiences over the last three years playing a handful of people with an open mind have been a magnitude greater that i ever Had playing the tournament circuits for 40k. Which goes to show that all you need so is open your mind,chit some effort in. And the rest will follow.
Broken record time regarding the sheer wall of insults here. This still ignores the fact that pick up games exist, and that some gamers don't have time to organize a social contract in advance. What if I am on a training mission with the Army, have some free time, and don't really know the local scene since this is my first time ever being in that town? Yeah, the whole texting theory falls flat there. And I doubt that sort of scenario is as rare as you'd think. Also, you remind me a lot of a poster over at warseer who insinuated that any gamers that were not explicitly the narrative type simply didn't want to even talk to their opponents. This is a funny image to me, an image that is as far from the truth as possible. What we want is to not have to micromanage every aspect of the game before we GET TO THE GAME. It's really simple when you think about it. You have a baseline that you can drop models and play to at any time. The current 40K doesn't allow that in the same way as previous editions. Now you have to basically plan for Apocalypse type games at all times, and that should never have happened. It also shouldn't be on the gamers to fix that, but unfortunately nobody will stop playing 40K long enough to send that message back to GW, so we get to wallow in the mire or play something different. Which is what I do.
Also, I really need to shoot a short video of the whole non-speaking gamer thing. It'd play out like a Sergio Leone western, it'd be fabulous.
So sending a text the day before a game, or face booking isn't common or practical? Or even having a chat about what you want to do the next time you meet up?clets not kid outselves here. You're talking about people being too lazy to communicate and looking for someone else to blame.
Texting or facebooking someone I hardly know that I may or may not have even theoretically met yet if I wander to my local GW is not practical. Having a chat once I'm there just leads to one of the scenarios I outlined assuming each player has brought roughly enough models for one pre-designed army with some wiggle room. In a club, sure, but the issue specifically here is for people who do pick-up games at a store with people they may not know well or at all. No one is really arguing that within a group of friends communication is important and likely the standard, which alleviates some issues.
How is texting/fb'ing someone 'not practical'? That's you being lazy, nothing more. If you don't know them, then get to know them. Get over yourself (not you, I'm talking in general). Bloody hel, our WMH group exploded with mk3, and some guys started up a Fb chat group for us all to organise games. There's names I don't know, and it doesn't matter - i just natter away until I meet them in person. Then I shake hands and it's all good
And I'm not talking about having a chat pre-game. Or after your first gsme after you've done what you've done and you're talking about what you like and what you'd like to do next time. I'm talking about having a chat at the store, hanging out. Getting to know them. You know. Putting in some effort, socially. Goes a long way in a social hobby, surprisingly enough...
I'm really starting to see a trend here. And also, I will reiterate that not every gamer walking into a store will game in that store forever. See my above examples to see why this attitude is irrelevant and the standard is what needs corrected, not the gamer.
There is also the argument that gsming groups or whatever are hostile to the approach I talk about, and that gsmes should be,perfectly provided for them, because they shouldn't have to do anything. I always remember the old phrase 'if the mountain won't come to you, maybe you have to come to the mountain'. It's true to say that game companies shouod adapt to nature of their gamers. It's just as true to say that gamers should adapt to suit the nature of their games. Sometimes it's not that the games need to change, it's the communities themselves that need to.
Most players are happy to work with the rules to tweak and adjust, but again, it depends on the group and having people come to agree on certain aspects. That may or may not be practical, and for pick-up players, it is most likely not practical. Really though, its far from unreasonable to expext a game to be perfectly playable out of the box, so player attitudes need not necessarily change if they can easily jump ship to a competitor who provides that.
Like I said. Pick up players are playing a game mode not fit for purpose. If the gsmes you choose to play for your pick up games are ultimately not fit for purpose, then you need to play games that are more suitable for pick up games. Or you need to adjust the approach you bring to your games and not 'pick up game'. Here's the thing - the former I would recommend. Go play WMH. But it will cost you. New armies. New rules. New investment in terms of time, models to paint, money to spent etc. The latter I would also recommend. What will it cost you? A change of perspective. Maybe a conversation. At worst, swallow your pride a bit in terms of matching up what you are bringing to the table to allow for the other guy (and that goes both ways).
The game should indeed be fit for that purpose, and until the last two editions WAS fit for that purpose. So the gist of what you are saying is we either need to adopt your view of negotiating games or move on to other games? Got it.
Like I said, three solutions. You don't need a perfect gaming group. You need a bit of cop on, maturity and a will to engage in cooperative game building. It is entirely possible to smooth out the edges of issues amongst your group.
As stated before, a wonderful pipe dream for many, but far from reality for most. Sure, you can attempt to be the change you want, but you'd need a good club to begin with.
So like I said. It's on the players. Lazy gamers. Come to the mountain instead. The gsme will only ever be what you are willing to put into it. And having cop on, maturity and cooperative gsme building is not a pipe dream. That's lazy gamer talk. Man up!
I just need a condescending insult flag, this is getting a bit tedious to type.
Balanced rules set would obviously be my clear favourite as well, don't get me wrong. But I have learned I can have fun with a bad rules set with good people. It's plenty realistic is ask for friends to be reasonable and work together. Regsrding excluding people - I find that the co-operative, chat about what you want approach is actually inclusive, rather than exlusive for the most part.
As above, a luxury clearly many don't have. Great idea in theory, hard in practice for many, many reasons.
You say a luxury many people don't have, I say effort people can't be arsed making. Or they've never actually tried. It's on them.
And I can just as easily turn this on its head:
'Blame the self righteous players. If we had a more cooperative, proactive community willing to step up and help each other, we wouldn't be having this discussion either, not to the degree and extend we are having. People would just sort out their issues amongst themselves and move on.
The issue here is defining the self righteous player. People will play what they like within the rules. Sometimes those visions among players don't match up, and no one is wrong is they can't agree or compromise. One of the possible solutions of sorting out these issues is to simply not play or agree to disagree, which I'm sure you can agree is not a positive solution.
Ultimately, the problem stems from the rules, so the rules are the issue to be addressed. It'd be great if everyone could magically hold hands and sing Hakuna Matata together, but its just not going to happen.
Easy. They're the people thst do nothing for themselves or their community, and want the perfect experience handed to them on a plate whilst not having to lift a finger on their part. Lazy gamers.
Not playing people is not playing people. I don't see it as positive or negative. If you're visions for what you want are so different that there is no common ground, then don't play. No reason you can't be mates outside of the 6 by 4. You don't owe ever one a gsme. Geek social fallacies 101.
The rules don't help. NeYou her does the playerbase. The problems stem from where the rules and the players interact. Both are woven into each other like a tapestry. Either one can fail and destroy the experience. And if the rules need to be addressed, then surely the players are just as capable of addressing them amongst themselves?
And then you get to the part where every single player would want something different. In 2 decades of gaming I've yet to find someone whose expectations/wants match mine 100%, or even 75%. Hell, my own brother and I butt heads over elements we love/hate about the game. It doesn't matter how two people agree to ride a tandem bike if it has no tires.
To make it clear where I'm coming from, I have a small gaming group of people who didn't know eachother, but all worked for the same orginaztion, so we have a common background. The 40k games are organized ahead of time and stated what kind of game it will be (tournament prep, casual, warning of large models, so on) and generally have similar power levels. I've personally been pushing BFG (a dead game at the moment) which is slowly picking up, and because I dislike some of the balance issues in the base game, I explained to the group I intended to use a fan modified version that tweaks, clarifies, and fixes balance issues. They all agreed and that's what we do. I personally understand all that it takes to create, build, and nurture an excellent gaming group. I'm also very aware of the challenges some people face who either don't have a FLGS or club and look for pick up games elsewhere. I've been in both scenarios for years on end at times. I know that in both scenarios, a well written ruleset would fix any problem that would have or did arise.
In short, while it'd be great if people were generally friendlier, more open to compromise, understood game design and balance better, and had universally larger and wider variety of models on hand at all times, its likely not going to happen in the grand scheme which is why a game company needs to produce a well written game so we don't have to worry about people sharing the same vision of an ideal match. Its a matter of universality in application for the solution. So while people could work with GW's rules and try and make a go of it, you'll find most people are going to either stop playing, or find greener pastures where they don't have to put in the extra effort just to get a mediocre experience anyways.
Then more,people need to act like you.
Is it more likely that a game company will come along an produce that perfect gsme for everyone so you don't have to worry about people wanting the same thing? That's as much of a pipe dream.
Universality is all well and good, but you aren't talking about universality - you are talking about 'imposed universality'. Imposed universal doesn't always work. Imposed Universal doesn't always fit. All it can do really is filter, and anything that doesn't fit is chucked. Including players wanting something different. Everyone wants something different. Things that work for x won't work for y, and if you insist that that isn't the case, thst that shouldn't be the case, that everyone needs to adhere to 'the one true way of playing', whatever that is. you are simply guilty of enormous hubris and arrogance. And you would be wrong. Ultimately, to use a soccer analogy, you play what's in from of you, not what you'd like to imagine is in front of you.
People could move on to other gsmes. Fair play to them. And I never suggested otherwise. They could stop. Again. Fair play. I just think it's a shame to do either, especially when you have invested so much in terms of money, effort and time into putting models together, painting them, devouring the lore, table time etc.i think putting in the effort to make the game yours is a perfectly valid way of enjoying your hobby and keeping it alive for you and your mates.
He's not talking about imposed universality, he's talking about a standard to launch from. Once again I default back to 3rd since I feel they had the right mix. The rule set fostered to casual play and narrative play without compromising pick up play. THAT is what Blacksails is lamenting the loss of more than anything, and he feels it's an indictment of the rules system and not the players that this is no longer the case. And he's right.
Just Tony wrote:For those who argue that the overly competitive nature is the issue: how many of you think that the MLB teams playing the All-Stars should include the worst players that year in the spirit of fair play? A competition is a competition whether it is a ball and bat or it's little plastic statues. OR cards, or whatever. Anybody not bringing their A game to anything other than specific scenarios that sound fun is an insult, and even then I would expect the player in the scenario play to do his absolute best as well.
Thankfully, not every game is, nor needs to be the all stars. A competitition might be a competitition, competitive isn't the only way, or the only proper way to play. There is every league and match up from uefa cup finals to non league and grassroots to kicking the ball around in the park with your mates, and it's all good. Take it from me, you don't need to bring your a game to every game, all the time. Life's too short. Your nerd weiner isn't so small that you need to feel like youve got something to prove, or take on the whole world all the time. This is a hobby, and for many, it's to unwind and chill out, not take the ante up to 11 and aim to crush everyone in the room. You're not wrong for wanting this, but this isn't the only way to play. And If that sounds like an insult to you, then you need to grow up.
Also, as far as the bolded: how is accusing me of overcompensation not an insult? And I need to grow up if I find that insulting? That's hilarious. Maybe in your country the terms "insult" and "grow up" mean drastically different things than they do in the US, but I'm going to guess they don't.
Here's the thing, everybody competes in this game. It's the nature of the game. Blanking on who said it originally, but "the objective of the game is to win, the point of the game is to have fun." Now I realize that nobody likes to lose when it comes down to it, but we can't all get participation trophies. If you want the kind of experience where there's not a decisive winner, you need to role play.
I didn't accuse you of anything. I was trying to illustrate a point with harsh language. If it came across that way I'll apologise. Sharp elbows and all that, and the Internet not conveying tone.
