Is it just me, or has the online 40k community become significantly less... childish, than it used to be?
Remember in 5th Edition, when everyone and their granny had a 40k blog through which they dispensed list-building advice to the masses?
Remember how the advice tended to differ only slightly from blog to blog - one dude would recommend an exra Long Fang per Pack while another recommended an extra Razorback - yet the factions which coalesced around these bloggers would shred each other verbally in every Dakka thread and article's comment section?
Remember when certain 40k news aggregators pretended to be above all the petty drama by engaging in said drama only from a different angle?
BBAP remembers.
None of this seems to occur anymore. You get the odd crank here and there, but none of the screeching nerd cat-fights you used to see. I think we desrve a collective pat on the back for that.
i have noted a perceptible madurity in the warhammer community at least in spain. 10-15 years ago the drama, the discussion, and the ragequits from tournaments was absolutely common. TFG ran rampant everywhere.
But now? Hell. You have some tables calling the judgues, and some discussions, but the drama as reduced to nearly 0. I have gone to 64-128 person tournaments that had 0 big problems, and in general the community is very healthy.
Haven't been to any events in 18 months or so so I can't speak for that side of things, but it's always great to go to a thing and not have to deal with TFG. Hope it's like that over here too.
Men in their 30s and 40s, and in some cases 50s, howling at each other about who was the best at the sci fi plastic toy soldiers game. There were even some IRL grudge matches if I recall correctly. Really good advertisement for the hobby.
BBAP wrote: Haven't been to any events in 18 months or so so I can't speak for that side of things, but it's always great to go to a thing and not have to deal with TFG. Hope it's like that over here too.
Men in their 30s and 40s, and in some cases 50s, howling at each other about who was the best at the sci fi plastic toy soldiers game. There were even some IRL grudge matches if I recall correctly. Really good advertisement for the hobby.
If you can't enjoy that kinda infighting, you really can't enjoy any hobby I think.
Drama is still around in the 40k community. I think the last I saw was some 'Pick Up Artist' having his wife e-beg to buy a Necron titan, and when their obsurdity was met with scoffs- well, the reaction was what you'd expect.
I just avoid the drama. All tabletop gaming is fully of whiny, entitled, and sometimes psychotic geeks and it's best to step back and let them cannibalize one another.
If you're looking online what I think you are seeing is that a lot of new people, esp younger ones, are heading to Facebook or possibly Reddit and traditional forums are running on a much smaller population. So its not so much the childishness isn't there its just moved somewhere else.
There are very few new forums that are of any great size, so those that have remained tend to have mods that have weeded out most of the bad behaviour over time - plus with a massive drop in getting new members there's fewer joining who are potential trouble makers.
Another aspect is as you get more mature and experienced you learn to filter out some of the drama. Someone ranting and raving about a new Battletome or Codex you just tend to overlook rather than get stuck in because you've seen it 10 times before and its old news.
I can remember when I joined this forum. The ass-hattery and rudeness was so bad that I had to block several people straight off the bat. These days things seem a lot more calm and polite on here, which is nice. It's a much better community than I've seen elsewhere online.
Watching the LVO stream, there was a pretty bad-blooded moment between a Tau and an Admech player, game 6. By the end they'd calmed down and hugged at the finish.
That kind of good sportsmanship has a positive knock-on effect. Conversely I think the more transparent the game & touraments become, the more the community can police bad behaviour. the net effect of these two things is a shift in norms - I think the game & its community is heading in a great direction.
The internet wasn't a thing back when I used to play RT!
One thing I have noticed since getting back into the hobby is that the overwhelmingly negative comments about the game on Dakka don't seem to be reflected in the wider community, certainly not in my local gaming group anyway. They just seem to get on with playing and enjoying the game...
I'm not sure about Drama, but the negativity hasn't gone anywhere. Most people hang out with people who think similarly to themselves, so those that are overwhelmingly negative will typically stick within their own groups.
Yet put in money in line as some tournaments put in the misguided idea of using 40k as some sort of "sport" when it's about least suitable game in the world for that and you have cheating and TFG behaviour aplenty as has been seen thorough 8th ed.
As money prizes has been going up so has cheating and TFG'ing.
Overread wrote: If you're looking online what I think you are seeing is that a lot of new people, esp younger ones, are heading to Facebook or possibly Reddit and traditional forums are running on a much smaller population. So its not so much the childishness isn't there its just moved somewhere else.
There are very few new forums that are of any great size, so those that have remained tend to have mods that have weeded out most of the bad behaviour over time - plus with a massive drop in getting new members there's fewer joining who are potential trouble makers.
Another aspect is as you get more mature and experienced you learn to filter out some of the drama. Someone ranting and raving about a new Battletome or Codex you just tend to overlook rather than get stuck in because you've seen it 10 times before and its old news.
This, go check out some of the Facebook groups, drama is alive and well there. Plus we still have the odd folk here and there on this site, usually they only get bad when you bring up a contentious topic though.
BBAP wrote: Is it just me, or has the online 40k community become significantly less... childish, than it used to be?
Remember in 5th Edition, when everyone and their granny had a 40k blog through which they dispensed list-building advice to the masses?
Remember how the advice tended to differ only slightly from blog to blog - one dude would recommend an exra Long Fang per Pack while another recommended an extra Razorback - yet the factions which coalesced around these bloggers would shred each other verbally in every Dakka thread and article's comment section?
Remember when certain 40k news aggregators pretended to be above all the petty drama by engaging in said drama only from a different angle?
BBAP remembers.
None of this seems to occur anymore. You get the odd crank here and there, but none of the screeching nerd cat-fights you used to see. I think we desrve a collective pat on the back for that.
The drama is still there, it's just not quite as front and center.
GW actually controls their messaging now, so it's not left to random internet people to control it. They have community outreach stuff, active engagement, and their own sites. We don't have everything going through BoLS or a couple rumormongers on Warseer. Tournaments are much more professional and organized affairs in many cases and it makes it harder for TFG's to run amok quite as easily (though obviously this is still possible). The game is also in such a constant state of flux with so much more stuff and kinds of play and different tournament standards that it's hard to nail everything down quite as much as was possible under say, 4th or 5th edition and we don't end up having 8 months to "solve" the game between Codex releases with only 5 different basic Rulebook missions to play. The game and community has also cycled through a number of extremely toxic personalities that no longer appear to engage with the hobby anymore. There's also just a lot more tabletop stuff out there, so people have more choices if they just don't like 40k.
I think there's also something to be said for the fact that 40k is a lot more expensive to get into than it used to be (and it was *never* cheap). At the end of 4E and start of 5E Guardsmen came 20 to a box for $35, a Codex was $20, Russ Tanks were $40 and came with the Vehicle Accessory Sprue, and a Cadian Battleforce with a Russ tank, twenty guardsmen and 3 Heavy Weapons teams was $90. Adjusting that for inflation, Guardsmen should be $43.4 for 20 ($21.7 for 10), a Codex should be $25, Russ Tanks should be and a Battleforce should be $111.60. Now Guardsmen are 10 to a box for $30, a Codex is $50, Russ Tanks are $50 (which tracks right with inflation...but now the vehicle accessory sprue is an extra $15) and the $90 Battleforce gets you only 10 Guardsmen with and a Commissar and a Russ tank (or only about $65 worth of stuff by the inflation-adjusted value of 4E/5E prices). In real terms, the hobby is just dramatically more expensive to get into than it used to be, usually by about 33-50%, and that does put some selection pressure on the kinds of people likely to get into the hobby in the first place.
