Because "competitive" (as if this word could be used for 40k...) players think themselves smart and smarter than the others 40k players because they listen to podcast telling them how to abuse rules and play probably more often to 40k than normal players. So they think they are the best persons and casual are just idiots who don't understand the game and deserve the hate.
The competitive scene has always been toxic and a full of cry babies. Not surprised by those people.
Well when you get a sub group within a community that takes something very seriously and turns it up to 12... you get this sort of thing. Its a game of pushing plastic toys around with no real world consequences lol!
I wouldn't worry about it. FB is full of keyboard warriors who have nothing better to do than hate on things and people, to make themselves feel better... You can see it on dakka too, heck the internet at large is just allowing people to say anything they want and knowing people will read it and get a reaction. Theres a global breakdown in the ability to effectively communicate online. Its the same with video games etc...
These types of people would not say 1% of the things they say to a real person because when said out loud it would become apparent how ridiculous they sound. (Unless they are delusional/socially inept tiny fraction of society so not to notice)
You can see it with any type of competitive aspect of anything. You will always get loudmouth smack talkers who know it all and are right all the time. They found something they think they are better at than everyone else. Seems like overcompensating for a lack in something else, probably from childhood. Maybe sports abilities, GF, financial success whatever... I aint no psychologist though so could be way offf
Sunny Side Up wrote: I thought the community actually came closer together with 8th.
godardc wrote: Because "competitive" (as if this word could be used for 40k...) players think themselves as smart and smarter than the others 40k players because they listen to podcast telling them how to abuse rules and play probably more often to 40k than normal players.
So they think they are the best persons and casual are just idiots who don't understand the game and deserve the hate.
The competitive scene has always been toxic and a full of cry babies. Not surprised by those people.
Rarely is an OP shown to be wrong with such elegance and decisiveness.
godardc wrote: Because "competitive" (as if this word could be used for 40k...) players think themselves as smart and smarter than the others 40k players because they listen to podcast telling them how to abuse rules and play probably more often to 40k than normal players.
So they think they are the best persons and casual are just idiots who don't understand the game and deserve the hate.
The competitive scene has always been toxic and a full of cry babies. Not surprised by those people.
godardc wrote: Because "competitive" (as if this word could be used for 40k...) players think themselves as smart and smarter than the others 40k players because they listen to podcast telling them how to abuse rules and play probably more often to 40k than normal players.
So they think they are the best persons and casual are just idiots who don't understand the game and deserve the hate.
The competitive scene has always been toxic and a full of cry babies. Not surprised by those people.
We're reaching whole new levels of irony.
It's actually pretty common, sadly enough.
For the minority who care about differences in playstyle, the screeds about how vile the 'other' is are consistently vile themselves.
2 Captains with Bolters
2 Lieutenants with Bolters and Chainswords
30 Bolter Marines
4 Missile Launchers
4 Lascannons
4 Heavy Bolters
2 Dreadnoughts with assault cannons and stormbotlers
3 Centurions with Hurricane Bolters and Heavy Bolters
1 Land Raider
1 Laser Predator Tank
I ran them at Blood Ravens (Using the IF tactic for them).
The game was fun, enjoyable and excitable! It swung both ways until turn 4 when my opponent, playing ork boyz horde finally got the up on me. End score was 9-6.
Competitives will constantly moan about every model in my list. They'll tell you they suck, they're too many points, they're not enough firepower. But, I've learned that the competitive version of 40K isn't as "wonderful" as they'll have you believe, and playing with these "sucky" units can be loads more fun.
Don't listen to that community. It's not the only way to enjoy this hobby.
@OP: If I understood correctly, there's currently a lot of noise in the competitive crowd? There hasn't been anything major in 40K recently rulewise, but maybe there's a new list/trick someone found that I'm not aware of.
But we're in the middle of discovering what Apoc is all about though, which makes people wonder about the current 40K ruleset. Not sure if it would create heated arguments about 40K though.
fresus wrote: @OP: If I understood correctly, there's currently a lot of noise in the competitive crowd? There hasn't been anything major in 40K recently rulewise, but maybe there's a new list/trick someone found that I'm not aware of.
But we're in the middle of discovering what Apoc is all about though, which makes people wonder about the current 40K ruleset. Not sure if it would create heated arguments about 40K though.
Originaly he had a screenshot of a fb group with people saying some vile obnoxious things about playing with casual players etc. Just generly saying horrible obnoxious things.. I also dont think its to do with any specific event. Just a snapshot into a certain group of individuals. And he was trying to make sense of it maybe?
You can't label the entire "competitive 40k" community by the words of a few. Just as you cannot label the entire casual community by the words of a few.
It is a well known truism that among the human race there are undesirables that attack others for not living or liking the things that that individual does.
auticus wrote: You can't label the entire "competitive 40k" community by the words of a few. Just as you cannot label the entire casual community by the words of a few.
It is a well known truism that among the human race there are undesirables that attack others for not living or liking the things that that individual does.
Well, I deem obnoxious tournament players and filthy casuals who don´t know the rules equally irritating. But there is a solution to the problem at hand: Don´t do tournaments or PUGs in your FLGS and then you will never run in with any kind of unsavory types. Instead spend time with your friends and play garage hammer. It worked for me perfectly.
Yeah. Was a selection of a conversation from FB Competitive 40K (and quite a few more than just a few select individuals) disparaging people who don't play tournaments. Unfortunately, the language they used was severe enough that it also violates dakka policies.
Sunny Side Up wrote: Yeah. Was a selection of a conversation from FB Competitive 40K (and quite a few more than just a few select individuals) disparaging people who don't play tournaments. Unfortunately, the language they used was severe enough that it also violates dakka policies.
Seems like a great bunch to be around in that case.
But it's the way such "exclusive" groups tend to behave.
Meh is all i say to it. Not worth getting upset about it.
Sunny Side Up wrote: Extracts the competitive 40K facebook group. There's pages upon pages of this stuff there suddenly.
I am not sure why there is so much rage among tournament players?
Did something happen? I thought the community actually came closer together with 8th.
Keep in mind, you're citing the FB 'Comp. 40k', not necessarily tourney players. If I have the correct group, it says there are 9.4k members, so it's pretty easy to get some lower common denominators (a math term, I know ) posting the more base and bad of human diatribes.
I suggest, maybe go to a tourney, take a poll or survey there? Ask Qs like, "Is it annoying to play non-tourney players at these events? If yes, then is it their:
a. lack of tactical/strategic acumen
b. ignorance of rules?
c. the fact that *they* gripe and complain about tourney regulars?
d. and more.
And/or ask, "Is it positive to have non-tourney players? Why?" accompanied by similar, though reciprocal follow up Qs.
a. because you met new person
b. because they brought something different (and good) that is not a " 'Net list " or common build
c. etc
I think citing that discussion is really akin to attending a rally, political, religious or sports, and citing their over-the-top vehemence of their rivals/enemies, and then asking, "What's up with Raider fans (American football team in California, with bad attitude reputation) and their hatred of the Denver Broncos?
N.Y. Mets fans (or all ALB ) hating the N.Y. Yankees?
SunnyS.U., I am unable to cite any better known European rivalries, except the one my wife ran into. She was wearing a 'Tudor Rose'/England rugby jersey, while we were visiting in Wales. She pleaded "It's just a gift! I I didn't know!" I know your dakka flag says Germany.
Anyway, as a long time tourney player, I have nothing to disparage the non-tourney players, the garage players, etc. I'm not better (at 40k specifically) than any of them.
Sunny Side Up wrote: Extracts the competitive 40K facebook group. There's pages upon pages of this stuff there suddenly.
I am not sure why there is so much rage among tournament players?
Did something happen? I thought the community actually came closer together with 8th.
Keep in mind, you're citing the FB 'Comp. 40k', not necessarily tourney players. If I have the correct group, it says there are 9.4k members, so it's pretty easy to get some lower common denominators (a math term, I know ) posting the more base and bad of human diatribes.
I suggest, maybe go to a tourney, take a poll or survey there? Ask Qs like, "Is it annoying to play non-tourney players at these events? If yes, then is it their:
a. lack of tactical/strategic acumen
b. ignorance of rules?
c. the fact that *they* gripe and complain about tourney regulars?
d. and more.
And/or ask, "Is it positive to have non-tourney players? Why?" accompanied by similar, though reciprocal follow up Qs.
a. because you met new person
b. because they brought something different (and good) that is not a " 'Net list " or common build
c. etc
I think citing that discussion is really akin to attending a rally, political, religious or sports, and citing their over-the-top vehemence of their rivals/enemies, and then asking, "What's up with Raider fans (American football team in California, with bad attitude reputation) and their hatred of the Denver Broncos?
N.Y. Mets fans (or all ALB ) hating the N.Y. Yankees?
SunnyS.U., I am unable to cite any better known European rivalries, except the one my wife ran into. She was wearing a 'Tudor Rose'/England rugby jersey, while we were visiting in Wales. She pleaded "It's just a gift! I I didn't know!" I know your dakka flag says Germany.
Anyway, as a long time tourney player, I have nothing to disparage the non-tourney players, the garage players, etc. I'm not better (at 40k specifically) than any of them.
Europeans have spent most of human history trying to kill each other. It's only over the last 70 years that we've decided to settle down and actually work for the common good, so national rivalries are well understood. What the OP is quoting is a bunch of people so heavily invested in 'the hobby' that they've allowed their self-image and self-worth to be based on it. It's pretty sad, really. More to be pitied than scorned. Of course, this isn't true of every tourney or competitive player as surely as the stereotype of derpy rules-idiot isn't true of 99% of casual players.
Banville wrote: Europeans have spent most of human history trying to kill each other. It's only over the last 70 years that we've decided to settle down and actually work for the common good, so national rivalries are well understood. What the OP is quoting is a bunch of people so heavily invested in 'the hobby' that they've allowed their self-image and self-worth to be based on it. It's pretty sad, really. More to be pitied than scorned. Of course, this isn't true of every tourney or competitive player as surely as the stereotype of derpy rules-idiot isn't true of 99% of casual players.
Yeah, I skipped citation of national conflicts; those being 70+ years back. 'Course, the Iron Curtain only went down 30+ years ago. I was just sticking with the overall civilian goofery.
Banville wrote: Europeans have spent most of human history trying to kill each other. It's only over the last 70 years that we've decided to settle down and actually work for the common good, so national rivalries are well understood. What the OP is quoting is a bunch of people so heavily invested in 'the hobby' that they've allowed their self-image and self-worth to be based on it. It's pretty sad, really. More to be pitied than scorned. Of course, this isn't true of every tourney or competitive player as surely as the stereotype of derpy rules-idiot isn't true of 99% of casual players.
Yeah, I skipped citation of national conflicts; those being 70+ years back. 'Course, the Iron Curtain only went down 30+ years ago. I was just sticking with the overall civilian goofery.
70 years back.
--> so how bout Yugoslavia?
Mind you theres also countries made up out of countries still around but that one there is a bit of an iffy case.
Not to mention that spain has it's own issues and i am just waiting for some new shenanigans between coriscan and france /austria and italy due to South tyrol.
Especially with the parties involved but he just europe.
So, steering this back onto the topic in hand than it descending into political bollocks about Europe the last 70 odd years (interesting discussion, but considering the ban on politics I don't want to see a thread nuked because if it).
I currently can play in 5 specific locations, two of which are GW stores themselves and are usually running theme days/events so for matched play 40k, I have the choice of two LGS and a gaming group. The gaming group and the one LGS caters to both casual and competitive 40k and are great places to be.
The other LGS is full on competitive matched only. The current cheese/spam/meta is alive and well here. Minimum 3 colours is a rarity. And to top it off really scummy out if game tactics used to. For example, in a slow grow league, my first opponent in the 1000pts games was running guilliman. And my second opponent got chatting to me as I showed off my foot force Custodes (around 90% painted) and turns up to my game with two storm eagles. Yeah, left a bitter taste in my mouth to say the least. It's so bad in that place even the necromunda league is full WAAC with 0% narrative and even frostgrave had people running the exact same Elementalist builds with 0% fun.
So yeah, I can see this as perfectly normal behaviour for WAAC players who believe they are better because their hyper min/max list will win unless countered by an exact list. While I understand that everyone has fun in different ways, but seriously, this kind of behaviour isn't going to win you friends or repeat opponents.
The tournament scene going crazy at the end of an edition is nothing new nor something to worry about.
The rules of the game are not really that good or thought thru until the end. So we get the hype at the beginning while everything is new and the tournament scene changes for the better, as soon as the first Codex appears that breaks the core game (this is were some players usually bring the excuse that it is written with the next edition in mind) it turns around and get worse with each new release.
Now we are at a point were the Edition is mostly done and we are just waiting for 9th to hit and shake the game up again bringing the competitive scene down (as everything is new and "balanced")
This is also usually the time when 40k competitive people find their way into Fantasy and start playing there.
Each edition of WH/AoS and 40k had the point were the other one was the better game but now AoS still get so much hate from people because of what was done that this option is not for the majority, so instead of switching and we get more hate towards the game than in the past.
So yeah, I can see this as perfectly normal behaviour for WAAC players who believe they are better because their hyper min/max list will win unless countered by an exact list. While I understand that everyone has fun in different ways, but seriously, this kind of behaviour isn't going to win you friends or repeat opponents.
WAAC players and competitive players are not the same and I have met less WAAC type of people at tournaments than in casual club games
Go look at the recent interview Ash did with a tourney grinder at Guerilla Miniatures Gaming. It is very telling. Ash is asking about all the obvious issues casuals have with the game and the other guy most of the time cannot even comprehend the questions, or gives imbecilic answers that only apply to tourney play (like "it doesn't matter that some army building choices are better than others because the "meta" is self-correcting"). It takes Ash 5 minutes of prodding and rephrasing to get the guy to even admit that two army lists costing the same points might not have an equal chance of winning given equal player skill. He goes as far as claiming that an army of nothing but bolter marines should do fine as long as they "play to the mission".
tneva82 wrote: Competive 40k is self contradicting term anyway so what's the matter anyway.
Highly inclined to disagree with you. High level play is completely different to the average beet and pretzels game of 40k.
Of course, but out of all the wargames out there, 40K is far from having the best ruleset to play competitively.
From a competitive point of view, 40K's main appeal is the very large player base/number of big events, not its inherent tactical depth. The rules are lacking, and it's very expensive, especially when a quick point change can make dozens of your model unplayable at the highest level.
As far as rules go, Warhammer is one of the worst games to play as a competitive game. Way too many inconsistencies, poor wording, inconsistent wording, vague rules, and that's not even getting into the balance (or lack thereof). Really the only benefit is the number of players which enables a larger pool of players.
The fact there is this underlying desire to turn Warhammer into a "tabletop sport" despite all its flaws and shortcomings is a bigger issue, since "competitive" Warhammer barely resembles the game as it's played outside of those mediums, yet at the same time those mediums trickle down and affect everything from local events to casual game nights at the local gaming store. It has the adverse effect of permeating every aspect of the game rather than having a clear delineation between competitive and casual games.
On top of that, the mindset of the competitive Warhammer crowd is far and away removed from how everyone else plays but online it seems to be the only thing that gets discussed. How many times have you seen someone asks a question, and get told what's competitive/meta or told to scrap their entire army and buy something else, rather than be given advice on how to make what they want to play work (something you often see in other games rather than "Change 60% of your army"). How many rules for events are assumed to be base rules (the "rule of 3" and detachment rules spring to mind here; these are for organized events, yet almost everyone online talks and references them as though they were Matched Play rules)
Wayniac wrote: As far as rules go, Warhammer is one of the worst games to play as a competitive game. Way too many inconsistencies, poor wording, inconsistent wording, vague rules, and that's not even getting into the balance (or lack thereof). Really the only benefit is the number of players which enables a larger pool of players.
The fact there is this underlying desire to turn Warhammer into a "tabletop sport" despite all its flaws and shortcomings is a bigger issue, since "competitive" Warhammer barely resembles the game as it's played outside of those mediums, yet at the same time those mediums trickle down and affect everything from local events to casual game nights at the local gaming store. It has the adverse effect of permeating every aspect of the game rather than having a clear delineation between competitive and casual games.
On top of that, the mindset of the competitive Warhammer crowd is far and away removed from how everyone else plays but online it seems to be the only thing that gets discussed. How many times have you seen someone asks a question, and get told what's competitive/meta or told to scrap their entire army and buy something else, rather than be given advice on how to make what they want to play work (something you often see in other games rather than "Change 60% of your army"). How many rules for events are assumed to be base rules (the "rule of 3" and detachment rules spring to mind here; these are for organized events, yet almost everyone online talks and references them as though they were Matched Play rules)
Maybe, but why would that make so many people who play 40K competitively and primarily/exclusively in tournaments (whether or not that is a flawed aspiration) display so much hate and loathing towards those that do not?
If anything, based on your explanation, I'd except animosity to go mainly in the other direction.
Wayniac wrote: As far as rules go, Warhammer is one of the worst games to play as a competitive game. Way too many inconsistencies, poor wording, inconsistent wording, vague rules, and that's not even getting into the balance (or lack thereof). Really the only benefit is the number of players which enables a larger pool of players.
The fact there is this underlying desire to turn Warhammer into a "tabletop sport" despite all its flaws and shortcomings is a bigger issue, since "competitive" Warhammer barely resembles the game as it's played outside of those mediums, yet at the same time those mediums trickle down and affect everything from local events to casual game nights at the local gaming store. It has the adverse effect of permeating every aspect of the game rather than having a clear delineation between competitive and casual games.
On top of that, the mindset of the competitive Warhammer crowd is far and away removed from how everyone else plays but online it seems to be the only thing that gets discussed. How many times have you seen someone asks a question, and get told what's competitive/meta or told to scrap their entire army and buy something else, rather than be given advice on how to make what they want to play work (something you often see in other games rather than "Change 60% of your army"). How many rules for events are assumed to be base rules (the "rule of 3" and detachment rules spring to mind here; these are for organized events, yet almost everyone online talks and references them as though they were Matched Play rules)
Maybe, but why would that make so many people who play 40K competitively and primarily/exclusively in tournaments (whether or not that is a flawed aspiration) display so much hate and loathing towards those that do not?
If anything, based on your explanation, I'd except animosity to go mainly in the other direction.
I haven't seen the hate or loathing, so I can't answer that. Beyond the usual "ego clash" you find in competitive environments, anyways. And since the picture (?) from the OP was deleted, I can 't see what sort of animosity is being talked about. I'm not in the competitive 40k groups since I got tired of seeing people be told to throw away half of their list when they asked for tips, or being told that 90% of their codex was garbage and to only focus on the handful of "good units", and the ITC circlejerking.
Animosity between communities is pretty stupid overall.
As a mostly casual player, I actually consider that it's a good thing there are competitive 40K players. I can't understand why they want to play it that way, but they do buy a lot of models (which is good for everyone), and they push for a more balanced ruleset, which is, for the vast majority, also beneficial to casual players. The only drawbacks are when GW screws up when trying to balance things, like they did with the battle brothers rule (which didn't fix any imbalance issues, but did hurt some fluffy lists) or the "no fly during the charge phase", which has mostly been fixed now.
Strg Alt wrote: Well, I deem obnoxious tournament players and filthy casuals who don´t know the rules equally irritating. But there is a solution to the problem at hand: Don´t do tournaments or PUGs in your FLGS and then you will never run in with any kind of unsavory types. Instead spend time with your friends and play garage hammer. It worked for me perfectly.
So, I'm in my early 40s with a wonderful wife and a stepson. Please don't get them wrong, I love them both more than any piece of plastic or resin. First of all, time is limited. Would my wife have a problem with me building a 40K table? Not at all. Now, storage would be a bit of an issue. I'd need to find some way to either get it to fold down or use something else. I've thought about using two 6' x 2.5' folding tables. That'd give me a 6' x 5' surface allowing for 6" on each side for models that are out of play or in reserve or for books, tape measures, dice, anything. I could buy a 6' x 4' mat from any of the stores that sell them, get some terrain, and I'd be fine. My wife wouldn't have any issue with that.
Here's the issue... while I do have a small group of friends, none of them have any want or time (depending on the person) to assemble/paint an entire 1000 or 2000 point army. Yes, I have the models to easily put together and paint a 1000 to 2000 point army that they could play, but I don't know that any of them would actually want to take an entire afternoon to learn the game not knowing if they'd ever actually play again.
So, all that said, trying to play Garagehammer is really not something I can do. I will need to play at my FLGS or GW store where there are people who want to play.
TL;DR, toxic behavior is not exclusive to W40k. It is a product of any competitive online community. The toxic behavior is rooted in an ideology that skill == worth, and people are desperate to protect their perceived worth and be accepted. To do this they engage in toxic behavior that is commonly observed and complained about.
The competitive community honestly isn't going off the rails. Its a competitive community so it will inherently be plagued with toxic attitudes, most commonly elitism and arrogance. But this is a charged question, and its a charged issue. I would even be wary of this being a "troll" question. Because the phenomenon mentioned here isn't one that is unique to 40K's competitive community, but rather endemic to online competitive communities on a large scale. Compared to other types of online communities, competitive communities are ripe for toxic attitudes (second to political communities these days but... lets not get into that ). This is for a couple of reasons.
In essence, to be a part of a competitive community you must tie a player's "worth" at least in some degree to "skill". This is, at least on some level, intuitive, after all, if you wanted to learn chess would you rather take advise from Judit Polgar or Trisha Paytas? But also it is important to realize that advise is objectively good or bad on its own regardless of who says it, what is observed is merely the correlation that the chess advise of a Grand Master who once beat Kasperov would more often than not be "good" as compared to the chess advise of a youtube troll. While a focus on skill == worth does not directly create a toxic environment, it lays the groundwork for the toxic attitudes of players to take hold.
One of the things players do on competitive forums is discuss unit builds and strategies, in order to be taken seriously players feel a pressure to establish their own "worth" so that their advise is heard. True greats, who win major GTs have enough name recognition and clout that they don't need to do this. But there are not a lot of GT winners, that is a small pool. So many posters need to establish their skill in other ways. An unscrupulous person will do this by attacking players they disagree with by accusing them of being "bad" or "unskilled". It is an ad hominem attack, "X is bad advise because Y is unskilled."
Y's skill level should be irrelevant in determining whether X is good or bad advise, but you will be more inclined to disregard Y's advise if you are seeking advice to help you win games and it appears that the majority of competitive players view him as unskilled. This creates a tendency in any competitive community to devolve into personal attacks, accusing people who disagree with them as being bad players and thus not worth listening too. This can also commonly come in the form of attacking a player's lived experiences, the most common retort being "that wouldn't work against a skilled opponent", dismissing an opposing viewpoint by stating that it only works against poor opponents with a heavy implication that truly good players, read: those that agree with me, will always defeat X strategy.
Elitism of the competitive community towards the general player base also stems from this. This is most commonly seen as a defense of the competitive community and the competitive way of play. Also this is where competitive players clash the hardest with outsiders or players existing outside of competitive circles. For many competitive players, there are no "rules exploits" or "loopholes" (or more nuanced there are no "rules exploits" or "loopholes" in the army I play). Everything permissible within the rules is fair play until FAQ'd, because the ideal way to play is to use everything at your disposal to secure a win. By any means necessary. Because if you win, it means you are skilled at the game, and if you are skilled at the game it means that your opinion is more valuable, and if your opinion is more valuable it means you are closer to being accepted by the competitive community. So when somebody from the outside makes an argument along these lines, "you shouldn't do Y, because it abuses the rules and makes the game less fun", that is seen as an affront on the fundamental structure of competitive play. This opinion is, unjustifiably, seen as dangerous to the competitive community because it places a supreme value judgement on "fun" as opposed to "skill" being the measurement of how the game is played. Furthermore, many players confuse pointing out rules exploits as an attack on their skill, and by extension worth. They will hear, "you are not a skilled player, you only won because of Y". Which will cause them to defend Y (which is rules as worded by the way), until they are blue in the face... but keep in mind that they hear "you are not a skilled player, you only won because of Y", because they are projecting (see below). This will frequently cascade into a defense of why Y was intended or not overpowered, because otherwise would imply that they are not as skilled as somebody who doesn't use Y.
You see, I saved the best for last. The hipocrisy that plagues all competitive communities. It is pride. To many players in the competitive community, losing is unacceptable. Because if they lost it means they were not as skilled as their opponent, and their opinions are less valuable than their opponents, and they feel as though their credibility in the community on the whole was eroded when they lost. This is what leads to cheating scandals at major GTs. As long as they don't get caught they can win and winning is everything. Far more common than cheating however, are excuses and insults. "You only won because you used a cheesy [unit, strategy]" "you only won because you got lucky". If a player losses, it cannot be because they were outplayed... unless that loss came at the hands of one of the uncontested greats. A loss to someone outside the competitive community or to someone lower on the hierarchy? Many in the competitive community cannot take that blow to their pride.
And finally, its often the case that the more insecure a player in the competitive community is, the more likely to engage in toxic behavior such as belittling, attacking, insulting, poor sportsmanship, or even outright cheating. This is because players secure in their skill don't mind when things go poorly for them, and often will seek out opponents who they view as challenging. After all, "you only get smarter by playing a smarter opponent". When someone desperately wants to be accepted by a community that values skill above all else, sometimes... a player will use every strategy they can imagine to gain acceptance... by any means necessary.
But again. Again. And I say this with emphasis. These are problems that plague any competitive community. Video games especially are famous for creating toxic competitive environments. This can arise in sports, things as seemingly benign as body building forums. etc. Its also important to note that this absolutely does not encompass the entire competitive community or the "circuit" competitive community. The circuit being those who travel to multiple GTs per year and play there. Indeed, it is a creature of internet culture, such as facebook or forums. Because in competitive circuits and actual tourney games, disputes tend to be blown off and people are focused on playing the game. You cannot trash talk your way to a GT victory, and attacking the techniques of the winner won't take his trophy away. Its only when you return to the internet, a world of people who take the game seriously but weren't at your specific tournament, and the need to reestablish your worth as a competitive gamer becomes a focus again. If you want to do your part in reducing toxicity in competitive communities, the best thing you can do is reframe the arguments. Explain why things are effective in detail and without reference to tournament results. Refrain from ad hominem attacks, and point out weaknesses in bad advise in game terms only and without reference to player skill. And finally, understand that you don't have the clout to change most competitive communities, but you can do your part to ensure that people feel welcome in threads that you are a part of.
Cheers! Sorry for the run on post. But I hope someone finds it useful.
The longer I enjoy this hobby, and the longer I make my living as a game designer, the more I embrace the fact that I LOVE 40k and AoS, but loathe them as competitive rules-sets. Worse, my time playing both competitively actually brought out some of my worst instincts, made me a worse hobbyist, and actively hurt my ability to have actual fun.