But bear in mind, I found you equally insulting and just as condascending in what you said In how every one not giving a hundred percent in a game is an 'insult'. You just had a go at everyone that plays a Wargame to relax and let go and doesn't turn it up to 11. And bear in mind the context in which I referred to the need to grow up - 'this is a hobby, and for many, it's to unwind and chill out, not take the ante up to 11 and aim to crush everyone in the room. You're not wrong for wanting this, but this isn't the only way to play. And if that sounds like an insult to you, you need to grow up'. So is the thought of people enjoying using wargaming to chill out and relax and not give 100% insulting to you? Or just another way to play, that even if it's not for you, it's an approach you can understand and acknowledge?
Here's the thing, everybody competes in this game. It's the nature of the game. Blanking on who said it originally, but "the objective of the game is to win, the point of the game is to have fun." Now I realize that nobody likes to lose when it comes down to it, but we can't all get participation trophies. If you want the kind of experience where there's not a decisive winner, you need to role play.
And you can get off the soapbox. If I want that kind of experience, I will look for that kind of experience. RPGs are not the only way to doing it,cdespite what you think. You can 'role-play' outside of rpg's, because all role playing is is fundamentally story telling. And bringing a narrative to life. And you can do that anywhere. just don't have to approach wargames like a competitive event, shockingly. Winners and losers happen, but the approach/perspective doesn't see the win or the loss as 'the point' or 'the objective'; it's about playing through a story/scenario/hook and having fun with friends. Like watching a movie play out. Gw games used to have gms, as do a lot of historical games and there is nothing at all wrong in still approaching games in this manner.
And more insults and condescending attitude. Always plan for both sides of the spectrum. I work 2nd shift, and have a small window of time when the stores are open to get a game in. I don't bother anymore since I will have no time to play after spending far too long simply negotiating the type of game I WANT to play. THAT is the inherent problem with 40K currently (and AOS for those keeping track), and one that the rules SHOULD accommodate for. They actually did a few editions ago, and I guess that's the rub on my part. I can't understand how a balanced springboard was possible 19 years ago, AND for a decade at least, that is suddenly not possible now without a Geneva convention amongst the players themselves.
You are not the only person out there with not a hell of a lot of times on your hands. I work/travel fifty hours a week, and have various other commitments at home, and training (gym, running-training for marathons etc) that mean I'm often not 'free' until after 8 or 9 at night. I can't game 24/7. Or even plan for gaming 24/7. Like I said, I'm lucky if I get one or two games in a month sometimes. My window is just as small as yours. We manage by playing at a friends house, usually after work on a Friday. And we are happy to carry on games over succeeding weeks as well if they're 'big' games. We work around our time constraints. Negotiating how we are going to build our games is just something we do now - the more you get into it I've found, the more natural it becomes.
40k is not a pick up game. Nor is it balanced. And if you think it was a 'balanced springboard' 19 years ago, you'd be hopelessly wrong. 3rd edition was a monstrosity in terms of balance. Anyway, whatever 40k was 19 or 20 years ago is irrelevant. A lot of things were a lot different twenty years ago. I was different. You were different. Things change. I changed. You changed. Things evolve. The game grew. The game expanded. The game changed. As the tau say - 'the one constant in the universe is change. The wise adapt'.
What the game 'should be' is irrelevant outside of theorising and 'what ifs'. What the game 'is' and how we work with it is the actual practical reality in the ground and what needs done. Too many people get all flustered and bogged down with the former, and never realise that it's the latter that is actually important. I just propose dealing with the reality, rather than get muddled down in wish listing or constantly complaining about problems whilst not doing anything about it.
Broken record time regarding the sheer wall of insults here. This still ignores the fact that pick up games exist, and that some gamers don't have time to organize a social contract in advance. What if I am on a training mission with the Army, have some free time, and don't really know the local scene since this is my first time ever being in that town? Yeah, the whole texting theory falls flat there. And I doubt that sort of scenario is as rare as you'd think. Also, you remind me a lot of a poster over at warseer who insinuated that any gamers that were not explicitly the narrative type simply didn't want to even talk to their opponents. This is a funny image to me, an image that is as far from the truth as possible. What we want is to not have to micromanage every aspect of the game before we GET TO THE GAME. It's really simple when you think about it. You have a baseline that you can drop models and play to at any time. The current 40K doesn't allow that in the same way as previous editions. Now you have to basically plan for Apocalypse type games at all times, and that should never have happened. It also shouldn't be on the gamers to fix that, but unfortunately nobody will stop playing 40K long enough to send that message back to GW, so we get to wallow in the mire or play something different. Which is what I do.
What if you are? Again, I've moved cities and I've moved countries, and I've never had an issue finding out what was played where and getting involved. If you don't have time to organise that social contract, either don't play a once off gsme in a random store in a random town you'll never be in again, or organise/play a different game there. I'd personally be in two minds about it - seems like a lot of work for a 'random one off game'. Ultimately, for me it's about community. I play people first and foremost, games second.
And trust me, I'm a lot different to that warseer poster, and I think that description rings a bell, but the name eludes me right now. I play narrative. And I play competitive. I play pick up games too. I enjoy all three. All three have value. All have their place. 40k is simply not a pick up gsme any more. If you want to enjoy it, you need to approach it in another direction. Personally, I think it's worth it. Feel free to disagree. I don't mind the 'negotiation phase' at all. I'm happy to work around it, even with my time limitations. I enjoy the tinkering and the 'game building'. I find its as much fun as rolling dice. it just frustrates me that so many people are so unwilling to step out of their bubble, and expand their gaming horizons. Pick up gsmes are fine for what they are, but they don't define gaming, nor it's baseline. It's nothing more that one approach to take, and one amongst many.
And for what it's worth, I've been equally harsh to those who see 'narrative gaming' as the one true way, the end all and be all, and who end up being disparaging and nasty towards the idea of pick up games and tournaments.
I'm really starting to see a trend here. And also, I will reiterate that not every gamer walking into a store will game in that store forever. See my above examples to see why this attitude is irrelevant and the standard is what needs corrected, not the gamer.
I disagree. The community is the heart and soul of what still amounts to a social hobby. Without gamers making the effort towards each other, there is no community. With no community, there is no point.
The game should indeed be fit for that purpose, and until the last two editions WAS fit for that purpose.
Lol no. 40k was always a wreck of a game. Drop the rose tinted glasses. Its a cluttered, clunky mess and always has been. The fact that you could jury rig it as a pick up gsme twenty years ago with it doesn't necessarily mean it was designed, or even fully suitable as a pick up game, or for tournaments. Warmachine/hordes are designed from the get-go as pick up/tournament games and they do them extremely well. Even back in third or fourth, 40k was never anything even remotely close to what WMH is.
So the gist of what you are saying is we either need to adopt your view of negotiating games or move on to other games? Got it
Well, yes.
I mean, it's kind of obvious if you ask me.
If you have issues with 40k, you either continue playing, and swallow your frustrations and keep dealing with all the crap, you walk away and play different games, or you try and sort it out amongst yourselves and make it work for you. It's not rocket surgery.
And then you get to the part where every single player would want something different. In 2 decades of gaming I've yet to find someone whose expectations/wants match mine 100%, or even 75%. Hell, my own brother and I butt heads over elements we love/hate about the game. It doesn't matter how two people agree to ride a tandem bike if it has no tires.
Then get tyres and put them on. Me and Mrs deadnight got into cycling recently, and the first thing you do if you're doing it properly is learn how bikes work, so you can swap out And change things like tires to suit different terrain types and so you can do basic bike repair and maintenance.
Gaming isn't much different. You want a tandem bike, then get it sorted. Or get your own bikes but cycle on the same road with one following the other or cycling side by side and try and make sure you keep pace with each other. If you're cycling together and going somewhere the point is not to leave your mate miles and miles behind in the process. Or to just choose your own routes regardless of what they're doing. Because neither is fun nor fair, is it?
If you share 75% or even 50% then that's a start. Be accommodating to the guy at the other end. On the understanding he'll be accommodating to you. That's how you build a community relationship that lasts long term. You play the game that he wants to play, and in return, he plays the game/match up you want to play for the following game. Doesn't seem hard. I mean. We do it all the time. Of the three guys I play with mostly,ci am by far the most 'competitive', as that was my gaming upbringing for about ten years prior to meeting them. The others are more laid back, and each has different likes, dislikes, tastes and approaches. I like the sci fi approach, M likes his tanks a bit too much, P will always homebrew even if the system is perfect and R likes to charge across the field like an ork. And we often play 2 on 2, and make our gsmes work with a bit of negotiation, a bit of give and take, and you know what? It all works out in the end.
He's not talking about imposed universality, he's talking about a standard to launch from. Once again I default back to 3rd since I feel they had the right mix. The rule set fostered to casual play and narrative play without compromising pick up play. THAT is what Blacksails is lamenting the loss of more than anything, and he feels it's an indictment of the rules system and not the players that this is no longer the case. And he's right.
Thst 'standard', depending on how you do it can very well end up being imposed universality. And that's not always a good thing. For me, the standard to launch from is called having a conversation, and building relationships with people. I play the long game here and don't settle for 'just a game in a store' with strangers because people and our connections are ultimately the heart of this hobby, and without them, there is no hobby.
And like I said, that was 20years ago. Third edition was a clunky, unbalanced game in its own right. I still get shivers when I think of starcannon eldar, the craftworld supplement, 'on a 1 I go faster' blood Angels, and how the gsme devolved into either 'rhino rush', or 'shoot the rhino rush' types lists. Plus close combat and rolling up flanks was no end of annoying. I don't think it did any of those things you mention (casual, narrative, pick up play, tournaments etc) well, and being honest, were I to go back to it, I think 'casual, with a chat beforehand to make sure it's a decent match up' is the most workable approach. I've also said that I agree with blacksails on a lot of things - he is right a lot of the time, but there is always another perspective and 'the other side of the coin' to look at. I mean, I dislike the fact that 40k isn't a pick up game. I like pick up gsmes. I love WMH for that very reason(favourite gsme, for a lot of reasons). the reality on the ground is that 40k is a clunky, broken mess, and the only practical way to get anything out of it is to 'level up as gamers' and step in with a social shock absorber to make it work. Here's the thing - I also like narrative games, and I like this approach anyway, so for me, it's both natural and enjoyable to do this for 40k. Almost like I'd probably be doing it anyway. It's just that sadly, too many people are too blinkered to want to change their ways - gsmers are surprisingly conservative and terrified of change, often being very unwilling to step out of their comfort zone. I think it's a shame. Regarding my attitude/approach? Sometimes you need tough love and to be shocked out of it before you will react and push yourself as a result. And I like the whole 'pushing myself' thing. i believe in and encourage self improvement, and personal empowerment. That's what everything I say boils down to. Often times I've found that sharp elbows and tough talk, backed up with examples of people who have made it work goes a lot further than any amount of mollycoddling - that just enables and reinforces our apathy and intertia.
Listen, tony - I'll say it again - I'll apologise if I came across insulting towards you directly. And I mean it. That wasn't my intent. Please believe me. I'm too easy going in person so want to be seen like that here. I appreciate the feedback, and for what it's worth - happy gaming. Find yourself over here, and I'll promise you a beer in ye quaint old Scottish pub.
Very interesting thread and glad I got pointed towards it.
I see a lot of "no it can't be done. its too difficult. theres too many obstacles. people won't allow it. No. no." which come across as putting obstacles in the way, rather than actually just giving it a go and taking ownership of your own hobby that you have paid good money for, but feel frustrated by..........yet aren't prepared to fix or attempt to fix.
You get more out of the game the more you put in. Open style gaming is easy once you realise that, really, its only a case of approaching the game with a different mindset.
As far as all this "oh, they might not have the models to rebuild their army" talk that's scattered throughout the thread - just use the models you have and work with them!