Ginjitzu wrote: Anyone remember the official GW forum on their website? By the Emperor, what a hell that was. The Warp itself would be tame in comparison.
The one where you got banned for mentioning Squats? I didn't hang around much before it died but... yeah.
Ginjitzu wrote: Anyone remember the official GW forum on their website? By the Emperor, what a hell that was. The Warp itself would be tame in comparison.
To be fair, the worst part about it was the site itself. The format they had was horrific to try and sort through and read, I think half angst came from trying to navigate it
That came down what, end of 2006? Twas a very different online world back then
People who appear to enjoy gaming in general seem to be in charge of GW again.
All the "rage" was caused by those in power deciding what was "good" in a vacuum ignoring their customer-base.
People tend to escalate when something they love appears to be pee'ed-on by those only interested in money without the effort to engage the source of the money.
We have pretty good rules.
Cleaning those up go a long way in reducing TFG behaviour by removing grey areas.
The models and factions are all good to see and had been requested through the ages.
Updates are fairly quick and they even implemented the "Chapter Approved" which was also published around 3rd edition which was in happier times.
Community Drama is less because we are largely getting what we want: a fun hobby experience with minimal confusion.
I would really like to see alternating unit activation and a wee bit less determined by dice-rolls and I would be "content".
Talizvar raises a good point; also GW is communicating with us (in the extreme we get a daily bit of news or community article EVERY day now it seems). Another big issue in the dark days was that GW would do stuff without telling much until release day. There was very little to no pre-release info which, of course, led to people going in circles debating/arguing about what might come.
Plus those who met with no codex over and over soon got to worrying that their army was to be squatted and that makes people highly strung and worried and annoyed.
Even without GW's faster turn around periods now the communication ease a lot of contention (for the most part when it goes right) and also gives a good solid air that GW is listening to its customers.
Kirby was famous for saying he never needed community feedback or market research to know what the market wanted. And to be fair when he came into his position GW wasn't in the best of places and likely did need to take a more closed management approach to get things back on track - and they did. I feel, however that what he set in motion didn't change nor adapt to a changing situation and that if he was using business theory it was from other markets. Wargamers are odd in the modern world - we don't buy products that recycle fast; we expect 10 or more years support; we actually require improved product (material/design/details/style) to make us upgrade etc....
I will say something though, being involved in one way or another in this hobby since 1996 (so 2nd edition 40k).
To use a real-world analogy, I see Warhammer as having 3 "eras":
1) The Golden Age, similar to the height of the Roman Empire before the Dark Ages. This was the 2nd edition days up until probably around 4th edition when they began to ignore criticism, lash out at independent retailers and kill their own games for "competing" with their main 2 games.
2) The Dark Ages: This would be the "Kirby Era" of no communication, treating customers like dirt and coming close to the precipice of going the way of TSR. This also represents the era of "We're a model company, not a game company" as an excuse despite that being objectively false.
3) The Middle Ages: This would be the current age. GW is active again with the community instead of ignoring it and issuing the word of God from the Ivory Tower, the rules are in an overall good place (certain issues notwithstanding) and in general an infinite improvement over the dark ages.
Now to me, while I 100% agree that the way 40k is now is a lot better than how it was in the decline, it is IMHO a pale imitation of the real golden age. In the golden age, GW had passionate and knowledgeable designers (e.g. Andy Chambers, Alessio Cavatore, Rick Priestly himself). People who genuinely had an interest in making a solid game with great models, rather than pretty models with something resembling a game built around them. They engaged with the community, they supported independent stores more (does anyone remember the Outriders?) and overall things were pretty damn good.
That's how I see it now. This is imitating the glory days, but not actually coming close to them. And IMHO the biggest thing I find lacking is passion. None of the current crop of designers (who, other than Jervis I'm pretty sure all came on board during the Dark Ages) see to be really passionate about the game; sure you sometimes get a well-written codex but a lot of them just feel phoned in and designed by someone (or multiple people) who really can't get "into" the faction enough to really make them play correctly, while in the golden age it felt like all the designers really wanted each army to be as good as it could be.
This is, incidentally, a big reason why the Chaos 3.5 codex was so good and IMHO the single best codex GW ever put out, despite its flaws; it was written by someone who legitimately played Chaos as their primary army and played against Chaos for many years (Pete Hiaines being a friend of Andy Chambers') and really wanted to have them look and work great. For all of is flaws that book showed real passion in designing it that you rarely, if ever, see anymore.
So yes, 40k is better now that it has been the last several years, perhaps even close to the last decade. But for those of us who remember the real glory days, we can see through what they're doing now and see how it's just an attempt to regain the days of old. It's a pale imitation of what the real golden age was. Perhaps unironically exactly like the Imperium itself.
BBAP wrote: None of this seems to occur anymore. You get the odd crank here and there, but none of the screeching nerd cat-fights you used to see. I think we desrve a collective pat on the back for that.
It's Monday morning after the biggest tournament of the year, give it time to fester and become truly toxic.
Interestingly in contrance to many users views, I find reading Dakka keeps me informed, but ultimately puts me right off the hobby. Every thread is full of negativity, I mean my god am I sick of people hearing about Knight Castellans or Eldar Soup.
If I got to actually play in a local event [a rare event in itself.] everyone seems lovely I have an amazing time, make new friends and have some really solid games of warhammer. The difference is quite stark.
Thank the MODs in this forum. They weed out 120% of the unnecessary, childish banters so we can go on and live our lives talking about what matters - RAW vs. RAI.
It feels to me like there’s less ego floating around in general. Peeps are mostly left to enjoy their hobby their way.
There are still some elements I wish we didn’t have, but that’s likely more opinion than anything approaching fact.
Example? Without explicitly mentioning names, there was once a tournament group that described themselves as ‘elite’ 40k gamers. They really did consider themselves above mere plebs, and weren’t much fun to interact with online.
What happened to them? DFKDFC. But I’ve not seen hide nor hair of them for yonks. So I’m guessing they either consumed themselves, or grew older and chilled out a bit. Either way, their absence isn’t necessarily unwelcome.
Looking at the tournament threads that are front and centre of the forum currently I'd say passive aggressive childish unpleasantness is still very much a dominant personality type!
I will say something though, being involved in one way or another in this hobby since 1996 (so 2nd edition 40k).
To use a real-world analogy, I see Warhammer as having 3 "eras":
1) The Golden Age, similar to the height of the Roman Empire before the Dark Ages. This was the 2nd edition days up until probably around 4th edition when they began to ignore criticism, lash out at independent retailers and kill their own games for "competing" with their main 2 games.
2) The Dark Ages: This would be the "Kirby Era" of no communication, treating customers like dirt and coming close to the precipice of going the way of TSR. This also represents the era of "We're a model company, not a game company"
as an excuse despite that being objectively false.
3) The Middle Ages: This would be the current age. GW is active again with the community instead of ignoring it and issuing the word of God from the Ivory Tower, the rules are in an overall good place (certain issues notwithstanding) and in general an infinite improvement over the dark ages.