The hobby can still produce competitive offerings. Just a recent example I NEVER would have seen coming was A Song of Ice and Fire which makes for a much more skill based exercise (still isn't perfect, but nothing is). The industry is still doing good work, AND GW is still making killer FUN, games... but the two just haven't intersected with their two big games.
Highly inclined to disagree with you. High level play is completely different to the average beet and pretzels game of 40k.
Good Lord, man. Beets and pretzels? I don't care how you play the game, but improve your snacks while doing it! Casual gaming isn't even beets and pretzels.
akaean wrote: TL;DR, toxic behavior is not exclusive to W40k. It is a product of any competitive online community. The toxic behavior is rooted in an ideology that skill == worth, and people are desperate to protect their perceived worth and be accepted. To do this they engage in toxic behavior that is commonly observed and complained about.
Toxic behaviour isn't even the issue, IMHO. Competitive play poisons the actual rules, not the players. Because of the focus on competitive play, GW now "balances" armies by just looking at over/under used units in tournaments and changing points cost a little bit without thinking about the how and why. Competitive players feel like the game is fine as long as each faction has 1 competitive build and they spout imbecilic nonsense about the meta being self-correcting - the notion that if a list is over represented, players will switch to lists that can easily beat that one, and so a dynamic balance of rock-paper-scissors lists will emerge. Competitive players think this is good and healthy. Meanwhile casual players just see that they can't have fun games with the models they like because they get curbstomped every time even by other casuals who just happen to like models with better rules, let alone anyone actively copying tournament netlists. They don't see switching armies a valid solution like competitive players do. But because GW only listens to competitive players for balance, this state will never get fixed.
There’s a lot of baseless conjecture being thrown toward the competitive community. A balanced game is good for both casual and competitive players yet it’s the competitive community that is the driving force for balance. The competitive community is the reason 8th edition is probably the most balanced edition of Warhammer in recent history.
Competitive 40K is the way Warhammer as a whole is going to move into a wider audience, just like Esports did to video games. 8th edition has brought in more players into the hobby than any other edition and that’s partially due to the effort of the ITC and the playtest team. Competitive events are selling out faster than every before. For example the largest competitive Warhammer event in the world, the Las Vegas Open, sold out in mere hours.
Warhammer players seem to wanna separate themselves into casual and competitive camps with both sides thinking that what they want is at odds with the other when the truth is they both want the same thing.
Competitive 40K is the way Warhammer as a whole is going to move into a wider audience, just like Esports did to video games. 8th edition has brought in more players into the hobby than any other edition and that’s partially due to the effort of the ITC and the playtest team. Competitive events are selling out faster than every before. For example the largest competitive Warhammer event in the world, the Las Vegas Open, sold out in mere hours.
I think this is looking at the issue of growth backwards. Esports are becoming a thing for the same reasons that people watch traditional sports. An audience is created by kids playing sports (and now e-sports) and the pitch for the viewing experience is "you know what is all about, now come watch it played at the highest possible level". The audience for esports is growing because more people play for fun and can appreciate what they will be watching.
It's the same with 40k. By engaging with the community and making entry into the hobby easier with starter sets and now faster painting methods GW is increasing the base of people who are interested in the hobby. That subsequently means more people who are interested in the playing competitively.
I've played the game both ways and now that I don't have the time for practice games and keeping up with the meta I play it as a "beets and pretzels" game. It's best to think of it as two separate things just like regular sports. The strategies that NBA teams use are not particularly applicable in a pickup game of 50 year dudes on a Saturday morning. Conversely what seems OP in a pickup basketball game would be considered ho-hum in the NBA.
Guardsmanwaffle wrote: There’s a lot of baseless conjecture being thrown toward the competitive community. A balanced game is good for both casual and competitive players yet it’s the competitive community that is the driving force for balance. The competitive community is the reason 8th edition is probably the most balanced edition of Warhammer in recent history.
The competitive community has a very degenerate idea about what balance means and them driving GW's design is a major problem with this edition. Casual players are in no way benefitting from "balance" that boils down to minor points juggling to keep a dozen of the most ridiculous power lists roughly equal to one another, while everything else is garbage.
Competitive 40K is the way Warhammer as a whole is going to move into a wider audience, just like Esports did to video games. 8th edition has brought in more players into the hobby than any other edition and that’s partially due to the effort of the ITC and the playtest team. Competitive events are selling out faster than every before. For example the largest competitive Warhammer event in the world, the Las Vegas Open, sold out in mere hours.
I think this is looking at the issue of growth backwards. Esports are becoming a thing for the same reasons that people watch traditional sports. An audience is created by kids playing sports (and now e-sports) and the pitch for the viewing experience is "you know what is all about, now come watch it played at the highest possible level". The audience for esports is growing because more people play for fun and can appreciate what they will be watching.
It's the same with 40k. By engaging with the community and making entry into the hobby easier with starter sets and now faster painting methods GW is increasing the base of people who are interested in the hobby. That subsequently means more people who are interested in the playing competitively.
Everything you say is true, the increased popularity of warhammer is what is driving the popularity of competitive 40K, but it’s competitive 40K that is going to take 40K further into populartiy.
If we take esports and gaming again as a example, gamings popularity lead to the creation of the esport community, and the popularity of esports pushed gaming into the mainstream so much so that it’s on espn. The rising popularity of warhammer is leading to the creation of a competitive warhammer community which will further drive warhammer into the mainstream, probably not to espn though. I don’t remember which event it was but there was a ITC event that made it into the front page of twitch that probably brought more new eyes onto 40K than GW’s marketing.
Guardsmanwaffle wrote: There’s a lot of baseless conjecture being thrown toward the competitive community. A balanced game is good for both casual and competitive players yet it’s the competitive community that is the driving force for balance. The competitive community is the reason 8th edition is probably the most balanced edition of Warhammer in recent history.
The competitive community has a very degenerate idea about what balance means and them driving GW's design is a major problem with this edition. Casual players are in no way benefitting from "balance" that boils down to minor points juggling to keep a dozen of the most ridiculous power lists roughly equal to one another, while everything else is garbage.
A quick glance and the top placing lists of various events disproves you. There has never been a more diverse 40K meta than what we are experiencing now. You say minor points juggling is “degenerate” but you’ll have a hard time convincing anyone that 8th edition was a better game before the chapter approved points changes and the castellan nerf.
It's not hard to find a toxic behavior in either group if you look hard enough. There are several in this thread who's posting history would do them shame if examined. The world has enough villains in it without any need to manufacture more.
Play the game the way you enjoy with people who feel the same. And keep your head out of your own ass, and everything will be fine.
It's not hard to find a toxic behavior in either group if you look hard enough. There are several in this thread who's posting history would do them shame if examined. The world has enough villains in it without any need to manufacture more.
Play the game the way you enjoy with people who feel the same. And keep your head out of your own ass, and everything will be fine.
I honestly don't know why people are up in arms about this anyway. Most tournament players don't walk into a FLGS and club seals. Tournament players play at tournaments, or schedule practice games with people who know what they're getting into.
Now if your thinking of people who do maybe 1 or 2 tournaments a year, and spend the rest of their time at a FLGS trying to crush unsuspecting players... that's not a competitive player or a tournament player. That's a jerk. Don't judge the competitive community by that mark.
I've not played a casual game of 40k in like 5 months at this point. Does that mean I'm into the hobby "wrong" just because I enjoy tournament play?
Honestly this reminds me of a few discussions I've seen regarding the TF2 Friendlies vs tryhard players. All in all this is a game, and a lot of players will play that game in different ways, ways that suit their personal temperament. Or perhaps religion would be a better comparison? Everyone believes something different and is certain that those beliefs are absolute. And will attempt to beat down anyone who has a different view, regardless of how sturdy their own platform may be.
Honestly as long as peeps have a bit of fun and enjoyment does it all really matter?
Horst wrote: I honestly don't know why people are up in arms about this anyway. Most tournament players don't walk into a FLGS and club seals. Tournament players play at tournaments, or schedule practice games with people who know what they're getting into.
Now if your thinking of people who do maybe 1 or 2 tournaments a year, and spend the rest of their time at a FLGS trying to crush unsuspecting players... that's not a competitive player or a tournament player. That's a jerk. Don't judge the competitive community by that mark.
I've not played a casual game of 40k in like 5 months at this point. Does that mean I'm into the hobby "wrong" just because I enjoy tournament play?
Yeah I don't get it man. There is no right or wrong. I guess I will paraphrase my post from another thread..
I don't understand anyone would not prefixing request for games with "I'm looking to test out a list for a tournament" or "Looking for a competitive game as need to practice for tournament". That's the only way to ensure you get competition and get a meaningful test. Otherwise what's the point.?
Like wise bringing an unoptimized list and not stating you want to have a casual game because your list is unoptimized and then complaining about getting stomped... Why?
If someone's asking for tournament/competitive practice will see you get stomped and them no getting any meaningful test. Thus everyone's time is wasted. So again, what's the point?
Do your due diligence and if you don't, its on you.
The only time you get any kind of bad game/matchup is if both parties just don't bother to communicate as to expectations for the game. And its down to both parties. Nobody is a friggin mind reader. I don't understand why people have such issues with talking to one another.
Obviously there is a problem about being disingenuous about intent. There is no fix for being an asshat.
Asshat behaviour is not new or exclusive to 40k. And it seems to be mostly an online phenomenon. Fortunately all the people at my community are ok. (Part from that one guy whose stuff is always in range and yet I'm always somehow 1/99th of an inch out of range so I don't bother to play that guy lol)
Highly inclined to disagree with you. High level play is completely different to the average beet and pretzels game of 40k.
Good Lord, man. Beets and pretzels? I don't care how you play the game, but improve your snacks while doing it! Casual gaming isn't even beets and pretzels.
Horst wrote: I honestly don't know why people are up in arms about this anyway. Most tournament players don't walk into a FLGS and club seals. Tournament players play at tournaments, or schedule practice games with people who know what they're getting into.
Now if your thinking of people who do maybe 1 or 2 tournaments a year, and spend the rest of their time at a FLGS trying to crush unsuspecting players... that's not a competitive player or a tournament player. That's a jerk. Don't judge the competitive community by that mark.
I've not played a casual game of 40k in like 5 months at this point. Does that mean I'm into the hobby "wrong" just because I enjoy tournament play?
Fine.
But again, it’s the competitive 40K group that has pages upon pages of people identifying as tournament players (many with high ITC rankings, etc.. to prove the point) denigrating and maligning casual players in the most horrific language, not the other way round.
There are also (far fewer) “voices of reason” in the discussion, true, and mods shut it down eventually, but the overwhelming sentiment coming from tournament players was just strikingly hostile.
So there is either some weird psychology going on in the vein of akaean’s hypothesis, or it’s a weird attempt to somehow label “bad (in behavior, not skill) competitive players” as “not actually competitive, but actually filthy casuals” to conserve the tautological myth of “all ”true” competitives are actually the good guys and the “bad ones” aren’t actually “true” competitive players.
Horst wrote: I honestly don't know why people are up in arms about this anyway. Most tournament players don't walk into a FLGS and club seals. Tournament players play at tournaments, or schedule practice games with people who know what they're getting into.
Now if your thinking of people who do maybe 1 or 2 tournaments a year, and spend the rest of their time at a FLGS trying to crush unsuspecting players... that's not a competitive player or a tournament player. That's a jerk. Don't judge the competitive community by that mark.
I've not played a casual game of 40k in like 5 months at this point. Does that mean I'm into the hobby "wrong" just because I enjoy tournament play?
Fine.
But again, it’s the competitive 40K group that has pages upon pages of people identifying as tournament players (many with high ITC rankings, etc.. to prove the point) denigrating and maligning casual players in the most horrific language, not the other way round.
There are also (far fewer) “voices of reason” in the discussion, true, and mods shut it down eventually, but the overwhelming sentiment coming from tournament players was just strikingly hostile.
So there is either some weird psychology going on in the vein of akaean’s hypothesis, or it’s a weird attempt to somehow label “bad (in behavior, not skill) competitive players” as “not actually competitive, but actually filthy casuals” to conserve the tautological myth of “all ”true” competitives are actually the good guys and the “bad ones” aren’t actually “true” competitive players.
Exclusive group identification and behaviour based upon othering.
It's normal that this happens.
Also relatively natural.
There is no correlation between the "quality" of a ruleset and the competitive community around it.
If a game is popular, then there will be a competing mindset that is born out of it. There are no other factors.
Just look at MtG, it has the worst possible balancing in the history of games, with less than 0,01% of the cards of the game actually playable and if you try to go to an event with a thematic deck you will get stomped and laughed at. Yet it has a huge following in the competitive community.
This looks exclusive to facebook groups right now. The competitive community in my area is a handful of people out of 100+ players. It's much more disparaging over in the Warmachine, Xwing, and card game community
I'm baffled that this is a thing outside of ETC/ATC/200+ people events. Maybe 1-2% of AoS or 40k players attend tournaments regularly enough (the the previous wrecking crew roster or the etc squad from back in the day)
Spoletta wrote: There is no correlation between the "quality" of a ruleset and the competitive community around it.
If a game is popular, then there will be a competing mindset that is born out of it. There are no other factors.
Just look at MtG, it has the worst possible balancing in the history of games, with less than 0,01% of the cards of the game actually playable and if you try to go to an event with a thematic deck you will get stomped and laughed at. Yet it has a huge following in the competitive community.
MtG has always been pretty balanced within the formats that they run, from Modern to Standard to Pauper. You're getting confused with YuGiOh
cody.d. wrote: Or perhaps religion would be a better comparison? Everyone believes something different and is certain that those beliefs are absolute. And will attempt to beat down anyone who has a different view, regardless of how sturdy their own platform may be.
So, casuals would be the ones who just go to church on Sunday, sing a few songs, and hang out with friends, while competitive players would be the ones who start crusades and inquisitions? You know, that actually works...
Honestly as long as peeps have a bit of fun and enjoyment does it all really matter?
Individuals and small groups don't amount to much, but collectively, they can exert great control over the game and its community. Warmachine is an example of a game that went completely competitive, and while people were defending it (even praising it) early on for such a decision, it has become very obvious that it was this mindset which ultimately destroyed the game. I believe that a competitive mindset, if allowed to fester, will absolutely destroy any game it takes hold of.
I think what people tend to forget is that competitive players all start out as casuals at some point (if not of the current game, than of a different game that introduced them to the hobby). They don't start out thinking "My goal is to win tournaments". They start out thinking, "This looks like a fun game. I'll give it a try." If you don't have new players and casuals, your game is basically one of those towns in Japan, where the low birth rate and number of people leaving for opportunities has created a ghost town that is slowly disappearing.
Similarly, I've seen a lot of casual, older players that say they were competitive in the past, but now just want to chuck some dice around and have fun with mates. It seems like the competitive mindset is temporary, possibly even unsustainable over time. If your game is too competitive orientated, with no room for casuals, these players leave the game when they stop being competitive (like Warmachine). Games which support a healthy casual community (like AoS) end up keeping these players.
I think of being competitive as the "teenage years" of being a gamer. It's just a phase. You are full of yourself, you think your problems are everybody's problems, and you believe you know more than you actually do - but don't worry. It doesn't last forever. Eventually, you grow up.
Spoletta wrote: There is no correlation between the "quality" of a ruleset and the competitive community around it.
If a game is popular, then there will be a competing mindset that is born out of it. There are no other factors.
Just look at MtG, it has the worst possible balancing in the history of games, with less than 0,01% of the cards of the game actually playable and if you try to go to an event with a thematic deck you will get stomped and laughed at. Yet it has a huge following in the competitive community.
MtG has always been pretty balanced within the formats that they run, from Modern to Standard to Pauper. You're getting confused with YuGiOh
Lol no.
It is balanced if you force yourself to use only the "good" cards and the "good" builds.
You cannot select what you want and somehow win against an opponent with a competitive deck just because you are a better player, which is the definition that we are using of "balanced" for 40K.
In MtG this is just impossible. You cannot even select your favorite color if it isn't competitive at the moment. The balance of MtG is utterly trash if you use any standard method to measure it. If we use the MtG meter to assess the balance of 40K, then 7th edition was the most balanced game ever produced. After all the top 3 or 4 builds were about balanced with each other, so the game must be fine, right?
tneva82 wrote: Competive 40k is self contradicting term anyway so what's the matter anyway.
Highly inclined to disagree with you. High level play is completely different to the average beet and pretzels game of 40k.
Competitive 40k is too Ccg these days. It is less about your skills on the table and more about the ability to produce a new army 4 times a year as the meta shifts and new units are the best in class. Meta chasing is too expensive for most people, but without it you will never podium at one of the big tourneys
Nurglitch wrote: I've proposed using lists fixed by the organizers to make the game about skills on the table.
Never gonna get off the ground. Deck building, it is is essentially deck building, it too engrained in competitive wargaming. Same reason magic is still about building decks. Also, like three quarters (or more) of the biggest tourneys are held by people who sell models. And most of the rest have some professional connections with gw.
Not everyone is going to be BFF's or get along; and you know what? That's OK.
I know the type of player I like to play W40K with and the type of player who I do not enjoy playing W40K with. I'll avoid playing games with the later.
Nurglitch wrote: I've proposed using lists fixed by the organizers to make the game about skills on the table.
Not going to happen. That would reveal the actual skill of the players, rather than how well they can download netlists and follow flow charts, and the blow to their fragile egos would be too great...
...but I'd really like to see something like that. They've had sealed deck tournaments for CCGs forever, but they've never really had premade deck tournaments - probably because you can still avoid responsibility for the loss by blaming the randomness of the decks.
Nurglitch wrote: I've proposed using lists fixed by the organizers to make the game about skills on the table.
Not going to happen. That would reveal the actual skill of the players, rather than how well they can download netlists and follow flow charts, and the blow to their fragile egos would be too great...
...but I'd really like to see something like that. They've had sealed deck tournaments for CCGs forever, but they've never really had premade deck tournaments - probably because you can still avoid responsibility for the loss by blaming the randomness of the decks.
The top 1000 or so players all know what is good and are invested enough to meta chase, so their gameplay does come down to skill. But one of those skills is meta reading
I feel like GW has an interesting relationship with the competitive community right now.
On one hand, they're supporting 40K competitive play with more consistent FAQs, regular points adjustments, etc. On the other hand, they continue to add complexity, options and supplements that are obviously aimed at folks that lean toward open/narrative gaming. It's like 40K is both more *supported* than ever for competitive play and yet less *suited* than ever for competitive play. At least in certain aspects.
I still like 40K, but I don't do big tournaments anymore and my mindset is casual-competitive at most. It seems like a pretty good time for the casual-competitive crowd, since we're getting some rebalancing alongside plenty of new toys to play with. *shrug*
They play for different reasons. The rules cannot easily accommodate both playstyles. The rules swing one way or another, and one group rants that the other group is being catered to, and is killing their hobby.
Nurglitch wrote: I've proposed using lists fixed by the organizers to make the game about skills on the table.
Not going to happen. That would reveal the actual skill of the players, rather than how well they can download netlists and follow flow charts, and the blow to their fragile egos would be too great...
...but I'd really like to see something like that. They've had sealed deck tournaments for CCGs forever, but they've never really had premade deck tournaments - probably because you can still avoid responsibility for the loss by blaming the randomness of the decks.
And you guys say tournament players are toxic, lol. Talking down about people who don't play the game in the same way as you is REALLY different from the tournament players who talk down to casuals....
Honestly, look at the winning lists for recent tournaments. There is quite a bit of variation. Even if a list has a similar "core", almost every player puts a different spin on their list over someone else's. It's incredibly rare for 2 players to play the same "netlist".
Guardsmanwaffle wrote: There’s a lot of baseless conjecture being thrown toward the competitive community. A balanced game is good for both casual and competitive players yet it’s the competitive community that is the driving force for balance. The competitive community is the reason 8th edition is probably the most balanced edition of Warhammer in recent history.
The competitive community has a very degenerate idea about what balance means and them driving GW's design is a major problem with this edition. Casual players are in no way benefitting from "balance" that boils down to minor points juggling to keep a dozen of the most ridiculous power lists roughly equal to one another, while everything else is garbage.
As opposed to one or two of the most ridiculous power lists that go unchecked until the community either has had enough and comes up with enough houserules to fix or or collectively decides to shun players until they lose an acceptable amount? These aren't exactly great solutions either.
Ultimately, I think everyone has the same hope of what balance means, but at least in my experience, the players who complain about "competitive players" (which is not the same as what I would call "casuals" but its apparently a two party system) seem to approach the discussion with an idea of balanced that's as impractical as it is degenerate for the players who put the ALL in WAAC.
Realistically, there are more viable codexes right now than 40k has ever seen. That's not the same thing as being able to throw whatever you want on the table and win a tournament. You may have to concede a few points to putting in a Guard battalion or have a squad of blue lootas providing some suppressive fire for your red bikes. There's very little in the game right now you can't include a unit or two of in the game and still have a shot of X-1 or better. That, to me, is a pretty huge benefit as someone who's pretty casual about the game.
And you guys say tournament players are toxic, lol. Talking down about people who don't play the game in the same way as you is REALLY different from the tournament players who talk down to casuals....
I don't care how they play (though I won't ever agree with it). But I don't like what competitive players do to the games. I don't generally use the word "toxic", but there's no getting around the fact that when competitive players become the dominant play style of a game, it is poisonous to the long term health of the game.
I can't tell you the number of people I've heard say that they quit playing games because of this attitude. Tom Vassel has a notorious example of one player - just one person - ruining Netrunner for him and Sam Healey within a few minutes, despite greatly enjoying the game and playing it. If one player can delete two players, is that healthy for the game? Is a single competitive player worth two casual players? And a single overly competitive player can ruin the game for more than just two people over his many years - I can't tell you how many Warmachine players I never saw a second time. I doubt I could ever have such a immediate and damaging affect on the game, regardless of what I did.
Honestly, look at the winning lists for recent tournaments. There is quite a bit of variation. Even if a list has a similar "core", almost every player puts a different spin on their list over someone else's. It's incredibly rare for 2 players to play the same "netlist".
If everybody is driving the same sports car, does it matter if they are painted slightly different shades of red?
Nurglitch wrote: I've proposed using lists fixed by the organizers to make the game about skills on the table.
Not going to happen. That would reveal the actual skill of the players, rather than how well they can download netlists and follow flow charts, and the blow to their fragile egos would be too great...
...but I'd really like to see something like that. They've had sealed deck tournaments for CCGs forever, but they've never really had premade deck tournaments - probably because you can still avoid responsibility for the loss by blaming the randomness of the decks.
And you guys say tournament players are toxic, lol. Talking down about people who don't play the game in the same way as you is REALLY different from the tournament players who talk down to casuals....
Honestly, look at the winning lists for recent tournaments. There is quite a bit of variation. Even if a list has a similar "core", almost every player puts a different spin on their list over someone else's. It's incredibly rare for 2 players to play the same "netlist".
It's not variation if you see 5 lists that are all some take on "Loyal 32 and extras". I'd argue the opposite, but it's enough to keep peddling the narrative that there's variety in the tournament. REAL variety would be actual different armies or different lists, not roughly the same thing with a few parts different. Instead you see this horsegak constantly being peddled that there's "variety" in the top lists, and you look and like half of them are still all some flavor of Imperial soup.
I honestly am not at all thrilled with the fact it seems the competitive crowd are "pushing" the changes on 40k. It's bad enough that ITC is essentially playing their own game due to their missions to have their own meta that you don't see at the official GTs and the like, but it's the fact that a lot of changes inadvertently affect all of matched play, tournament or not, based on them being abused by the tiny minority who are the cutthroat competitve players. Look at how Blood Angels got nerfed because Smash Captains and Guard were makng waves (it since got overturned partially), even though Blood Angels themselves were fine.
Wayniac wrote: It's not variation if you see 5 lists that are all some take on "Loyal 32 and extras". I'd argue the opposite, but it's enough to keep peddling the narrative that there's variety in the tournament. REAL variety would be actual different armies or different lists, not roughly the same thing with a few parts different. Instead you see this horsegak constantly being peddled that there's "variety" in the top lists, and you look and like half of them are still all some flavor of Imperial soup.
I honestly am not at all thrilled with the fact it seems the competitive crowd are "pushing" the changes on 40k. It's bad enough that ITC is essentially playing their own game due to their missions to have their own meta that you don't see at the official GTs and the like, but it's the fact that a lot of changes inadvertently affect all of matched play, tournament or not, based on them being abused by the tiny minority who are the cutthroat competitve players. Look at how Blood Angels got nerfed because Smash Captains and Guard were makng waves (it since got overturned partially), even though Blood Angels themselves were fine.
Go on and count the number of "Loyal 32 and Extras" you see in there... I see very few instances of Loyal 32 being used at all, at least not as the 180 point barebones variant that's used as a boogeyman.
1st place: DE with CW airwing
2nd place: Tau
3rd place: Leviathan and GSC 4th: Chaos undivided
5th: Sisters and knights with loyal 32
6th: Harlequins and CWE 7th: Space wolves and Knights
8th: Thousand sons, Alpha legion and some daemons
9th: Mono DE 10th: Mono DE
If this isn't an healthy state of balance, i don't know what it is.
I don't visit said Facebook group, but I do frequent tournaments and see nobody "going off the rails" but rather a friendly community who just likes to play to win. I'm not sure what the fuss is about.
I think the issue here may actually be Facebook. A lot of people seem to turn in to trumped up ass holes as soon as they log into social media. The amount of abuse posted on those platforms is astonishing, makes Dakka look like everyone here are BFF’s.
You see the same thing in video game collecting where there shouldn’t even be competition. There’s always some judgemental ass hole gate keeping saying that someone’s collection is garbage for some Top Trumps reason.
People are just going to be mean to each other, especially when the chances of retribution are slim to none.
I don't play tournaments and ignore any of the comments that stem from it so my opinion is somewhat worthless. However, something that sticks out to me is the requirements for becoming a competitive player are not based around hard work, skill or determination at least for the most part. It is essentially playing a list which is as highly in your favour as possible (this is the whole point of tabletop I know) and only really requires you to have an understanding of the rules of the game to succeed. This often means spending £400 as often as FAQs are released. I find the game is rarely about "skill" which is why it has brought me so many laughs over the years, chance does that.
My point being, many of the people you are referring to did not have to have learn be humble, hard working and often sociable. Their "skill" comes from a great understanding of the.. power of retail! Therefore there attitudes are often cheap.