Example - someone said about genestealer cult and a imperial knight force and how it would never work because the cult can't damage the knight. Well, who says they have to?
1 - the cult has to slip past the knight on patrol and exit the table with as much of their forces as they can. But can they? Come up with some suitable environmental rules for maybe them choosing to wait until night before making the attempt? But what about the scanners on the knight? Perhaps its just waiting for them............
2 - as the cult has no way of directly dealing with the knight, they'll need to call in the assistance of that missile silo they took over recently*. But they need to plant a tracking device onto the knight, who is unlikely to let them near him. some will die in the attempt, but one may succeed and remove this obstacle from the cults uprising...........
That took, what, 3 mins of thought? Chuck down the toys and play. Who cares if its unbalanced or the points are different? That is not the driver of the game - the players are and the onus is on them to step up and have a mature approach with their pastime.
Unit1126PLL wrote: *shrugs* It stops when the players stop it. There are already rules for orbital strikes in both the Heresy and regular 40k, as well as rules for surface-to-orbit battle vessels such as the Manta and the Sokar Stormbird. So... never? Hopefully? I'd love it if the scale kept increasing. Next year my enemy can bring a cruiser but my deep-striking troops can board it, and the year later, he'll bring a battleship, but my superheavies will be landed straight into the cargo hold after some defensive fire rolls. Honestly I think that'd be a fun scenario.
Or, y'know, they could make a game for that and you could actually play it instead? Because meanwhile the people that want to play a skirmish level game with impactful squad and platoon sized units are wondering why they have to give up their game so you can have yours...
Do they have to give it up? I have two friends that play 1000 points constantly. I cannot participate, for obvious reasons, but that's okay - no one is forcing me to.
Just like how you could play 1000 points, or 500, or 400 Combat Patrol, and aren't forced to play at my size.
That's literally the point of 40k and its points limits.
Problem is they cannot play 1500-2000 pts game meaningfully against list that has lots of apoc stuff. It's just opponent rolling dice to see if they wipe opponent out or not. That's not fun game.
Newsflash: One ruleset cannot cover every scale sensibly. You don't make epic scaled battles with 40k models by just by cramming in more models and bigger ones to boot. Skirmish games works differently from platoon games that work differently to company games, batallion games etc.
I see a lot of "no it can't be done. its too difficult. theres too many obstacles. people won't allow it. No. no." which come across as putting obstacles in the way, rather than actually just giving it a go and taking ownership of your own hobby that you have paid good money for, but feel frustrated by..........yet aren't prepared to fix or attempt to fix.
You get more out of the game the more you put in. Open style gaming is easy once you realise that, really, its only a case of approaching the game with a different mindset.
As far as all this "oh, they might not have the models to rebuild their army" talk that's scattered throughout the thread - just use the models you have and work with them!
Example - someone said about genestealer cult and a imperial knight force and how it would never work because the cult can't damage the knight. Well, who says they have to?
1 - the cult has to slip past the knight on patrol and exit the table with as much of their forces as they can. But can they? Come up with some suitable environmental rules for maybe them choosing to wait until night before making the attempt? But what about the scanners on the knight? Perhaps its just waiting for them............
2 - as the cult has no way of directly dealing with the knight, they'll need to call in the assistance of that missile silo they took over recently*. But they need to plant a tracking device onto the knight, who is unlikely to let them near him. some will die in the attempt, but one may succeed and remove this obstacle from the cults uprising...........
That took, what, 3 mins of thought? Chuck down the toys and play. Who cares if its unbalanced or the points are different? That is not the driver of the game - the players are and the onus is on them to step up and have a mature approach with their pastime.
*hey look! another game idea!
Funny, that those examples are very close to what I had in mind when I read those complaints… One other was to give GC units some kind of "scenario" blasting charges, that could immobilize or destroy the knight etc… From narrative perspective such matchup is really a great theme for multitude of ideas...
Getting back to broader context: what I think is very clearly visible in this thread, is a problem with 40K origins vs… playerbase origins. 40K started as a freestyle RPG game with multitude of options and nobody really thought of mythical "competetive ballance" in RT and 2nd ed. One important thing that gets overlooked in such threads, is that 3rd ed "reboot" (1998) of 40K was not done because late 2nd ed ballance issues. It was made because Diablo premiere (1996) shifted computer entertainment focus from turn based games towards real time genres of computer games. And everyone had to adapt to completely new mentality of players. Before Diablo, one mission of e.g. X-COM: Enemy Unknown could take entire evening (especially with save-restore approach), and finishing some games could take weeks or months even. So there wasn't so huge disparity between miniature wargaming and computer wargaming (from hobby perspective). And miniature wargaming had added bonus of "over-the-top graphics setting" back then. But after Diablo influence (it was obviously not the first one, but with the largest impact), turn based computer games quickly collapsed to a niche genre, and this was so fast and big impact, that by the year 2000 almost all strategy titles were real-time. There was a brief period of (more or less) '96-'98, when many games were published with hybrid engines (like M.A.X. or X-COM: Apocalypse), but eventually computer gaming went "full real time". At this point, disparity between computer based entertainment and "oldschool" RPG or tabletop games became huge in terms of necessary time investment. This is the reason why 3rd ed 40k was not "tweaked and improved" 2nd ed, but vastly simplified and streamlined "quick and dirty" edition - because average new player (late '90 teenager) had entirely different focus scope than teenager from the '80 and early '90. So GW had to cut its RPG roots and try to become a "wargame", which it weren't earlier - it was really a genre of it's own: massively overgrown RPG battle resolution system without proper RPG game… And after that a global trend of "every game has to have a grand tournament with monetary prizes" kicked in and everything went nuts (from an old-school casual player perspective at least).
This is "prehistory", but understanding that period is crucial to understanding current situation: we have now a very divided community, with a huge part of it treating 40K as a typical wargame and comparing it to other wargames out there (doesn't really matter if in casual or competetive context), a large minority treating it as a narrative game (be it for legacy reasons or because they came to conclusion, that it is an unwieldy mess of rules unsuited for competitive play) and some folks treating it purely as a modelling/painting hobby with ocasional playability… And because 3rd ed "engine" was so "quick and dirty" it is really hard to "fix" it, so it could compete with modern competitively focused games written from ground up. But reverting to a "guideline for narrative reenactment" was trivial, hence 6th and 7th ed...
Hrm, I dont think one can chalk everything up to Diablo. Diablo was hardly the first big impact "real time" game, Command & Conquer, Doom, Dune II, MechWarrior II and many other games did real time gaming and multiplayer before Diablo did with great popular success. Likewise, turn based RPG's continued to be wildly popular for some time even after Diablo (see Fallout 1 & 2).
40k moved to a more "pickup" style with army lists and whatnot because thats how people were already starting to move by the end of RT (when GW first started publishing such material), and because, just like Real Time with computer games, it attracts a wider audience than the more RPG style of original RT play.
2E got a reboot because it ran into the exact same issues 7E is running into, few can keep up with all the available rules through multiple sales channels, balance became nonexistent and the rules became increasingly clunky and awkward for the kinds of things being pushed into the ruleset along with army size beginning to bloat on a ruleset that just didnt handle those sizes well.
Vaktathi wrote: Hrm, I dont think one can chalk everything up to Diablo. Diablo was hardly the first big impact "real time" game, Command & Conquer, Doom, Dune II, MechWarrior II and many other games did real time gaming and multiplayer before Diablo did with great popular success. Likewise, turn based RPG's continued to be wildly popular for some time even after Diablo (see Fallout 1 & 2).
40k moved to a more "pickup" style with army lists and whatnot because thats how people were already starting to move by the end of RT (when GW first started publishing such material), and because, just like Real Time with computer games, it attracts a wider audience than the more RPG style of original RT play.
2E got a reboot because it ran into the exact same issues 7E is running into, few can keep up with all the available rules through multiple sales channels, balance became nonexistent and the rules became increasingly clunky and awkward for the kinds of things being pushed into the ruleset along with army size beginning to bloat on a ruleset that just didnt handle those sizes well.
That is why I wrote about Diablo "(it was obviously not the first one, but with the largest impact)" - it is mostly a symbolic and not actual turning point. Fallout 1 is 1997, Fallout 2 is 1998 and then Van Burren was cancelled, because at that time, turn based mechanics was considered obsolete. It is perfectly in line with what I wrote previously. If you remember that times, then you should remember also, that Diablo and Fallout 1 were directly compared to each other, because at first Diablo was developed as a turn based RPG, but then Blizard changed it's mind (and that is why we still have Blizzard nowadays and Interplay went near bankrupt in 1998 and done poorly afterwards - because they stick to an outdated philosophy for too long). And yes, huge, turn based RPG games prevailed a bit longer, because of their nature (compare Daggerfall to Skyrim and you'll see clearly why the first one was released way too soon).
And what you wrote is really a reiteration of what I wrote - GW had to adapt to evolving audience it had no controll over. Todays growing market of boardgames and other "physical genres" is due to increasing sentiment to step out the virtual at least for a moment, because we spend so much time online, both at work and at home. You really cannot analyse GW and tabletop games without such social insight and focus solely on internall balance issues of 2nd or 7th ed... To reiterate again: try to understand my previous post not as an answer on "why GW decided to scrap 2nd ed" but on "why they decided in such a rush, that 3rd ed should be a complete, drastically castrated reboot with much faster gameplay and not just release an improved 2nd with ballance restored, that they were working on" - there was simply no time to reengeneer the whole game that fast in such quickly changing and demanding enviroment as the turn of a century was… Back then PC gaming was still a niche (but growing) entertainment, PlayStation was still a quite new thing (it got an upgrade to PS2 in 2000 - things hasn't turned as fast back then as they do nowadays, especially in Europe). And consoles are important to this, because they raised the first "instant gratification" generations (from gaming perspective). Both 8bit and early PC gaming (DOS times) required time to load (especially 8bit from casettes) or knowledge to configure or a mix of both, but consoles were plug&play from the very begining. The whole LotR fiasco was partly because of that shift in mentality...
And to be perfectly clear: I do not think, that those were the sole reasons behind GW choices, but that such perspective matter, both back then and now, and is usually omitted by dakkanauts in such discussions.
It's funny. People ask for things and then hate them.
GW had too much rules bloat, so they streamlined everything in 3rd. Then people felt their armies weren't able to have enough options, so they added Chapter Approved. Then people felt like there was too much rules bloat, so they stopped Chapter Approved. Then people thought their armies didn't have enough options, so they released 6th Edition and Escalation. Then people complained about 6th edition, so they added 7th edition, where people are complaining about rules bloat.
How much do you want to bet that 8th Edition becomes streamlined, and then some expansion comes out (or a billion supplements) because people complain that there's not enough options...
... I mean, complaining about having too many rules to keep track of seems a bit silly. Why do people feel the need to memorize every rule? Just memorize your army, and have your opponent memorize theirs. It's like if I was a Fighter in D&D 3.5: I could memorize everything for being a fighter, but if I tried to remember Wizards, Antipaladins, Rogues, and Swashbuckler classes I'd go insane, not to mention the ridiculous number of supplements. I mean hell, look at d20pfsrd.org - that's just the free use Pathfinder rules.
40k really isn't that complex by comparison. My army has what, three rules sources at most?
Was 3.5 D&D fair? IIRC Wizards and other spellcasters outclassed Fighters and other physical classes by a stupid amount after level 10. It became up to the players of the game to really work out how to settle the issues with the game's rules. The term 'munchkin' came into existence because of people who deliberately broke the game, playing mechanically rather than the way the game was intended, i.e. narratively. To them, the game was something to be won, beaten, or broken.