Now to me, while I 100% agree that the way 40k is now is a lot better than how it was in the decline, it is IMHO a pale imitation of the real golden age. In the golden age, GW had passionate and knowledgeable designers (e.g. Andy Chambers, Alessio Cavatore, Rick Priestly himself). People who genuinely had an interest in making a solid game with great models, rather than pretty models with something resembling a game built around them. They engaged with the community, they supported independent stores more (does anyone remember the Outriders?) and overall things were pretty damn good.
That's how I see it now. This is imitating the glory days, but not actually coming close to them. And IMHO the biggest thing I find lacking is passion. None of the current crop of designers (who, other than Jervis I'm pretty sure all came on board during the Dark Ages) see to be really passionate about the game; sure you sometimes get a well-written codex but a lot of them just feel phoned in and designed by someone (or multiple people) who really can't get "into" the faction enough to really make them play correctly, while in the golden age it felt like all the designers really wanted each army to be as good as it could be.
This is, incidentally, a big reason why the Chaos 3.5 codex was so good and IMHO the single best codex GW ever put out, despite its flaws; it was written by someone who legitimately played Chaos as their primary army and played against Chaos for many years (Pete Hiaines being a friend of Andy Chambers') and really wanted to have them look and work great. For all of is flaws that book showed real passion in designing it that you rarely, if ever, see anymore.
So yes, 40k is better now that it has been the last several years, perhaps even close to the last decade. But for those of us who remember the real glory days, we can see through what they're doing now and see how it's just an attempt to regain the days of old. It's a pale imitation of what the real golden age was. Perhaps unironically exactly like the Imperium itself.
skchsan wrote:Thank the MODs in this forum. They weed out 120% of the unnecessary, childish banters so we can go on and live our lives talking about what matters - RAW vs. RAI.
With all respect to mod's who give their free time, I have to take issue with this. Far too often, I see mod's locking threads that were started with the most well meaning intentions, only because a couple of unruly pests decide to hijack it and start bickering. When my siblings and I used to bicker as children, my mother didn't just lock the living room door and deny the whole family access, she would admonish us and send us to separate rooms, thereby leaving everyone else in peace. I think locking down whole threads instead of dealing directly with culprits is lazy and unfair to the vast majority who play by the rules.
Honestly I'd say if GW keeps going as they are this Renaissance could work itself into a Golden Age (certainly I think GW feels its a golden age with regard to their current profits and market position after a massive turn around and slew of big investments).
Which is another thing; never ever before has any game company pushed out as many models and tomes and material as GW are at their current pace. Granted even they know they can't keep it up like this forever, but even if they burn out and slow down after finishing the AoS battletomes its still a monumental amount of models and sculpts and material they've been pushing forward.
The whole "passionate" thing I think its a rose tinted glasses thing coupled to personal perceptions. I'm sure GW has a lto of very passionate staff with them still; things just get filtered a bit and I think that one also tends to view old s tuff with the nostalgia eyes and can see some of the "management" things that are always there, but which you never "see" when you're young. Then again sometimes people see things that aren't even there - eg they see a story with a central female character and they go all "SJW/Womens rights/political" when it was never intended nor featured in any management plan - ego it was just a story.
You must have never been laughed at for having your models bad painted, if you think that being toxic is limited to tournament crowed. IMO being an A hole is a cross hobby thing.
As a long time tourney player in a number of games, the toxic players are in general in casual groups, playing casual players.
The process is simple. TFG's want to win. They win best when playing casuals that don't have a ability or desire to know the rules well enough to defeat TFG.
They don't win at Tourneys where if they do win, they do get to a level to where they are playing a real Tourney player, who calls them on any BS, and they lose.
They can't exist long in a Competitive environment.
Yet some how the narrative has been changed by Casuals to make people think the TFG is common in the Tourney scene.
Social interaction required for a Tabletopgame:
Ergo you need, generally people
Ergo you will deal with people
Ergo you will find TFG's.
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Karol wrote: You must have never been laughed at for having your models bad painted, if you think that being toxic is limited to tournament crowed. IMO being an A hole is a cross hobby thing.
Karol wrote: You must have never been laughed at for having your models bad painted, if you think that being toxic is limited to tournament crowed. IMO being an A hole is a cross hobby thing.
Never seen this. In general, Competitive players care less what your model looks like, they only want it to be clear on what it is, and what it has. Any comments on painting are general encouraging, as even competitive players in general acknowledge that a brilliant looking game is better for the hobby.
Karol wrote: You must have never been laughed at for having your models bad painted, if you think that being toxic is limited to tournament crowed. IMO being an A hole is a cross hobby thing.
Never seen this. In general, Competitive players care less what your model looks like, they only want it to be clear on what it is, and what it has. Any comments on painting are general encouraging, as even competitive players in general acknowledge that a brilliant looking game is better for the hobby.
Tournament playing generally get upset about non wisywig over maybe anything else short of cheating.
That's probably because it's 1 impossible to follow the 1 plasma gun is a grav and the flamers are plasma and this scout is and intercessor stuff easily and it's easy for you to miss important information about a unit like that.
Most competitive player's just want a good clean game, winning and loosing can get heated, i know I can swear like a trooper at my dice, but that's not the other player's fault it's just sometimes you have those games/days or even events. Also I've found a number of players are always down for a you could have done X or Y or I'm so glad you failed X roll or I was screwed.
The platforms are a bit more varied now than they were then. When I started in 2009, every man and his dog has a blog, not just for Warhammer. Blogging was a very popular craze for a few years and that's somewhat died down now, taking a lot of the hobby bloggers with it.
Reddit is a pretty big platform now for Warhammer and a there's a lot of hate towards Dakka or other similar forums whenever it's mentioned from there. Shame really.
Tyranid Horde wrote: The platforms are a bit more varied now than they were then. When I started in 2009, every man and his dog has a blog, not just for Warhammer. Blogging was a very popular craze for a few years and that's somewhat died down now, taking a lot of the hobby bloggers with it.
Reddit is a pretty big platform now for Warhammer and a there's a lot of hate towards Dakka or other similar forums whenever it's mentioned from there. Shame really.
Which is amusing because until very recently the community on Reddit was subject to many years of absolutely insane drama and some of the most shockingly abusive mod behavior I've ever seen, such that the community was rather infamous on Reddit in general and across other GW communities as a result, and fracturing warhammer stuff across half a dozen different subreddits.
Reemule wrote: As a long time tourney player in a number of games, the toxic players are in general in casual groups, playing casual players.
The process is simple. TFG's want to win. They win best when playing casuals that don't have a ability or desire to know the rules well enough to defeat TFG.
I can certainly attest to this. At my local club we are 80%, I'd guess, casual players with a handful of more competitive but friendly players. We have one guy, who is TFG, that no one wants to play anymore. He cheats and claims that he read his book wrong. It has got to a point where the competitive players now stand around his table waiting for him to pull something so they can stop him. He even emailed me to complain about what they were doing, saying that they should leave him alone and let him play the way he wants to. He wonders why no one will play him anymore!!!
So, weird observations I've witnessed, at my brick and mortar.
1. Players in store - mostly 18-25, somehow wealthy, left leaning politics.
2. Players at the one east coast gaming event ive been to - mostly 21-30s, rich adults with good pay and seemingly a ton of personal time (Programmers/investment bankers?) MAJORITY right wing, like, bad. Lotta MAGA jokes, lotta Trump conversations, a lot of mildly Incel behavior, a lot of weird gross infatuation with extreme right wing German gak. Patches, badges, slogans, insignia. Like, I understand if you like DKoK, but if you have a bunch of WW2 german army gak on you, that isn't 40k.