I am not bashing competitive players on a whole, the vast, vast majority stick with Armies through numerous losses and misery to learn nuanced ways to use the army they enjoy. I am talking about the individuals who bring unpainted knights to a 1000pts game
Alphabet wrote: I don't play tournaments and ignore any of the comments that stem from it so my opinion is somewhat worthless. However, something that sticks out to me is the requirements for becoming a competitive player are not based around hard work, skill or determination at least for the most part. It is essentially playing a list which is as highly in your favour as possible (this is the whole point of tabletop I know) and only really requires you to have an understanding of the rules of the game to succeed. This often means spending £400 as often as FAQs are released. I find the game is rarely about "skill" which is why it has brought me so many laughs over the years, chance does that.
My point being, many of the people you are referring to did not have to have learn be humble, hard working and often sociable. Their "skill" comes from a great understanding of the.. power of retail! Therefore there attitudes are often cheap.
I am not bashing competitive players on a whole, the vast, vast majority stick with Armies through numerous losses and misery to learn nuanced ways to use the army they enjoy. I am talking about the individuals who bring unpainted knights to a 1000pts game
The most competitive 40k environment is ITC at the moment, which requires fully painted armies. Every large GT I've been to has required fully painted and based armies, or has heavily penalized you (-2 to your roll for first turn) if you have a single unpainted model in your army. I've never actually seen an unpainted army (though I have seen a few models with only 3 colors).
Nobody is going out and spending $400 the second an FAQ is released... the players who are winning games are using similar lists for long periods of time, with multiple tweaks over time to change things. The skill of a competitive player comes from two places really... planning your army to have an answer to other common meta armies, and to know how to execute your strategy against other common meta armies. That's not a trivial task, given that there are a lot of good armies out there right now.
But yea, I've not seen a person be able to simply go out, buy an army, slap it together, and play it at a tournament unpainted. That's just not how competitive 40k works. Without months or years of experience playing that army, you will not know exactly what to do when you fight specific opponents, and will often lose because of it. Every competitive army right now has bad matchups, that unless you have a good plan for how to deal with, you're going to just lose.
Also, about competitive players bringing Knights to a 1000 point game. Competitive players do not play 1000 point games. You're describing a jerk, not a competitive player. There's a difference.
1st place: DE with CW airwing
2nd place: Tau
3rd place: Leviathan and GSC 4th: Chaos undivided
5th: Sisters and knights with loyal 32
6th: Harlequins and CWE 7th: Space wolves and Knights
8th: Thousand sons, Alpha legion and some daemons
9th: Mono DE 10th: Mono DE
If this isn't an healthy state of balance, i don't know what it is.
A lot of people won't consider a game balanced unless they can spam a full army of whatever niche unit they love and win most of their games with it.
1st place: DE with CW airwing
2nd place: Tau
3rd place: Leviathan and GSC 4th: Chaos undivided
5th: Sisters and knights with loyal 32
6th: Harlequins and CWE 7th: Space wolves and Knights
8th: Thousand sons, Alpha legion and some daemons
9th: Mono DE 10th: Mono DE
If this isn't an healthy state of balance, i don't know what it is.
A lot of people won't consider a game balanced unless they can spam a full army of whatever niche unit they love and win most of their games with it.
Perhaps. But then was the old Tyranid codex 'balanced' or a good one because it had Tyrantspam as a highly competitive build, even if most of the rest of it was poor? The Warhams pro athlete might say yes, but a casual-competitive player might have a wildly different opinion.
The list there doesn't give us enough information. You can have headline diversity in the results, but if each codex is only showing a single competitive build, it doesn't suggest well-balanced codices and gaming to folks outside the most competitive circles.
I'm not saying that's what happened at that event or that it's the state of 8th edition right now. Again, I think it's a pretty good time for those folks toward the middle of the continuum. I'm just pointing out that 'healthy balance' legitimately depends on your perspective, and that top-level competitive play is a very distorted place.
Wayniac wrote: It's not variation if you see 5 lists that are all some take on "Loyal 32 and extras".
You're grossly homogenizing things by declaring over 90% of the list "extras".
While you both have a point it would be nice if GW would address th3 elephant in the room of adding cheap CP battalions and sinking all that CP into something else.
Try getting advise on how to improve a mono anything imperial list and 90% of the suggestions will be the 32 douches or the 17.
While it's far better than it has been in previous editions thats no reason to allow GW to half ass it. But by the same token just taking random units and throwing them together with no plan shouldn't be a viable way to win a GT either.
Some of these corner stones of list design do still need addressing but I also think the community is still seeing some of the backlash to the increased amount of people who arnt 100% commited to either the WAAC or CAAC camps.
phillv85 wrote:I think the issue here may actually be Facebook. A lot of people seem to turn in to trumped up ass holes as soon as they log into social media. The amount of abuse posted on those platforms is astonishing, makes Dakka look like everyone here are BFF’s.
I think the general level of cruelty on display is something unique to social media, but I've seen the competitive mindset drive players from games - even when the competitive players were otherwise amiable people. They can be great guys, but then curb stomp a newbie while overloading them with tons of information about what they did wrong, what they need to buy next, how to play better, and so on.
There’s always some judgemental ass hole gate keeping
Gatekeeping gets a bad rap. In video games, if we were a bit more deliberate in who's opinions we listened to, people like Anita Sarkeesian wouldn't have ruined a generation of games.
Alphabet wrote:I find the game is rarely about "skill" which is why it has brought me so many laughs over the years, chance does that.
Seems like this would be a very easy thing to test (play two armies multiple times, then switch an play the opponent's armies multiple times - in a game of skill, the better player would have more wins, rather than the better army). However, because of the significant amount of randomness inherent in something like 40k, you'd have to play a significant number of games to reach a conclusion (law of really big numbers says that the more data points you have, the closer the data will approach a true average value). But the only way to control for actual skill would be to use the same armies and same terrain every game.
Their "skill" comes from a great understanding of the.. power of retail! Therefore there attitudes are often cheap.
When it comes to GW games, attitudes are the only thing that can be cheap.
Wayniac wrote: It's not variation if you see 5 lists that are all some take on "Loyal 32 and extras".
You're grossly homogenizing things by declaring over 90% of the list "extras".
While you both have a point it would be nice if GW would address th3 elephant in the room of adding cheap CP battalions and sinking all that CP into something else.
Try getting advise on how to improve a mono anything imperial list and 90% of the suggestions will be the 32 douches or the 17.
While it's far better than it has been in previous editions thats no reason to allow GW to half ass it. But by the same token just taking random units and throwing them together with no plan shouldn't be a viable way to win a GT either.
Some of these corner stones of list design do still need addressing but I also think the community is still seeing some of the backlash to the increased amount of people who arnt 100% commited to either the WAAC or CAAC camps.
This is a perspective thing, but I see it more of a patch on the way GW has historically kept taking small chunks of the setting and declaring them an entire army to get people to buy a half dozen kits over and over. To me, Guard are the cheap, base line unit that's always in the setting for every one of the factions that ally them in. The problem in my mind is just that GW kept making things "their own army". It'd be like if GW released 3 Ork codexes and only one of them allowed Boyz and another was just Stompas, with GW treating them as separate "factions". Is it an exploit for Orks to spend CP they earned from Boyz on Lootas? 8th from the beginning has felt like GW has seen the need to consolidate their factions but then again I've mostly been a fan of the setting from other media, where the Imperium is rarely depicted as 15 completely unrelated factions.
Sqorgar wrote: I think the general level of cruelty on display is something unique to social media, but I've seen the competitive mindset drive players from games - even when the competitive players were otherwise amiable people. They can be great guys, but then curb stomp a newbie while overloading them with tons of information about what they did wrong, what they need to buy next, how to play better, and so on.
And I've seen the casual mindset drive people from games with endless unwritten rules about what is "cheese", poor knowledge of the rules, condescending attitudes towards new players who are interested in tournaments, etc.
In video games, if we were a bit more deliberate in who's opinions we listened to, people like Anita Sarkeesian wouldn't have ruined a generation of games.
Lolwut? This is a joke, right? Tell me you don't seriously believe that gamergate nonsense...
And I've seen the casual mindset drive people from games with endless unwritten rules about what is "cheese", poor knowledge of the rules, condescending attitudes towards new players who are interested in tournaments, etc.
I had a guy come up to me while playing a game (who wasn't my opponent), calling me out for being abusive of the rules, when I was rolling to get CP back for stratagems I played during deployment (pre FAQ when they changed this). Some people who declare themselves "casual" players just cannot accept that they are wrong about things sometimes, and will butt into other games to loudly proclaim that their interpretation of the rules is the "one true interpretation" even if they're demonstrably wrong. I haven't seen a tournament player do this yet....
Sqorgar wrote: I think the general level of cruelty on display is something unique to social media, but I've seen the competitive mindset drive players from games - even when the competitive players were otherwise amiable people. They can be great guys, but then curb stomp a newbie while overloading them with tons of information about what they did wrong, what they need to buy next, how to play better, and so on.
And I've seen the casual mindset drive people from games with endless unwritten rules about what is "cheese", poor knowledge of the rules, condescending attitudes towards new players who are interested in tournaments, etc.
I think it's worth pointing out that the individual personal relationships players have with each other is often more important than some vague dichotomy like 'casual vs competitive.' That tends to get left out for some reason.
Peregrine wrote:
sqorgar wrote:In video games, if we were a bit more deliberate in who's opinions we listened to, people like Anita Sarkeesian wouldn't have ruined a generation of games.
Lolwut? This is a joke, right? Tell me you don't seriously believe that gamergate nonsense...
Yeah, this threw me for a loop. My impression of Anita Sarkeesian is that she'd like it if women were treated like people rather than aliens. Yet somehow there's people that believe she's determined to ruin gaming for...reasons.
Nurglitch wrote: Yeah, this threw me for a loop. My impression of Anita Sarkeesian is that she'd like it if women were treated like people rather than aliens. Yet somehow there's people that believe she's determined to ruin gaming for...reasons.
Clearly it is the fact that there might be fewer straight white male protagonists that is ruining gaming, not loot boxes, day 1 DLC, and endless milking the cash cow of Call of Battlefield 15 or SportsBall 2019 over and over and over again instead of making something innovative and worth buying.
And I've seen the casual mindset drive people from games with endless unwritten rules about what is "cheese", poor knowledge of the rules, condescending attitudes towards new players who are interested in tournaments, etc.
No, you haven't. You are absolutely full of gak.
Also, isn't it a bit hypocritical to criticize behavior you gleefully engage in? You've been the most condescending poster in this forum for years.
Lolwut? This is a joke, right? Tell me you don't seriously believe that gamergate nonsense...
It would be a thread derail to discuss this at any length, but I think if game companies listened to actual gamers about what they wanted rather than a charlatan with no actual investment or interest in the field, we'd have less predatory business practices, better games, and a healthier industry. The best thing that can be said about Anita Sarkeesian is that she kinda understood SOME of the discredited feminist theories she lazily applied to games she's never played - she's like if Jack Thompson and Jack Chick had a stupid baby.
Sqorgar wrote: I think the general level of cruelty on display is something unique to social media, but I've seen the competitive mindset drive players from games - even when the competitive players were otherwise amiable people. They can be great guys, but then curb stomp a newbie while overloading them with tons of information about what they did wrong, what they need to buy next, how to play better, and so on.
And I've seen the casual mindset drive people from games with endless unwritten rules about what is "cheese", poor knowledge of the rules, condescending attitudes towards new players who are interested in tournaments, etc.
I think it's worth pointing out that the individual personal relationships players have with each other is often more important than some vague dichotomy like 'casual vs competitive.' That tends to get left out for some reason.
Peregrine wrote:
sqorgar wrote:In video games, if we were a bit more deliberate in who's opinions we listened to, people like Anita Sarkeesian wouldn't have ruined a generation of games.
Lolwut? This is a joke, right? Tell me you don't seriously believe that gamergate nonsense...
Yeah, this threw me for a loop. My impression of Anita Sarkeesian is that she'd like it if women were treated like people rather than aliens. Yet somehow there's people that believe she's determine to ruin gaming for...reasons.
Wasnt aware who that is. I just watched her youtube video which was first one featuring her that popped up.... "Ms Male in gaming". Well, arent I glad I got educated... In the current climate I can totaly see big name dev bosses bending over backwards and stifling creativity and forcing change on people because "PR social media Gakstorm = less $$"
But how is this anything to do with 40k competative???
Sqorgar wrote: I think the general level of cruelty on display is something unique to social media, but I've seen the competitive mindset drive players from games - even when the competitive players were otherwise amiable people. They can be great guys, but then curb stomp a newbie while overloading them with tons of information about what they did wrong, what they need to buy next, how to play better, and so on.
And I've seen the casual mindset drive people from games with endless unwritten rules about what is "cheese", poor knowledge of the rules, condescending attitudes towards new players who are interested in tournaments, etc.
I think it's worth pointing out that the individual personal relationships players have with each other is often more important than some vague dichotomy like 'casual vs competitive.' That tends to get left out for some reason.
Peregrine wrote:
sqorgar wrote:In video games, if we were a bit more deliberate in who's opinions we listened to, people like Anita Sarkeesian wouldn't have ruined a generation of games.
Lolwut? This is a joke, right? Tell me you don't seriously believe that gamergate nonsense...
Yeah, this threw me for a loop. My impression of Anita Sarkeesian is that she'd like it if women were treated like people rather than aliens. Yet somehow there's people that believe she's determine to ruin gaming for...reasons.
Wasnt aware who that is. I just watched her youtube video which was first one featuring her that popped up.... "Ms Male in gaming". Well, arent I glad I got educated...
In the current climate I can totaly see big name dev bosses bending over backwards and stifling creativity and forcing change on people because "PR social media Gakstorm = less $$"
But how is this anything to do with 40k competative???
I think it might be that what you describe as a "PR social media Gakstorm" is generally being more sensitive to people's sensitivities and foibles; 'knowing your audience' in the jargon of my trade. Generally competitive 40k seems to go off the rails when people start posturing and lecturing when they should be humble and mentor up-and-comers. Ditto 'casual' when it's played out in public, or even in private between two or more people with little else in common except a desire to play the game they imagine 40k to be.
Sqorgar wrote: It would be a thread derail to discuss this at any length, but I think if game companies listened to actual gamers about what they wanted rather than a charlatan with no actual investment or interest in the field, we'd have less predatory business practices, better games, and a healthier industry. The best thing that can be said about Anita Sarkeesian is that she kinda understood SOME of the discredited feminist theories she lazily applied to games she's never played - she's like if Jack Thompson and Jack Chick had a stupid baby.
That's odd. I recall her lobbying for increased representation of minorities, against sexist stereotypes, etc. I don't recall her saying anything in favor of adding loot boxes and day one DLC and assorted other pay-to-win business practices.
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Sqorgar wrote: No, you haven't. You are absolutely full of gak.
Oh really? You know my experience better than I do? Do you have any evidence to back up your claim, or are you just assuming that I must be lying because it would be really convenient for your argument?
Sqorgar wrote: I think the general level of cruelty on display is something unique to social media, but I've seen the competitive mindset drive players from games - even when the competitive players were otherwise amiable people. They can be great guys, but then curb stomp a newbie while overloading them with tons of information about what they did wrong, what they need to buy next, how to play better, and so on.
And I've seen the casual mindset drive people from games with endless unwritten rules about what is "cheese", poor knowledge of the rules, condescending attitudes towards new players who are interested in tournaments, etc.
I think it's worth pointing out that the individual personal relationships players have with each other is often more important than some vague dichotomy like 'casual vs competitive.' That tends to get left out for some reason.
Peregrine wrote:
sqorgar wrote:In video games, if we were a bit more deliberate in who's opinions we listened to, people like Anita Sarkeesian wouldn't have ruined a generation of games.
Lolwut? This is a joke, right? Tell me you don't seriously believe that gamergate nonsense...
Yeah, this threw me for a loop. My impression of Anita Sarkeesian is that she'd like it if women were treated like people rather than aliens. Yet somehow there's people that believe she's determined to ruin gaming for...reasons.
I believe it boils down to:
1. She seemingly lies about her history to suit her commercial advantage (recorded videos of her stating she did not begin gaming until 2010 Vs. writing in the New York Times that she begged for a GameBoy in the 1990's).
2. Her claims of feminism ring hollow when she used to be the 'Seminar Manager/Coordinator' of Bart Baggett and helped him organize seminars on 'hand-writing analysis', including as a way to improve love lives. Mr. Bagget, of course, also published books to teach men how to get women to sleep with them, including by use of Neuro Linguistic Programming (junk pseudo-sicience in my opinion). It strikes as a bit of odd company for an ardent feminist. I believe Mr. Bagget claims he was just being funny.
3. She's been accused of ripping off the work of others for her own benefit and/or cherry picks data heavily without consulting the Let's Play/Long Players she is actually taking data from.
4. There's still a ton of controversy around her Kickstarter. It was funded on June 16, 2012. To this day, only videos 1, 5 and 8 are complete (of supposedly 12). This Kickstarter received $160,000. There are also claims that the videos that were made are using copyrighted artwork and other intellectual property without license or permission as well.
5. This dovetails with Femnist Frequency, her non-profit and the organization behind her kick starter, not actually receiving non-profit status until 2014, 2 years after she got the money.
Obviously, she's addressed these at one point or another and the flame wars rage on, but for people who dislike her that's what it boils down to: the belief that she is a fake who just makes controversies to rake in money before moving on to the next.
Sqorgar wrote: I think the general level of cruelty on display is something unique to social media, but I've seen the competitive mindset drive players from games - even when the competitive players were otherwise amiable people. They can be great guys, but then curb stomp a newbie while overloading them with tons of information about what they did wrong, what they need to buy next, how to play better, and so on.
And I've seen the casual mindset drive people from games with endless unwritten rules about what is "cheese", poor knowledge of the rules, condescending attitudes towards new players who are interested in tournaments, etc.
I think it's worth pointing out that the individual personal relationships players have with each other is often more important than some vague dichotomy like 'casual vs competitive.' That tends to get left out for some reason.
Peregrine wrote:
sqorgar wrote:In video games, if we were a bit more deliberate in who's opinions we listened to, people like Anita Sarkeesian wouldn't have ruined a generation of games.
Lolwut? This is a joke, right? Tell me you don't seriously believe that gamergate nonsense...
Yeah, this threw me for a loop. My impression of Anita Sarkeesian is that she'd like it if women were treated like people rather than aliens. Yet somehow there's people that believe she's determine to ruin gaming for...reasons.
Wasnt aware who that is. I just watched her youtube video which was first one featuring her that popped up.... "Ms Male in gaming". Well, arent I glad I got educated...
In the current climate I can totaly see big name dev bosses bending over backwards and stifling creativity and forcing change on people because "PR social media Gakstorm = less $$"
But how is this anything to do with 40k competative???
I think it might be that what you describe as a "PR social media Gakstorm" is generally being more sensitive to people's sensitivities and foibles; 'knowing your audience' in the jargon of my trade. Generally competitive 40k seems to go off the rails when people start posturing and lecturing when they should be humble and mentor up-and-comers. Ditto 'casual' when it's played out in public, or even in private between two or more people with little else in common except a desire to play the game they imagine 40k to be.
Thanks for answering my question but Im afraid I dont follow.
Wow, seems the topic has changed. When I mentioned gaming earlier as an example where people are also snarky, I meant in game collecting circles. Where Dude A who has 4000 games, gaks on Dude B because his collection, while being 4500 games, doesn't have that Little Samson cart or some other reason Dude B isn't a true collector. It was meant as an example of the snideness that goes on on social media platforms (including forums).
Sqorgar wrote: I think the general level of cruelty on display is something unique to social media, but I've seen the competitive mindset drive players from games - even when the competitive players were otherwise amiable people. They can be great guys, but then curb stomp a newbie while overloading them with tons of information about what they did wrong, what they need to buy next, how to play better, and so on.
And I've seen the casual mindset drive people from games with endless unwritten rules about what is "cheese", poor knowledge of the rules, condescending attitudes towards new players who are interested in tournaments, etc.
I think it's worth pointing out that the individual personal relationships players have with each other is often more important than some vague dichotomy like 'casual vs competitive.' That tends to get left out for some reason.
Peregrine wrote:
sqorgar wrote:In video games, if we were a bit more deliberate in who's opinions we listened to, people like Anita Sarkeesian wouldn't have ruined a generation of games.
Lolwut? This is a joke, right? Tell me you don't seriously believe that gamergate nonsense...
Yeah, this threw me for a loop. My impression of Anita Sarkeesian is that she'd like it if women were treated like people rather than aliens. Yet somehow there's people that believe she's determined to ruin gaming for...reasons.
I believe it boils down to:
1. She's seemingly lies about her history to suit her commercial advantage (recorded videos of her stating she did not begin gaming until 2010 Vs. writing in the New York Times that she begged for a GameBoy in the 1990's).
2. Her claims of feminism ring hollow when she used to be the 'Seminar Manager/Coordinator' of Bart Baggett and helped him organize seminars on 'hand-writing analysis', including as a way to improve love lives. Mr. Bagget, of course, also published books to teach men how to get women to sleep with them, including by use of Neuro Linguistic Programming (junk pseudo-sicience in my opinion). It strikes as a bit of odd company for an ardent feminist. I believe Mr. Bagget claims he was just being funny.
3. She's been accused of ripping off the work of others for her own benefit and/or cherry picks data heavily without consulting the Let's Play/Long Players she is actually taking data from.
4. There's still a ton of controversy around her Kickstarter. It was funded on June 16, 2012. To this day, only videos 1, 5 and 8 are complete (of supposedly 12). This Kickstarter received $160,000. There are also claims that the videos that were made are using copyrighted artwork and other intellectual property without license or permission as well.
5. This dovetails with Femnist Frequency, her non-profit and the organization behind her kick starter, not actually receiving non-profit status until 2014, 2 years after she got the money.
Obviously, she's addressed these at one point or another and the flame wars rage on, but for people who dislike her that's what it boils down to the belief that she is a fake who just makes controversies to rake in money before moving on to the next.
Wow... What a self righteous annoyingly arrogant person. She actualy thinks CDProjekt needs to change their content and shes the one to tell them how do it.."the whole of the internet will drag you" She seems ather delusional about her influence. Its their creation they can do whatever they want. Its callled free speech.
Back on topic. I can see the pallarels to video gaming now.. As been echoed, Its the competative nature to do with everything. The online community itself and the way it communicated about all aspects of society is really off the rails.
auticus wrote: You can't label the entire "competitive 40k" community by the words of a few. Just as you cannot label the entire casual community by the words of a few.
It is a well known truism that among the human race there are undesirables that attack others for not living or liking the things that that individual does.
Sqorgar wrote: I think the general level of cruelty on display is something unique to social media, but I've seen the competitive mindset drive players from games - even when the competitive players were otherwise amiable people. They can be great guys, but then curb stomp a newbie while overloading them with tons of information about what they did wrong, what they need to buy next, how to play better, and so on.
And I've seen the casual mindset drive people from games with endless unwritten rules about what is "cheese", poor knowledge of the rules, condescending attitudes towards new players who are interested in tournaments, etc.
I think it's worth pointing out that the individual personal relationships players have with each other is often more important than some vague dichotomy like 'casual vs competitive.' That tends to get left out for some reason.
Peregrine wrote:
sqorgar wrote:In video games, if we were a bit more deliberate in who's opinions we listened to, people like Anita Sarkeesian wouldn't have ruined a generation of games.
Lolwut? This is a joke, right? Tell me you don't seriously believe that gamergate nonsense...
Yeah, this threw me for a loop. My impression of Anita Sarkeesian is that she'd like it if women were treated like people rather than aliens. Yet somehow there's people that believe she's determined to ruin gaming for...reasons.
I believe it boils down to:
1. She's seemingly lies about her history to suit her commercial advantage (recorded videos of her stating she did not begin gaming until 2010 Vs. writing in the New York Times that she begged for a GameBoy in the 1990's).
2. Her claims of feminism ring hollow when she used to be the 'Seminar Manager/Coordinator' of Bart Baggett and helped him organize seminars on 'hand-writing analysis', including as a way to improve love lives. Mr. Bagget, of course, also published books to teach men how to get women to sleep with them, including by use of Neuro Linguistic Programming (junk pseudo-sicience in my opinion). It strikes as a bit of odd company for an ardent feminist. I believe Mr. Bagget claims he was just being funny.
3. She's been accused of ripping off the work of others for her own benefit and/or cherry picks data heavily without consulting the Let's Play/Long Players she is actually taking data from.
4. There's still a ton of controversy around her Kickstarter. It was funded on June 16, 2012. To this day, only videos 1, 5 and 8 are complete (of supposedly 12). This Kickstarter received $160,000. There are also claims that the videos that were made are using copyrighted artwork and other intellectual property without license or permission as well.
5. This dovetails with Femnist Frequency, her non-profit and the organization behind her kick starter, not actually receiving non-profit status until 2014, 2 years after she got the money.
Obviously, she's addressed these at one point or another and the flame wars rage on, but for people who dislike her that's what it boils down to the belief that she is a fake who just makes controversies to rake in money before moving on to the next.
Wow... What a self righteous annoyingly arrogant person. She actualy thinks CDProjekt needs to change their content and shes the one to tell them how do it.."the whole of the internet will drag you" She seems ather delusional about her influence.
Its their creation they can do whatever they want. Its callled free speech.
Back on topic. I can see the pallarels to video gaming now..
As been echoed, Its the competative nature to do with everything. The online community itself and the way it communicated about all aspects of society is really off the rails.
it's especially hillarious considering the creator of cyberpunk universe defended CDPR.......
Also rumor has she's broke soooooooooooo..
Anyways this has nothing to do with competitive mindset or not.
It is the exclusive groups of wannabees that decided that "THEY" only know HOW to play 40k and that filthy CASUALS are morons.
Case in point the opposite can also happen, these are fringe groups and considering that i got introduced to 40 k by a competitive dude should prove you wrong. In fact he always toned down lists depending on enemy or match he wanted, he regularly played fluffy little campagins with houserules galore but also practice matches. Was a nice dude. In essence my point is fringe groups and voices heard the loudest are often not the propper picture just broad strokes of Black and white.
Argive wrote: Its their creation they can do whatever they want. Its callled free speech.
That is not what free speech means. Freedom of speech means that the government can not censor you or punish you for speaking, it does not mean that individuals are not permitted to criticize you or tell you to change what you're saying. Anita Sarkeesian is not a government official and has no power to compel obedience. She is merely a private citizen expressing her personal opinions. She has every right to post her disapproval of a company's product and demand that they pay her to approve everything they do, the game company is free to consider that as they wish. If a private business voluntarily decides that putting all of their content through her review process would be a good business strategy then there is nothing about this decision that contradicts the right to freedom of speech.
Automatically Appended Next Post:
Not Online!!! wrote: It is the exclusive groups of wannabees that decided that "THEY" only know HOW to play 40k and that filthy CASUALS are morons.