Was 3.5 D&D fair? IIRC Wizards and other spellcasters outclassed Fighters and other physical classes by a stupid amount after level 10. It became up to the players of the game to really work out how to settle the issues with the game's rules. The term 'munchkin' came into existence because of people who deliberately broke the game, playing mechanically rather than the way the game was intended, i.e. narratively. To them, the game was something to be won, beaten, or broken.
D&D is not competitive. 40K is, no matter what people try to claim. There is a winner and a loser and no GM.
Also, 3.5 D&D casters still relied on physical classes to do actual damage, since most attack spells were not effective against high level NPCs.
That is why I wrote about Diablo "(it was obviously not the first one, but with the largest impact)" - it is mostly a symbolic and not actual turning point. Fallout 1 is 1997, Fallout 2 is 1998 and then Van Burren was cancelled, because at that time, turn based mechanics was considered obsolete.
Interplay being unable to pay its employees and keep the doors open, and Black Isle losing a bunch of the project team, probably had more to do with it than any specific game mechanic.
One will note that Fallout Tactics retained the turn based element for combat, and the Bethesda Fallout first person games attempted to emulate elements of that old turn based gameplay as well, with great success.
It is perfectly in line with what I wrote previously. If you remember that times, then you should remember also, that Diablo and Fallout 1 were directly compared to each other, because at first Diablo was developed as a turn based RPG, but then Blizard changed it's mind (and that is why we still have Blizzard nowadays and Interplay went near bankrupt in 1998 and done poorly afterwards - because they stick to an outdated philosophy for too long).
Fallout did not make or break Interplay, nor did turn based mechanics, Interplay made a huge array of games, from RPG's to flight sims and RTS games. Turn based RPG play didnt kill Interplay, poor business and project management did.
And what you wrote is really a reiteration of what I wrote - GW had to adapt to evolving audience it had no controll over.
Sure, mostly I'm just disagreeing with the source of that evolution.
Todays growing market of boardgames and other "physical genres" is due to increasing sentiment to step out the virtual at least for a moment, because we spend so much time online, both at work and at home.
cant comment there, thats a supposition I just dont know enough to comment on.
You really cannot analyse GW and tabletop games without such social insight and focus solely on internall balance issues of 2nd or 7th ed... To reiterate again: try to understand my previous post not as an answer on "why GW decided to scrap 2nd ed" but on "why they decided in such a rush, that 3rd ed should be a complete, drastically castrated reboot with much faster gameplay and not just release an improved 2nd with ballance restored, that they were working on" - there was simply no time to reengeneer the whole game that fast in such quickly changing and demanding enviroment as the turn of a century was… Back then PC gaming was still a niche (but growing) entertainment, PlayStation was still a quite new thing (it got an upgrade to PS2 in 2000 - things hasn't turned as fast back then as they do nowadays, especially in Europe). And consoles are important to this, because they raised the first "instant gratification" generations (from gaming perspective). Both 8bit and early PC gaming (DOS times) required time to load (especially 8bit from casettes) or knowledge to configure or a mix of both, but consoles were plug&play from the very begining. The whole LotR fiasco was partly because of that shift in mentality...
And to be perfectly clear: I do not think, that those were the sole reasons behind GW choices, but that such perspective matter, both back then and now, and is usually omitted by dakkanauts in such discussions.
Sure, but I also dont think its necessarily a source of what forced changes so much as an acknowledgement that once a certain point is reached, to grow the product has to change. Videogames were the same way. Deep, complicated, and long play time videogames still exist and make their presence felt, but have limited markets.
The market for tabletop wargaming in the late 90's was already firmly and dominantly in GW's hands, and market trends in videogames shouldnt have been any reason to crash-dump a new ruleset on the market. Existing product issues, business cycle concerns, management desires, and other such things would be far more pressing than "videogames make people want stuff *now* so we have to dump everything and put out a totally new ruleset next week!".
I think my main point would be that "Instant Gratification"/ease of use isnt so much a trend forced onto the market and game that it must then adapt to, so much as a market threshold to accommodate growth beyond a certain point, and applies to anything be it videogames or tabletop games or movies or cars or guns or drones or anything else. To grow beyond a certain point you have to reduce the barriers to entry. GW has been moving back towards all the things that restrained 2E's growth such that it required a reboot with 7E, which is why we see the problems we do again.
Was 3.5 D&D fair? IIRC Wizards and other spellcasters outclassed Fighters and other physical classes by a stupid amount after level 10. It became up to the players of the game to really work out how to settle the issues with the game's rules. The term 'munchkin' came into existence because of people who deliberately broke the game, playing mechanically rather than the way the game was intended, i.e. narratively. To them, the game was something to be won, beaten, or broken.
D&D is not competitive. 40K is, no matter what people try to claim. There is a winner and a loser and no GM.
Also, 3.5 D&D casters still relied on physical classes to do actual damage, since most attack spells were not effective against high level NPCs.
D&D is as competitive as the players make it out to be. I've heard some GMs and players actually play 'munchkin' campaigns, where the goal really is to 'win' the game, and the GM is trying to kill the players while the players go all-out to be munchkiny (with hilarious results in some cases... I have some stories if you ever want to hear them!)
Similarly, 40k is as competitive as the players want it to be. A game does not have to have a GM to be non-competitive: many co-operative board games do not have GMs. Also, having a winner and a loser does not automatically make it competitive either, if anything, it would be unrealistic if a game depicting battles did not have a way to turn those battles into victories. It'd be like a historical wargame where both the Nazis and the USA won World War II somehow, because to make the Nazis lose makes the game somehow 'more competitive' simply because there's a loser.
Also, I can go into details, but I once had a game where the party wizard (not I) made encounters a non-issue. I can explain it, if you'd like, but it didn't involve the NPCs at all. He simply cast a spell, and the encounter ended, with no one suffering more than 3 damage in the process. Damage wasn't necessary for spellcasters to be OP.
Difference: the GM ALWAYS wins in D&D because they have unlimited resources. I guarantee I can out munchkin any PC group trivially.
Having a winner and loser by definition makes it a competition of sorts. If people don't care if they win or lose, that's different. I think that's what you describing.
Martel732 wrote: Difference: the GM ALWAYS wins in D&D because they have unlimited resources. I guarantee I can out munchkin any PC group trivially.
Having a winner and loser by definition makes it a competition of sorts. If people don't care if they win or lose, that's different. I think that's what you describing.
You'd be surprised. I once watched a group of munchkins and a munchkin GM, and even things like Nexus Dragons (yes, I know, an AD&D monster, but it's a GM after all) were becoming trivial for the players to deal with.
And perhaps it is a 'competition of sorts' but so are many things we wouldn't consider games. If you broaden you definition of competitive enough, you could include 'survival' as a competitive thing, at which point it's become simply ridiculous. I suppose it depends on where you draw the line. I draw the line somewhere above 40k: for me, to treat 40k competitively is just an exercise in either being upset or making other people upset.
"You'd be surprised. I once watched a group of munchkins and a munchkin GM, and even things like Nexus Dragons were becoming trivial for the players to deal with. "
I make my own NPCs, bro. Often, enemy parties of PC classes are the worst thing for them to face. And templated monsters, like frost giant clerics with anti-magic field.
If 40K wasn't competitive, I'd see Eldar units other than scatbikes, warpspiders, WKs, and fire dragons from time to time.
Martel732 wrote: "You'd be surprised. I once watched a group of munchkins and a munchkin GM, and even things like Nexus Dragons were becoming trivial for the players to deal with. "
I make my own NPCs, bro. Often, enemy parties of PC classes are the worst thing for them to face. And templated monsters, like frost giant clerics with anti-magic field.
If 40K wasn't competitive, I'd see Eldar units other than scatbikes, warpspiders, WKs, and fire dragons from time to time.
I'm serious. You'd be surprised. I suppose I'll tell you of the one build I personally encountered. I don't know all of the details, of course, but it went something like this: A wizard with two metamagic feats: one which made his spells do like 3 frost damage on demand and one that made all damaging spells teleport every living thing to the outer range of the spell. Then, for encounters, he cast a spell that detected every town within 10 miles and triggered both metamagic feats. All entities in the area, including party members, plants, pets, farm animals, literally 'all living things,' RAW, were teleported ten miles away without saves. The party members had to teleport back of course. And this could happen every round, IIRC, at least until the spell slots were empty. But this was the sort of stupidity that happened.
That's not true at all. Someone can run Scatbikes, Warpspiders, WKs, and Fire Dragons while still being perfectly fluffy - people don't do that because '40k is a competitive game' anymore than munchkins broke D&D because it was a competitive game. Some people break games, and they don't have to be 'competitive' games to be broken by these people. The fact that munchkins exist in both D&D and 40k is evidence for this... else, D&D is competitive, which is just perverse.
"Someone can run Scatbikes, Warpspiders, WKs, and Fire Dragons while still being perfectly fluffy "
If you say so.
"'m serious. You'd be surprised. I suppose I'll tell you of the one build I personally encountered. I don't know all of the details, of course, but it went something like this: A wizard with two metamagic feats: one which made his spells do like 3 frost damage on demand and one that made all damaging spells teleport every living thing to the outer range of the spell. Then, for encounters, he cast a spell that detected every town within 10 miles and triggered both metamagic feats. All entities in the area, including party members, plants, pets, farm animals, literally 'all living things,' RAW, were teleported ten miles away without saves. The party members had to teleport back of course. And this could happen every round, IIRC, at least until the spell slots were empty. But this was the sort of stupidity that happened."
This is child's play, and not terribly difficult to counter once it is scouted by enemy NPCs.
That is why I wrote about Diablo "(it was obviously not the first one, but with the largest impact)" - it is mostly a symbolic and not actual turning point. Fallout 1 is 1997, Fallout 2 is 1998 and then Van Burren was cancelled, because at that time, turn based mechanics was considered obsolete.
Interplay being unable to pay its employees and keep the doors open, and Black Isle losing a bunch of the project team, probably had more to do with it than any specific game mechanic.
One will note that Fallout Tactics retained the turn based element for combat, and the Bethesda Fallout first person games attempted to emulate elements of that old turn based gameplay as well, with great success.
It is perfectly in line with what I wrote previously. If you remember that times, then you should remember also, that Diablo and Fallout 1 were directly compared to each other, because at first Diablo was developed as a turn based RPG, but then Blizard changed it's mind (and that is why we still have Blizzard nowadays and Interplay went near bankrupt in 1998 and done poorly afterwards - because they stick to an outdated philosophy for too long).
Fallout did not make or break Interplay, nor did turn based mechanics, Interplay made a huge array of games, from RPG's to flight sims and RTS games. Turn based RPG play didnt kill Interplay, poor business and project management did.
And what you wrote is really a reiteration of what I wrote - GW had to adapt to evolving audience it had no controll over.
Sure, mostly I'm just disagreeing with the source of that evolution.
Todays growing market of boardgames and other "physical genres" is due to increasing sentiment to step out the virtual at least for a moment, because we spend so much time online, both at work and at home.
cant comment there, thats a supposition I just dont know enough to comment on.
You really cannot analyse GW and tabletop games without such social insight and focus solely on internall balance issues of 2nd or 7th ed... To reiterate again: try to understand my previous post not as an answer on "why GW decided to scrap 2nd ed" but on "why they decided in such a rush, that 3rd ed should be a complete, drastically castrated reboot with much faster gameplay and not just release an improved 2nd with ballance restored, that they were working on" - there was simply no time to reengeneer the whole game that fast in such quickly changing and demanding enviroment as the turn of a century was… Back then PC gaming was still a niche (but growing) entertainment, PlayStation was still a quite new thing (it got an upgrade to PS2 in 2000 - things hasn't turned as fast back then as they do nowadays, especially in Europe). And consoles are important to this, because they raised the first "instant gratification" generations (from gaming perspective). Both 8bit and early PC gaming (DOS times) required time to load (especially 8bit from casettes) or knowledge to configure or a mix of both, but consoles were plug&play from the very begining. The whole LotR fiasco was partly because of that shift in mentality...