A lot of chat groups/forums on 40k stuff I've seen online bear some of the same. Has anyone noticed a weird right wing slant to the recent players at events?
Granted - EXTREMELY small sample size on my part, but it really ruined the competitive hobby side for me.
1. Players in store - mostly 18-25, somehow wealthy, left leaning politics.
2. Players at the one east coast gaming event ive been to - mostly 21-30s, rich adults with good pay and seemingly a ton of personal time (Programmers/investment bankers?) MAJORITY right wing, like, bad. Lotta MAGA jokes, lotta Trump conversations, a lot of mildly Incel behavior, a lot of weird gross infatuation with extreme right wing German gak. Patches, badges, slogans, insignia. Like, I understand if you like DKoK, but if you have a bunch of WW2 german army gak on you, that isn't 40k.
A lot of chat groups/forums on 40k stuff I've seen online bear some of the same. Has anyone noticed a weird right wing slant to the recent players at events?
Granted - EXTREMELY small sample size on my part, but it really ruined the competitive hobby side for me.
Not sure which "East Coast" you've been to.
Although most of us do enjoy talking about Trump, but not in the way you seem to imply.
And I think you have left and right wings mixed up here.
Karol wrote: You must have never been laughed at for having your models bad painted, if you think that being toxic is limited to tournament crowed. IMO being an A hole is a cross hobby thing.
Never seen this. In general, Competitive players care less what your model looks like, they only want it to be clear on what it is, and what it has. Any comments on painting are general encouraging, as even competitive players in general acknowledge that a brilliant looking game is better for the hobby.
Then go and write somewhere that you don't want to paint your army, because you don't like to paint and see what happens. There is a litteral paint mafia that claims that playing with an unpainted army is one of the worse things you can do, The tournament players care if your army is legal and if this is an event, if you have the obligatory 5 colours. Plus games vs them are faster, no distracting talking, just rolling and saying what you do.
"There is a litteral paint mafia that claims that playing with an unpainted army is one of the worse things you can do, [...]"
Not even us actual paint mafiosos think *anything* is worse than using literal's synonym-for-figurative meaning. It should be figurative's antonym.
There is nothing worse than that. Not even playing unpainted.
Dai wrote: Looking at the tournament threads that are front and centre of the forum currently I'd say passive aggressive childish unpleasantness is still very much a dominant personality type!
Agreed. Currently trying to have a civilized discussion about characters in a tournament thread. I've only had one decent response. Everyone else thinks it's pissing and moaning.
I once met a fellow through X-Wing who turned out to be a real charmer. Put me off of playing Imps for the longest time which was a shame because I turned out to really love that faction later on. Anyways, yeah he was a former CAF officer. Would make all these jokes about killing babies and not so subtle racism. Had killed 11 men in Afghanistan. LOL. But we tolerated him because everyone deserves a chance at first but he just got worse and worse. And he would play the "best" lists and he got to be pretty good so you actually had to work to beat him. Plus he was just such a rules freak, like every round was a rules debate. He just wasn't a very nice guy, even when he was being sociable he'd say some awful crazy thing about homeless people or gays and you'd just cringe. Eventually the owner had a talk with him and he disappeared.
But then this old fart who was a Magic player turned out to be a gold hoarding nuclear war but who thought the world was about to end...
The real answer is casual and competitive both have their share of TFG's, neither is immune. The idea that neither side attracts them is silly. They do attract different kinds of TFG, but they're both TFG.
Tournament TFG will lawyer you to death and attempt to use really sketchy wordings on rules to win. These are the guys who look at something like the admech scryerskull strategem and argued it let them shoot whenever they wanted out of phase, or the guy who says that RAW Take cover and Bullgryns Slab shields don't do anything because there's no such thing as an "armor save". Instances where yes, on a very technical sense they are correct RAW, but RAI is blatantly obvious. These are the ones who may also "forget" certain rules that disadvantage them, but these are hard to prove.
A casual TFG is more likely to make stuff up or deliberately misinterpret rules that are known and accepted. They're much more likely to pick on less knowledgeable players who either won't know or are two nervous to call them on it. These also tend to be the ones picking on players for lower quality paintjobs, choice of army, generic bully behavior, etc.
Neither is mutually exclusive of course, but that's my general experience.
The real answer is casual and competitive both have their share of TFG's, neither is immune. The idea that neither side attracts them is silly. They do attract different kinds of TFG, but they're both TFG.
Tournament TFG will lawyer you to death and attempt to use really sketchy wordings on rules to win. These are the guys who look at something like the admech scryerskull strategem and argued it let them shoot whenever they wanted out of phase, or the guy who says that RAW Take cover and Bullgryns Slab shields don't do anything because there's no such thing as an "armor save". Instances where yes, on a very technical sense they are correct RAW, but RAI is blatantly obvious. These are the ones who may also "forget" certain rules that disadvantage them, but these are hard to prove.
A casual TFG is more likely to make stuff up or deliberately misinterpret rules that are known and accepted. They're much more likely to pick on less knowledgeable players who either won't know or are two nervous to call them on it. These also tend to be the ones picking on players for lower quality paintjobs, choice of army, generic bully behavior, etc.
Neither is mutually exclusive of course, but that's my general experience.
Yes. I think it's also important to point out that in either case, they are in the vast, vast minority. Disagreeable people appear to us to be more common than they are, only because our brains tend to recall negative emotions and the people associated with them as a sort of defense mechanism against such encounters in future. It also doesn't help that everyone's definition of TFG us different. Some people characterize anyone who brings Castellans & Loyal 32 as TFG even though some of them might be the nicest people one could meet.
And everybody clapped. I mean, guys- we just got out of this politics purge, don't drag it back onto the page. There's places to rage about the people that vote the other way. Hell, I'm pretty sure there's places where you can go and rage at them and go back and forth all day about this kinda stuff. But if you can't discuss games- something that should be a shared interest, a thing that can humanize people you disagree with and establish a common ground to work with and bridge the gap between us so we can better understand one another- well, if you can't keep your politics out of it, I genuinely believe you might have an unhealthy obsession, or at least be blinded to a simple fact- every village has an idiot, even the village you belong to.
I don't care how much you hate the President or the people who voted for him, discussing those people that politically align differently from you like they're a toxic element is book definition toxic behavior. You gentlemen are better than this, I know, I've had talks with you both before and you're good guys.
I've had my encounters with obnoxious people of all sides of the spectrum, so don't get yourself thinking this is an exclusively "right-wing" thing. We got the local that went on a tirade about boob armor and had a spectacular meltdown in the shop when the women didn't thank him for insinuating all the guys they play with are rapists or pigs (quite the opposite). And the one that somehow believed that smelling like mildew, feet, and unwashed bootyhole was somehow on par with being black or gay and tried to claim discrimination. We had one guy from some D&D group badmouth our regulars online, and then several of his "Anti-Fascist" friends from out of town were making actual threats of violence- which, of course, had to involve authorities and much laughing because most of our players are vets and about half of them are CHL holders.