Just like certain casual players decided that only "THEY" know HOW to play 40k and that filthy TOURNAMENT PLAYERS are morons.
1st place: DE with CW airwing
2nd place: Tau
3rd place: Leviathan and GSC 4th: Chaos undivided
5th: Sisters and knights with loyal 32
6th: Harlequins and CWE 7th: Space wolves and Knights
8th: Thousand sons, Alpha legion and some daemons
9th: Mono DE 10th: Mono DE
If this isn't an healthy state of balance, i don't know what it is.
They did just nerf the two lists that would have taken 8 of the ten places before though, so give it a bit of time to stagnate again.
1st place: DE with CW airwing
2nd place: Tau
3rd place: Leviathan and GSC 4th: Chaos undivided
5th: Sisters and knights with loyal 32
6th: Harlequins and CWE 7th: Space wolves and Knights
8th: Thousand sons, Alpha legion and some daemons
9th: Mono DE 10th: Mono DE
If this isn't an healthy state of balance, i don't know what it is.
They did just nerf the two lists that would have taken 8 of the ten places before though, so give it a bit of time to stagnate again.
Argive wrote: Its their creation they can do whatever they want. Its callled free speech.
That is not what free speech means. Freedom of speech means that the government can not censor you or punish you for speaking, it does not mean that individuals are not permitted to criticize you or tell you to change what you're saying. Anita Sarkeesian is not a government official and has no power to compel obedience. She is merely a private citizen expressing her personal opinions. She has every right to post her disapproval of a company's product and demand that they pay her to approve everything they do, the game company is free to consider that as they wish. If a private business voluntarily decides that putting all of their content through her review process would be a good business strategy then there is nothing about this decision that contradicts the right to freedom of speech.
Automatically Appended Next Post:
Not Online!!! wrote: It is the exclusive groups of wannabees that decided that "THEY" only know HOW to play 40k and that filthy CASUALS are morons.
Just like certain casual players decided that only "THEY" know HOW to play 40k and that filthy TOURNAMENT PLAYERS are morons.
Here I was thinking trying to cause economic damage through attacking someones reputation/attempting to exert social pressure is not in and of itself stifling free speech/creativity or a form of censorship.
I gues I used the wrong term.
Anyhow... it seems this will devolve into name calling no matter how many good thought out posts are made.
Argive wrote: Here I was thinking trying to cause economic damage through attacking someones reputation/attempting to exert social pressure is not in and of itself stifling free speech/creativity or a form of censorship.
I gues I used the wrong term.
Criticism is not censorship. And people "try to cause economic damage" like that all the time. It is now censorship any time a 40k player posts a complaint about GW's prices or rules quality?
What are you talking about? Setting up a organisation and taking government grant money, (therefore Defacto taking agency from the government to some degree...?) to try and push an agenda to change/restrict content absolutely is akin to censorship. Call it what you want of course you are welcome to your opinions.
I'm beginning to see a pattern mirroring the person in question.
The issues with gaming is marketing gak, loot boxes, DLC BS.. The biggest issue is parents not taking responsibility what their kids play and not raising their children properly and getting fish hooked by clickbait and the newest outrage. Not the content itself which is aimed at adults in most cases...
An individual grumbling about rules/cost in 40k is not the same as an individual starting a group because everyone should be offended by a model that doesn't suit their view point. Changing that creation = censorship.
Argive wrote: Its their creation they can do whatever they want. Its callled free speech.
That is not what free speech means. Freedom of speech means that the government can not censor you or punish you for speaking, it does not mean that individuals are not permitted to criticize you or tell you to change what you're saying. Anita Sarkeesian is not a government official and has no power to compel obedience. She is merely a private citizen expressing her personal opinions. She has every right to post her disapproval of a company's product and demand that they pay her to approve everything they do, the game company is free to consider that as they wish. If a private business voluntarily decides that putting all of their content through her review process would be a good business strategy then there is nothing about this decision that contradicts the right to freedom of speech.
Automatically Appended Next Post:
Not Online!!! wrote: It is the exclusive groups of wannabees that decided that "THEY" only know HOW to play 40k and that filthy CASUALS are morons.
Just like certain casual players decided that only "THEY" know HOW to play 40k and that filthy TOURNAMENT PLAYERS are morons.
Stop commenting if you can't be bothered to read one fully.
Okay people lets please remember the rules, number 1 is be polite, number 2 is stay on topic. The topic here is Competitive 40k and being polite is mandatory.
Thanks,
ingtaer.
In my city there are a few gaming clubs, a Warhammer store and there used to be a FLGS with gamin tables too. Since I play or played MtG, UFS, WFB, W40K, Warmachine and Blood Bowl all at the largest tournaments in the area I came across tons of players from all the different gaming groups and I have had no problems with any of them.
So I have some friends who only move in the magic community, some only in blood bowl community. One plays in "that" 40k group and another plays his 40k in another group but I know them individually from a card game. So I hear these discussions all the time. I can hear them talk about how "competitive" or "rude" this or that gaming group is and that group says the same thing back. It has nothing to do with competitive or casual gamers being "worse". It's just people who identify as a group and talk gak about an outside group. Like in sports, politics, friends, school, work. It's just the same.
I only identify as a gamer who likes to play games I find fun and not with any specific group so there is no real clash between my identity and my opponents even if they see themselves as a member of a certain group. Some games I play super competitive like Warmachine and Magic and others like GW games really laid back but sometimes I just go and do a casual monday night draft in magic or try to do my hardest 40k list and play it to the best of my ability at a tournament. I don't really identify in any camp so I have never had problems interacting with top tournament players, ETC players in GW games or PT/GP grinders in magic, or the more casual gamers who only use fluffy lists or thematic decks.
Got completely crushed a week ago at round 1 of a 40k tournament against a former ETC player. I conceded 15 min into the game and then we brought out an old card game that has been dead for a decade and played some really fun games with that while waiting for round 2. From super competitive to super casual in the time it took for me to remove my last 7 models from the table. Most tournament players also play more laid back games and almost none of them sees themselves as anything else than a gamer.
Most friction I have ever seen is between more casual players in any given game system. Not necessary from ill will but more casual groups usually have more house rules and expectations on behavior that differs more wildly from group to group and even between individuals than in more competitive groups. Just try to get a fair game of casual EDH in magic with more casual players who don't know each other. Every one will say that any deck better than theirs is unfair and that they are the only one with a truly fun and casual deck and almost no one will agree on what is a good level to play at. If you take competitive players instead and say that it will be a competitive game they will probably all turn up with good decks at a similar power level and have a better time than the casuals. You can probably do the same thing with an escalation league or a casual tournament and get the same results. Who haven't been to a small local tournament with like 15 local players who have agreed to tone it down and then a 16th player out of town shows up with the toughest list possible.
Some better communication and understanding of different gaming groups could resolve most of the drama. Like others have said before. Many of those labeled competitive isn't truly competitive players or actual tournament players. Some of them are probably just other casual players that just play with different house rules that might seem more competitive from the outside. Like my WFB friends played against some people at the GW store from a local club, probably 2-3 out of 50+ people in that club, and for the last 13 years they have called people from that club power gamers while I have mostly played Blood Bowl with people from that same club and my experience is almost the opposite. But it's fun to casually bash them so my friends don't really want to change their mind cause then they can't complain about that game 13 years ago when they were 15 years old and lost to someone older and more experienced.
1st place: DE with CW airwing
2nd place: Tau
3rd place: Leviathan and GSC 4th: Chaos undivided
5th: Sisters and knights with loyal 32
6th: Harlequins and CWE 7th: Space wolves and Knights
8th: Thousand sons, Alpha legion and some daemons
9th: Mono DE 10th: Mono DE
If this isn't an healthy state of balance, i don't know what it is.
They did just nerf the two lists that would have taken 8 of the ten places before though, so give it a bit of time to stagnate again.
Ynnari and Castellan lists were certainly present, but not overbearingly so, in lists before the April FAQ came out.
Well, that list your sharing is also misleading since those ITC results were prior to how they were labeling factions. You had grey knight armies with one supreme command of GK just to game that system. Which is hilarious, seeing competitive gamesmanship applied to army classification lol.
Automatically Appended Next Post: This is a really good discussion about competitive 40kBTW guys. Good feedback on both sides.
And you guys say tournament players are toxic, lol. Talking down about people who don't play the game in the same way as you is REALLY different from the tournament players who talk down to casuals....
I don't care how they play (though I won't ever agree with it). But I don't like what competitive players do to the games. I don't generally use the word "toxic", but there's no getting around the fact that when competitive players become the dominant play style of a game, it is poisonous to the long term health of the game.
I can't tell you the number of people I've heard say that they quit playing games because of this attitude. Tom Vassel has a notorious example of one player - just one person - ruining Netrunner for him and Sam Healey within a few minutes, despite greatly enjoying the game and playing it. If one player can delete two players, is that healthy for the game? Is a single competitive player worth two casual players? And a single overly competitive player can ruin the game for more than just two people over his many years - I can't tell you how many Warmachine players I never saw a second time. I doubt I could ever have such a immediate and damaging affect on the game, regardless of what I did.
Honestly, look at the winning lists for recent tournaments. There is quite a bit of variation. Even if a list has a similar "core", almost every player puts a different spin on their list over someone else's. It's incredibly rare for 2 players to play the same "netlist".
If everybody is driving the same sports car, does it matter if they are painted slightly different shades of red?
I want to comment on this point. Because i don't think this is a fair comparison. The problem you are describing is something that will be inherent in literally any game, or any type. Some people are jerks. And they will ruin the fun of people trying to get into a game. This could happen in a pick up basketball game in the park, where one bad egg on the court makes two or three people never want to play basketball again. I've met a lot of competitive players who are genuinely a lot of fun to play with and are good people. Its about the attitude people take into the game with them.
In 40K, not all competitive players are jerks, and not all jerks are competitive players. BUT the majority of jerks in the 40K community consider themselves competitive players. My prior post about the culture of competitive gaming was not to argue that all competitive players are bad, merely to point out that the competitive culture is attractive to certain types of negative attitudes. This is why many negative voices will be heard in competitive communities. The competitive community will always exist, and it will always attract the worst, its just the way it is for any player v player game.
To people who brought up the Gamergate, I applaud you. Thank you for helping us realize that we table top gamers share a lot of the worst elements of video game culture as well. Regardless of what you think of a female game reviewers thoughts, women have just as much right to be wrong about games as I do, and they have just as much right to voice those wrong opinions as anyone else. Furthermore, reviewing a video game through a different metric, even if that metric is feminism, is not inherently wrong either. Someone being blasted and attacked for voicing an unpopular opinion is alienating to the general community and further isolates gaming communities from general society. Which in turns feeds into elitism and some sort of perverse class culture.
Sadly, Gamergate isn't as off topic as you might think. This is a thread about toxic behavior in the 40k competitive community as compared to the broader 40K community, the fact that it is so easy for parts of our community to embrace a toxic ideology such as Gamergate demonstrates that toxic isolationist ideologies have strains that run deeper throughout the entire community, and that is an uncomfortable truth. Table Top games have a pretty rough competition with video games, and honestly we should strive to be as accepting as possible. We need people to feel welcome in our circles, and want to join in those circles and... well buy armies and play games. War gaming groups outside of the big ones tend to be more welcomeing as well, because they are even more desperate for players.
What this talk about Gamergate has reminded me of, is that more than just the competitive community can be toxic and unwelcoming to different groups of people. Its something we all need to look at and make sure that we are creating an environment that people feel welcome in. Its not just competitive communities, its an issue with "nerd" culture at large. We need to work together to become more welcoming so our hobby and passion can grow and flourish.
And you guys say tournament players are toxic, lol. Talking down about people who don't play the game in the same way as you is REALLY different from the tournament players who talk down to casuals....
I don't care how they play (though I won't ever agree with it). But I don't like what competitive players do to the games. I don't generally use the word "toxic", but there's no getting around the fact that when competitive players become the dominant play style of a game, it is poisonous to the long term health of the game.
I can't tell you the number of people I've heard say that they quit playing games because of this attitude. Tom Vassel has a notorious example of one player - just one person - ruining Netrunner for him and Sam Healey within a few minutes, despite greatly enjoying the game and playing it. If one player can delete two players, is that healthy for the game? Is a single competitive player worth two casual players? And a single overly competitive player can ruin the game for more than just two people over his many years - I can't tell you how many Warmachine players I never saw a second time. I doubt I could ever have such a immediate and damaging affect on the game, regardless of what I did.
Honestly, look at the winning lists for recent tournaments. There is quite a bit of variation. Even if a list has a similar "core", almost every player puts a different spin on their list over someone else's. It's incredibly rare for 2 players to play the same "netlist".
If everybody is driving the same sports car, does it matter if they are painted slightly different shades of red?
I want to comment on this point. Because i don't think this is a fair comparison. The problem you are describing is something that will be inherent in literally any game, or any type. Some people are jerks. And they will ruin the fun of people trying to get into a game. This could happen in a pick up basketball game in the park, where one bad egg on the court makes two or three people never want to play basketball again. I've met a lot of competitive players who are genuinely a lot of fun to play with and are good people. Its about the attitude people take into the game with them.
In 40K, not all competitive players are jerks, and not all jerks are competitive players. BUT the majority of jerks in the 40K community consider themselves competitive players. My prior post about the culture of competitive gaming was not to argue that all competitive players are bad, merely to point out that the competitive culture is attractive to certain types of negative attitudes. This is why many negative voices will be heard in competitive communities. The competitive community will always exist, and it will always attract the worst, its just the way it is for any player v player game.
To people who brought up the Gamergate, I applaud you. Thank you for helping us realize that we table top gamers share a lot of the worst elements of video game culture as well. Regardless of what you think of a female game reviewers thoughts, women have just as much right to be wrong about games as I do, and they have just as much right to voice those wrong opinions as anyone else. Furthermore, reviewing a video game through a different metric, even if that metric is feminism, is not inherently wrong either. Someone being blasted and attacked for voicing an unpopular opinion is alienating to the general community and further isolates gaming communities from general society. Which in turns feeds into elitism and some sort of perverse class culture.
Sadly, Gamergate isn't as off topic as you might think. This is a thread about toxic behavior in the 40k competitive community as compared to the broader 40K community, the fact that it is so easy for parts of our community to embrace a toxic ideology such as Gamergate demonstrates that toxic isolationist ideologies have strains that run deeper throughout the entire community, and that is an uncomfortable truth. Table Top games have a pretty rough competition with video games, and honestly we should strive to be as accepting as possible. We need people to feel welcome in our circles, and want to join in those circles and... well buy armies and play games. War gaming groups outside of the big ones tend to be more welcomeing as well, because they are even more desperate for players.
What this talk about Gamergate has reminded me of, is that more than just the competitive community can be toxic and unwelcoming to different groups of people. Its something we all need to look at and make sure that we are creating an environment that people feel welcome in. Its not just competitive communities, its an issue with "nerd" culture at large. We need to work together to become more welcoming so our hobby and passion can grow and flourish.
The key difference is TT games are played face to face. Online abuse and cyberbullying are runnin amok, unchecked and are spirling out of control not because of inherent content of games, but because people are removed through the shield of annonymity and think they have a license to act like A Holes to get their kicks as in the real world they are not able to or allowed to... The issue in the OP was people saying horrid things online about 40k players.
I dont think anyone has cited example of being spoken to or being treated in a similiar way whilst actualy playing 40k. Loosing really badly is not the same as being called names and getting abuse hurled at you. That is becasue the peole that are most obnoxiously vocal online are on an ego trip. They are trying to make themselves feel better through some sort of twisted idea that they can talk down to someone. Cyber bullies are weak minded cowards, when dealing with a person face to face they would not say anything.
If the examples cited would happen in a local club environment in 99% of communities you just wouldint allow that person back in. I think this is a fair assesment. Sure some people might be unfortunate to play in some juvenile run outlier club but I would take a stab in the dark and say it is less than 1% because of the resources needed and the average age of gamers (going by the poll we did). Anecdotal evidence of an outlier event is not a good representation of the greater whole..
I do agree though, we should all do our part in making better communities. Online and offline. For me that would include not risng to the bait and arguing with people endlessly over trivial stuff, I gotta take a leaf out of my own book
1st place: DE with CW airwing
2nd place: Tau
3rd place: Leviathan and GSC 4th: Chaos undivided
5th: Sisters and knights with loyal 32
6th: Harlequins and CWE 7th: Space wolves and Knights
8th: Thousand sons, Alpha legion and some daemons
9th: Mono DE 10th: Mono DE
If this isn't an healthy state of balance, i don't know what it is.
They did just nerf the two lists that would have taken 8 of the ten places before though, so give it a bit of time to stagnate again.
And you guys say tournament players are toxic, lol. Talking down about people who don't play the game in the same way as you is REALLY different from the tournament players who talk down to casuals....
I don't care how they play (though I won't ever agree with it). But I don't like what competitive players do to the games. I don't generally use the word "toxic", but there's no getting around the fact that when competitive players become the dominant play style of a game, it is poisonous to the long term health of the game.
I can't tell you the number of people I've heard say that they quit playing games because of this attitude. Tom Vassel has a notorious example of one player - just one person - ruining Netrunner for him and Sam Healey within a few minutes, despite greatly enjoying the game and playing it. If one player can delete two players, is that healthy for the game? Is a single competitive player worth two casual players? And a single overly competitive player can ruin the game for more than just two people over his many years - I can't tell you how many Warmachine players I never saw a second time. I doubt I could ever have such a immediate and damaging affect on the game, regardless of what I did.
Honestly, look at the winning lists for recent tournaments. There is quite a bit of variation. Even if a list has a similar "core", almost every player puts a different spin on their list over someone else's. It's incredibly rare for 2 players to play the same "netlist".
If everybody is driving the same sports car, does it matter if they are painted slightly different shades of red?
I want to comment on this point. Because i don't think this is a fair comparison. The problem you are describing is something that will be inherent in literally any game, or any type. Some people are jerks. And they will ruin the fun of people trying to get into a game. This could happen in a pick up basketball game in the park, where one bad egg on the court makes two or three people never want to play basketball again. I've met a lot of competitive players who are genuinely a lot of fun to play with and are good people. Its about the attitude people take into the game with them.
In 40K, not all competitive players are jerks, and not all jerks are competitive players. BUT the majority of jerks in the 40K community consider themselves competitive players. My prior post about the culture of competitive gaming was not to argue that all competitive players are bad, merely to point out that the competitive culture is attractive to certain types of negative attitudes. This is why many negative voices will be heard in competitive communities. The competitive community will always exist, and it will always attract the worst, its just the way it is for any player v player game.
To people who brought up the Gamergate, I applaud you. Thank you for helping us realize that we table top gamers share a lot of the worst elements of video game culture as well. Regardless of what you think of a female game reviewers thoughts, women have just as much right to be wrong about games as I do, and they have just as much right to voice those wrong opinions as anyone else. Furthermore, reviewing a video game through a different metric, even if that metric is feminism, is not inherently wrong either. Someone being blasted and attacked for voicing an unpopular opinion is alienating to the general community and further isolates gaming communities from general society. Which in turns feeds into elitism and some sort of perverse class culture.
Sadly, Gamergate isn't as off topic as you might think. This is a thread about toxic behavior in the 40k competitive community as compared to the broader 40K community, the fact that it is so easy for parts of our community to embrace a toxic ideology such as Gamergate demonstrates that toxic isolationist ideologies have strains that run deeper throughout the entire community, and that is an uncomfortable truth. Table Top games have a pretty rough competition with video games, and honestly we should strive to be as accepting as possible. We need people to feel welcome in our circles, and want to join in those circles and... well buy armies and play games. War gaming groups outside of the big ones tend to be more welcomeing as well, because they are even more desperate for players.
What this talk about Gamergate has reminded me of, is that more than just the competitive community can be toxic and unwelcoming to different groups of people. Its something we all need to look at and make sure that we are creating an environment that people feel welcome in. Its not just competitive communities, its an issue with "nerd" culture at large. We need to work together to become more welcoming so our hobby and passion can grow and flourish.
The key difference is TT games are played face to face.
Online abuse and cyberbullying are runnin amok, unchecked and are spirling out of control not because of inherent content of games, but because people are removed through the shield of annonymity and think they have a license to act like A Holes to get their kicks as in the real world they are not able to or allowed to...
The issue in the OP was people saying horrid things online about 40k players.
I dont think anyone has cited example of being spoken to or being treated in a similiar way whilst actualy playing 40k. Loosing really badly is not the same as being called names and getting abuse hurled at you.
That is becasue the peole that are most obnoxiously vocal online are on an ego trip. They are trying to make themselves feel better through some sort of twisted idea that they can talk down to someone. Cyber bullies are weak minded cowards, when dealing with a person face to face they would not say anything.
If the examples cited would happen in a local club environment in 99% of communities you just wouldint allow that person back in. I think this is a fair assesment.
Sure some people might be unfortunate to play in some juvenile run outlier club but I would take a stab in the dark and say it is less than 1% because of the resources needed and the average age of gamers (going by the poll we did). Anecdotal evidence of an outlier event is not a good representation of the greater whole..
I do agree though, we should all do our part in making better communities. Online and offline.
For me that would include not risng to the bait and arguing with people endlessly over trivial stuff, I gotta take a leaf out of my own book
Trust me, being a woman in a gaming group can be quite the rough time with a bunch of socially awkward fellows making gross passes at you. It won't be everyone, but in only takes one or two to really ruin the experience, and they are not usually called out for it and it is one of the biggest reasons ladies won't show up.
And you guys say tournament players are toxic, lol. Talking down about people who don't play the game in the same way as you is REALLY different from the tournament players who talk down to casuals....
I don't care how they play (though I won't ever agree with it). But I don't like what competitive players do to the games. I don't generally use the word "toxic", but there's no getting around the fact that when competitive players become the dominant play style of a game, it is poisonous to the long term health of the game.
I can't tell you the number of people I've heard say that they quit playing games because of this attitude. Tom Vassel has a notorious example of one player - just one person - ruining Netrunner for him and Sam Healey within a few minutes, despite greatly enjoying the game and playing it. If one player can delete two players, is that healthy for the game? Is a single competitive player worth two casual players? And a single overly competitive player can ruin the game for more than just two people over his many years - I can't tell you how many Warmachine players I never saw a second time. I doubt I could ever have such a immediate and damaging affect on the game, regardless of what I did.
Honestly, look at the winning lists for recent tournaments. There is quite a bit of variation. Even if a list has a similar "core", almost every player puts a different spin on their list over someone else's. It's incredibly rare for 2 players to play the same "netlist".
If everybody is driving the same sports car, does it matter if they are painted slightly different shades of red?
I want to comment on this point. Because i don't think this is a fair comparison. The problem you are describing is something that will be inherent in literally any game, or any type. Some people are jerks. And they will ruin the fun of people trying to get into a game. This could happen in a pick up basketball game in the park, where one bad egg on the court makes two or three people never want to play basketball again. I've met a lot of competitive players who are genuinely a lot of fun to play with and are good people. Its about the attitude people take into the game with them.
In 40K, not all competitive players are jerks, and not all jerks are competitive players. BUT the majority of jerks in the 40K community consider themselves competitive players. My prior post about the culture of competitive gaming was not to argue that all competitive players are bad, merely to point out that the competitive culture is attractive to certain types of negative attitudes. This is why many negative voices will be heard in competitive communities. The competitive community will always exist, and it will always attract the worst, its just the way it is for any player v player game.
To people who brought up the Gamergate, I applaud you. Thank you for helping us realize that we table top gamers share a lot of the worst elements of video game culture as well. Regardless of what you think of a female game reviewers thoughts, women have just as much right to be wrong about games as I do, and they have just as much right to voice those wrong opinions as anyone else. Furthermore, reviewing a video game through a different metric, even if that metric is feminism, is not inherently wrong either. Someone being blasted and attacked for voicing an unpopular opinion is alienating to the general community and further isolates gaming communities from general society. Which in turns feeds into elitism and some sort of perverse class culture.
Sadly, Gamergate isn't as off topic as you might think. This is a thread about toxic behavior in the 40k competitive community as compared to the broader 40K community, the fact that it is so easy for parts of our community to embrace a toxic ideology such as Gamergate demonstrates that toxic isolationist ideologies have strains that run deeper throughout the entire community, and that is an uncomfortable truth. Table Top games have a pretty rough competition with video games, and honestly we should strive to be as accepting as possible. We need people to feel welcome in our circles, and want to join in those circles and... well buy armies and play games. War gaming groups outside of the big ones tend to be more welcomeing as well, because they are even more desperate for players.
What this talk about Gamergate has reminded me of, is that more than just the competitive community can be toxic and unwelcoming to different groups of people. Its something we all need to look at and make sure that we are creating an environment that people feel welcome in. Its not just competitive communities, its an issue with "nerd" culture at large. We need to work together to become more welcoming so our hobby and passion can grow and flourish.
Trust me, being a woman in a gaming group can be quite the rough time with a bunch of socially awkward fellows making gross passes at you. It won't be everyone, but in only takes one or two to really ruin the experience, and they are not usually called out for it and it is one of the biggest reasons ladies won't show up.
Yeah I can totally see that. Some people might mean well or just not understand what they are saying is bad. Sadly, some people will just label you as a gender. I will go easy on you because you're a girl or want to crush you because you're a girl. How about just treat you like a person. So must be frustrating sometimes I get it :(
This might not be viable maybe try setting up your own club/group? Then you can screen people who want to join and set some clear boundaries? I know this might also not seem like a good idea but maybe speak to whoever is running the group to have a word on the down lo with whoever is the most gross on the down lo and explain to them that their behavior is potentially turning people away from he hobby or something. Maybe just say to the person really loudly next time it happens: "Excuse me, but are you hitting on me??" And watch their embarrassment? Maybe that will send a message? I dunno. I hear your story all to often. Wish there was a good solution for fixing jerks.
I have a problem with the casual vs. competitive spat because I see it used all the time to justify poor rules design from Games Workshop. The attitude seems to be "it's just a beer and pretzels game, it doesn't need to be well designed!"
I really strongly disagree with that. I am not a GW gamer any more because I find their games so poorly designed at what they are trying to do (and to be honest the quality of the writing has gone down so much that any sense of narrative is utterly debased). I do not want to spend ages painting an army based on a faction I am enthusiastic for because of aesthetics and story (the things that hook most of us on a given faction) to find out I am relegated to a punching bag for another person who happened to like the aesthetic and story of a faction that for whatever reason the "design studio" (ie. a bunch of unprofessional hacks) decided would be vastly overpowered or designed for a totally different paradigm mid edition.
That is just not fun. You show up for a game and spend half an hour setting up your lovingly painted little dudes (all my armies are painted) and get wiped out on turn 2 before you even have a chance to really play.