And to be perfectly clear: I do not think, that those were the sole reasons behind GW choices, but that such perspective matter, both back then and now, and is usually omitted by dakkanauts in such discussions.
Sure, but I also dont think its necessarily a source of what forced changes so much as an acknowledgement that once a certain point is reached, to grow the product has to change. Videogames were the same way. Deep, complicated, and long play time videogames still exist and make their presence felt, but have limited markets.
The market for tabletop wargaming in the late 90's was already firmly and dominantly in GW's hands, and market trends in videogames shouldnt have been any reason to crash-dump a new ruleset on the market. Existing product issues, business cycle concerns, management desires, and other such things would be far more pressing than "videogames make people want stuff *now* so we have to dump everything and put out a totally new ruleset next week!".
I think my main point would be that "Instant Gratification"/ease of use isnt so much a trend forced onto the market and game that it must then adapt to, so much as a market threshold to accommodate growth beyond a certain point, and applies to anything be it videogames or tabletop games or movies or cars or guns or drones or anything else. To grow beyond a certain point you have to reduce the barriers to entry. GW has been moving back towards all the things that restrained 2E's growth such that it required a reboot with 7E, which is why we see the problems we do again.
We may have different view on what is a factor and what is a result, because we speak from perspectives of two different regions. '90 in US were very different from '90 in Poland - we had a sort of "accelerated evolution", because being a coutry which tried to "catch up" after decades of communism and we sort of had "everything here and now mixed up" - products and trends from '80 in the west were ported lately and mixed with newest worldwide trends from the '90. So perhaps because of this "compressed" evolution of the market I see some factors differently - some of them shifted in a couple of years, not over a decade or more… And we had massively smaller market here, so catching up on a trend was "to be or not to be" for many companies, so I may have a bit more of "catching a wave" than "create a demand and then provide a supply" POV.
Martel732 wrote: "Someone can run Scatbikes, Warpspiders, WKs, and Fire Dragons while still being perfectly fluffy "
If you say so.
"'m serious. You'd be surprised. I suppose I'll tell you of the one build I personally encountered. I don't know all of the details, of course, but it went something like this: A wizard with two metamagic feats: one which made his spells do like 3 frost damage on demand and one that made all damaging spells teleport every living thing to the outer range of the spell. Then, for encounters, he cast a spell that detected every town within 10 miles and triggered both metamagic feats. All entities in the area, including party members, plants, pets, farm animals, literally 'all living things,' RAW, were teleported ten miles away without saves. The party members had to teleport back of course. And this could happen every round, IIRC, at least until the spell slots were empty. But this was the sort of stupidity that happened."
This is child's play, and not terribly difficult to counter once it is scouted by enemy NPCs.
Sure. I don't munchkin enough to know anything more. The point is that munchkins exist in D&D, and also exist in 40k. That in no way is evidence that 40k is competitive any moreso than it is evidence that D&D is competitive.
Also, yes, I say so. I can concoct a fluffy reason for all those things to exist in one army:
"Sam-Hainn exists, and has access to Wraithknights which they roll out when the situation is especially dire." Boom. Fluff for a highly mobile army of fire-dragons (in Wave Serpents), Scatbikes, Warp Spiders, and Wraithknights all working together. That army really isn't unfluffy. What it is is unfun. That's something that needs to be talked about between the players involved... then, if the player running the Eldar is unwilling to compromise, the game can not be played. I have a hunch that if they are not a munchkin, they will compromise.
Martel732 wrote: I haven't had an eldar player compromise since 5th ed.
Then just don't play them, if they are unwilling to compromise. If you'd like, I could even find you another club within driving or even bussing distance of your house, though I hate having to do your work for you. It's just that your meta is so awful that I want to do something to help, and if that something is finding you a group that isn't full of munchkins, then so be it. If you want said help, PM me your address (don't want it up for everyone to see!) though I understand if you don't want to; I'm an internet stranger after all.
Martel732 wrote: There's one other place, but my schedule doesn't sync. Kicking around the ba was novel in 6th ed, but at this point you'd think theyd get bored.
Depending on where you live, I could find another place, I bet you, within 45 minutes driving, at least if it's an urban area.
Martel732 wrote: If 40K wasn't competitive, I'd see Eldar units other than scatbikes, warpspiders, WKs, and fire dragons from time to time.
I play Eldar and I do not like scatbikes (the most bland option in current codex IMHO), I do not own a WK and if I would, I see it's use only in a fluffy wraith army (either Iyanden or Pale Court), I do own Fire Dragons since 3rd ed, but rarely field them, I do not fancy Wave Serpents and I own only a single squad of Warp Spiders (and now use them with a self-imposed s5 nerf). I build my armies with "one of each" philosophy, I often use Wasp Walkers and Wraithlords and ally a lot of Harlies and homebrew Exodites. And I have never used Seer Council based deathstar, even though I own all necessary components. By your logic, I must clearly not exist
Please, do not confuse your "local meta" with the entirety of any faction players...
Martel732 wrote: I can ask around. I know two stores quit doing in-store gaming so they are out.
Feel free, and I suggest you do ask around. Everywhere I've ever been, there's been at least 3 clubs in the city or its suburbs, and I've been quite a few places.
Wow.....I didn't realize that 40k was only for people who want to spend 1/2 an hour finding the person in your local flgs that wants to play the game the same way you do. I didn't know that my dislike for Facebook and the fact that I don't want to give my number to all of the people at the LGS means that I should be playing a different game (or that it made me utterly anti-social). If I would have known that, I would have simply told my buddy that turned me onto the game 5 years ago "No, this game is definitely not for me. Cool models and interesting fluff be damned." So, the fact that I no longer have a local gaming group between people moving away and the rest completely turned off by 6th/7th edition, means I should pack up my models and quit the game entirely? Why can't I WANT GW to make a better ruleset so that playing the game isn't so much of a chore? Will they? Probably not, but I do really want that. As far as being the one at the store promoting the game and trying to make all of this work, I'm sorry, but most of my hobby time is taken up by my Pathfinder/MTG group, so I get to the store a couple of Saturdays a month and really just want to go there and play the game. Guess I'm an anti-social donkey-cave.....or I should not play this game any more. At least that's what I'm getting from a lot of people on this thread. (Not all, but a lot)
Also, there are a lot of us out here who see that 40k is a game. It's a game with 2 players (the vast majority of the time) playing 2 opposing forces trying to beat the other to some pre-determined objectives (even kill points are an objective). At the end of this, there will be a winner and a loser, no matter how much you want to argue against that. Even if you don't care, there is still a winner and a loser. Why is it so bad to WANT a game that I like as much as 40k for the models and the fluff (not to mention the amount of money I've put into it) to realize that it really is a game. I've said this in the past, but I want to reiterate here, I am not a WAAC player, but I don't want to have to spend x amount of time before a game finding a way to make a game that my army can compete in. That should NOT be up to me or my opponent, that SHOULD be up to the people designing the game. Nobody here is arguing that the ruleset is balanced or good, we are stating that we want it to be. I am shocked that so many people think that's wrong.
Battlesong wrote: Wow.....I didn't realize that 40k was only for people who want to spend 1/2 an hour finding the person in your local flgs that wants to play the game the same way you do. I didn't know that my dislike for Facebook and the fact that I don't want to give my number to all of the people at the LGS means that I should be playing a different game (or that it made me utterly anti-social). If I would have known that, I would have simply told my buddy that turned me onto the game 5 years ago "No, this game is definitely not for me. Cool models and interesting fluff be damned." So, the fact that I no longer have a local gaming group between people moving away and the rest completely turned off by 6th/7th edition, means I should pack up my models and quit the game entirely? Why can't I WANT GW to make a better ruleset so that playing the game isn't so much of a chore? Will they? Probably not, but I do really want that. As far as being the one at the store promoting the game and trying to make all of this work, I'm sorry, but most of my hobby time is taken up by my Pathfinder/MTG group, so I get to the store a couple of Saturdays a month and really just want to go there and play the game. Guess I'm an anti-social donkey-cave.....or I should not play this game any more. At least that's what I'm getting from a lot of people on this thread. (Not all, but a lot)
Also, there are a lot of us out here who see that 40k is a game. It's a game with 2 players (the vast majority of the time) playing 2 opposing forces trying to beat the other to some pre-determined objectives (even kill points are an objective). At the end of this, there will be a winner and a loser, no matter how much you want to argue against that. Even if you don't care, there is still a winner and a loser. Why is it so bad to WANT a game that I like as much as 40k for the models and the fluff (not to mention the amount of money I've put into it) to realize that it really is a game. I've said this in the past, but I want to reiterate here, I am not a WAAC player, but I don't want to have to spend x amount of time before a game finding a way to make a game that my army can compete in. That should NOT be up to me or my opponent, that SHOULD be up to the people designing the game. Nobody here is arguing that the ruleset is balanced or good, we are stating that we want it to be. I am shocked that so many people think that's wrong.
You don't have to use Facebook to pre-arrange games. My group in State College used Meetup, you could use Google Hangouts, or you could use Dakkadakka! Just start a thread in the Find a Game forum. If you only have a couple of saturdays a month to plan, then you can use the other 26-29 days in the month to figure something out!
It would literally take less effort than typing the post you just typed. XD
Yeah, the person I'm talking about was HelloKitty. They clamored about how great AOS was because of the narrative gaming thing, and they were first to sing Unbound's accolades because of narrative gaming. Then that creature went on a quest to convert the masses, along with anecdotal evidence of the burgeoning scene in its area. The figures were... fluid to say the least, and near the end they were forced to basically admit to fabricating the huge AOS scene. They wound up essentially rage quitting gaming in typical dramatastic fashion, which ended with an eventual ban from Warseer.
Doesn't say much, EVERYBODY got banned from Warseer.
To shorten this to the crux: I believe you are absolutely wrong about 40K being a pick up game. It wasn't in the first two editions, but was indeed a good pick up game in 3rd and 4th. It didn't start to see the time consuming rules bloat until 5th. THAT is why I went back to 3rd Ed. 40K when I game, and 6th Ed. WFB as well. I've never been happier. Well, if I could get my entire gaming club circle from both towns I frequented to follow suit, I'd be happier.
Martel732 wrote:7th ed is extremely similar to 2nd ed. The only difference is that it's vanilla, eldar, demons instead of CSM, Tyranids, Eldar.
To me, 7th (and to a degree 6th) seemed more like trying to stuff 2nd Ed. back into the 3rd Ed. model. There was a reason 2nd was killed. Terminator Librarians with displacer fields, blind grenades, overwatch. the vehicle rules. the laughable percentage system.