And then, above all, worse than any right or left wing drama, we get the little groups of guys that show up- just two or three- and since they're new, try to make them feel at home and feel comfortable. Then more of them show up after a while and it looks good. But they aren't really buying stuff, maybe I should just give it some time.... Aaaaaaaaand the guys are back there beating their chests and gloating because their tournament soup lists just smashed some newbie kid's Space Marine fluffy casual list. So, I get to go find out that these dudes have been banned from the FLGS two counties away and be the one that gets to tell them what our FLGS is like, what kind of community we want, and the first time I get a snarky comment I get to give them explicit directions to the door and the quickest way off the property.
Oh, and of course- I'm the one that has to go online to our store's Social Media page and start cleaning up this mess. Each and every one of those little drama spectacles started some kind of outrage mob action on our page, and overwhelmingly from people that have never even been to our store and most of them live out of state.
The saving grace, of course- tying it back to '40k community drama'- is that online outrage mobs have the memory of a goldfish. They go, they post their little opinions and pretend to be absolutely disgusted about something, pleasure themselves to the number of thumbsy-uppies they get from internet strangers, and once they feel validated, they go back to scrolling through facebook and looking for something else to pretend to be offended by. It's a vicious little cycle and it's a direct side effect of a society that's leaned too hard on social media for socializing and validation, rather than interpersonal relationships with actual human beings.
But, one good thing about drama is it's usually quickly removed if you're willing to be firm.
And everybody clapped. I mean, guys- we just got out of this politics purge, don't drag it back onto the page. There's places to rage about the people that vote the other way. Hell, I'm pretty sure there's places where you can go and rage at them and go back and forth all day about this kinda stuff. But if you can't discuss games- something that should be a shared interest, a thing that can humanize people you disagree with and establish a common ground to work with and bridge the gap between us so we can better understand one another- well, if you can't keep your politics out of it, I genuinely believe you might have an unhealthy obsession, or at least be blinded to a simple fact- every village has an idiot, even the village you belong to.
I don't care how much you hate the President or the people who voted for him, discussing those people that politically align differently from you like they're a toxic element is book definition toxic behavior. You gentlemen are better than this, I know, I've had talks with you both before and you're good guys.
I've had my encounters with obnoxious people of all sides of the spectrum, so don't get yourself thinking this is an exclusively "right-wing" thing. We got the local that went on a tirade about boob armor and had a spectacular meltdown in the shop when the women didn't thank him for insinuating all the guys they play with are rapists or pigs (quite the opposite). And the one that somehow believed that smelling like mildew, feet, and unwashed bootyhole was somehow on par with being black or gay and tried to claim discrimination. We had one guy from some D&D group badmouth our regulars online, and then several of his "Anti-Fascist" friends from out of town were making actual threats of violence- which, of course, had to involve authorities and much laughing because most of our players are vets and about half of them are CHL holders.
And then, above all, worse than any right or left wing drama, we get the little groups of guys that show up- just two or three- and since they're new, try to make them feel at home and feel comfortable. Then more of them show up after a while and it looks good. But they aren't really buying stuff, maybe I should just give it some time.... Aaaaaaaaand the guys are back there beating their chests and gloating because their tournament soup lists just smashed some newbie kid's Space Marine fluffy casual list. So, I get to go find out that these dudes have been banned from the FLGS two counties away and be the one that gets to tell them what our FLGS is like, what kind of community we want, and the first time I get a snarky comment I get to give them explicit directions to the door and the quickest way off the property.
Oh, and of course- I'm the one that has to go online to our store's Social Media page and start cleaning up this mess. Each and every one of those little drama spectacles started some kind of outrage mob action on our page, and overwhelmingly from people that have never even been to our store and most of them live out of state.
The saving grace, of course- tying it back to '40k community drama'- is that online outrage mobs have the memory of a goldfish. They go, they post their little opinions and pretend to be absolutely disgusted about something, pleasure themselves to the number of thumbsy-uppies they get from internet strangers, and once they feel validated, they go back to scrolling through facebook and looking for something else to pretend to be offended by. It's a vicious little cycle and it's a direct side effect of a society that's leaned too hard on social media for socializing and validation, rather than interpersonal relationships with actual human beings.
But, one good thing about drama is it's usually quickly removed if you're willing to be firm.
I've never understood this rule. How come it's acceptable for us to tear the living piss out of each other because of our taste in a particular shape of plastic, or whether a rule is clear or not, but the mere mention of a politician is prohibited? What gives?
I've never understood this rule. How come it's acceptable for us to tear the living piss out of each other because of our taste in a particular shape of plastic, or whether a rule is clear or not, but the mere mention of a politician is prohibited? What gives?
Because the majority of people calm down when the argument is "marines VS tyrainds" or whatever. Sure people can get a bit heated and excited, but by and large the majority take it casually.
When it comes to politics things get ugly fast. People don't calm down, they get worse. Arguments boil over and go right into personal insults and mud slinging and before you know if you've got a chunk of people hating on each other. It basically results in loads of reports of insults, harassments and sets up long term feuds between people very fast.
Even though the political viewpoints and arguments on Dakka will change nothing in the world we live in people argue as if they will; and because those changes would affect our lives (some in very big ways) people get really passionate about it.
So basically politics can bring out the worst; it can result in bans and suspensions and hurt feelings and contention within a community; esp online. Religion can do the very same and its why many forums have a no politics and no religious debate rule. It's basically shutting down the chance for things to spiral into a nightmare situation which will only sour the community.
Sure this doesn't apply to everyone, but it applies to enough that it creates problems, so shutting it down works. Also even within hobbies there are sometimes banned discussions. Eg in Photography there was a time that nearly every forum had a ban on digital VS film debate. You could talk about both, but you couldn't pit them against each other as it would only lead, again, to fights. Some wargame forums had similar rules when AoS first came out and there was huge backlash and arguments between old fantasy fans and new AoS fans at that time. Rather like the film VS digital arguments, the AoS VS Old World fantasy has settled on its own for the most part.
Ginjitzu wrote: I've never understood this rule. How come it's acceptable for us to tear the living piss out of each other because of our taste in a particular shape of plastic, or whether a rule is clear or not, but the mere mention of a politician is prohibited? What gives?
Because insinuating that someone is a terrible human being, a bigot, cancer, Nazi, etc. because of the way they vote- often by misrepresenting their position- is a quick way to make things volatile. It also tends to carry over into other threads, and we get oddly suspicious new people joining just to deliberately stir drama on some of the hot-button topics. Given this day and age where an entire website or group can earn a negative reputation over a few outrage fetishists with blogs disguised as news sites, it's pretty much the safe way to play.
Calling someone subhuman filth because they cheated is wholesome and righteous.
Ginjitzu wrote: I've never understood this rule. How come it's acceptable for us to tear the living piss out of each other because of our taste in a particular shape of plastic, or whether a rule is clear or not, but the mere mention of a politician is prohibited? What gives?
Because insinuating that someone is a terrible human being, a bigot, cancer, Nazi, etc. because of the way they vote- often by misrepresenting their position- is a quick way to make things volatile. It also tends to carry over into other threads, and we get oddly suspicious new people joining just to deliberately stir drama on some of the hot-button topics. Given this day and age where an entire website or group can earn a negative reputation over a few outrage fetishists with blogs disguised as news sites, it's pretty much the safe way to play.
Calling someone subhuman filth because they cheated is wholesome and righteous.
Bah, had a run in with a pacifist and a commi on the same train and gave me gak for playing a wargame. i just laughed and told them to go look at chess and it's history.
As for the outrage culture, represantitve democracy --> Person not policy matters --> social media age and "hyper awarness of the media = gakshow is basically inevitable.