GW games are designed as adversarial games, not co-op games. There are two sides and win conditions. So when I play them I expect to have a reasonable shot at winning. The set up and tear down time along with the monetary and time investment in your faction are enormous. So to me, it is really not worth it if I am gonna be handicapped from the start because I decided I really like Orks and I want to play a horde style army or whatever. I am not super pushed about losing a close game, or even getting stomped every now and then for making a dumb mistake, but getting absolutely gutted because my opponent rolled double turn or has the insane new hotness while my army has languished without update for maybe 10 years in the worst cases is just super off putting.
The answer from self professed casual gamers is that I should relax and enjoy the narrative of the battle. But having the same narrative every time (my Boyz get krumped) is tiresome and boring. I like narrative games, that is why I play Dungeons and Dragons every week. But I would like a wargame to actually be a wargame and to give players a fair shot without handicapping them for not knowing that the design paradigm has shifted or not doing online research about what faction not to pick based on what will not give them a fun time.
Casual players who have a strong identity often dismiss people like me as toxic competitive players. But I really feel that is unfair. I paint all my minis. I have started several gaming clubs and introduced dozens of people to wargaming. When I played in tournaments I often won best sportsman. I think I am generally a chill guy to play against. I pick my armies based on my love of the story or miniatures. I just want a well designed game that gives people like me a fair chance vs. other people when I am not making stupid mistakes.
This is also the reason I liked Warmachine and Hordes Mk1 and Mk2 where I could select forces based pretty much on what I liked the look of and once I learned not to make mistakes I could play and have a solid chance of winning in almost all match ups and why I do not like Mk3 where I have to play in a particular theme list which requires buying certain models which might not fit with what I want or look nice.
It is why I quit WFB (setting up an entire NG army fully painted to have it pretty much wiped on turn 1 by a sorc on a disk getting a purple sun off down my lines or whatever it was) and why I quite 40K (orks obviously being seen as a second tier punching bag faction for most of the lifespan of the game across multiple editions and more and more crazy poor balance).
So someone said competitive players drive off casual players. I think that is a false dichotomy. By putting up with terrible rules design and dismissing all critique as the whining of a toxic WAAC donkey cave you are losing a lot of people like me who just want a fair and serious (from a game design perspective) game. GW seem to be doing well so maybe people like me are the minority, but I think the growth in other games speaks to the fact that there are a lot of people in the same boat.
Da Boss wrote: I have a problem with the casual vs. competitive spat because I see it used all the time to justify poor rules design from Games Workshop. The attitude seems to be "it's just a beer and pretzels game, it doesn't need to be well designed!"
I really strongly disagree with that. I am not a GW gamer any more because I find their games so poorly designed at what they are trying to do (and to be honest the quality of the writing has gone down so much that any sense of narrative is utterly debased). I do not want to spend ages painting an army based on a faction I am enthusiastic for because of aesthetics and story (the things that hook most of us on a given faction) to find out I am relegated to a punching bag for another person who happened to like the aesthetic and story of a faction that for whatever reason the "design studio" (ie. a bunch of unprofessional hacks) decided would be vastly overpowered or designed for a totally different paradigm mid edition.
That is just not fun. You show up for a game and spend half an hour setting up your lovingly painted little dudes (all my armies are painted) and get wiped out on turn 2 before you even have a chance to really play.
GW games are designed as adversarial games, not co-op games. There are two sides and win conditions. So when I play them I expect to have a reasonable shot at winning. The set up and tear down time along with the monetary and time investment in your faction are enormous. So to me, it is really not worth it if I am gonna be handicapped from the start because I decided I really like Orks and I want to play a horde style army or whatever. I am not super pushed about losing a close game, or even getting stomped every now and then for making a dumb mistake, but getting absolutely gutted because my opponent rolled double turn or has the insane new hotness while my army has languished without update for maybe 10 years in the worst cases is just super off putting.
The answer from self professed casual gamers is that I should relax and enjoy the narrative of the battle. But having the same narrative every time (my Boyz get krumped) is tiresome and boring. I like narrative games, that is why I play Dungeons and Dragons every week. But I would like a wargame to actually be a wargame and to give players a fair shot without handicapping them for not knowing that the design paradigm has shifted or not doing online research about what faction not to pick based on what will not give them a fun time.
Casual players who have a strong identity often dismiss people like me as toxic competitive players. But I really feel that is unfair. I paint all my minis. I have started several gaming clubs and introduced dozens of people to wargaming. When I played in tournaments I often won best sportsman. I think I am generally a chill guy to play against. I pick my armies based on my love of the story or miniatures. I just want a well designed game that gives people like me a fair chance vs. other people when I am not making stupid mistakes.
This is also the reason I liked Warmachine and Hordes Mk1 and Mk2 where I could select forces based pretty much on what I liked the look of and once I learned not to make mistakes I could play and have a solid chance of winning in almost all match ups and why I do not like Mk3 where I have to play in a particular theme list which requires buying certain models which might not fit with what I want or look nice.
It is why I quit WFB (setting up an entire NG army fully painted to have it pretty much wiped on turn 1 by a sorc on a disk getting a purple sun off down my lines or whatever it was) and why I quite 40K (orks obviously being seen as a second tier punching bag faction for most of the lifespan of the game across multiple editions and more and more crazy poor balance).
So someone said competitive players drive off casual players. I think that is a false dichotomy. By putting up with terrible rules design and dismissing all critique as the whining of a toxic WAAC donkey cave you are losing a lot of people like me who just want a fair and serious (from a game design perspective) game. GW seem to be doing well so maybe people like me are the minority, but I think the growth in other games speaks to the fact that there are a lot of people in the same boat.
TBF i think casual players often don't really bother with dealing with the shoddy ruleset and introduce houserules, i've seen everything really from hadicaps points wise for weaker armies to whole mission sets written down.
In a way i think that the focus of GWatm torwards ITC ruleset is bad for the balance because ITC ruleset is differing vastly from the mainline 40 k ruleset which all base theirs on. That beeing said GW is SHODY to the extreme when rulewriting and it is no wonder that the ITC-system does a lot better then GW40k itself.
Worst offender imo are missing Keywords, especially on squishy Charachters not getting charachter keywords. Or questionable formulation.
In a way there's also willing powercreep from GW's part with the newer models. Then there was WHFB and the completely broken Spell shenanigans.
Then there is the rather unfair ammount of update share: Basically the old DE codex, the Crons and the orks but also until recently chaos with that really bland codex, etc. Compared to Eldar or SM and some other darlings.
AND God beware, when you play an army that is produced by FW: Oh you payed2000£ for a Krieg/ R&H army ? Yeah your rules are 3 editions behind most of the time or just plain suck if written by GW mainline rulestudio, obviously an afterthought made by an intern in 1 H and no playtesting behind the rules itself.
You wanted to play Corsairs? Nope ilegal now in matched play.WHO CARES? (obviously not the dude with the amazing kitbahsed Corsair army, that dude can go feth himself out of principle....)
And let's not start talking about SoB......
GW also seems to forget these armies because they don't sell much and blame their inherent design choices and ignore them therefore not realising that an 4th /5 th edition Codex in 6-7 or even 8th is utter garbage and akin of a boxing match between a female lightwight against a heavy wight champion.
Now 8th also brought us down to no more USR, no NOW INSTEAD WE GET 5-6 slightly different but same Rules spread about what feels like 100+ units? That solved cluster and bloat alright!
Heck to play CSM now you need atleast Codex 2.0 vigilus, CA, FAQ's RB.
You own Codex 1 and don't want to upgrade for obvious reasons? Add that shadowspear list to that.
In a way it is obvious that the clusterfeth that are the rues are intended to sell you more gak then ever and it get's really annoying because half the time you feel like the playtesters seem to not have a single clue WTF they are doing. That is if Playtesters even exist for GW.
Even funnier it get's when we go now into the Subfaction shenanigans, of which often only certain combinations of Subfactions and according Stratagems and traits make units actually worth their salt. Your army ain't fitting that? Screw you then!
In essence GW knows that they have a spotty balance history and decided to go with the most balancing thought requiring system. Great.
Now youve got sitautions like these: 13 pts CSM/ SMRG or AL vs 13 pts UM/ WB. Guess which of these performs better. And that is just one internal balancing problem and i know that such a system rarely achieves equal long pikes for all subfactions BUT ATLEAST AN ATTEMPT could be made. Even funnier whn you compare mordian requirements and effect compared to Cadians, etc.
Now i prefer this system over the old one, but atleast try to give everyone a Spear and not a shortsword to some and others full armour Pike and longsword. so to speak.
I have a problem with the casual vs. competitive spat because I see it used all the time to justify poor rules design from Games Workshop. The attitude seems to be "it's just a beer and pretzels game, it doesn't need to be well designed!"
I really strongly disagree with that. I am not a GW gamer any more because I find their games so poorly designed at what they are trying to do (and to be honest the quality of the writing has gone down so much that any sense of narrative is utterly debased). I do not want to spend ages painting an army based on a faction I am enthusiastic for because of aesthetics and story (the things that hook most of us on a given faction) to find out I am relegated to a punching bag for another person who happened to like the aesthetic and story of a faction that for whatever reason the "design studio" (ie. a bunch of unprofessional hacks) decided would be vastly overpowered or designed for a totally different paradigm mid edition.
That is just not fun. You show up for a game and spend half an hour setting up your lovingly painted little dudes (all my armies are painted) and get wiped out on turn 2 before you even have a chance to really play.
GW games are designed as adversarial games, not co-op games. There are two sides and win conditions. So when I play them I expect to have a reasonable shot at winning. The set up and tear down time along with the monetary and time investment in your faction are enormous. So to me, it is really not worth it if I am gonna be handicapped from the start because I decided I really like Orks and I want to play a horde style army or whatever. I am not super pushed about losing a close game, or even getting stomped every now and then for making a dumb mistake, but getting absolutely gutted because my opponent rolled double turn or has the insane new hotness while my army has languished without update for maybe 10 years in the worst cases is just super off putting.
The answer from self professed casual gamers is that I should relax and enjoy the narrative of the battle. But having the same narrative every time (my Boyz get krumped) is tiresome and boring. I like narrative games, that is why I play Dungeons and Dragons every week. But I would like a wargame to actually be a wargame and to give players a fair shot without handicapping them for not knowing that the design paradigm has shifted or not doing online research about what faction not to pick based on what will not give them a fun time.
Casual players who have a strong identity often dismiss people like me as toxic competitive players. But I really feel that is unfair. I paint all my minis. I have started several gaming clubs and introduced dozens of people to wargaming. When I played in tournaments I often won best sportsman. I think I am generally a chill guy to play against. I pick my armies based on my love of the story or miniatures. I just want a well designed game that gives people like me a fair chance vs. other people when I am not making stupid mistakes.
This is also the reason I liked Warmachine and Hordes Mk1 and Mk2 where I could select forces based pretty much on what I liked the look of and once I learned not to make mistakes I could play and have a solid chance of winning in almost all match ups and why I do not like Mk3 where I have to play in a particular theme list which requires buying certain models which might not fit with what I want or look nice.
It is why I quit WFB (setting up an entire NG army fully painted to have it pretty much wiped on turn 1 by a sorc on a disk getting a purple sun off down my lines or whatever it was) and why I quite 40K (orks obviously being seen as a second tier punching bag faction for most of the lifespan of the game across multiple editions and more and more crazy poor balance).
So someone said competitive players drive off casual players. I think that is a false dichotomy. By putting up with terrible rules design and dismissing all critique as the whining of a toxic WAAC donkey cave you are losing a lot of people like me who just want a fair and serious (from a game design perspective) game. GW seem to be doing well so maybe people like me are the minority, but I think the growth in other games speaks to the fact that there are a lot of people in the same boat.
I, too, lose a lot of my games because I turn up with an army that I like rather than one that will stomp efficiently. But my experience has been more the other way round from yours - the more competitive players I know or have run into are always eager to give me advice on how to change my army lists. Mind you, they're friendly about it, they understand why I choose fluffy or pretty over efficient and they're never condescending, either. Nobody has ever told me to just chill because it's a beer and pretzels game. Rather, it's been more along the lines of "you're going to need to expect to lose if you bring unit A or don't use unit B".
Oh, I never blamed the other player for being too competitive if I lost, I think that is nonsense. They built the army they want, I built the army I want, we played, they had a good time, I did not.
I am also happy to take advice from such players and they often will give advice, the thing is, I am often not taking the advice because I want to fit a certain theme or accomplish a certain aesthetic with my force.
Other, more well designed games allow me to do this with minimal concessions for "power" because the games are balanced and most of the deciding between winner and loser happens at the "playing the game" phase rather than the "listbuilding phase".
The problem is not in any way the other players - I was a tournament player and when the game was better balanced (5th ed 40K, 6th and 7th (first half) Fantasy) I really enjoyed myself. I rarely ever had poor experiences with people playing in tournaments.
The problem is a rules system that is heavily luck based, that does not finish one design cycle completely before shifting design paradigm and that seems incapable of maintaining any semblance of balance between units, lists and factions.
People say it is designed for narrative play, and as a big fan of narrative gaming I really disagree. A well balanced system is not an impediment to narrative play because it is always easier to unbalance for narrative from a solid starting point. There is no downside to having a tightly designed game, and it is a bit of a disgrace that GW as one of the oldest and most established companies on the market has such low standards in this regard.It really seems to me to be a lack of discipline and focus from the design team that causes this, they seem like a thoroughly unprofessional bunch of people.
It is this problem with design that leads to ill feeling in the playerbase, and then we all blame each other for not compensating for the flaws built into the game by people charging us large sums of money for hard backed books full of rules.
It is designed for narrative play. So long as you are in a group that is also in for narrative play and aren't building tournament stomp liists, and as long as everyone is open to house ruling.
Otherwise yes, the game of 40k or AOS is a game decided in the listbuilding phase often, and thats by intent because thats what the community wants.
auticus wrote: It is designed for narrative play. So long as you are in a group that is also in for narrative play and aren't building tournament stomp liists, and as long as everyone is open to house ruling.
Otherwise yes, the game of 40k or AOS is a game decided in the listbuilding phase often, and thats by intent because thats what the community wants.
It isn't designed for narrative play over anything else.
I don't see how it particularly encourages narrative play. If you have to house rule it and rely on people behaving well then it was just poorly designed in any case.
I would really like them to do a better job with that because it would make it a lot easier for me to find people to play with in a game I found at least tolerable.
But I hate that the community gets blamed for GW not being bothered to write proper rules. That crap only flies when you are essentially a hobbyist making cheap rules pamphlets rather than a large corporation.
auticus wrote: It is designed for narrative play. So long as you are in a group that is also in for narrative play and aren't building tournament stomp liists, and as long as everyone is open to house ruling.
Otherwise yes, the game of 40k or AOS is a game decided in the listbuilding phase often, and thats by intent because thats what the community wants.
It isn't designed for narrative play over anything else.
Thats good. I never stated it was designed for narrative play over anything else. I said that it was designed for narrative play so long as you're in the appropriate group that can do things in a non hyper competitive fashion.
It was also designed for open play and their version of "matched play".
If you have to house rule it and rely on people behaving well then it was just poorly designed in any case.
I don't disagree with you, it is poorly designed. The rules and "balance" are garbage, have been garbage for over two decades, and continues to sell millions of dollars of product because the commercial base of gamers are ok with that. That is a whole other topic unto itself though.
auticus wrote: It is designed for narrative play. So long as you are in a group that is also in for narrative play and aren't building tournament stomp liists, and as long as everyone is open to house ruling.
Otherwise yes, the game of 40k or AOS is a game decided in the listbuilding phase often, and thats by intent because thats what the community wants.
It isn't designed for narrative play over anything else.
Thats good. I never stated it was designed for narrative play over anything else. I said that it was designed for narrative play so long as you're in the appropriate group that can do things in a non hyper competitive fashion.
It was also designed for open play and their version of "matched play".
If you have to house rule it and rely on people behaving well then it was just poorly designed in any case.
I don't disagree with you, it is poorly designed. The rules and "balance" are garbage, have been garbage for over two decades, and continues to sell millions of dollars of product because the commercial base of gamers are ok with that. That is a whole other topic unto itself though.
If players were okay with terrible balance, what happened to 7th?
stratigo wrote: If players were okay with terrible balance, what happened to 7th?
You know, this is actually a good point. I think the community fell hook, line, and sinker for "new" GW seeing how 8th is quickly becoming as bloated, if not more, as 7th ever was. Yet 7th GW stocks plummeted and they had to change while something happened during 8th that made everyone forgive and forget and now we see GW has learned that doing yet another half-assed job can result in them making more money than ever before, despite not actually fixing any of the flaws of the game.
I don't have an answer for why 7th was unacceptable garbage while 8th, despite showing all of the same flaws (some worse due to even worse soup and meta lists) being lauded and people seem to have no issue with it.
stratigo wrote: If players were okay with terrible balance, what happened to 7th?
You know, this is actually a good point. I think the community fell hook, line, and sinker for "new" GW seeing how 8th is quickly becoming as bloated, if not more, as 7th ever was. Yet 7th GW stocks plummeted and they had to change while something happened during 8th that made everyone forgive and forget and now we see GW has learned that doing yet another half-assed job can result in them making more money than ever before, despite not actually fixing any of the flaws of the game.
I don't have an answer for why 7th was unacceptable garbage while 8th, despite showing all of the same flaws (some worse due to even worse soup and meta lists) being lauded and people seem to have no issue with it.
Cause the game is better for the vast majority of people and the rules are, objectively, tighter. It's still 40k, it is still i go you go, and there will never be a fix for that, but it is simply a better game. Like you go "Oh soup is worse!" But it isn't. You don't have invisible riptides getting to attack 2 to 3 times a turn after they deepstrike and nonsense like that. In your antipathy for 40k, you strive to make it far worse in your constructed reality than it is in objective reality. A thing doesn't have to be "THE WORSTEST EVAR!" to be bad, or have problems. Just like something doesn't have to be "FLAWLESS AND THE BEST!" to be fun and good. Indeed something can be both good and have problems all at once. But this binary of utter gak to utter gold plagues 40k. And not just in the rules, but in commentary of the setting and the issues of portrayals and how much should be lampshaded and how important is tradition.
The thing with 8th is it is a great rule set for open/narrative play. It works great if you play with a like minded group of mates who all have the same objective, an enjoyable game. The core rules work, the extra rules can be made to work, picked and chosen to best effect. Power levels are great. It’s only when people get competitive about the game, either in a tournament or just in manner that problems arise. It’s not about balance it’s more often about wording of a rule or grammar.
“Competitive” players who are most vocal on the Internet May well not be representative of the wider tournament community but you can see why anyone would be put off going to an event that has the potential to meet more than one of these types. They tend not to appreciate that people enjoy different aspects of the game from them. I’ve had them on here telling me I’m lying when I say it doesn’t matter who wins a game of 40k to me. It MUST matter! Apparently.
I think GW are doing very well at the minute maintaining the three ways to play and making “rules” that are match play only or suggestion like the rule of three. In the other modes it isn’t needed. In my group having 3 identical units is boring as hell and if anyone was bringing such a force it would be explained by a narrative and discussed before hand.
When tournaments first started they were a celebration of the hobby, people took pride in their armies and reports of the events were full of pictures of gorgeous armies lovingly built and described. I have never seen a phot of a winning army. It’s all about the list. It’s only the HH scene where people seem to take pride in bringing out a gorgeous army at an event. They are more like classic sports car races. A move back to that style of event at some times would encourage less competing players to attend events. Points for best army or story. As it stands I would avoid a tournament so as to minimise the risk of meeting who are the vocal superior competitive minority that poison the whole hobby. Spending a day with one of those would be bad, going to an event where there could be a dozen would be hell on Earth.
Well, part of the thing though is some of those AREN'T matched play rules. The "rule of three" for example isn't for Matched Play, it's for organized events (i.e. tournaments) just somehow everyone thinks it's a global matched play rule and applies it.
That's the sort of thing that's a problem because it's where tournament mentality seeps into all types of games instead of "staying in its lane" as the case may be.
Andykp wrote: When tournaments first started they were a celebration of the hobby, people took pride in their armies and reports of the events were full of pictures of gorgeous armies lovingly built and described. I have never seen a phot of a winning army. It’s all about the list. It’s only the HH scene where people seem to take pride in bringing out a gorgeous army at an event. They are more like classic sports car races. A move back to that style of event at some times would encourage less competing players to attend events. Points for best army or story. As it stands I would avoid a tournament so as to minimise the risk of meeting who are the vocal superior competitive minority that poison the whole hobby. Spending a day with one of those would be bad, going to an event where there could be a dozen would be hell on Earth.
Agreed with all that post. The thing I find so sad about the way people sometimes talk about tournaments is that they're STILL mostly a hobby celebration. The vast majority of people at a big tournament aren't there with any serious intention to win or 'place' - they are there for a weekend away with friends and some fun games against new people. It's sad that the competitive aspect seems to be the only one that matters, or that the fact that hundreds of people turn up is somehow indicative of 'competitive 40k'. If 400 people turn up, my guess is that maaayyybeeee 100 are there to 'compete'. And that's being generous.
Regarding Heresy, I think the opportunity to show off armies is taken much more seriously. However, I think I've come up against just as many beatface ultra-competitive style players in Heresy as I have in 40k - in Heresy they just tend to pretend they aren't!
In 7th, basically any casual/fluffy/unoptimized CWE or Tau list would have destroyed most Ork or Tyranid lists, which meant many people couldn't play non-competitive games with the factions they enjoyed.
In 8th, there aren't such dramatic unbalance between codices. It's a lot more enjoyable at the narrative/casual end of the spectrum.
Automatically Appended Next Post: This is a really good discussion about competitive 40kBTW guys. Good feedback on both sides.
Quite enjoyed it and would love to really debate the "do points matter" concept Ash baits throughout the whole thing.
It's something I've found more and more interesting as I've played a variety of game systems. I feel like players often put too much faith in points as an ultimate decider of balance, largely because that's how the idea is sold to players, but realistically there are too many secondary hidden currencies in game systems for points to ever be right. Even in AOS where there's less tactical application of DPP and Durability math, those kind of concepts can make relying on points for perfect math problematic at best (see Rend vs Ghosts).
I've come to appreciate that the biggest issue with points is just that the idea of paying for everything in a complex game system with the same currency leads to too many instances of overlapping design space. Game systems seem to get more varied as they introduce layers of structure to put fewer things in less direct competition. Things like Infinity's SWC or Warmachine's upcoming Requisition points are easy examples. Even Guild Ball sneaks it in by making list building a matter of getting 4 squaddy points, 1 captain point, and 1 mascot point. I even find 40k's current detatchment system produces a fair amount of variety, though somewhat in reverse by rewarding players for constructing their army out of 3 smaller groups. I do often think that separating out the points spent on models and their equipment would be overall good for the game.
Overall, I just see points as another stat that can be adjusted for balance and have somewhat let go of them as a complete arbiter for balance. They still matter. Ash regular spends about a quarter of his points on a pair of Blackstars that are just.... not worth over 200 a piece.... but getting all the points exactly right, bumping up your granularity to 1 million points games to do so, isn't going to actually balance the game the way people think unless you remove more or less all of the factors that make decisions on the table matter.
I've been far less interested in making constructs around lists that incentivize different styles of lists overall. Warmachine's recent trek into themes is probably a little restrictive, but does a good job making space for most of its stuff and I'm really happy with how Malifaux is doing the same. I think 40k could really benefit from the idea of specialist detachments taken a little further, making reasons to take a set of Terminators or something similar and breaking codexes up into separate detachment styles. I just find this trend away from adjusting points as a balancer and more towards designing smaller forces that are balanced against each other rather positive overall.
Automatically Appended Next Post:
Wayniac wrote: Well, part of the thing though is some of those AREN'T matched play rules. The "rule of three" for example isn't for Matched Play, it's for organized events (i.e. tournaments) just somehow everyone thinks it's a global matched play rule and applies it.
That's the sort of thing that's a problem because it's where tournament mentality seeps into all types of games instead of "staying in its lane" as the case may be.
Most of the time if a rule is good enough for tournaments, its almost certainly worth including in my casual games. They're pretty much the definition of rules that make a fairer game regardless of the effort players are putting in.
When tournaments first started they were a celebration of the hobby, people took pride in their armies and reports of the events were full of pictures of gorgeous armies lovingly built and described. I have never seen a phot of a winning army. It’s all about the list. It’s only the HH scene where people seem to take pride in bringing out a gorgeous army at an event. They are more like classic sports car races. A move back to that style of event at some times would encourage less competing players to attend events. Points for best army or story. As it stands I would avoid a tournament so as to minimise the risk of meeting who are the vocal superior competitive minority that poison the whole hobby. Spending a day with one of those would be bad, going to an event where there could be a dozen would be hell on Earth.
There's a little bit of rose colored glasses here. When tournaments first started it wasn't nearly as easy to share anything about them as it is now; there wasn't really any way to make them part of a global community either. I think some of this also comes from the difference in experiences more tournaments second hand via the internet and fewer in person. I get where the impression comes from, but part of that is just that lists are the easiest thing for players not at an event to connect with and learn from and on the internet, the audience is mostly people who were not at the event.
When you're actually at events, there's tons of celebration of the hobby going on still. A well painted army gets a ton of buzz and word of mouth sends players over to whatever table they can see it in action. Players joke about their favorite units and ask to see really cool conversions and paint jobs as they set up and nights are often spent regaling tales of improbable dice results over a round of drinks. A thing I've discovered over the years is that much of the banter you see on forums is between people that largely aren't winning or even going to many tournaments and the players that do don't bother to wade into the forums very often. It creates a situation where what you read about online is mostly a hollow echo of the actual event.
But you know what? We DO need to see some photos of the winning army. Most players invested enough to win a major tournament actually have gorgeous armies. Some of the best really. I'd love to see them get more attention. That's definitely a great point.
Part of the issue too is the armies have changed. Back in my day (2nd/3rd edition) you almost never saw a mixed army. Now? Almost every winning list (there are occasional "dark horse" exceptions) look like a hodgepodge of units without much, if any, coherence because they aren't built for looks, they're built to win. They boil the game down to numbers only, and screw the rest. I've seen things that push the hobby aspects lambasted as being useless in a tournament because in a tournament only winning should matter. If you ask me, that's not the sort of ecosystem that this hobby wants or needs. This isn't League of Legends or Magic the Gathering (although with the combo stacking it may as well be), the entire spectacle needs to be rewarded not just whoever comes up with (read: takes from someone else) the most broken list.