Battlesong wrote: Wow.....I didn't realize that 40k was only for people who want to spend 1/2 an hour finding the person in your local flgs that wants to play the game the same way you do. I didn't know that my dislike for Facebook and the fact that I don't want to give my number to all of the people at the LGS means that I should be playing a different game (or that it made me utterly anti-social). If I would have known that, I would have simply told my buddy that turned me onto the game 5 years ago "No, this game is definitely not for me. Cool models and interesting fluff be damned." So, the fact that I no longer have a local gaming group between people moving away and the rest completely turned off by 6th/7th edition, means I should pack up my models and quit the game entirely? Why can't I WANT GW to make a better ruleset so that playing the game isn't so much of a chore? Will they? Probably not, but I do really want that. As far as being the one at the store promoting the game and trying to make all of this work, I'm sorry, but most of my hobby time is taken up by my Pathfinder/MTG group, so I get to the store a couple of Saturdays a month and really just want to go there and play the game. Guess I'm an anti-social donkey-cave.....or I should not play this game any more. At least that's what I'm getting from a lot of people on this thread. (Not all, but a lot)
Also, there are a lot of us out here who see that 40k is a game. It's a game with 2 players (the vast majority of the time) playing 2 opposing forces trying to beat the other to some pre-determined objectives (even kill points are an objective). At the end of this, there will be a winner and a loser, no matter how much you want to argue against that. Even if you don't care, there is still a winner and a loser. Why is it so bad to WANT a game that I like as much as 40k for the models and the fluff (not to mention the amount of money I've put into it) to realize that it really is a game. I've said this in the past, but I want to reiterate here, I am not a WAAC player, but I don't want to have to spend x amount of time before a game finding a way to make a game that my army can compete in. That should NOT be up to me or my opponent, that SHOULD be up to the people designing the game. Nobody here is arguing that the ruleset is balanced or good, we are stating that we want it to be. I am shocked that so many people think that's wrong.
If you feel that way then quit because you are not a hardcore fanboy of GW like most people on dakka dakka.
Its not GW's fault that people up and quit wh40k. Its thoses people's fault for getting too smart and realizing all that time, money and effort can be spent some place better.
WH40k is a "beer and pretzel," game according to GW. It isnt ment to be a perfect balanced game for tournament play. Its ment to be a game where you waste an entire afternoon arguing about convuloted rules conflicts. Then you "Forge the narrative " because there is no good answer.
Yeah, the person I'm talking about was HelloKitty. They clamored about how great AOS was because of the narrative gaming thing, and they were first to sing Unbound's accolades because of narrative gaming. Then that creature went on a quest to convert the masses, along with anecdotal evidence of the burgeoning scene in its area. The figures were... fluid to say the least, and near the end they were forced to basically admit to fabricating the huge AOS scene. They wound up essentially rage quitting gaming in typical dramatastic fashion, which ended with an eventual ban from Warseer.
Lol yes, I remember... It. Rarely came across a poster so blinkered. I'd have loved to have seen that thread by the way...
To shorten this to the crux: I believe you are absolutely wrong about 40K being a pick up game. It wasn't in the first two editions, but was indeed a good pick up game in 3rd and 4th. It didn't start to see the time consuming rules bloat until 5th. THAT is why I went back to 3rd Ed. 40K when I game, and 6th Ed. WFB as well. I've never been happier. Well, if I could get my entire gaming club circle from both towns I frequented to follow suit, I'd be happier.
Mate, I played third and fourth and while the power 'output' of the current game has been vastly increased from where it was then, the 'ratios' of imbalance across the bell curve was just as bad. In other words, it was a broken mess of a game at the best of times. Some builds dominated without trying. And I will happily list them if you wish - I can still remember them all. Others - well you might as well have not bothered turning up. Also bear in mind how towards the end of third, the sheer amount of supplementary material requires to play a game (rulebook, codex,white dwarfs, chapter approved etc etc) was quite similar in a lot of ways to how sixth and seventh have played out in terms of rules bloat.
The evidence speaks for itself. It was never a 'good pick up game'. Maybe you played it that way, I'm presuming that was your introduction and exposure to gsming (please correct me if I'm wrong) and that colours your views, but objectively speaking, third and fourth were not good gsmes for that style of play - even then, you needed a 'gentleman's agreement' to get the most out of it, or you'd be blown of the table.
Unit1126PLL wrote: You don't have to use Facebook to pre-arrange games. My group in State College used Meetup, you could use Google Hangouts, or you could use Dakkadakka! Just start a thread in the Find a Game forum. If you only have a couple of saturdays a month to plan, then you can use the other 26-29 days in the month to figure something out!
It would literally take less effort than typing the post you just typed. XD
"You don't have to use social media to arrange a game, you just have to use social media to do it" is hardly a convincing reply. You shouldn't have to do any of that to arrange a game. If I want to play a game of X-Wing I don't go on social media and negotiate what kind of game I want to play, I just show up on X-Wing night and say "hey, want to play" to whoever is sitting at an open table. If I can't show up on the appropriate night and play a game without negotiation it's a major flaw.
Unit1126PLL wrote: You don't have to use Facebook to pre-arrange games. My group in State College used Meetup, you could use Google Hangouts, or you could use Dakkadakka! Just start a thread in the Find a Game forum. If you only have a couple of saturdays a month to plan, then you can use the other 26-29 days in the month to figure something out!
It would literally take less effort than typing the post you just typed. XD
"You don't have to use social media to arrange a game, you just have to use social media to do it" is hardly a convincing reply. You shouldn't have to do any of that to arrange a game. If I want to play a game of X-Wing I don't go on social media and negotiate what kind of game I want to play, I just show up on X-Wing night and say "hey, want to play" to whoever is sitting at an open table. If I can't show up on the appropriate night and play a game without negotiation it's a major flaw.
I mean, you have to arrange D&D games ahead. Is that an awful game?
Think of 40k more like D&D and less like Xwing. It isn't Xwing, as you astutely pointed out.
Unit1126PLL wrote: You don't have to use Facebook to pre-arrange games. My group in State College used Meetup, you could use Google Hangouts, or you could use Dakkadakka! Just start a thread in the Find a Game forum. If you only have a couple of saturdays a month to plan, then you can use the other 26-29 days in the month to figure something out!
It would literally take less effort than typing the post you just typed. XD
"You don't have to use social media to arrange a game, you just have to use social media to do it" is hardly a convincing reply. You shouldn't have to do any of that to arrange a game. If I want to play a game of X-Wing I don't go on social media and negotiate what kind of game I want to play, I just show up on X-Wing night and say "hey, want to play" to whoever is sitting at an open table. If I can't show up on the appropriate night and play a game without negotiation it's a major flaw.
I mean, you have to arrange D&D games ahead. Is that an awful game?
Think of 40k more like D&D and less like Xwing. It isn't Xwing, as you astutely pointed out.
This. There are a lot of games where you can just show up on the dedicated game night at local game shop and say hey want to play to whoever else is there. Warhammer is not conducive to that style of play, and trying to shoehorn it in is the root of most of these things. I am perfectly content with doing the above for Warmachine which is or was the other game I played. If I played X-Wing or Infinity or any of the other game that are better suited to that approach I would have no problem doing it with them either. But I do not believe that Warhammer is intended or built around or even adequately set up for that sort of thing where you just turn up and ask whoever else is there for a game with little or no other discussion.
The default assumption for Warhammer seems to be that you are part of a gaming Club and while you may have a set day that you meet it's more of a social Gathering that involves playing a game then going specifically for the purpose of the game like you or hypothetical x wing night at the game shop. It's much more like getting together to play D&D where it's an all day Affair and you're going to socialize and talk with your buddies just as much if not more than actually play the game. When I used to play D&D we would spend maybe half the day chatting and eating before we even started to play and we would talk about things we did or things we might want to do it the game or some cool book that's coming out things like that it wasn't it's D&D night let's dive in and start playing.
That's where I feel the disconnect is. GW is wanting/thinking that you're in a social group where Warhammer is your equivalent to bridge or whatever (in fact, I always think of like the Reform Club in Around the World in 80 Days, but with Warhammer instead of whist.), where it's mainly a social venue with a medium that everyone enjoys, rather than a "game" that you simply play for the sake of it being a game. Which makes sense really since it's rooted in the old British "wargaming club" from the days of Bath and Featherstone. The whole "go down to the game shop and see who else turns up" is largely an American thing because we have woefully few actual wargames clubs.
Stormonu wrote: I remember one army fielding a Warhound Titan; another was fielding nothing but Tau Riptides (plus a couple Forgeworld variants I wasn't falimiar with); the funniest was the 5-man "Hello Kitty" Knight formation. Another person was running some sort of IG-Genestealer cult with a dozen or so Earthshaker batteries (?!?). A few others were either running drop pod marine lists (5 man squads per pod, about a dozen pods) or Eldar scatbikes (that somehow appeared to be arriving by Deep Strike) - backed up by a Wraithknight.
Id wager that these guys are professional wargamers, they go to every major tourney and are interested in wrecking face and getting a prize.
Unit1126PLL wrote: You don't have to use Facebook to pre-arrange games. My group in State College used Meetup, you could use Google Hangouts, or you could use Dakkadakka! Just start a thread in the Find a Game forum. If you only have a couple of saturdays a month to plan, then you can use the other 26-29 days in the month to figure something out!
It would literally take less effort than typing the post you just typed. XD
"You don't have to use social media to arrange a game, you just have to use social media to do it" is hardly a convincing reply. You shouldn't have to do any of that to arrange a game. If I want to play a game of X-Wing I don't go on social media and negotiate what kind of game I want to play, I just show up on X-Wing night and say "hey, want to play" to whoever is sitting at an open table. If I can't show up on the appropriate night and play a game without negotiation it's a major flaw.
I mean, you have to arrange D&D games ahead. Is that an awful game?
Think of 40k more like D&D and less like Xwing. It isn't Xwing, as you astutely pointed out.
If I wanted to play D&D, I'd play D&D. D&D has a GM. 40K has no GM. They aren't comparable.
Unit1126PLL wrote: You don't have to use Facebook to pre-arrange games. My group in State College used Meetup, you could use Google Hangouts, or you could use Dakkadakka! Just start a thread in the Find a Game forum. If you only have a couple of saturdays a month to plan, then you can use the other 26-29 days in the month to figure something out!
It would literally take less effort than typing the post you just typed. XD
"You don't have to use social media to arrange a game, you just have to use social media to do it" is hardly a convincing reply. You shouldn't have to do any of that to arrange a game. If I want to play a game of X-Wing I don't go on social media and negotiate what kind of game I want to play, I just show up on X-Wing night and say "hey, want to play" to whoever is sitting at an open table. If I can't show up on the appropriate night and play a game without negotiation it's a major flaw.
I mean, you have to arrange D&D games ahead. Is that an awful game?
Think of 40k more like D&D and less like Xwing. It isn't Xwing, as you astutely pointed out.
If I wanted to play D&D, I'd play D&D. D&D has a GM. 40K has no GM. They aren't comparable.
40k had a GM, and arguably campaigns require (well "require" is too strong a word, more like "are enhanced by") a GM. Still, the point is that 40k lives much closer on the spectrum to D&D than other tabletop games like Warmachine or X-Wing or Infinity. It is a competition by virtue of having a "winner" and a "loser" but the Warhammer games are poised to be much more of a social thing beyond "just" a game. Like for example, I go to play Warmachine and while I know the fluff, I really am not interested in how the fluff encapsulates our battle. I don't care why Kommander Sorscha is leading an attack on High Exemplar Kreoss, or the narrative surrounding why my Khador army is in this particular area, or why the terrain is the way it is. if I played X-Wing I would not really care about where in the universe this battle is taking place, or why Luke Skywalker is is my force or why Boba Fett is in this battle. It's "just" a game, a tactical exercise. On the flipside, Warhammer I get more interested in the hows and whys; I want to know why we are fighting this battle, why my general brought this particular force, why the terrain is set up in the way it is. Warhammer exists in a different format than the other games, although they are certainly related.
The underlying issue here is approaching Warhammer as "just a game".
Unit1126PLL wrote: I mean, you have to arrange D&D games ahead. Is that an awful game?