I think it's very important to keep politics as FAR away from this forum as possible. A lot of people want to get away from politics when they come here, myself included.
Darsath wrote: I think it's very important to keep politics as FAR away from this forum as possible. A lot of people want to get away from politics when they come here, myself included.
Considering how wh40k started and considering how much satire is in it, did that work out for you?
Darsath wrote: I think it's very important to keep politics as FAR away from this forum as possible. A lot of people want to get away from politics when they come here, myself included.
Considering how wh40k started and considering how much satire is in it, did that work out for you?
Edit: to clarify it is an honest question.
It has. Shockingly so. I think it also helps that where I play, everyone kind of agrees to not talk politics. Instead we talk almost exclusively hobby related stuff (or video games and movies if we wanna drift off).
Darsath wrote: I think it's very important to keep politics as FAR away from this forum as possible. A lot of people want to get away from politics when they come here, myself included.
Considering how wh40k started and considering how much satire is in it, did that work out for you?
Edit: to clarify it is an honest question.
It has. Shockingly so. I think it also helps that where I play, everyone kind of agrees to not talk politics. Instead we talk almost exclusively hobby related stuff (or video games and movies if we wanna drift off).
Interesting, i suspected though that the old fluff would be more difficult to not see the satire of it with you beeing from over there and what not.
Tbh i also feel like discussion about anything really has turned worse, respectively the capability to disscus anything thanks to social media.
People have been killing each other over political differences for - well - generations. It's nothing new; in fact we've come a long way! Used to be politicians duelled over issues if they got heated enough!
Then again we still have football hooligans and gangs- people willing to fight and even kill over nothing more than the fact that they support one city team and the other people support another in a game of kicking a ball around a football pitch.
Nope its nothing new; but its often the case that as children we zone it out and don't notice it so it appears new as we get much older. Heck even as an adult you can ignore a lot of politics if you choose too (just turning off the news instantly isolates you for a lot of the daily drama around the topic).
And yeah you can very much have events and talk geeky stuff without poiltics coming into it. Sure the odd reference will appear here and there, but by and large you can do it without having to get into any political real world discussion.
Overread wrote: People have been killing each other over political differences for - well - generations. It's nothing new; in fact we've come a long way! Used to be politicians duelled over issues if they got heated enough!
Then again we still have football hooligans and gangs- people willing to fight and even kill over nothing more than the fact that they support one city team and the other people support another in a game of kicking a ball around a football pitch.
Nope its nothing new; but its often the case that as children we zone it out and don't notice it so it appears new as we get much older. Heck even as an adult you can ignore a lot of politics if you choose too (just turning off the news instantly isolates you for a lot of the daily drama around the topic).
And yeah you can very much have events and talk geeky stuff without poiltics coming into it. Sure the odd reference will appear here and there, but by and large you can do it without having to get into any political real world discussion.
Can't say i was never not interested in politics. Infact i can't say that about most swiss people considering the study i recently got to see.
Then again maybee our system is just more interactive therefore politics especially Policy more prevalent and discussions about it more needed then elsewhere.
Regardless certain topics need a more ritualised discussion Format i think, one in which people try to avoid personell questions and a more balanced approach.
I do not necessarily agree therefore with the politics ban but i can see that it makes live easier for the mods which is a good thing since they do a good job for free.
Ginjitzu wrote: I've never understood this rule. How come it's acceptable for us to tear the living piss out of each other because of our taste in a particular shape of plastic, or whether a rule is clear or not, but the mere mention of a politician is prohibited? What gives?
Overread wrote:
Because the majority of people calm down when the argument is "marines VS tyrainds" or whatever. Sure people can get a bit heated and excited, but by and large the majority take it casually.
When it comes to politics things get ugly fast. People don't calm down, they get worse. Arguments boil over and go right into personal insults and mud slinging and before you know if you've got a chunk of people hating on each other. It basically results in loads of reports of insults, harassments and sets up long term feuds between people very fast.
Allow me to direct you to the Background and You Make Da Call subforums kind sir.
Adeptus Doritos wrote:Calling someone subhuman filth because they cheated is wholesome and righteous.
Not Online!!! wrote:
I do not necessarily agree therefore with the politics ban but i can see that it makes live easier for the mods which is a good thing since they do a good job for free.
By default, when someone tries to drag politics into gaming I assume one of the following:
-their political opinions are too stupid for political discussion groups, so they have to bring them elsewhere
-they are deliberately looking to start some kind of drama or conflict
-they delusionally believe that their political opinions are an objective truth and have yet to encounter someone who will tell it which hole they can stuff it into/blow it out of
Adeptus Doritos wrote: By default, when someone tries to drag politics into gaming I assume one of the following:
-their political opinions are too stupid for political discussion groups, so they have to bring them elsewhere
-they are deliberately looking to start some kind of drama or conflict
-they delusionally believe that their political opinions are an objective truth and have yet to encounter someone who will tell it which hole they can stuff it into/blow it out of
Personally I find telling them to take their heresy elsewhere before we call the inquisition tends to get them to take that nonsence outside of hobby time. But also lucky enough to have a group thats mostly middle age dudes with jobs and partners etc so everyone is pretty much just wanting the same thing of all banter no realworld BS.
Adeptus Doritos wrote: By default, when someone tries to drag politics into gaming I assume one of the following:
-their political opinions are too stupid for political discussion groups, so they have to bring them elsewhere
-they are deliberately looking to start some kind of drama or conflict
-they delusionally believe that their political opinions are an objective truth and have yet to encounter someone who will tell it which hole they can stuff it into/blow it out of
one issue, is that humans are political. And things we create are. Just as often its the people who say that politics should be kept out of gaming, are just as guilty of fueling it with there own politics.
Being understanding of issues is important, and its great when people are able to just walk out of politics. Its healthy to be able to walk away from it
Adeptus Doritos wrote: By default, when someone tries to drag politics into gaming I assume one of the following:
-their political opinions are too stupid for political discussion groups, so they have to bring them elsewhere
-they are deliberately looking to start some kind of drama or conflict
-they delusionally believe that their political opinions are an objective truth and have yet to encounter someone who will tell it which hole they can stuff it into/blow it out of
You realise that maintaining the Status quo by not allowing any discussion is equally political?
That said i feel that you don't give humans the Credit they deserve when discussing politics, but i will admit freely that that might be a too optimistic statement of mine.
ingtaer wrote: Enough of the politics digression please.
> Has a decent discuassion why politics is banned on Dakka.
> Explore the many fold reasons why.
> States that the mods generally do a good job at modding.
> Also state that modern social interaction / lack thereoff probably have impeded on the capability of discussion in a civil manner.
> Basically not a political discussion but rather one why it became so heated in the first place which lead to the Dakka mods closing the politics thread, which was accepted by all in this thread as acceptable.
> New mod comes in and literally tries to shut down a discussion about the root problem by saying it is politics.......
See the irony ?
___________________________
Anyways, considering how much trouble and calls for blood (figuratively) the LVO cheating caused i am completely willing to say the hobby is just as it allways was.
Yeah, basically to all your points especially the last one. These newer mods seem to be taking their "job" too seriously. We had a threat getting really heated a while back (I think it was another PL vs. Points thread) that had a longterm mod participating in it regularly including dealing with at least one rather hostile poster, and zero issues whatsoever.
ingtaer wrote: Enough of the politics digression please.