The game is too hard to balance and make "fair" do to the sheer size. I feel like had GW put the same effort that they are currently into the game back in 3rd edition, we would have had our best edition. Not talking about the actual game design, but the scale. 500 point Detachments are basically the size of an entire army at 1500 points back in 3rd. Now an army can be made up of 3-4 of those. All from different factions and sometimes with specialist detachments applied. THEN you look at strats and traits. It's just way too much. I feel like this is what kills the competitive scene currently for me, I really liked playing competitively again when the indexes were out, but by the fall we already were seeing the bloat reintroduced.
For competitive sake I hope 9th does 3 things.
1. Actually bothers with writing terrain rules
2. Penalizes soup rather then encouraging it
3. Cleans up this mess we have detachments and with CP's and using them as currency.
It's ironic that we are basically playing 7th ed unbound now, which people flipped over then, but now are OK since it's called something else and been over complicated.
Wayniac wrote: Part of the issue too is the armies have changed. Back in my day (2nd/3rd edition) you almost never saw a mixed army. Now? Almost every winning list (there are occasional "dark horse" exceptions) look like a hodgepodge of units without much, if any, coherence because they aren't built for looks, they're built to win. They boil the game down to numbers only, and screw the rest. I've seen things that push the hobby aspects lambasted as being useless in a tournament because in a tournament only winning should matter. If you ask me, that's not the sort of ecosystem that this hobby wants or needs. This isn't League of Legends or Magic the Gathering (although with the combo stacking it may as well be), the entire spectacle needs to be rewarded not just whoever comes up with (read: takes from someone else) the most broken list.
I don't really see this. Everything that mixes is pretty aesthetically coherent unless the players are intentionally going on out of their way to make incongruit paint schemes out of it. I get the complaints of prior ally systems, but everything now feels pretty much in line with the way 40k has always been depicted to me.
3. Cleans up this mess we have detachments and with CP's and using them as currency.
Yeah.
I like 8th overall, but CPs need a fix. GW tells us that command points exist to -- for instance -- allow Blood Angels to do Blood Angel-y things. But the best way to get the points to do Blood Angel-y things is to add cheap detachments from other factions...which also open up more stratagems!
The whole thing is backwards. Purer, more representative armies should receive more stratagem benefits. Soup armies should receive fewer, just because their nature allows them to find power in combos and compensate for weaknesses.
Of course, the reality is that GW is never going to discourage soup. It's too good for their bottom line.
If I were king, I'd put strict painting requirements on tournament entry and make best overall the real first place instead of most battle points. Then I'd bring back Ard Boys events as a way to contain everyone else like the old days.
3. Cleans up this mess we have detachments and with CP's and using them as currency.
Yeah.
I like 8th overall, but CPs need a fix. GW tells us that command points exist to -- for instance -- allow Blood Angels to do Blood Angel-y things. But the best way to get the points to do Blood Angel-y things is to add cheap detachments from other factions...which also open up more stratagems!
The whole thing is backwards. Purer, more representative armies should receive more stratagem benefits. Soup armies should receive fewer, just because their nature allows them to find power in combos and compensate for weaknesses.
Of course, the reality is that GW is never going to discourage soup. It's too good for their bottom line.
I strongly prefer the way it is, but that's mostly because I think there's far too many factions at the codex level and the current system does a good job consolidating them into something more coherent. The old style of making each new model type its own faction that needs to be spammed to 2000 points is miserable to me. A few points spent on a large number of Guard backed up by a lot of points spent on a few marines is the Imperium to me. Chaos is spikey marines fighting along side their daemonic corruptors. The... 8? Factions we have now with a good diversity in sub themes is far more interesting than the 20ish factions of the past.
If players were okay with terrible balance, what happened to 7th?
Well here, the same that happened in 5th when Draigo and company were stomping around, the same in 6th as well... they ate it up and kept on going.
My community has been the same size for about 20 years.
7th was the first time gw really managed to push it's community out here.
In a way i belive the community as a whole is too accepting torwards the often shoddy Jobs gw rules are.
However that's relative on a scale, which Disaster 7th is the point of danger for gw and anything less anything's fine.
Irkjoe wrote: If I were king, I'd put strict painting requirements on tournament entry and make best overall the real first place instead of most battle points. Then I'd bring back Ard Boys events as a way to contain everyone else like the old days.
I’ve often thought about this, given that the majority of people at a big tournament are there for the trip rather than there to see how ‘good’ they are at 40k.
Big tournament, make the main publicised 40k event a big narrative campaign. Teams, 1500pt armies, a big projected map, team leaders deploy forces, etc etc. No prizes for winning, etc.
Then do a side event for ‘really competitive’. No holds barred open 40k. Way fewer places, polystyrene terrain and no painting requirement.
Irkjoe wrote: If I were king, I'd put strict painting requirements on tournament entry and make best overall the real first place instead of most battle points. Then I'd bring back Ard Boys events as a way to contain everyone else like the old days.
I believe its mostly an American culture problem and not a GW problem.
Tournaments here in the NL (and from what I see, most of Europe) do have normal painting requirements and the winner is best overall which includes painting points (in the past also sportsmanship but that has slowly dissapeared because its a lot harder to score fairly).
What other people have said reads very true to me, on the internet you see the top X lists and that's it. so its easy to get the picture that its a no fun allowed cheese competition but your seeing 8 lists out of 100 and your not experiencing the joy of gaming that is felt even at the very top tables.
Yes some donkey-caves always exist but thats because your dealing with people and no amount of tournament setup is going to change that.
Irkjoe wrote: If I were king, I'd put strict painting requirements on tournament entry and make best overall the real first place instead of most battle points. Then I'd bring back Ard Boys events as a way to contain everyone else like the old days.
I believe its mostly an American culture problem and not a GW problem.
Tournaments here in the NL (and from what I see, most of Europe) do have normal painting requirements and the winner is best overall which includes painting points (in the past also sportsmanship but that has slowly dissapeared because its a lot harder to score fairly).
What other people have said reads very true to me, on the internet you see the top X lists and that's it. so its easy to get the picture that its a no fun allowed cheese competition but your seeing 8 lists out of 100 and your not experiencing the joy of gaming that is felt even at the very top tables.
Yes some donkey-caves always exist but thats because your dealing with people and no amount of tournament setup is going to change that.
That rings true to me too, based purely on the internet so no way indicative of all of US attitude but some of the worst offenders I’ve seen showing off the toxic side of the competetive scene donhail from the US. That’s not to say there are some prime douches from other countries too, I’m not going to name names they know who they are!
Automatically Appended Next Post:
“When you're actually at events, there's tons of celebration of the hobby going on still. A well painted army gets a ton of buzz and word of mouth sends players over to whatever table they can see it in action. Players joke about their favorite units and ask to see really cool conversions and paint jobs as they set up and nights are often spent regaling tales of improbable dice results over a round of drinks. A thing I've discovered over the years is that much of the banter you see on forums is between people that largely aren't winning or even going to many tournaments and the players that do don't bother to wade into the forums very often. It creates a situation where what you read about online is mostly a hollow echo of the actual event”
And this is why it’s sad, the idiots mouthing off on line about competition being the be all and end all put many reasonable people like me off ever going near an event.
Obviously there will always be variation between individuals but US culture is very competitive starting at an early age. The idea of intentionally holding back for no other reason than to be more evenly matched is pretty alien to many people. I've even had people not believe me when talking about doing so; they found it more plausible I was making it up to cover for losing. That says quite a lot, I feel.
NinthMusketeer wrote: Obviously there will always be variation between individuals but US culture is very competitive starting at an early age. The idea of intentionally holding back for no other reason than to be more evenly matched is pretty alien to many people. I've even had people not believe me when talking about doing so; they found it more plausible I was making it up to cover for losing. That says quite a lot, I feel.
NinthMusketeer wrote: Obviously there will always be variation between individuals but US culture is very competitive starting at an early age. The idea of intentionally holding back for no other reason than to be more evenly matched is pretty alien to many people. I've even had people not believe me when talking about doing so; they found it more plausible I was making it up to cover for losing. That says quite a lot, I feel.
That’s not alien at all. It is in fact far more common for a competitive player to go “here’s what I could do that would completely destroy you, but in the idea of fun, here’s what I will do”. Now a number of more competitive players play almost exclusively other competitive players, and the dudes who are in the regular top 10 are in constant prep mode. There’s rarely a stretch of more then 2 months where they aren’t going to a major or gt. Like some of these guys are pro 40kers. They make, if not a living, at least a fairly good supplement based off their skills at the game. And I know it is funny to think about, but would, say, Geoff Robinson be as great a caster as he is if he wasn’t also an extremely good competitive player (and this applies to more than just his 40k commentary)? I don’t think so
NinthMusketeer wrote: Obviously there will always be variation between individuals but US culture is very competitive starting at an early age. The idea of intentionally holding back for no other reason than to be more evenly matched is pretty alien to many people. I've even had people not believe me when talking about doing so; they found it more plausible I was making it up to cover for losing. That says quite a lot, I feel.
This is it. US culture is just a lot more intensely competitive than EU and the 40k crowd reflects it. GW is a British company but for better or worse they cannot ignore their US customers.
NinthMusketeer wrote: Obviously there will always be variation between individuals but US culture is very competitive starting at an early age. The idea of intentionally holding back for no other reason than to be more evenly matched is pretty alien to many people. I've even had people not believe me when talking about doing so; they found it more plausible I was making it up to cover for losing. That says quite a lot, I feel.
This is it. US culture is just a lot more intensely competitive than EU and the 40k crowd reflects it. GW is a British company but for better or worse they cannot ignore their US customers.
But they shouldn’t listen to only their ultra competitive customers and alienate the rest of the player base. And the vocal minority on here and other sites want them too. I firmly believe we need a paired down simple rule set like epic 40000 just for competitive play.
NinthMusketeer wrote: Obviously there will always be variation between individuals but US culture is very competitive starting at an early age. The idea of intentionally holding back for no other reason than to be more evenly matched is pretty alien to many people. I've even had people not believe me when talking about doing so; they found it more plausible I was making it up to cover for losing. That says quite a lot, I feel.
This is it. US culture is just a lot more intensely competitive than EU and the 40k crowd reflects it. GW is a British company but for better or worse they cannot ignore their US customers.
But they shouldn’t listen to only their ultra competitive customers and alienate the rest of the player base. And the vocal minority on here and other sites want them too. I firmly believe we need a paired down simple rule set like epic 40000 just for competitive play.
This.
It's like a cancer that has infected the game. 40k's rule have never, ever been great for tournaments (well not like these so-called "pros" are wanting (lol, remind me again of when people got paid for attending 40k tourneys?)) as the rules are just not up to scratch. It's not a eSport. It never will be. Stop trying to make this game into something it is not and take your horrible incoherent soup lists away from this game I have loved for over 20 years and let the game go back to normality so we can stop having people think this is the normal way to play the game.
NinthMusketeer wrote: Obviously there will always be variation between individuals but US culture is very competitive starting at an early age. The idea of intentionally holding back for no other reason than to be more evenly matched is pretty alien to many people. I've even had people not believe me when talking about doing so; they found it more plausible I was making it up to cover for losing. That says quite a lot, I feel.
This is it. US culture is just a lot more intensely competitive than EU and the 40k crowd reflects it. GW is a British company but for better or worse they cannot ignore their US customers.
But they shouldn’t listen to only their ultra competitive customers and alienate the rest of the player base. And the vocal minority on here and other sites want them too. I firmly believe we need a paired down simple rule set like epic 40000 just for competitive play.
This.
It's like a cancer that has infected the game. 40k's rule have never, ever been great for tournaments (well not like these so-called "pros" are wanting (lol, remind me again of when people got paid for attending 40k tourneys?)) as the rules are just not up to scratch. It's not a eSport. It never will be. Stop trying to make this game into something it is not and take your horrible incoherent soup lists away from this game I have loved for over 20 years and let the game go back to normality so we can stop having people think this is the normal way to play the game.
Not this. Incoherent soup lists are a product of the 'Forge the Narrative' push by GW and GW alone. The so called 'competitive' crowd didn't want anything to do with that until it was forced into the game and they had to deal with it anyway.
Not this. Incoherent soup lists are a product of the 'Forge the Narrative' push by GW and GW alone. The so called 'competitive' crowd didn't want anything to do with that until it was forced into the game and they had to deal with it anyway.
No. Both are equally guilty. Gw saw an opportunity to sell more stuff (why sell someone one army when you can sell them ALL of them. They were just giving people what they wanted, since folks have wanted allies since third ed. 'Forge the narrative' was just a catch-all term to folks to shrug their shoulders, visualise what the dice were saying was happening, and carry on.
And while gw pushed allies and broken soup, let's be clear - gamers are still the other side of the very same coin, and there were more than a minority of gamers who were more than happy to take said broken soup. And take eight of everything, run with it, smiling with glee and then inflict it on any guy/girl opposite them.
I think "soup" makes more sense than the Imperium having all these separate armies. It would be rare that any Imperial force fights completely on their own.
The problem seems to be with implementation where there are no restrictions (or few enough that they do not matter) that allow people to cherry pick all the best stuff. Not to mention the fact that so much of what is available is Imperials.
Would be cool to have a list where it was just "armies of the imperium" and gave a more limited and balanced selection of units to make a cohesive "soup" army, but limited more specialist units to the "pure" faction armies so that faction identity is maintained. Kind of like what Mantic did with Forces of Nature as the "soup" list but then making lists for Trident Realms, Salamanders and the Herd as the "faction lists" with the specialist units and so on.
Andykp wrote: But they shouldn’t listen to only their ultra competitive customers and alienate the rest of the player base.
Andy, what makes you think that GW has not done so? "Listened" to the 'rest of the player base'? I myself don't have an answer for this question, but what makes you think the 'rest of the player base' has been ignored?
Given that, for more than a year, GW has been back on message boards, the FaceBoook forum, and has a more active email/inquiry mechanism (their community page), I'd say there's plenty of opportunity for them to get input from the casual players to tourney going players. And the evidence that GW listens, is their twice a year BIG FAQ, adjusting parts of the game (nerfing Smite Spam for example).
It does make sense that organized groups, like the ITC, are going to get more attention, because they're representing such a large base of players and these groups have big tourneys that draw a lot of attention.
But that doesn't invalidate the input from *anyone*, everyone, casual players, from getting to tell GW what's up.
And I ask you, 'How are the [my words] 'casual players' being alienated?'
Andy, if you're not satisfied with the state of 'competitive play', let's call it tournament play or GW's term, "Matched" play, if you're not happy with it, what steps have you taken, besides posting here? Have you got a few like minded players to have your own league? House rules? Banned Forge World? Painting requirements? Have you been posting on GW's FB? Emails to them?
Andykp wrote: And the vocal minority on here and other sites want them too. I firmly believe we need a paired down simple rule set like epic 40000 just for competitive play.
Didn't we get it? The 7e rule book, its actual rules, is 205 pages of game mechanics, and then 8e got paired to 8 pages of 'Core Rules'. And, there are 'Matched' rules versus Open and Narrative. I must be overlooking something. Would you please give an example or be more specific? (no sarcasm) Do you mean game mechanics? Missions?
What would you have as for a "simple rule set like epic 40000 just for competitive play"? I'm asking nicely.
Andykp wrote: But they shouldn’t listen to only their ultra competitive customers and alienate the rest of the player base.
Andy, what makes you think that GW has not done so? "Listened" to the 'rest of the player base'? I myself don't have an answer for this question, but what makes you think the 'rest of the player base' has been ignored?
Given that, for more than a year, GW has been back on message boards, the FaceBoook forum, and has a more active email/inquiry mechanism (their community page), I'd say there's plenty of opportunity for them to get input from the casual players to tourney going players. And the evidence that GW listens, is their twice a year BIG FAQ, adjusting parts of the game (nerfing Smite Spam for example).
It does make sense that organized groups, like the ITC, are going to get more attention, because they're representing such a large base of players and these groups have big tourneys that draw a lot of attention.
But that doesn't invalidate the input from *anyone*, everyone, casual players, from getting to tell GW what's up.
And I ask you, 'How are the [my words] 'casual players' being alienated?'
Andy, if you're not satisfied with the state of 'competitive play', let's call it tournament play or GW's term, "Matched" play, if you're not happy with it, what steps have you taken, besides posting here? Have you got a few like minded players to have your own league? House rules? Banned Forge World? Painting requirements? Have you been posting on GW's FB? Emails to them?
Andykp wrote: And the vocal minority on here and other sites want them too. I firmly believe we need a paired down simple rule set like epic 40000 just for competitive play.
Didn't we get it? The 7e rule book, its actual rules, is 205 pages of game mechanics, and then 8e got paired to 8 pages of 'Core Rules'. And, there are 'Matched' rules versus Open and Narrative. I must be overlooking something. Would you please give an example or be more specific? (no sarcasm) Do you mean game mechanics? Missions?
What would you have as for a "simple rule set like epic 40000 just for competitive play"? I'm asking nicely.
Firstly I don’t think we have been ignored but this very vocal minority that don’t represent all tournament players shout very loudly for changes to the whole game to make “balance” better for their style of play. The danger is GW will be overly swayed by them as they lobby very hard. So far they haven’t and all the books and add ins to 40k so far have catered very nicely to narrative and “casual” players as you call us. I prefer more hobby minded players. Maintaining the three ways to play is vital to that so that changes can be made that don’t impact the casual player adversely. I’m very lucky that I play ina very small but very like minded group and play the way we like with an ongoing narrative behind all our games if not campaigns. Other than that I partake in the staff surveys and interact with gw on social media. The danger is I hear from players who aren’t lucky enough to have a group like me and who have to tiptoe around a minefield of pick up games where match play is the standard and tournament “rules” are enforced, see rule of three for an example. All this call for banning soup is another example. Soup and CP farming and all that work fine if you don’t abuse it. It isn’t broken. It’s inky when you look for a competetive edge that it goes from a nice narrative tool to being a game changer. And my group and many players like me don’t abuse it because we don’t want to win. We want a fun narrative exciting game. So ban soup for tournaments fine, but keep match play there. I’m told time and time again the balance is better for everyone, and I’m sure it could be but the game is balanced fine the way we play. Best it has been ever.
For your last point I guess you aren’t familiar with the epic 40000 rules or I wasn’t clear. Epic 40000 had rules for units where units provided fire power to attacks and they had set stats for units regardless of options. So balance was easier to achieve. The game flowed quickly and felt very tactical because the way attacks both damaged units and added blast markers to them. Hindering them in coming turns. It wasn’t I go you go. It alternated phases. List building was efficient and could provide characterful detachments that behaved tactically as you expect. It would fix all the things tournament players go on about wanting. It doesn’t just mean a small core rule book but stripped down rules for very model. And best of all it worked. It was a great game to play it just lacked a bit of character and detail, but tournament lists are as dull and uncharacterful as it gets anyway. So that is fine.
I’ve played every edition of 40k and epic and have seen the change the rise of the tournaments have had, just look on here at the you make the call section or the tactics threads. You can’t have a normal conversation about the game on there. 8th is the best of both, a good game for casuals and a thriving tournament scene. The two are like oil and water. The only way to improve one without damaging the other is to keep them separate.
It's like a cancer that has infected the game. 40k's rule have never, ever been great for tournaments
What is the 'cancer'? Is it tourney play? If so, you seem to be over looking Rogue Trader Tournaments, that is, the tourneys that existed as far back as 1e, starting in the year 1987.
"Great"? That's subjective, as given massive tourney growth and popularity in the last 7 years, things must be at least 'good'. For all of 4e, when I started, there weren't tourneys that I could find (GW sponsored Games Days now and then, "T'anksGiving" were events, but certainly not tourneys). I am a tourney regular for 7+ years now. I attend 14 or so RTTs a year, and 4 to 6 GTs, leagues, too. And I think the rules are 'good enough' with some room for improvement (though that gap gets slimmer and slimmer every year).
Grimtuff wrote: Stop trying to make this game into something it is not and take your horrible incoherent soup lists away from this game I have loved for over 20 years and let the game go back to normality so we can stop having people think this is the normal way to play the game.
If you don't like, 'horrible incoherent soup lists', then ban them from your local scene. It's not hard. Get your group of players together, discuss and agree to ban multi-codex lists. Do have some dissenters? No problem, start a league, post your league rules (e.g. like having bans on FW and soup). Those who don't like your fixes don't have to sign up.
Done.
Maybe host an Apoc game a few times a year, so that players *can* field their models from multiple codices.
Now, as for 'normality'? What do you call normal 40k?
When I look at normal, there were always bad things in 40k:
Rhino Rush. Squats. Allies in 6e. 5e/6e Jaws of the World Wolf.
Bad & confusing game mechanics like "consolidate into a new combat" from 3e and 4e. Skimmers versus AP1.
Broken units: GK Rifleman dreadnaughts from 5e. 5e & 6e Mephiston. 29" assault range of 5e wyches. What's the assault range on hormagaunts now, with ... krakken? 32" 40"?
There's *always* been honked up stuff in 40k. That said, I still love this game, as one person's loved unit is another's bane. That's what I call 'normal' 40k. And now, twice a year, broken units and mechanics get nerfed. Usually.
There were tourneys in 2e & 3e. They largely disappeared from 4e to 5e (at least in California). That was the hay-day for the number of GW retail stores in the states, and they hosted tourneys once in a while. Towards 5e's waning years, tourneys came back and have showed no slowing down since.
When I think something is wrong, I talk to my local peeps, our RTT/FLGSTO, and I get to vote on things within the ITC, and I easily get to give input to the ITC organizers, frequently enough that we know each other by name.
Grimtuff, what do you do to fix 40k to how you like it?
It's like a cancer that has infected the game. 40k's rule have never, ever been great for tournaments
What is the 'cancer'? Is it tourney play? If so, you seem to be over looking Rogue Trader Tournaments, that is, the tourneys that existed as far back as 1e, starting in the year 1987.
It's not tourney play per se, as that has always existed. It's this fairly recent push by certain individuals (possibly the same ones trying to "balance" the game to their whim) to try an make 40k an eSport. It's never going to be. The game simply ins't built for it, yet these hardcore "pros" come muscling in trying to make the game into something it is clearly not and frustratingly some people listen and think this is how the game, whose rules are frankly not up to scratch for this sort of thing; is supposed to be played. 40k is NOT LoL or whatever. If you want a game more suited for this then there are loads of others out there that are far more appropriate and stop trying to hamfistedly make 40k into something it is not because that is the only way some people can get validation in their little lives.
It's like a cancer that has infected the game. 40k's rule have never, ever been great for tournaments
What is the 'cancer'? Is it tourney play? If so, you seem to be over looking Rogue Trader Tournaments, that is, the tourneys that existed as far back as 1e, starting in the year 1987.
It's not tourney play per se, as that has always existed. It's this fairly recent push by certain individuals (possibly the same ones trying to "balance" the game to their whim) to try an make 40k an eSport.
Oh, video games? Did I miss something in the thread, on say pages 3 and 4? It's a bit off topic, eh? (again, my tone is intended to be nice, not snotty)
But wouldn't a 40k video game be something that GW puts out (and has already done so) having little to do with table top game mechanics and just much more of a FirstPersonShooter format, like Fortnight & M.U.D. games?
And who are these guys? Got names?
Grimtuff wrote: It's never going to be. The game simply ins't built for it, yet these hardcore "pros" come muscling in trying to make the game into something it is clearly not and frustratingly some people listen and think this is how the game, whose rules are frankly not up to scratch for this sort of thing; is supposed to be played. 40k is NOT LoL or whatever. If you want a game more suited for this then there are loads of others out there that are far more appropriate and stop trying to hamfistedly make 40k into something it is not because that is the only way some people can get validation in their little lives.
This is all too general.
Who are the 'pros' that are muscling in? Nick Nanavati? Sean Nayden? Reece Robbins?
And if it is Reece and crew (who have done more modifying than anyone else to make the game more tourney playable) then, I would disagree with the 'hamfisted' approach. More depending on who you mean.
Andykp wrote: Firstly I don’t think we have been ignored but this very vocal minority that don’t represent all tournament players shout very loudly for changes to the whole game to make “balance” better for their style of play. The danger is GW will be overly swayed by them as they lobby very hard. So far they haven’t and all the books and add ins to 40k so far have catered very nicely to narrative and “casual” players as you call us.
(no sarcasm)
"Vocal minority shouting" does seem to be an inbuilt problem of humanity, huh? Consider the "Lunatic Fringe" of the band Red Rider song. At least, in representative democracies, right?
That said, I don't think that "GW will be overly swayed by them". You yourself state that, "So far they haven’t and all the books and add ins to 40k so far have catered very nicely to narrative and “casual” players as you call us." So, perhaps, there is not quite such a need for alarm that is thread addresses?
(BTW: Is there a better label than 'casual'? Perhaps the terms GW uses, "narrative" and "open"?)
Andykp wrote: I prefer more hobby minded players. Maintaining the three ways to play is vital to that so that changes can be made that don’t impact the casual player adversely.
I totally agree.
Andykp wrote: The danger is I hear from players who aren’t lucky enough to have a group like me and who have to tiptoe around a minefield of pick up games where match play is the standard and tournament “rules” are enforced, see rule of three for an example.
I agree that this has become the norm, but with good reason (not purposely, but as a matter of happenstance). Pick up games have always been wildly variable (points, rule interpretations, opponent quality and experience, etc), and I experienced this throughout 4e & 5e, before my 40k community became solid.
The mechanism that is making this happen, is that tourney players play more games, thus laying a firmer (deeper? more plentiful?) foundation of experience on how to play, like knowing current FAQs and such. On pick-up game night, it's likely that the tourney guys are there in majority. Now, I'm willing to play a book mission for a new player to the FLGS, and knowing my group, most of them would be willing, too. Once the pick up guy finds that he can play more games because most of us are playing the tourney format, then yeah, he might just have to go along with the majority and how they play. So your concern has some validity.
Narrative games ( I'm guessing ) can just as easily be played on a pick up game. I would guess that a narrative campaign takes more preparation.
So, I get your point: Narrative or 'casual' players might lose out given tourney players are dominant of the scene.
This can be fixed the way I stated in my post to Grimtuff. The ability of organizing a like minded group has never been easier and more powerful. Start a group on FB and there ya go. Post a notice on the FLGS bulletin board and the "minefield" is dodged. Right?
Andykp wrote: All this call for banning soup is another example. Soup and CP farming and all that work fine if you don’t abuse it. It isn’t broken. It’s inky when you look for a competetive edge that it goes from a nice narrative tool to being a game changer. And my group and many players like me don’t abuse it because we don’t want to win. We want a fun narrative exciting game. So ban soup for tournaments fine, but keep match play there. I’m told time and time again the balance is better for everyone, and I’m sure it could be but the game is balanced fine the way we play. Best it has been ever.
I agree here, too. 40k is currently better than ever.