No, it's not an awful game for that reason (it's an awful game in general though), but having to arrange everything in advance and keep a group together for a long period of time is one of the main reasons I don't play D&D. They also aren't really comparable things. You have to arrange a D&D game in advance primarily because you need more than two players, and if you're playing an extended campaign instead of a one-shot adventure you need those same players to be there on a regular schedule. 40k, as a two-player "line up your armies and fight" wargame, doesn't have this requirement. So there's no excuse for having to arrange games in advance.
Think of 40k more like D&D and less like Xwing. It isn't Xwing, as you astutely pointed out.
40k is not like D&D at all. D&D is a cooperative game with a single DM running everything for the PCs, where the goal is to work together to create a story. 40k can be played this way, but the standard game is a zero-sum wargame with opposing armies fighting single missions from a standard set of scenarios. The only difference between X-Wing and 40k is that X-Wing is made by relatively competent game designers and functions "out of the box", while 40k is garbage published by incompetent authors who would be fired from any other company.
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WayneTheGame wrote: Like for example, I go to play Warmachine and while I know the fluff, I really am not interested in how the fluff encapsulates our battle. I don't care why Kommander Sorscha is leading an attack on High Exemplar Kreoss, or the narrative surrounding why my Khador army is in this particular area, or why the terrain is the way it is. if I played X-Wing I would not really care about where in the universe this battle is taking place, or why Luke Skywalker is is my force or why Boba Fett is in this battle. It's "just" a game, a tactical exercise. On the flipside, Warhammer I get more interested in the hows and whys; I want to know why we are fighting this battle, why my general brought this particular force, why the terrain is set up in the way it is. Warhammer exists in a different format than the other games, although they are certainly related.
This is about your preferences in fluff, not the rules of any of those games. The fact that you find the fluff of WM/H or X-Wing to be boring and not worthy of your time doesn't mean that the fluff doesn't exist. Both of those games can have just as much of a story behind them as 40k if you want.
How does 40k live closer to D&D than other wargames? What about it is particularly RPG like or narrative focused? Why do you not care about the fluff/background of your force for other games but magically care about 40k?
As far as I can tell, there is nothing about 40k that is narrative driven or lends itself to that style of gaming. Quite simply, it doesn't do anything well, and its equally flawed an argument to say people approach the game wrong towards competitive players as it is to say narrative players are approaching wrong.
An unbalanced, poorly written mess with no built in campaign rules or similar does not a narrative game make.
Blacksails wrote: How does 40k live closer to D&D than other wargames? What about it is particularly RPG like or narrative focused? Why do you not care about the fluff/background of your force for other games but magically care about 40k?
As far as I can tell, there is nothing about 40k that is narrative driven or lends itself to that style of gaming. Quite simply, it doesn't do anything well, and its equally flawed an argument to say people approach the game wrong towards competitive players as it is to say narrative players are approaching wrong.
An unbalanced, poorly written mess with no built in campaign rules or similar does not a narrative game make.
But it must be good at something, because I really love GW! It isn't a good competitive game so that means it must be a great narrative game!
Now I do agree 100% GW does not do nearly enough to actually encourage narrative gaming. Where is my GW-ified version of Featherstone's Wargaming Campaigns or Tony Bath's Ancient Wargaming?
Martel732 wrote: I don't really care about the fluff at all, because it clearly can't be reproduced on the table top. So what does it matter to me at all?
This is actually true and a large reason why I prefer the 40kRPGs.
Martel732 wrote: I don't really care about the fluff at all, because it clearly can't be reproduced on the table top. So what does it matter to me at all?
110% agree with Martel here, there is so little point to the fluff these days as almost noone cares about it. "Riptides are rare and experimental? Okay, ill take three and put me down for two of those almost unheard of Stormsurges too". this issue is further compounded by the fluff constantly changing to suit GW's needs (continuing with the aforementioned example, what happened to the Tau not building titan scale suits because they where inefficient and prone to mishaps?) to sell new and shiny kits.
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Blacksails wrote: How does 40k live closer to D&D than other wargames? What about it is particularly RPG like or narrative focused? Why do you not care about the fluff/background of your force for other games but magically care about 40k?
It dosnt. Please do not compare the mess that is 40K to DND.
As far as I can tell, there is nothing about 40k that is narrative driven or lends itself to that style of gaming. Quite simply, it doesn't do anything well, and its equally flawed an argument to say people approach the game wrong towards competitive players as it is to say narrative players are approaching wrong.
Exactly. 40K is basically about bringing the biggest, nastiest units that you can and then clubbing your hapless opponents to death with them.
An unbalanced, poorly written mess with no built in campaign rules or similar does not a narrative game make.
Fully agree. Half the rules make no sense or interact poorly with others and the other half are open to discussion.
If Riptides were 0-1 per 1500 pts and Stormsurges 0-1 per 3000 pts, I'd be totally fine with them. But nope, that skirmish over there has five super rare suits with no support units! Totally.
On the flip side, none of the BA stories of glory work out on the table top at all. It's just one curb stomping after another.
Martel732 wrote: I don't really care about the fluff at all, because it clearly can't be reproduced on the table top. So what does it matter to me at all?
This is actually true and a large reason why I prefer the 40kRPGs.
This is precisely the reason I see people turn to 40k and want it to be more "fluffy".
They want to recreate the epic moments in the stories.
I always felt it is a failure of the author or the rules makers if the character's capabilities are not somewhat similar in the story and tabletop.
If a primarch can lift a tank and throw it, then he should be able to do the same as an IK with the power-glove (whatever that rule is, cannot remember).
I guess it is just too much to ask to apply reasonable point values or to limit special rules or psycher abilities applied to units they have no business influencing.
Martel732 wrote: If Riptides were 0-1 per 1500 pts and Stormsurges 0-1 per 3000 pts, I'd be totally fine with them. But nope, that skirmish over there has five super rare suits with no support units! Totally.
"Butbutbut its mah supa secret army made up of supa units for supa special missions, its totally fluffy!"[/smarmygit]
And then some people at my club wonder, after seeing both of the Tau players deploying triptide and dual stormsurge lists in games as low as 1500, why I consider many players there to be slightly powergamerish.
On the flip side, none of the BA stories of glory work out on the table top at all. It's just one curb stomping after another.
Eh, its the same for the Guard, remember those stories where Leman Russ are capable tanks, like that one where an entire company got dropped on the wrong side of the enemy lines and fought their way back to safety (Gunheads)? Well, try telling a Leman Russ in the game that!
Interestingly, if they only added an additional point of rear armor to all Russ hulls, they'd be exponentially better. Standard AV 11 and the current AV 11s get AV 12. With the grenade nerf, those vehicles require a real melee investment to destroy. I'd add old school 2nd ed targeters back too to make standards Russes BS 4.
Without Str D, it's actually pretty challenging to shoot a Russ to death at range.
Martel732 wrote: If Riptides were 0-1 per 1500 pts and Stormsurges 0-1 per 3000 pts, I'd be totally fine with them. But nope, that skirmish over there has five super rare suits with no support units! Totally.
"Butbutbut its mah supa secret army made up of supa units for supa special missions, its totally fluffy!"[/smarmygit]
And then some people at my club wonder, after seeing both of the Tau players deploying triptide and dual stormsurge lists in games as low as 1500, why I consider many players there to be slightly powergamerish.
You'll play just one game with such an army. Then both, neither you nor your opponents want to play with resp. against this army. I had this several times.
Martel732 wrote: If Riptides were 0-1 per 1500 pts and Stormsurges 0-1 per 3000 pts, I'd be totally fine with them. But nope, that skirmish over there has five super rare suits with no support units! Totally.
"Butbutbut its mah supa secret army made up of supa units for supa special missions, its totally fluffy!"[/smarmygit]
And then some people at my club wonder, after seeing both of the Tau players deploying triptide and dual stormsurge lists in games as low as 1500, why I consider many players there to be slightly powergamerish.
You'll play just one game with such an army. Then both, neither you nor your opponents want to play with resp. against this army. I had this several times.
they get multiple games - that said, they are not the worst offenders for power armies. One can only shudder at the thought of one of our Eldar players armies.
I will say part of the biggest issue with GW's lack of balance is that it punishes people who have a cool idea that happens to be the overpowered army at a particular time, and at the same token punishes someone with an idea that happens to use an underpowered army at a given time. E.g. the person who loves Terminators gets screwed, and the person who likes jetbikes or big stompy robots gets rewarded for no apparent reason.
However, I do notice that most gaming communities have that one person who always seems to be a jerk to everyone, like everything they say or do comes off in a bad way, but they are like well known to everyone at the game store so are a permanent fixture that can't be gotten rid of. That can be devastating to a community when the person is also the competitive WAACTFG type of guy because they will always get preferential treatment.
Unit1126PLL wrote: You don't have to use Facebook to pre-arrange games. My group in State College used Meetup, you could use Google Hangouts, or you could use Dakkadakka! Just start a thread in the Find a Game forum. If you only have a couple of saturdays a month to plan, then you can use the other 26-29 days in the month to figure something out!
It would literally take less effort than typing the post you just typed. XD
"You don't have to use social media to arrange a game, you just have to use social media to do it" is hardly a convincing reply. You shouldn't have to do any of that to arrange a game. If I want to play a game of X-Wing I don't go on social media and negotiate what kind of game I want to play, I just show up on X-Wing night and say "hey, want to play" to whoever is sitting at an open table. If I can't show up on the appropriate night and play a game without negotiation it's a major flaw.
I mean, you have to arrange D&D games ahead. Is that an awful game?
Think of 40k more like D&D and less like Xwing. It isn't Xwing, as you astutely pointed out.
Really? 40k is a whole lot closer to x-wing then it is to D&D. I know about D&D, I've been playing D&D since the mid 80s. While I would certainly go to the local shop to find players for a D&D game, or to find a campaign to become a part of, I would never show up there with a character (or a bunch of characters) looking to just jump into a game for 1 session....I'm not a fan of one-offs to start and that's not the way an RPG works. Here's the thing, 40K is NOT an RPG, 40K is a wargame, as x-wing is a wargame. If you're going to your LGS for a game of 40K, unless you're meeting people from your gaming club there (which I don't have as my RPG group has literally no desire to play wargames of any type), the idea is to play a game against another person, your force against theirs, using the rules of the game to have a fair competition. This is the difference: in the vast majority of cases, D&D sessions - and even campaigns - do not end with a winner and a loser, they are designed to continue so your character can learn and grow. 40K, for the most part, is run in individual games in which one side comes out on top of the other in the competition; the rules SHOULD be designed to allow as fair a game as possible. They are not; I understand they are not, I accept that they are not - but I am not forced to like it, I am not forced to not want something better, even while working with the mess that we have
However, GW seems to want 40k games to be more than go to the shop, play a game, and leave with barely any social interaction with your opponent, the equivalent to your "show up with a character for 1 session".
Unit1126PLL wrote: You don't have to use Facebook to pre-arrange games. My group in State College used Meetup, you could use Google Hangouts, or you could use Dakkadakka! Just start a thread in the Find a Game forum. If you only have a couple of saturdays a month to plan, then you can use the other 26-29 days in the month to figure something out!
It would literally take less effort than typing the post you just typed. XD
"You don't have to use social media to arrange a game, you just have to use social media to do it" is hardly a convincing reply. You shouldn't have to do any of that to arrange a game. If I want to play a game of X-Wing I don't go on social media and negotiate what kind of game I want to play, I just show up on X-Wing night and say "hey, want to play" to whoever is sitting at an open table. If I can't show up on the appropriate night and play a game without negotiation it's a major flaw.
I mean, you have to arrange D&D games ahead. Is that an awful game?