> Has a decent discuassion why politics is banned on Dakka.
> Explore the many fold reasons why.
> States that the mods generally do a good job at modding.
> Also state that modern social interaction / lack thereoff probably have impeded on the capability of discussion in a civil manner.
> Basically not a political discussion but rather one why it became so heated in the first place which lead to the Dakka mods closing the politics thread, which was accepted by all in this thread as acceptable.
> New mod comes in and literally tries to shut down a discussion about the root problem by saying it is politics.......
See the irony ?
___________________________
Anyways, considering how much trouble and calls for blood (figuratively) the LVO cheating caused i am completely willing to say the hobby is just as it allways was.
No you see have misrepresented what I said, see the bit I highlighted in orange? That is not what I did, I asked for the "digression" to please cease. This thread is about 40k community drama and whilst some of that will involve politics posts like this;
1. Players in store - mostly 18-25, somehow wealthy, left leaning politics.
2. Players at the one east coast gaming event ive been to - mostly 21-30s, rich adults with good pay and seemingly a ton of personal time (Programmers/investment bankers?) MAJORITY right wing, like, bad. Lotta MAGA jokes, lotta Trump conversations, a lot of mildly Incel behavior, a lot of weird gross infatuation with extreme right wing German gak. Patches, badges, slogans, insignia. Like, I understand if you like DKoK, but if you have a bunch of WW2 german army gak on you, that isn't 40k.
A lot of chat groups/forums on 40k stuff I've seen online bear some of the same. Has anyone noticed a weird right wing slant to the recent players at events?
Granted - EXTREMELY small sample size on my part, but it really ruined the competitive hobby side for me.
Are exactly the reason why we don't allow politics here and why this thread was reported. As well as it being off topic.
ingtaer wrote: Enough of the politics digression please.
> Has a decent discuassion why politics is banned on Dakka.
> Explore the many fold reasons why.
> States that the mods generally do a good job at modding.
> Also state that modern social interaction / lack thereoff probably have impeded on the capability of discussion in a civil manner.
> Basically not a political discussion but rather one why it became so heated in the first place which lead to the Dakka mods closing the politics thread, which was accepted by all in this thread as acceptable.
> New mod comes in and literally tries to shut down a discussion about the root problem by saying it is politics.......
See the irony ?
___________________________
Anyways, considering how much trouble and calls for blood (figuratively) the LVO cheating caused i am completely willing to say the hobby is just as it allways was.
No you see have misrepresented what I said, see the bit I highlighted in orange? That is not what I did, I asked for the "digression" to please cease. This thread is about 40k community drama and whilst some of that will involve politics posts like this;
1. Players in store - mostly 18-25, somehow wealthy, left leaning politics.
2. Players at the one east coast gaming event ive been to - mostly 21-30s, rich adults with good pay and seemingly a ton of personal time (Programmers/investment bankers?) MAJORITY right wing, like, bad. Lotta MAGA jokes, lotta Trump conversations, a lot of mildly Incel behavior, a lot of weird gross infatuation with extreme right wing German gak. Patches, badges, slogans, insignia. Like, I understand if you like DKoK, but if you have a bunch of WW2 german army gak on you, that isn't 40k.
A lot of chat groups/forums on 40k stuff I've seen online bear some of the same. Has anyone noticed a weird right wing slant to the recent players at events?
Granted - EXTREMELY small sample size on my part, but it really ruined the competitive hobby side for me.
Are exactly the reason why we don't allow politics here and why this thread was reported. As well as it being off topic.
Then why not specify the Post you took issue and instead just put an ominous comment warning down.
I'd argue the way a lot of these threads seem to go (and really, every thread of recent where any disagreement turns into internet blood sports) proves there's still a tremendous degree of drama within the 40k community. There's a large number of 'personalities' who pop up in every thread to make claims designed to start arguments (a bit back there was a thread talking about how you needed every book ever released for 8th edition to play 8th edition, obviously an attempt to try and start some trouble).
If you don't think there's very much drama in 40k communities, say any of the following anywhere:
-"The new Commissar isn't very good "
-"Original Space Marines will very likely be phased out"
-"Horus Heresy isn't as popular as its players want to believe"
-"It's not fun playing against a Knight list."
-"Every store should have a policy against poor hygiene."
Adeptus Doritos wrote: If you don't think there's very much drama in 40k communities, say any of the following anywhere:
-"The new Commissar isn't very good "
-"Original Space Marines will very likely be phased out"
-"Horus Heresy isn't as popular as its players want to believe"
-"It's not fun playing against a Knight list."
-"Every store should have a policy against poor hygiene."
1. I don't like her but Personal tastes vary.
2. That is conjecture and Argumentation can be made concievable for both sides, altough i suspect a partial stopping is possible.
3. Highly depends on the lists involved, don't you think.
4. Probably.
I think tournament discussion would've been a better exemple Doritos.
I wasn't gonna do that because that's how we get those mysterious "New members to the forum" and lectures about how little plastic toys are somehow related to domestic violence or some nonsense.
I wasn't gonna do that because that's how we get those mysterious "New members to the forum" and lectures about how little plastic toys are somehow related to domestic violence or some nonsense.
I wasn't gonna do that because that's how we get those mysterious "New members to the forum" and lectures about how little plastic toys are somehow related to domestic violence or some nonsense.
Mwuhahahaha! Let the galaxy burn!!!
That would be 2 CP and your soul please.
Ok maybee we discount your soul and just ban you for 5 mins.
I think that argument wasn't so much about 40k or GW and more about using a popular setting as a vehicle for discussion. Albeit a terribly one sided discussion that usually resulted in the shaming of its opponents, but hey! It does seem to have dropped off the radar, or maybe I just stopped giving a damn what people think about my little plastic soldiers.
I think that if GW had supported SoB better over the years that would have helped a bit more too. Instead they just cranked out some lead and let it sit on a shelf for 20 years.
Back on topic though, you can all stop worrying about the lack of drama here now. I'm back! And unlike a certain planetary landing craft I'm here to stay, original SKU and everything... So I guess that means there are no quick play rules in my box.
Things that i find cause the most drama is when things we like are "threatened".
I see no shortage of the speculation that the new Primaris Marines will harald the old SM's quietly disappearing in future game updates.
That gets the older folk with way too many of these models, all upset.
I barely got over retiring my old metal terminators or the base size change.
SoB have been brought up quite a few times, rightly so.
They seem to be so close to being "Squat" 'ed if is frustrating, never mind a squad is ~$100.
Fans of this army are pretty die-hard (rightly so) so i think this is the second non-codex update I had seen for the army not including Index's.
My friend is all upset his Ork looted tanks are only listed in power levels and not points.
I had mentioned much earlier with Kirby at the helm of GW we could see players dropping off and rules bloat was insane and prices skyrocketed = loss of player-base and a game some have played for decades looked like it was going to die.
I have WAY too many GW models / armies, I am certain the cost would be in the tens of thousands in cost (spaced out over some 30 years however), I could say I would be more than upset if anything happened to this game.
I can't speak for live events in the "olden days," but you also have to factor in the filtering of online communities into moderated and un-moderated spaces. You still have thriving communities like /tg/ over on 4chan, which mainly features trolls trying to troll each other in one big frothy circlejerk.