Andykp wrote: For your last point I guess you aren’t familiar with the epic 40000 rules or I wasn’t clear. Epic 40000 had rules for units
Spoiler:
where units provided fire power to attacks and they had set stats for units regardless of options. So balance was easier to achieve. The game flowed quickly and felt very tactical because the way attacks both damaged units and added blast markers to them. Hindering them in coming turns. It wasn’t I go you go. It alternated phases. List building was efficient and could provide characterful detachments that behaved tactically as you expect. It would fix all the things tournament players go on about wanting. It doesn’t just mean a small core rule book but stripped down rules for very model. And best of all it worked. It was a great game to play it just lacked a bit of character and detail
, but tournament lists are as dull and uncharacterful as it gets anyway. So that is fine.
I am not familiar with epic, but thank you, I do know more now.
Andykp wrote: I’ve played every edition of 40k and epic and have seen the change the rise of the tournaments have had, just look on here at the you make the call section or the tactics threads. You can’t have a normal conversation about the game on there.
'Not having a normal conversation' is the Internet's mechansim of anonymity and its tendency to foster trolling and misunderstandings, not so much 40k, IMHO.
Andykp wrote: 8th is the best of both, a good game for casuals and a thriving tournament scene. The two are like oil and water. The only way to improve one without damaging the other is to keep them separate.
Well put!
And I think a lot of folks don't realize that the state of affairs is just this. ITC makes for tourney buffage and growth, and local leagues can foster narrative and casual players.
I really think that this thread needs that character from the Simpsons to say, "Move along, people. There's nothing to see here."
Oh! I remember: All this is called "Chicken Little" syndrome. People griping and waving their arms like there's a problem, a massive problem, when, really, there isn't. 40k is the best it's ever been.
NinthMusketeer wrote: Obviously there will always be variation between individuals but US culture is very competitive starting at an early age. The idea of intentionally holding back for no other reason than to be more evenly matched is pretty alien to many people. I've even had people not believe me when talking about doing so; they found it more plausible I was making it up to cover for losing. That says quite a lot, I feel.
This is it. US culture is just a lot more intensely competitive than EU and the 40k crowd reflects it. GW is a British company but for better or worse they cannot ignore their US customers.
But they shouldn’t listen to only their ultra competitive customers and alienate the rest of the player base. And the vocal minority on here and other sites want them too. I firmly believe we need a paired down simple rule set like epic 40000 just for competitive play.
This.
It's like a cancer that has infected the game. 40k's rule have never, ever been great for tournaments (well not like these so-called "pros" are wanting (lol, remind me again of when people got paid for attending 40k tourneys?)) as the rules are just not up to scratch. It's not a eSport. It never will be. Stop trying to make this game into something it is not and take your horrible incoherent soup lists away from this game I have loved for over 20 years and let the game go back to normality so we can stop having people think this is the normal way to play the game.
See this here is part of the problem "Hey some people actually are pro at 40k" "lul what losers"
stratigo wrote: See this here is part of the problem "Hey some people actually are pro at 40k" "lul what losers"
What's wrong with that opinion? 40k tournament prizes struggle to even cover the cost of attending an event you have to travel to, there's no way anyone is genuinely playing 40k professionally like professional MTG players and their $50,000+ cash prizes. When someone says "pro 40k player" it's pretty safe to assume we're talking about someone maybe, at best, making poverty-level wages off social media donations while living with their parents because they can't afford to pay rent from their "professional career". It's much like the misuse of "pro painted" on ebay, meaningless self-promotion by someone who is nowhere near as important as they think they are.
(And no, a game store owner who plays some 40k but gets their primary income from the retail business is not a "professional 40k player".)
The closest thing to pro 40k players would be like the tabletop tactics guys, who have patreon subscriptions to private sites to give them steady income. I don't think anyone would believe Jim Vesal or Nick Nanavati make enough money playing 40k tournaments to not need a primary income source.
stratigo wrote: See this here is part of the problem "Hey some people actually are pro at 40k" "lul what losers"
What's wrong with that opinion? 40k tournament prizes struggle to even cover the cost of attending an event you have to travel to, there's no way anyone is genuinely playing 40k professionally like professional MTG players and their $50,000+ cash prizes. When someone says "pro 40k player" it's pretty safe to assume we're talking about someone maybe, at best, making poverty-level wages off social media donations while living with their parents because they can't afford to pay rent from their "professional career". It's much like the misuse of "pro painted" on ebay, meaningless self-promotion by someone who is nowhere near as important as they think they are.
(And no, a game store owner who plays some 40k but gets their primary income from the retail business is not a "professional 40k player".)
And you tubers should go get a real job eh? If you don’t make money in a specifically narrow way, you’re just a freak right?
stratigo wrote: And you tubers should go get a real job eh? If you don’t make money in a specifically narrow way, you’re just a freak right?
Make your money any way you like. I'm kind of horrified that people are gullible enough to throw money at youtube "personalities" producing seriously underwhelming content, but good for them for identifying a source of income and exploiting it. I'm just extremely skeptical that anyone is making above poverty-level wages playing 40k "professionally". You don't get to call yourself a success if the average fast food employee is making more money than you and has a higher quality of life.
stratigo wrote: See this here is part of the problem "Hey some people actually are pro at 40k" "lul what losers"
What's wrong with that opinion? 40k tournament prizes struggle to even cover the cost of attending an event you have to travel to, there's no way anyone is genuinely playing 40k professionally like professional MTG players and their $50,000+ cash prizes. When someone says "pro 40k player" it's pretty safe to assume we're talking about someone maybe, at best, making poverty-level wages off social media donations while living with their parents because they can't afford to pay rent from their "professional career". It's much like the misuse of "pro painted" on ebay, meaningless self-promotion by someone who is nowhere near as important as they think they are.
(And no, a game store owner who plays some 40k but gets their primary income from the retail business is not a "professional 40k player".)
And you tubers should go get a real job eh? If you don’t make money in a specifically narrow way, you’re just a freak right?
I genuinely have no idea how you come to that conclusion from what you've quoted. There are no "professional 40k tournament players" as has been asserted in this thread and others. There are a few people who make a living from various things to do with 40k but not purely from playing tournaments, which is the point being made here. Very few tournaments offer cash prizes in general and those that do hardly offer enough to call a living wage. It seems like some people want to elevate certain players to some lauded status in an effort to turn 40k into some sort of eSport, but that's just not going to happen. I'm sure there are people who make OK money from 40k-related YouTube or Patreon donations but I think it's a stretch to call them pro-40k players in the same sense as pro-MtG players, or pro-LoL players. 40k is just nowhere near that level.
Slipspace wrote: There are a few people who make a living from various things to do with 40k but not purely from playing tournaments, which is the point being made here. Very few tournaments offer cash prizes in general and those that do hardly offer enough to call a living wage. ... I'm sure there are people who make OK money from 40k-related YouTube or Patreon donations but I think it's a stretch to call them pro-40k players in the same sense as pro-MtG players, or pro-LoL players. 40k is just nowhere near that level.
Roger Federer makes around twelve times as much money from sponsorships and endorsements as he does from actually playing tennis. Does that mean he's not really a "professional tennis player"? No, because his income from sponsorships and endorsements only exists because he's a famous tennis player. The fact that his "directly from playing tennis" income is a tiny fraction of his total income is irrelevant.
Likewise, if someone's income is ultimately dependent on them playing 40K, then they are a professional 40K player, regardless of whether most of that income is directly from tournament prizes or from secondary sources that in turn depend on their playing 40K, such as YouTube videos.
Slipspace wrote: There are a few people who make a living from various things to do with 40k but not purely from playing tournaments, which is the point being made here. Very few tournaments offer cash prizes in general and those that do hardly offer enough to call a living wage. ... I'm sure there are people who make OK money from 40k-related YouTube or Patreon donations but I think it's a stretch to call them pro-40k players in the same sense as pro-MtG players, or pro-LoL players. 40k is just nowhere near that level.
Roger Federer makes around twelve times as much money from sponsorships and endorsements as he does from actually playing tennis. Does that mean he's not really a "professional tennis player"? No, because his income from sponsorships and endorsements only exists because he's a famous tennis player. The fact that his "directly from playing tennis" income is a tiny fraction of his total income is irrelevant.
Likewise, if someone's income is ultimately dependent on them playing 40K, then they are a professional 40K player, regardless of whether most of that income is directly from tournament prizes or from secondary sources that in turn depend on their playing 40K, such as YouTube videos.
The distinction here is between professional tournament player and professional player. Federer could quite easily get by on just his winnings from tournaments. Indeed, many lesser ranked players without those sort of endorsements do just that (though it's worth noting those towards the bottom of the pro ladder in tennis often struggle to make a living from it). The point I'm making (as are others) is that it's not possible to make a living purely as a 40k tournament pro, thus there aren't any people who could be considered as such. I'd argue there are a vanishingly small number of people who could even call themselves some sort of more general "40k pro", when taking all 40k-related income into account besides retail sales (since someone making their living selling gaming merchandise is just a regular retailer). My issue is with the way these people seem to be raised up by the wider community, often on the basis of a flawed designation as a "pro" player. It seems to cause some problems with the attitudes some people then display towards both those players and the "non-pros".
NinthMusketeer wrote: Obviously there will always be variation between individuals but US culture is very competitive starting at an early age. The idea of intentionally holding back for no other reason than to be more evenly matched is pretty alien to many people. I've even had people not believe me when talking about doing so; they found it more plausible I was making it up to cover for losing. That says quite a lot, I feel.
Actually, there are plenty of actual sports that use handicapping to balance games between unequal opponents. It happens countless times every day on the links. It just isn't part of 40K culture for the most part. The attitude is often that if you draw a baby seal, club it. It's why I chuckle a little when people talk about how amazing the gaming community is. There are real sports that have much higher standards regarding fairness, sportsmanship and gentlemanly play.
This is an interesting thread to read through. One thing I'll add is that experience with "all the previous editions of 40K" doesn't actually apply very much to how GW works and how they make balance or FAQ changes. In fact, it doesn't apply at all. Games Workshop hasn't engaged with the community like they've done in eighth edition *literally ever* ... in part because the last time they even had meaningful playtesting, the internet didn't exist in its current rapid-consumption format (and I'm not certain how meaningful that playtesting really was in terms of the feedback provided, the methods by which it could be provided, and the degree to which that feedback was truly trusted).
The playtesting teams have established unprecedented trust with GW at the inner rings of testing, so you've got a lot more willingness to actually make changes for the sake of balance / etc., and the choice to put points in the back makes it much more palatable for them to tweak at least that part of how units work, since it doesn't require reprinting everyone's datasheets. By and large, the core testers are serious-minded people with a stake in the game being more successful than *just* for hardcore tournament players, don't leak, understand what GW is trying to do, are deferential to the company's goals, etc., and so when they make recs it tends to be taken seriously.
The game is in its best place ever in part because GW listens to the community, in part because of how the game of 8th edition was built internal to their studio, and in part because there is a cadre of testers who are not purely "tournaments 4ever" there to help parse through the infinite volume of noisy internet feedback and recommend care and caution // aggressive tweaking where they are needed.
It's also nowhere near how good a game it is GOING to be still, IMO, because all of these things they are doing to make it more balanced and more enjoyable for *ALL* player types are still in relative infancy when you think about it, this being only a couple of years into a new approach and methodology that by needs takes time over the course of lengthy print-based production cycles. There are still testing whiffs, design flaws, and plenty of community angry opinion about what's right and wrong. But it's at its best ever place, and it's only going to get better as time goes on.
“When you're actually at events, there's tons of celebration of the hobby going on still. A well painted army gets a ton of buzz and word of mouth sends players over to whatever table they can see it in action. Players joke about their favorite units and ask to see really cool conversions and paint jobs as they set up and nights are often spent regaling tales of improbable dice results over a round of drinks. A thing I've discovered over the years is that much of the banter you see on forums is between people that largely aren't winning or even going to many tournaments and the players that do don't bother to wade into the forums very often. It creates a situation where what you read about online is mostly a hollow echo of the actual event”
And this is why it’s sad, the idiots mouthing off on line about competition being the be all and end all put many reasonable people like me off ever going near an event.
I think the whole "casual/competitive" divide is pretty artificial and just in need of some middle ground. For me, I find it easier to make changes personally to find a compromise and I find that those changes tend to work better if I give towards the competitive end of things. There's a certain.... reality, to competitive environments that is easier to bow to. I mean, I might wish I could breath underwater, but I've compromised that I might need to take some specific things to do so because reality says otherwise. Unless something about the tournament format has a significant impact on balance (which should never be the goal of a tournament format but it happens), games played at that level are pretty true to the reality of the game itself, and fighting against them is generally rather disappointing. Most changes for competitive gaming are attempts to make the reality more open to everyone, which is why they tend to trickle down to all levels of play.
Where I see "casual" players really struggle is if they become unwilling to compromise. When I get hung up on wanting to play with something I try to step back and think about how much chance of winning I'm willing to give up to play it. Most things in the game won't lose you a game on their own, particularly with the steady updates we've seen to cut back on extreme outliers. I see a lot of people get frustrated because they really love Terminators and feel like their army should be nothing but Terminators. They'd probably be a lot happier if they stuck to a unit or two of Terminators and focused on having fun with them. Sometimes I want my Blackstar to drop of Artemis and a set of Frag Cannons and blow up a bunch of stuff, and yeah, none of that is optimal and taking it might lose me the game, but sometimes that's a fine trade to have some fun with it.
Sometimes you have to add something you're not super in love with to be more competitive. I don't LOVE Guard (though I modded my stuff a bit to fit my army better and now I want more of them....) but cutting out a few Hellblasters or something to make playing my Deathwatch more fun made the stuff I love more fun. It's also worth remembering that there are a LOT of cool things in the game and even if its not your first choice, its not like you can't have fun with a big stompy robot or whatever little module is popular right now. It's very easy, particularly in 8th, to focus on something you love, play models you love and do pretty well competitively with a couple concessions. Personally, that's where I've felt gaming as a whole shines. Take something you love and do the best you can with it, whether its at a tournament or just with your local pals. Just be open to change. Half the fun is growing and evolving both your army and how you play. That's sort of been my attitude, and its served me well, no matter how "competitive" or "casual" things get.
LunarSol wrote: Unless something about the tournament format has a significant impact on balance (which should never be the goal of a tournament format but it happens)
That's exactly what we see with the ITC format. The results of recent ITC and non-ITC tournaments have been rather different, and ITC objectives have a strong impact on army selection.
LunarSol wrote: Most changes for competitive gaming are attempts to make the reality more open to everyone, which is why they tend to trickle down to all levels of play.
I'd argue it goes both ways. Having competitive players out there to really do the grunt work of testing, analyzing, and exploiting provides a wealth of balancing data that you won't get from casual players. At the same time, when the game is balanced around competitive players, that can have unintended impact on less-competitive players. Case in point is the Renegade Castellan, which has been nerfed into worthlessness because the loyalist variant overperformed when paired with a CP battery and specific set of stratagems/warlord trait/relic/etc. The game has been balanced around the competitive meta, and non-competitive players suffer for it.
Part of this certainly comes down to the sledgehammer solutions (points adjustments) used to achieve balance, but with such big differences between fluffy, thematic and cutthroat, competitive lists I don't think it's possible to balance both simultaneously.
bogalubov wrote: If winning is not important for the non-competitive players, then how can they "suffer" due to some units being bad in un-optimized lists?
Winning may not be important, but balance is desirable. It's hard to have a fair fight if you have no idea what the relative power of your armies is, and it's not fun if every ostensibly equally-matched game is a one-sided stomp because one side overperforms.
When AoS launched without a points system, it wasn't just competitive players who complained.
I keep seeing people talk about balance, but when it comes down to it, something like 40k is literally impossible to balance (without making concessions that most people wouldn't want). For instance, if you have an amphibious unit costed at X points on a map with no water - that's wasted points. But if you are on a map with lots of water, that unit might be worth twice what his points cost is. Not only are point not adequate in representing the changing value of this unit, there's really only two ways to balance it - you either never play on a map with water (and thus the unit is never played because it wastes valuable points) or you create a more granular version of the points that makes it obnoxious (like unit is worth X points, on maps with water, X + Y points).
Ultimately, what happens is that in an effort to take a wide, expansive, and variable game and make it balanced, the end result is options being continually removed from the game. If you want to be "competitive" in 40k, you will not even consider using at least half of the models available to you. Scenarios which venture into interesting territory, or maps which are no symmetrical with a very limited subset of features, become "unfair" and "unbalanced" because the only way to not give an advantage to one player over the other is to literally give the same thing to both players. To add insult to injury, players like to treat dice rolls like having a 60% chance is fair because every player gets the same 60% chance, but it is entirely possible for a player to roll poorly on five or six rolls in a row, significantly destroying any ability to strategize over the course of a game. Competitive play eventually becomes "of the 10% of the game we are allowed to experience, this player made good decisions and his dice rolls conveniently fell right of the middle in the Bell Curve".
I think competitive players hate casual players because casual players want more added to the game, even if it isn't very good or only very rarely good. The strategy for competitive games of 40k is more about what you don't play with rather than what you do. When GW decides to get a bit narrative and starts adding a bunch of weird things to the game (something like Urban Conquest, for example, or building your own tanks from Chapter Approved), the end result is something that competitive gamers will ignore - but will also resent. And because they resent GW not catering to their needs, they also resent the gamers who enjoy these efforts.
I remember in Age of Sigmar when they released a model (I think it was a White Dwarf anniversary model) which didn't have a point value for matched play, and the competitive players went ballistic. Actually, Age of Sigmar, in general, when it released without point values created such an uproar in the community. At that point, most non-competitive wargamers had actually left wargames, and all that was left was competitive players - and they could not wrap their heads around the idea that something didn't have points. The amount of vitriol was truly amazing over something so small and trivial... Balance for a casual player is a game that feels like they are involved and doing things the whole game, and wounds or warscroll limitations can create those kind of games. Balance for competitive players is a game where you build armies to give yourself so much of an advantage that you've probably won before you even play the game.
You know, I think AoS and 40k have brought back a lot of the more casual players, and if they released a game without points now, I think it would go over much better. I think it was that AoS did it when casuals were more or less excised from the community that it got as bad as it did. In a way, it created a community without competitive players, which might be while AoS still has the most friendly and helpful playerbase of any miniature game out there.
LunarSol wrote: Unless something about the tournament format has a significant impact on balance (which should never be the goal of a tournament format but it happens)
That's exactly what we see with the ITC format. The results of recent ITC and non-ITC tournaments have been rather different, and ITC objectives have a strong impact on army selection.
LunarSol wrote: Most changes for competitive gaming are attempts to make the reality more open to everyone, which is why they tend to trickle down to all levels of play.
I'd argue it goes both ways. Having competitive players out there to really do the grunt work of testing, analyzing, and exploiting provides a wealth of balancing data that you won't get from casual players. At the same time, when the game is balanced around competitive players, that can have unintended impact on less-competitive players. Case in point is the Renegade Castellan, which has been nerfed into worthlessness because the loyalist variant overperformed when paired with a CP battery and specific set of stratagems/warlord trait/relic/etc. The game has been balanced around the competitive meta, and non-competitive players suffer for it.
Part of this certainly comes down to the sledgehammer solutions (points adjustments) used to achieve balance, but with such big differences between fluffy, thematic and cutthroat, competitive lists I don't think it's possible to balance both simultaneously.
Any scenario alters "what's good" to some degree. Much of the time its simply because games assume players will advance on one another but need a scenario to make doing so worthwhile. I do think the ITC is heavy handed in how it attempts to control what players take, but I also recognize that GW's stuff is a little too exploitable at list design to hold up for very long. I'd much rather see something in the middle, but GW has been a little too happy to let the community manage that side of things rather than take the time to do it themselves.
Personally, I take issue with the idea that fluffy, thematic and cuthroat, competitive are mutually exclusive ends of the same axis. Honestly, I think most of the competitive lists this edition are fluffier than what I've seen in the past. I'll take Guard + Smash Captains + Knight as what I envision 40k to look like any day over a line of Rhinos each full of Marines that I used to see when I'd wander through tournaments. That's fluffy to me; Marines as superhumans among average joes, but that's the thing about fluff though; people get in their head what their army SHOULD look like and impose all of their own weird hand ups. I played a game against a Blood Angels player who claimed to have no way of answering my Dreadnoughts. I suggested the obvious and he informed me that Blood Angel captains aren't allowed to have Jump packs according to some page in the codex or something? It was... mildly mind blowing.
Yeah, it sucks when something you've got in your head isn't as good as you want it to be. Sure the Renegade Castellan was nerfed and I guess that player who had a pure Renegade Knight army suffered for it (they better not of had Chaos allies though, right?) but we've also known that Renegade Knights are getting their own Codex and who knows what changes might come in that that might put it right back on the table. I think though, if you're arguing something is "worthless" you're taking a competitive stance on the matter. Maybe its overcosted; maybe its a solid 200 points overcosted, but that's not the same as worthless. Being open to change makes it a lot easier to be casual in my experience. You don't have to have the current best list, but being willing to change even a third of it to adapt to changes in the game is a great way to make the most out of your favorite things.
lord marcus wrote: And the spikey bitz posted 3D printed custodes tanks winning a tourney and everyone loses thier minds
The frustrating thing is just that things like this are exactly why its hard for tournament organizers have to make their rules for conversions and proxies overly strict and limiting for hobby potential. Someone takes things way too far and you lack the rules to do anything about it fairly.
lord marcus wrote: And the spikey bitz posted 3D printed custodes tanks winning a tourney and everyone loses thier minds
The frustrating thing is just that things like this are exactly why its hard for tournament organizers have to make their rules for conversions and proxies overly strict and limiting for hobby potential. Someone takes things way too far and you lack the rules to do anything about it fairly.
I don't consider it too far. in fact considering they're out of production or at the very least on backorder at the moment I think 3D printed virgins are fine as stand-ins. plus if it's a local game that I don't think it matters that much at all because not everyone can afford $150 tank let alone four of them
lord marcus wrote: And the spikey bitz posted 3D printed custodes tanks winning a tourney and everyone loses thier minds
The frustrating thing is just that things like this are exactly why its hard for tournament organizers have to make their rules for conversions and proxies overly strict and limiting for hobby potential. Someone takes things way too far and you lack the rules to do anything about it fairly.
Seems infinitely easier to implement painting requirements instead so you can't see they are 3d printed models.
catbarf wrote: The game has been balanced around the competitive meta, and non-competitive players suffer for it.
If winning is not important for the non-competitive players, then how can they "suffer" due to some units being bad in un-optimized lists?
This is a very misleading saying that I see tossed around occasionally, usually as part of a hit job against casual players. Let me explain,
The vast majority of people play Warhammer 40K or other miniature games like Bolt Action because they want to have *fun*. While what exactly is fun is different for any individual, and that definition of fun often has a wide overlap with winning. For some people, Fun is recreating a battle from the fluff and playing it out on a large scale, for some people fun is proving a point that a bad unit *is* viable, for others fun is a slobberknocker game where both sides are tearing eachother apart, and yes, for some, fun is winning for the sake of winning.
I bring this up because in general there is a trend. People are playing Warhammer 40k because they want to play a game to have fun. What is not fun, whether it be for a competitive player or for a casual player, is to put their army on the table, get absolutely stomped, and not feel that they ever had a chance. Let me give you another example. I used to play tennis, when I took tennis lessons the pro would "play down to my level", because if he played to win he would crush me. But he wanted me to have fun playing, he wanted me to get better playing, so he would play in rough parity so that I could work on volleys and keeping the ball in play and start to improve. If he just came out and service aced me four quick times in succession, then said "you are not a competitive player, how can you suffer due to not being as skilled as me?" I probably would not be having a great time, and I probably would dislike that pro.
This is true of warhammer as well. There are different types of casual players just as there are different types of competitive players. Some casual players are more purist where they feel constrained to build an army a certain way for aesthetic or fluff reasons, or to fit a story they wrote about their army. Some casual players just do the best they can with what they have because they don't want to buy a new army or repaint their marines into the chapter du jour. Other players just simply have difficulty grasping certain list building or tactical concepts that hold them back from true competitive play. None of these players want to be stomped. There is a difference between a good game and a stomp, and its something that the oversimplified quoted post, and others like it, seem to forget.
Let me give you another example. I'm a good player, and can hold my own in a competitive event, but I don't put the effort in, and I'm not in that upper echelon of skill to ever really be a top contender. I mostly look for slobberknockers and I love it when a game feels like both players are at eachother's throats and throwing punches with everything they have every turn. If I look back over my favorite games that I have played since I have started wargaming... I've maybe won half of them? I win far more than 50% of my games, but those wins that aren't exciting just aren't... as fun or memorable. But I like those games because they create exciting moments and have multiple tide changing plays and actions from both players. This type of game is only possible where one side isn't curb stomping, and it requires a certain amount of balance to achieve. Even if a game is ultimately lost, sometimes a player just needs a streak of something amazing to hold onto to laugh about or some heroics from a commander in their army.
Lets look at one of my personal favorite games I've played and look at it through this angle.
5th Edition, small tournament, Eldar v Dark Eldar. I was playing Eldar and was matched against my buddy who had been using his Dark Eldar. We had both done fairly well in the previous round. The game was objective based, and both of our armies were highly mechanized and mobile. Raiders + Ravagers v Wave Serpents + Falcons. Despite this, neither of us were able to claim an objective because each turn we would tear the throat out of any unit trying to get to the objectives. As the game started to draw to a close, we both got increasingly desperate, throwing units at the objective with everything we could, and destroying any effort our opponent made to do the same. When time was called we had a hard draw. We drew on primary (claim objectives) and we drew on the secondary (kill points). Took both of us out of the running for placing in the event but it was probably the most fun I've ever had wargamming.
The point is, this game was fun not because of who won (nobody won), but it was fun because it was hard fought and was an example of two balanced armies clashing and one not having a huge leg up or advantage over the other. Both players were engaged, both players felt at all times that the game was winnable from their perspective, and both players will remember that game for a long time. It is an example of why i enjoy playing wargames. Sometimes its about the journey, but that doesn't mean that I don't care about balance, and it doesn't mean that casual players don't care about balance.
and if they released a game without points now, I think it would go over much better.
I don't think it would. I think if they let 40k and AOS exist without points, that the competitive players would indeed howl but the fan base that stuck around would be so small as to not be worth keeping the lights on for GW.
There is a reason that they reversed course and put out points for AOS.
I'm fairly confident when I say 9 out of 10 players of both 40k and AOS are matched play type players. Thats not saying they are tournament players, tournament players are a subset of matched play players. However, matched play style standardized points and standardized scenarios are something the bulk of players not only want, but need to stay involved in a game.
lord marcus wrote: And the spikey bitz posted 3D printed custodes tanks winning a tourney and everyone loses thier minds
The frustrating thing is just that things like this are exactly why its hard for tournament organizers have to make their rules for conversions and proxies overly strict and limiting for hobby potential. Someone takes things way too far and you lack the rules to do anything about it fairly.