Think of 40k more like D&D and less like Xwing. It isn't Xwing, as you astutely pointed out.
This. There are a lot of games where you can just show up on the dedicated game night at local game shop and say hey want to play to whoever else is there. Warhammer is not conducive to that style of play, and trying to shoehorn it in is the root of most of these things. I am perfectly content with doing the above for Warmachine which is or was the other game I played. If I played X-Wing or Infinity or any of the other game that are better suited to that approach I would have no problem doing it with them either. But I do not believe that Warhammer is intended or built around or even adequately set up for that sort of thing where you just turn up and ask whoever else is there for a game with little or no other discussion.
The default assumption for Warhammer seems to be that you are part of a gaming Club and while you may have a set day that you meet it's more of a social Gathering that involves playing a game then going specifically for the purpose of the game like you or hypothetical x wing night at the game shop. It's much more like getting together to play D&D where it's an all day Affair and you're going to socialize and talk with your buddies just as much if not more than actually play the game. When I used to play D&D we would spend maybe half the day chatting and eating before we even started to play and we would talk about things we did or things we might want to do it the game or some cool book that's coming out things like that it wasn't it's D&D night let's dive in and start playing.
That's where I feel the disconnect is. GW is wanting/thinking that you're in a social group where Warhammer is your equivalent to bridge or whatever (in fact, I always think of like the Reform Club in Around the World in 80 Days, but with Warhammer instead of whist.), where it's mainly a social venue with a medium that everyone enjoys, rather than a "game" that you simply play for the sake of it being a game. Which makes sense really since it's rooted in the old British "wargaming club" from the days of Bath and Featherstone. The whole "go down to the game shop and see who else turns up" is largely an American thing because we have woefully few actual wargames clubs.
You're missing the whole part of what a lot of people are saying on here; we understand how 40k is designed......we just feel it's a pretty poor way to design a game and that's what we are voicing. We're not debating what 40K is, we're stating the way the rules are designed do not fit the type of game that it presents itself to be and, quite frankly, the way a lot of players (at least where I am) consider the game to be.
Automatically Appended Next Post: And yes, I could quit the game and start another game. I choose not to because I do enjoy the background of 40K and I love my models and, quite frankly, I have a lot of money invested in it. I have actually started playing X-Wing simply because the player pool on 40K is so slim (and I've always loved Star Wars). I am not going to quit 40K, and I do try to make it work, but I don't feel that any game should require the kind of effort 40K does.
Fenrir Kitsune wrote: As I said, people obstacles in the way becuase they don't see past them. "No it's too difficult for a myriad of reasons I'm putting down"
Exactly. I can play other games without all of this ridiculous pre-game negotiation and amateur game design, so I've mostly moved on from 40k. You can criticize people all you like for not being stubbornly dedicated to 40k and overcoming the major problems with the game, but that doesn't change the fact that these obstacles shouldn't exist and don't exist in good games. 40k is still a terrible game even if you house rule your own version of it.
Fenrir Kitsune wrote: As I said, people obstacles in the way becuase they don't see past them. "No it's too difficult for a myriad of reasons I'm putting down"
Exactly. I can play other games without all of this ridiculous pre-game negotiation and amateur game design, so I've mostly moved on from 40k. You can criticize people all you like for not being stubbornly dedicated to 40k and overcoming the major problems with the game, but that doesn't change the fact that these obstacles shouldn't exist and don't exist in good games. 40k is still a terrible game even if you house rule your own version of it.
I think this is a mature response. If you don't like the 'style' of 40k, which requires much pre-game negotiation like D&D, then 'mostly moving on' is a good idea. 40k's not for you, I fear.
And saying that it isn't like D&D and is more like X-wing is patently false. It requires pre-game negotiation and is awful for pick-up games. This is fact. Trying to shoehorn 40k into a pick-up game is going to end in tears for someone or another; it's simply not possible.
And some of us like it that way; I don't play many other table-top games because they sacrifice so much on the altar of 'balance' and 'playability.' I like 40k as it is, and that's okay. It's also okay to not like it. What's not okay is to fundamentally misunderstand the nature of the game and then complain when it doesn't work the way you ask it to, then when the nature of the game is apparent, tell everyone (even the people who enjoy it as it is) that it should be different and if you like it you're dumb.
Fenrir Kitsune wrote: As I said, people obstacles in the way becuase they don't see past them. "No it's too difficult for a myriad of reasons I'm putting down"
Exactly. I can play other games without all of this ridiculous pre-game negotiation and amateur game design, so I've mostly moved on from 40k. You can criticize people all you like for not being stubbornly dedicated to 40k and overcoming the major problems with the game, but that doesn't change the fact that these obstacles shouldn't exist and don't exist in good games. 40k is still a terrible game even if you house rule your own version of it.
I think this is a mature response. If you don't like the 'style' of 40k, which requires much pre-game negotiation like D&D, then 'mostly moving on' is a good idea. 40k's not for you, I fear.
And saying that it isn't like D&D and is more like X-wing is patently false. It requires pre-game negotiation and is awful for pick-up games. This is fact. Trying to shoehorn 40k into a pick-up game is going to end in tears for someone or another; it's simply not possible.
And some of us like it that way; I don't play many other table-top games because they sacrifice so much on the altar of 'balance' and 'playability.' I like 40k as it is, and that's okay. It's also okay to not like it. What's not okay is to fundamentally misunderstand the nature of the game and then complain when it doesn't work the way you ask it to, then when the nature of the game is apparent, tell everyone (even the people who enjoy it as it is) that it should be different and if you like it you're dumb.
Agree with this. There are much better games suited to tournament style and "cutthroat" competitive play where you are trying to one-up your opponent with your list or on the battlefield. 40k is not that game, and even when it could reasonably have been used as that game it wasn't all that great (just back in those days there were less popular alternatives). Now, I do not think 40k requires as much pre-game negoation as D&D (nothing quite does, but then again I've spent entire "sessions" discussing what type of campaign we should play, and then having to actually put off the first real session until the following time we met ) but it does require more than just "[You] Hey Bob want a game? [Bob] Sure! [You] Awesome, 1500 points sound good? [Bob] 1500 works, let me quickly grab a list" upon entering the game shop and seeing someone else there with their 40k stuff. It absolutely requires more than that, at the very least just a quick "What seems fair but fun for us both?" type of discussion, and at best actual narrative talk to make the game something more than just a one-off game that means nothing.
I honestly do not get why this concept is so hard to understand. If I want a cutthroat or "serious" competitive game, I would not choose 40k (in fact that's why I picked up Warmachine and why I haven't sold my Warmachine stuff yet, that is my go-to game for when I want a "serious" game), but I like 40k because of the breadth and depth of the background material and for the fact that it does allow that sort of customization levels. I don't mind "negotiating" with my opponent, but then again I am one of those Warhammer players who, while I don't want to always lose, I also strongly want to adhere to the "spirit of the game" that GW so often brought up in days of yore and keep my armies as close to the background and theme for the army as possible.
I don't think "cutthroat and competitive" games exist, the way I don't believe "casual" games to exist either.
You have well designed games, with tight, well balanced and tested rulesets, and poorly designed games like 40k.
The fact that you enjoy something doesn't mean it has to be a good thing. Guilty pleasure was invented for a reason. 40k is at its best a guilty pleasure. It's not a good game, nor for competitive nor for casual play.
I enjoy 40k when playing in a specific environment. I've had many hours of fun out of 40k. That doesn't make it a good game, not even close.
Unit1126PLL wrote: And saying that it isn't like D&D and is more like X-wing is patently false. It requires pre-game negotiation and is awful for pick-up games. This is fact. Trying to shoehorn 40k into a pick-up game is going to end in tears for someone or another; it's simply not possible.
But it shouldn't require pre-game negotiation. D&D requires pre-game work because of the inherent structure of the game. You have to coordinate 5+ people for several hours of playing at a time, do all of the pre-game world building as the DM, etc. Even the best possible RPG rules will still require this. With 40k, on the other hand, the pre-game work exists only because the rules are terrible. There is nothing inherent about the structure of a two-player miniatures game that requires anything more than agreeing on a point level and starting the game. 40k could work just like X-Wing if GW wasn't lazy and/or incompetent.
And some of us like it that way; I don't play many other table-top games because they sacrifice so much on the altar of 'balance' and 'playability.'
40k's flaws in balance and playability do not add anything to the game. They are flaws, not design choices.
Aye, there's a difference between everything being bland and the same for "balance", and 40k's brokenness. You can have wildly varying capabilities and unit functionality and still have relatively good balance, but 40k doesn't even try.
Well, I enjoy playing superheavy tank companies. I don't see how my army could be inherently balanced against, say, a player who wants to model their guard army on the Human Wave without making things more bland. So the fact that both co-exist in the rules either means the game requires pre-negotiation or one of us is going to be unhappy.
Unit1126PLL wrote: Well, I enjoy playing superheavy tank companies. I don't see how my army could be inherently balanced against, say, a player who wants to model their guard army on the Human Wave without making things more bland. So the fact that both co-exist in the rules either means the game requires pre-negotiation or one of us is going to be unhappy.
No, that's not true at all. It can't be balanced under the current rules because superheavies are invulnerable bricks of HP that fight at full effectiveness until they lose their last HP and can score objectives as well as any infantry unit. A more reasonable system where superheavies could be damaged and had point costs that reflect their actual power could work just fine. The superheavy company would have raw firepower, the human wave army would have mass bodies (with mass anti-tank weapons) and vastly better objective scoring ability. It's just like how in X-Wing, for example, a TIE swarm and a list with nothing but elite aces can be balanced just fine against each other and the game will be fun for both players.
And then there's also the fact that your example doesn't work with pre-negotiation either. You can't both play the army you want, so what exactly are you going to negotiate? That you both play "normal" armies with a diverse range of units instead of spamming a single unit? Great, now you're both playing the kind of armies that work fine in a balanced competitive game and there's no need for negotiation.
Unit1126PLL wrote: Well, I enjoy playing superheavy tank companies. I don't see how my army could be inherently balanced against, say, a player who wants to model their guard army on the Human Wave without making things more bland. So the fact that both co-exist in the rules either means the game requires pre-negotiation or one of us is going to be unhappy.
No, that's not true at all. It can't be balanced under the current rules because superheavies are invulnerable bricks of HP that fight at full effectiveness until they lose their last HP and can score objectives as well as any infantry unit. A more reasonable system where superheavies could be damaged and had point costs that reflect their actual power could work just fine. The superheavy company would have raw firepower, the human wave army would have mass bodies (with mass anti-tank weapons) and vastly better objective scoring ability. It's just like how in X-Wing, for example, a TIE swarm and a list with nothing but elite aces can be balanced just fine against each other and the game will be fun for both players.
And then there's also the fact that your example doesn't work with pre-negotiation either. You can't both play the army you want, so what exactly are you going to negotiate? That you both play "normal" armies with a diverse range of units instead of spamming a single unit? Great, now you're both playing the kind of armies that work fine in a balanced competitive game and there's no need for negotiation.
Superheavies have been damage-able in the past and they weren't anymore 'balanced' for regular games. I mean heck, how does the superheavy company compete with the all-aircraft army?
And yes, it does. Both sides go into the game knowing what to expect - the side with the human wave army expects to lose, and that's fine with them. Conversely, if I'm playing against drop melta spam, I can safely expect my baneblade company to lose. And that's fine with me, too.
Automatically Appended Next Post: Also, in your system, how are superheavies any different than regular tanks except 'bigguh'
NO WAY YOU WIN is knd of a new motto by now...
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or else I stick to forth ed, with tweaks.