Hankovitch wrote: I can't speak for live events in the "olden days," but you also have to factor in the filtering of online communities into moderated and un-moderated spaces. You still have thriving communities like /tg/ over on 4chan, which mainly features trolls trying to troll each other in one big frothy circlejerk.
I've found that a lot of unpleasantness these days has come from the leaking of places like 4chan into the rest of the world in ways we didnt see back say, a decade ago. 4chan was never been a pleasant place, but there was a time when it was understood that it was all a big bowl of piss, and it was where people went to get that out of their system and be goofy in a relatively isolated and confined space where none of it would really interact much with the real world, much like the somethingawful boards it originally spawned from. People would say or share terrible things usually without meaning them, people would giggle, and then it'd be forgotten. The problem became when some people decided they actually liked the taste of piss, they forgot you weren't supposed to drink it, and they started to believe the stuff being said and engage in those same behaviors outside of the once confined imageboards. I think for many people, it was really their only source of social interaction and their behavior adapted accordingly.
I used to roll around these places daily, and a lot of good stuff still pops up there, but there has definitely been a tonal shift over time.
Let's face it, you are always going to get people on forums who can peddle their own brand of nonsense relatively unscathed due to the anonymity which forums offer - be that political or otherwise.
Basically some people are just natural born ass hats.
On forums they generally act in an inflammatory manner in order to get attention, starve them of it and bingo they generally move on. Hence, don't feed the troll.
On a more positive note, yet off topic, WWWWHHHHHHOOOOOOOOOAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHH big new Chaos release coming, yay.
I find 40k not quite as funny these days as the world becomes more dystopian.
Almost every element of the 40k "fluff" literature was meant to be pretty over the top.
Any time people get their knickers in a knot about 40k they just need to watch this and all will be well:
<edit>NOTE! Does have some "colourful" language, you have been warned!
Most drama I see nowadays is people being creeps, not so much arguments or anything like that. Getting caught sending PMs to women of a decidedly horrifying nature, etc.
Almost every element of the 40k "fluff" literature was meant to be pretty over the top.
I can't think of a single thing included as bad things in the w40k lore bad-things-that-can-happen-to-you that didn't happen in my country the last 100-150 years. The models, or some of them do look goofy like orcs or necron, but the lore is more or less spot on what happens in the world. the only thing I do miss in the world comparing to the w40k lore is how fast do they rebuild or that they can rebuild at all from some stuff. In a way it is a rather optimistic view of the future, specialy considering how more deadly the enviroment is with just not humans trying to wack each other.
Almost every element of the 40k "fluff" literature was meant to be pretty over the top.
I can't think of a single thing included as bad things in the w40k lore bad-things-that-can-happen-to-you that didn't happen in my country the last 100-150 years. The models, or some of them do look goofy like orcs or necron, but the lore is more or less spot on what happens in the world. the only thing I do miss in the world comparing to the w40k lore is how fast do they rebuild or that they can rebuild at all from some stuff. In a way it is a rather optimistic view of the future, specialy considering how more deadly the enviroment is with just not humans trying to wack each other.
You speaking as a citizen of Poland that says something.
A country that has been pretty much unstable and under attack for quite literally hundreds of years.
1795 invasions from Russian Empire, Kingdom of Prussia and the Austrian Habsburg Monarchy.
1918 Second Polish Republic established.
1918-1921 Six border wars including the Polish-Czechoslovak over Cieszyn Silesia
1919-1919 Greater Poland Uprising
1919-1921 Three Silesian uprisings.
1920 East Prussian plebiscite
1921 Upper Silesia plebiscite
1920-1935 The May "coup" military overthrow.
1938 Annexed a portion of land from Lithuania.
1939 to 1945 Destroyed by Nazi Germany
1944 to 1952 Soviet Union continued the destruction with them as a communist satellite state.
You know looking at all this and a few familiar 40k names I saw in history, the Imperium is completely based on the Polish!
There has been pretty much only war.
I would hazard a guess that the Russians are the Orks and the Germans as the Eldar.
I will have to bug my friend who has a strong cultural affinity with the Cossacks.
I don't see it in Competitive play. When you get to know some of the top players in almost any game system, people nearly universally describe them as sweet, fun to play against and a great game to play.
Cause to Git Gud, you have to play. If your TFG you don't get to play. TFG doesn't get to exist long enough to git gud enough to play at top levels.
Reality is that for a casual who's group might have been playing smite wrong for the last 18 months, and no one cared cause only Jim has that model and he hates to play it.. its a rude awakening when they got a competitive game and get a lesson that it works differently. And maybe some don't take it well. But what is the solution?
I don't see it in Competitive play. When you get to know some of the top players in almost any game system, people nearly universally describe them as sweet, fun to play against and a great game to play.
Cause to Git Gud, you have to play. If your TFG you don't get to play. TFG doesn't get to exist long enough to git gud enough to play at top levels.
Reality is that for a casual who's group might have been playing smite wrong for the last 18 months, and no one cared cause only Jim has that model and he hates to play it.. its a rude awakening when they got a competitive game and get a lesson that it works differently. And maybe some don't take it well. But what is the solution?
The 14 page Cheating at the LVO thread would say otherwise - there is definite TFG behaviour at the top tables at a "premier" 40k event.
I find if there are prizes of some significant monetary value, no game is safe from TFG behavior.
Heck, some of the more competitive types could be tempted to "the dark side" if it is worth-it to them.
The main drama we all see is when your opponent is not playing to the same rules as you are.
- TFG: will ignore whatever rules he thinks he can get away with and make up a few while he is at it.
- Competitive: Will religiously follow the rules (RAW!!!) and will expect you to play your "best" game (optimal, points efficient, most synergistic units) and will typically not care that a unit composition flies in the face of what the "fluff" says.
- Scrub: has added rules that he adheres to and expects you to follow with or without your agreement (comments of "that is cheesy", "that is OP"... "it's not fair!" in general).-
- "Old Grognard":I am willing to include myself in this category after playing some 8 editions of the game a few prior versions of rules get mixed up in my head with the current edition it can be exasperating for both players.
- "Casual": Seems to fall into a couple categories from the "Fluff" type that wants everything to be true to the stories and then the "It's just a game" types that I think want to downplay the game since they hate losing.... - I would tentatively add the "house rule monster", I have a friend that just cannot play the game as written... it is a painful experience for him to play "straight out of the box" without just itching to "improve" the game. It has been comical to exploit the new rules and prove how some rules unchanged have worth. We made the rule of "play 3 full games before you change anything" he keeps wanting to change that too... What makes it worse is THEN my "Old Grognard" behavior gets worse now with house rules memorized as well.
So yeah, drama from player wants and expectations with each other and with GW keeps it pretty lively.
We can always add other controversial topics like tourney rules, recasters, 3D printing and the GW financial reports (less an issue these days).
I mean, guys- we just got out of this politics purge, don't drag it back onto the page. There's places to rage about the people that vote the other way. Hell, I'm pretty sure there's places where you can go and rage at them and go back and forth all day about this kinda stuff. But if you can't discuss games- something that should be a shared interest, a thing that can humanize people you disagree with and establish a common ground to work with and bridge the gap between us so we can better understand one another- well, if you can't keep your politics out of it, I genuinely believe you might have an unhealthy obsession, or at least be blinded to a simple fact- every village has an idiot, even the village you belong to.
What makes it worse is THEN my "Old Grognard" behavior gets worse now with house rules memorized as well.