Seems infinitely easier to implement painting requirements instead so you can't see they are 3d printed models.
Unless they're getting direct support from GW (that will be contingent on promoting their products), why should a TO care? Scratch-built, converted, 3D-printed, it's all the same.
lord marcus wrote: And the spikey bitz posted 3D printed custodes tanks winning a tourney and everyone loses thier minds
The frustrating thing is just that things like this are exactly why its hard for tournament organizers have to make their rules for conversions and proxies overly strict and limiting for hobby potential. Someone takes things way too far and you lack the rules to do anything about it fairly.
Seems infinitely easier to implement painting requirements instead so you can't see they are 3d printed models.
Unless they're getting direct support from GW (that will be contingent on promoting their products), why should a TO care? Scratch-built, converted, 3D-printed, it's all the same.
Right? Use cardboard or wads of tape if you want. The important thing is finding out who's the most finely-tuned Warhammer athlete.
and if they released a game without points now, I think it would go over much better.
I don't think it would. I think if they let 40k and AOS exist without points, that the competitive players would indeed howl but the fan base that stuck around would be so small as to not be worth keeping the lights on for GW.
There is a reason that they reversed course and put out points for AOS.
I'm fairly confident when I say 9 out of 10 players of both 40k and AOS are matched play type players. Thats not saying they are tournament players, tournament players are a subset of matched play players. However, matched play style standardized points and standardized scenarios are something the bulk of players not only want, but need to stay involved in a game.
In my opinion this is because Matched Play and points allow for rough approximations of balance for pick up games. Most players don't have a steady community to game with (myself included) and when we travel to shops to get a game in its really easy to set expectations with somebody we just met because everybody knows what a "2000 point game" is. Power Level tried to get around this in a way, but Power Level has many of the same shortcoming as points do, with additional variation that makes it an even less accurate prediction of army strength.
As I've played longer, I've met people and formed friendships, and we will on occasion branch out to try different game set ups and types. But matched play remains the most efficient way to get a one off game in with strangers. And that is why points are so important. Being able to set up and play one off games is hugely important for growing a community, and a points system is one of the most efficient ways of eyeballing balance between two forces on a gaming table, its not perfect, but... its better than nothing. That was the biggest problem with AOS' release. People would show up to an FLGS with players they didn't know very well, and it was really difficult to find a balance between the armies and create relatively fair games. Playing without points is easier if you always play the same people and know eachother and units inside and out. It doesn't work so well in new environments...
Let me give you another example. I'm a good player, and can hold my own in a competitive event, but I don't put the effort in, and I'm not in that upper echelon of skill to ever really be a top contender. I mostly look for slobberknockers and I love it when a game feels like both players are at eachother's throats and throwing punches with everything they have every turn. If I look back over my favorite games that I have played since I have started wargaming... I've maybe won half of them? I win far more than 50% of my games, but those wins that aren't exciting just aren't... as fun or memorable. But I like those games because they create exciting moments and have multiple tide changing plays and actions from both players. This type of game is only possible where one side isn't curb stomping, and it requires a certain amount of balance to achieve. Even if a game is ultimately lost, sometimes a player just needs a streak of something amazing to hold onto to laugh about or some heroics from a commander in their army.
I like to tell people that I don't really play to win; I play to almost lose.
akaean wrote: But matched play remains the most efficient way to get a one off game in with strangers. And that is why points are so important.
Part of that, though, is that nobody has tried anything else. When GW said, during early AoS, to bring one hero, one monster, several units, no more than 30 wounds - very few people actually tried it. The ones that did usually said that they got a good game out of it. Granted, they weren't power gamers looking to exploit every limitation towards their own dominance, but it worked for the 6 people who bothered to try it. If I tried it and played against another people who exploited the system to build a power army, I'd blame him personally, but somehow, we've arrived at the conclusion that the system was at fault for not factoring in that wargaming if filled with people who "model for advantage" wherever they can get away with it.
We don't need POINTS. We need a system that creates a decent game - and there are several of them out there that either don't use points, or when they do, don't use them primarily. For instance, Path to Glory creates a slow grow campaign without points. Actually, campaign systems in general do very well here, such as Firestorm, Urban Conquest, Necromunda's Dominion campaign, and so on - the goals of the games are not about winning ONE game, so per-game imbalances are largely unimportant.
Being able to set up and play one off games is hugely important for growing a community, and a points system is one of the most efficient ways of eyeballing balance between two forces on a gaming table, its not perfect, but... its better than nothing.
But it probably isn't better than something else. Or better yet, a lot of somethings. There are other solutions to points out there that... well, to be perfectly frank, I think that points are the reason why competitive players even exist in the first place. When we talk about them, it is almost always about the list building and rarely about the playing (after all, how can you stomp a newbie if your lists are equal power?). Using points gives them an excuse to build the most abusive lists they can, because we allow it. The points say these two armies are equal, so who are we to disagree?
But imagine that there were a dozen different common list building formats out there. One uses wounds, one power levels, one price based (no more than $200 worth of models), one based on limiting warscrolls, one path to glory, one skirmish, one firestorm, and so on. If there was someone who exploited one of those formats, he would not be able to exploit the other ones at the same time. It's because we've made points the standard that we've allowed this abusive list building exploitation to become standard as well. If we played more than one type of game, it would solve the problem largely because the individual values of each model would change with each type of game, making "list building for advantage" virtually impossible
That was the biggest problem with AOS' release. People would show up to an FLGS with players they didn't know very well, and it was really difficult to find a balance between the armies and create relatively fair games.
I think this was exaggerated and largely a hypothetical put forth by the competitive players who didn't actually play the game. The idea that people would show up with a dozen bloodthirsters just because the rules didn't say they couldn't was one born from paranoia rather than experience.
Playing without points is easier if you always play the same people and know eachother and units inside and out. It doesn't work so well in new environments...
Because competitive players have literally made us afraid of playing with each other. The way they've ruined the game community is so absolute that the idea that we might have to confront these players and negotiate a fair game has us quaking in our boots.
We don't need POINTS. We need a system that creates a decent game - and there are several of them out there that either don't use points, or when they do, don't use them primarily. For instance, Path to Glory creates a slow grow campaign without points. Actually, campaign systems in general do very well here, such as Firestorm, Urban Conquest, Necromunda's Dominion campaign, and so on - the goals of the games are not about winning ONE game, so per-game imbalances are largely unimportant.
But imagine that there were a dozen different common list building formats out there. One uses wounds, one power levels, one price based (no more than $200 worth of models), one based on limiting warscrolls, one path to glory, one skirmish, one firestorm, and so on. If there was someone who exploited one of those formats, he would not be able to exploit the other ones at the same time. It's because we've made points the standard that we've allowed this abusive list building exploitation to become standard as well. If we played more than one type of game, it would solve the problem largely because the individual values of each model would change with each type of game, making "list building for advantage" virtually impossible
Everything has points. The system you mentioned used wounds as a point system with additional "special" point for hero and monster. Even Guild Ball gives players 4 squaddie points, 1 mascot point, and 1 captain point to build their list with. Honestly, the wounds system is a good example of how point systems as a whole fail to grasp the whole system. A save throw is largely a wounds multipler in most situations, so a 5 wound model with a 4+ is probably "worth" about 10 wounds, while one with a 5+ is probably only "worth" about 7 or 8 despite them both being "worth" 5. That doesn't make it an unworkable system; just one with a pretty obvious flaw that will only work if the developers design around it. Blaming players for the flaws in the system doesn't make for better games. Fixing the system does.
I'm fairly confident when I say 9 out of 10 players of both 40k and AOS are matched play type players. Thats not saying they are tournament players, tournament players are a subset of matched play players. However, matched play style standardized points and standardized scenarios are something the bulk of players not only want, but need to stay involved in a game.
Weird... editing the auto append deleted my response to this.... so sorry if this is less well thought out than before.
I think there's a lot of reasons people stick to standard size games. The pick up game factor is pretty obvious and generally speaking it's actually pretty hard to just cut points in most systems. Very rarely do you have an easy 500 to drop without significantly reworking things, particularly when there are other restrictions like detachment slots at play. Even against long time friends, having the points down before you start reduces a lot of the already significant setup time. I tend to skew towards the competitive end of list building simply because that's where I feel like points start to work like players think they do. I honestly see stomps happen way more often when players are trying to negotiate a game at a lower tier simply because they're doing so without any real frame of reference beyond "stuff that's not too good".
LunarSol wrote: Personally, I take issue with the idea that fluffy, thematic and cuthroat, competitive are mutually exclusive ends of the same axis.
I don't think they're the same axis, and I apologize if I gave that impression. They are completely orthogonal to one another in 40K. A fluff-first player looking to recreate a particular company of Marines from the fiction isn't doing so from a competitive standpoint, and a competitive player putting together a list to take to a national tournament doesn't care one iota about whether his list fits the fluff or not. If a fluffy list happens to be competitive or a competitive list happens to be fluffy, it's pure coincidence- and I'd argue it doesn't happen more often than it does.
In a well-written wargame, what's optimal and what fits the background are the same thing. It's most obvious in historicals, where there's an implicit understanding that the tactics that worked in real life should work in the game, and if the optimal strategy bears little relation to history, then something's gone wrong. GW attempted this kind of fluff-crunch alignment with formations in 7th, providing bonuses to themed force composition, but that was so crudely implemented that it introduced severe balance problems of its own.
LunarSol wrote: I think though, if you're arguing something is "worthless" you're taking a competitive stance on the matter. Maybe its overcosted; maybe its a solid 200 points overcosted, but that's not the same as worthless. Being open to change makes it a lot easier to be casual in my experience. You don't have to have the current best list, but being willing to change even a third of it to adapt to changes in the game is a great way to make the most out of your favorite things.
Most players, I think, aren't purely competitive or purely fluff-focused; they strike a balance between the two. They have a theme in mind for their army and they buy models they like, but they try to assemble it into something that works reasonably well on the table. If a particular unit underperforms, that puts the owner in the uncomfortable position of either ditching it in favor of something more meta, or keeping a choice that actively detracts from their army's viability. Building an army should be about fun choices, and that's not a fun choice.
The optimal scenario would be that by following the fluff, a casual player can create a competitive, tournament-viable army. Everyone wins. But that will never happen if the game is balanced entirely through feedback from tournaments and competitive play, where fluff isn't even considered. Competitive play is a great resource for playtesting, but a style of play that excludes currently suboptimal units and builds to begin with, and doesn't reflect how a majority of players approach the hobby, cannot provide a comprehensive assessment of game state.
I like robust points systems, not because I want to play cutthroat competitive all the time, but because it's lame when I have a one-sided game because my buddy's 1500pts of Ultramarines and my 1500pts of Astra Militarum aren't remotely similar in effectiveness. And I certainly don't want his army being balanced according to the assumption that Guilliman will always be there along with the Loyal 32 for CP, just because those are the kinds of gimmicks a competitive player would use.
Sqorgar wrote: Because competitive players have literally made us afraid of playing with each other. The way they've ruined the game community is so absolute that the idea that we might have to confront these players and negotiate a fair game has us quaking in our boots.
Oh come on, that's a bit hyperbolic, don't you think?
Any 2 given casual players will often have drastically mistmatched forces. Say one guy likes to play nothing but tanks in his Guard army, and the other player likes to play a genestealer cults army with lots of abberants and other nasty gribblies. You think the Guard player is going to have a fun, fair game when the Genestealer player assaults his entire army from turn and prevents him from ever firing again?
LunarSol wrote: Personally, I take issue with the idea that fluffy, thematic and cuthroat, competitive are mutually exclusive ends of the same axis.
I don't think they're the same axis, and I apologize if I gave that impression. They are completely orthogonal to one another in 40K. A fluff-first player looking to recreate a particular company of Marines from the fiction isn't doing so from a competitive standpoint, and a competitive player putting together a list to take to a national tournament doesn't care one iota about whether his list fits the fluff or not. If a fluffy list happens to be competitive or a competitive list happens to be fluffy, it's pure coincidence- and I'd argue it doesn't happen more often than it does.
In a well-written wargame, what's optimal and what fits the background are the same thing. It's most obvious in historicals, where there's an implicit understanding that the tactics that worked in real life should work in the game, and if the optimal strategy bears little relation to history, then something's gone wrong. GW attempted this kind of fluff-crunch alignment with formations in 7th, providing bonuses to themed force composition, but that was so crudely implemented that it introduced severe balance problems of its own.
LunarSol wrote: I think though, if you're arguing something is "worthless" you're taking a competitive stance on the matter. Maybe its overcosted; maybe its a solid 200 points overcosted, but that's not the same as worthless. Being open to change makes it a lot easier to be casual in my experience. You don't have to have the current best list, but being willing to change even a third of it to adapt to changes in the game is a great way to make the most out of your favorite things.
Most players, I think, aren't purely competitive or purely fluff-focused; they strike a balance between the two. They have a theme in mind for their army and they buy models they like, but they try to assemble it into something that works reasonably well on the table. If a particular unit underperforms, that puts the owner in the uncomfortable position of either ditching it in favor of something more meta, or keeping a choice that actively detracts from their army's viability. Building an army should be about fun choices, and that's not a fun choice.
The optimal scenario would be that by following the fluff, a casual player can create a competitive, tournament-viable army. Everyone wins. But that will never happen if the game is balanced entirely through feedback from tournaments and competitive play, where fluff isn't even considered. Competitive play is a great resource for playtesting, but a style of play that excludes currently suboptimal units and builds to begin with, and doesn't reflect how a majority of players approach the hobby, cannot provide a comprehensive assessment of game state.
I like robust points systems, not because I want to play cutthroat competitive all the time, but because it's lame when I have a one-sided game because my buddy's 1500pts of Ultramarines and my 1500pts of Astra Militarum aren't remotely similar in effectiveness. And I certainly don't want his army being balanced according to the assumption that Guilliman will always be there along with the Loyal 32 for CP, just because those are the kinds of gimmicks a competitive player would use.
I agree with pretty much all of this and I think its the ideal that pretty much every game designer strives for. I also understand the reality of interconnected complex systems means that the ideal is much harder than it seems. Changing one thing affects everything related to it in subtle ways that shake out in the real world in ways that are hard to account for. In many ways, its an engineering job like any other and often come down to design trade offs. Like adding anything to a rocket requires the weight being accounted for in additional thrust.... that needs to be accounted for in fuel consumption that needs to be accounted for the in weight of fuel.... despite being created from imagination, game systems are tied to realities that work themselves out in ways that don't play out until players put them to the test.
The thing I still don't wrap my head around is the idea that an army from a single codex is somehow more true to the fluff than what you see in competitive armies in 8th. Truth be told, I've only recently been a fan of the game on the tabletop, but rather enjoyed the universe through other means and I've just never seen in that way. I mean, sure, Tau aren't running behind an army of Boyz but pretty much every page of my Knights Codex has them towering over Guard or Marines holding the line in front of them and I've never really pictured Chaos Marines without demons pouring out of portals around them. When its really down to just marines, its usually a much smaller encounter; a Kill Team at most. That's the fluff to me and 8th seems to do it very well to the point where I really wonder if the loyal 32 is really just something a competitive player would do or a result of GW designing a system to get players to realize that there should really be some guardsmen dying in the front lines of any encounter played at 40k's scale. Like I said, I've only recently been a fan of the game on the table and a big part of that is just that the lists I see feel a lot fluffier to me than when I've looked into the game in the past. Less homogenous? Sure, but its a mix that reflects the world GW has long sold me through video games, books, comics, and art.
Sqorgar wrote: Because competitive players have literally made us afraid of playing with each other. The way they've ruined the game community is so absolute that the idea that we might have to confront these players and negotiate a fair game has us quaking in our boots.
Oh come on, that's a bit hyperbolic, don't you think?
Yes. A bit. But there is some truth to it as well. Non-competitive players are afraid to play competitive players, and they are worried for any system which could potentially expose them to competitive behaviors and attitudes. The biggest complaints about AoS's lack of point were A) how do we know we'll get a balanced game where one side doesn't accidentally stomp the other? and B) how do we prevent the jerks from exploiting this open ended system to intentionally stomp their opponent? There is a terror of being stomped in this hobby, and it is entirely justified.
I'm perfectly okay playing a game I know I'm going to lose. I walk away happy if I feel like I did a good job in a bad situation. I'm not okay being stomped. There's something demoralizing about only being able to watch your opponent, without much of a chance to play, yourself. To me, a good game isn't about balance, but about being involved and active during the entire game.
Any 2 given casual players will often have drastically mistmatched forces. Say one guy likes to play nothing but tanks in his Guard army, and the other player likes to play a genestealer cults army with lots of abberants and other nasty gribblies. You think the Guard player is going to have a fun, fair game when the Genestealer player assaults his entire army from turn and prevents him from ever firing again?
Yeah, see, that's never going to happen. Casual players aren't stubborn like competitive players. If one player wants to play one thing and the other player wants to play another, they will usually play two games. Then something else for a third. Being experience focused rather than competitively focused means that they'll try out various unknown experiences, and repeat the ones they most enjoy. If playing that matchup above yielded a poor game, it won't get played a second time - and I think both players would be fine with that outcome.
Sqorgar wrote: Because competitive players have literally made us afraid of playing with each other. The way they've ruined the game community is so absolute that the idea that we might have to confront these players and negotiate a fair game has us quaking in our boots.
Oh come on, that's a bit hyperbolic, don't you think?
Any 2 given casual players will often have drastically mistmatched forces. Say one guy likes to play nothing but tanks in his Guard army, and the other player likes to play a genestealer cults army with lots of abberants and other nasty gribblies. You think the Guard player is going to have a fun, fair game when the Genestealer player assaults his entire army from turn and prevents him from ever firing again?
He may actually feel that way. I've certainly had times in my life where I took out my frustrations with how a game was designed on the players and not the game. I used to love competitive Pokemon battles on the Game Boy, but ultimately found myself frustrated with how the competitive community attempted to take balance into their own hands and at odds with the SmogOn crowd. Ultimately though, my issues were with the game itself and had to accept that the reality of the game mechanics didn't line up with how the franchise presented itself to me. A lot of people continue to blame the players and while I understand why, ultimately I've decided that neither the game nor the players are elements of the experience within my control, and I'm much happier focusing on the things I can improve for myself without having to force those changes on others.
I mean at its heart, 40k and AOS are both games pushed to be won in the listbuilding phase before either army hits the table.
A lot of people approach the game that way.
As such, you're going to have stompings. These aren't the games for people who want to play the game as opposed to beating the spreadsheet because you'll only get a good game if both players bring similarly powered lists.
If one player is playing to beat Excel and the other player is putting together a force he likes from the novels, we all know the outcome of that "game" before the first plastic dude touches the table.
He may actually feel that way. I've certainly had times in my life where I took out my frustrations with how a game was designed on the players and not the game.
That's not entirely accurate. I think the rules of 40k and AoS are absolutely appropriate for casual game "experiences", but fall apart completely at the highly competitive tournament level (which is why few or none of the tournaments use the 40k or AoS rules as written). Playing the games competitively is so out of whack for how these games are designed and intended to be played, that it often seems to me that people who do so are trying to shove a square peg into a round hole. And yet I often see people try to tell me that putting that square peg into the round hole is the right way to do it, and if I don't do it that way, then somehow, it is my fault. Or the peg's fault. Or the hole's fault. But it's never the fault of the idiot who can't see that the two don't fit together.
I used to love competitive Pokemon battles on the Game Boy, but ultimately found myself frustrated with how the competitive community attempted to take balance into their own hands and at odds with the SmogOn crowd. Ultimately though, my issues were with the game itself and had to accept that the reality of the game mechanics didn't line up with how the franchise presented itself to me.
Every single customizable game that has ever been made, and I assume ever will be made, falls apart when you minmax them. That's not the design's fault. It's just that when the edge cases become commonplace, the intent and purpose behind the design is lost to extremes.
It's like drinking water. It's good for you and you should do it often. But if you drink too much, you will die of water poisoning. Our bodies operate within a certain threshold, and when we leave that threshold, we tend to stop functioning so well. Game design is the same way, except that it tends to feel rewarding when you are ultimately poisoning the game.
A lot of people continue to blame the players and while I understand why, ultimately I've decided that neither the game nor the players are elements of the experience within my control, and I'm much happier focusing on the things I can improve for myself without having to force those changes on others.
While there is definitely wisdom in doing what you can to change what you can and not worrying about the rest, I think we've seen this hobby when competitive gamers become the dominant voice in it, and it was not a healthy place to be. By speaking up and making sure that the worst wheel isn't the only one squeaking, maybe we can all get some grease.
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auticus wrote: I mean at its heart, 40k and AOS are both games pushed to be won in the listbuilding phase before either army hits the table.
Absolutely not. The list building is part of personalization and player identity, and should be viewed in exactly the same manner as which color your paint your models. It is absolutely not intended to be a spreadsheet that you minmax to model your army for advantage. People do that because they can, not because they are supposed to, should, or told to.
In AoS2, every single warscroll ability has been rewritten to come with flavor text. For instance, the Arch-Revenant from Looncurse allows friendly Kuronoth Hunters within 12" reroll hit rolls of 1. But why? "An Arch-Revenant commands instant obedience and commitment from Kuronoth Hunters that are nearby". That rule is designed to enhance the model and give it personality. It's meant to tie the Arch-Revenant to the Kuronoth Hunters thematically - as a rule itself, it is pretty limited. It has relatively little gameplay value, but an immense amount of thematic value. Same with the rule that allows them to sacrifice their spite (giving up flying and pincher attacks) to negate a wound - gameplay-wise, it is basically the same as adding an extra wound to the model, but thematically, it feels almost tragic to use this rule.
The idea that a game should be won or lost in the list building phase is absolutely the last thing GW ever wants to happen. They want your fully painted army to get on that battlefield and tell a story - and the story they want you to tell isn't "I lost because my opponent used a rules exploit to table me on the second turn".
A lot of people approach the game that way.
Square peg. Round hole. These games are primarily thematic and customizable, which is antithetical to competitive.
Horst wrote:
Any 2 given casual players will often have drastically mistmatched forces. Say one guy likes to play nothing but tanks in his Guard army, and the other player likes to play a genestealer cults army with lots of abberants and other nasty gribblies. You think the Guard player is going to have a fun, fair game when the Genestealer player assaults his entire army from turn and prevents him from ever firing again?
This is not confined to casual players having drastically mismatched forces though. It's happened to me plenty times playing wmh.
Same can be said of serious players and competitive players/games. Even games that are on the 'better balanced' end of the spectrum are not immune to the phenomenon you describe. Which is essentially 'gotcha!' armies, 'silver bullets', or 'hard counters'. It's the nature of ttgs in general.
LunarSol wrote:
The thing I still don't wrap my head around is the idea that an army from a single codex is somehow more true to the fluff than what you see in competitive armies in 8th. Truth be told, I've only recently been a fan of the game on the tabletop, but rather enjoyed the universe through other means and I've just never seen in that way.
On the scale of Epic - sure. On the scale of 40k, I'll personally disagree. A company or two of Marines deployed as the 'tip of the spear' alongside 80,000 guardsmen - awesome. 3 one chapter masters, a couple of titans and 32 guardsmen strikes me as more gamey than fluffy. IMO, of course.
Sqorgar wrote:
Playing the games competitively is so out of whack for how these games are designed and intended to be played, that it often seems to me that people who do so are trying to shove a square peg into a round hole. And yet I often see people try to tell me that putting that square peg into the round hole is the right way to do it, and if I don't do it that way, then somehow, it is my fault. Or the peg's fault. Or the hole's fault. But it's never the fault of the idiot who can't see that the two don't fit together.
[
I know we often disagree, but I cannot for the life of me fault this anaology. It's pretty spot on.
Sqorgar wrote:
Every single customizable game that has ever been made, and I assume ever will be made, falls apart when you minmax them. That's not the design's fault. It's just that when the edge cases become commonplace, the intent and purpose behind the design is lost to extremes.
Ttgs are very limited systems and can only hold so much 'weight'. It's like when you were a kid and your mum told you to play nice with your toys. Play with them hard enough, and they'll break.
Sqorgar wrote:
While there is definitely wisdom in doing what you can to change what you can and not worrying about the rest, I think we've seen this hobby when competitive gamers become the dominant voice in it, and it was not a healthy place to be. By speaking up and making sure that the worst wheel isn't the only one squeaking, maybe we can all get some grease.
Nnetheless, their voices should be heard. Like anything, you can't just listen to one section and ignore the rest.
Sqorgar wrote:
Absolutely not. The list building is part of personalization and player identity, and should be viewed in exactly the same manner as which color your paint your models. It is absolutely not intended to be a spreadsheet that you minmax to model your army for advantage. People do that because they can, not because they are supposed to, should, or told to.
Hmm, personally list build g is neither about personalisation. Or identity. To me, it's a function of scenario design and essential game-building.
Sqorgar wrote:
The idea that a game should be won or lost in the list building phase is absolutely the last thing GW ever wants to happen. They want your fully painted army to get on that battlefield and tell a story - and the story they want you to tell isn't "I lost because my opponent used a rules exploit to table me on the second turn".
[
I think what gw 'want to happen' is to let players play the game they want to play. Theirs is a broad church If players want to win or lose the game in the list building phase, gw won't stop them. They'll happily sell them stuff.
Sqorgar wrote:
A lot of people approach the game that way.
Square peg. Round hole. These games are primarily thematic and customizable, which is antithetical to competitive.
Disagree. Competitive players can appreciate both theme and customisation - the latter is a core component of list-building-for-advantage. And even competitive players can like themed armies, just like any one else
LunarSol wrote:
Everything has points. The system you mentioned used wounds as a point system with additional "special" point for hero and monster. Even Guild Ball gives players 4 squaddie points, 1 mascot point, and 1 captain point to build their list with. Honestly, the wounds system is a good example of how point systems as a whole fail to grasp the whole system. A save throw is largely a wounds multipler in most situations, so a 5 wound model with a 4+ is probably "worth" about 10 wounds, while one with a 5+ is probably only "worth" about 7 or 8 despite them both being "worth" 5. That doesn't make it an unworkable system; just one with a pretty obvious flaw that will only work if the developers design around it. Blaming players for the flaws in the system doesn't make for better games. Fixing the system does..
The problem is, to a very large extent, 'the system' itself is fundamentally unfixable. You cannot have any kind of a systemvthst imposes flat, universal values to denote 'worth' on things with anything approaching even the vaguest sense of balance, or accuracy when the reality on the ground is that something's worth is entirely situational, and depends both on what it's fielded with, what it's fielded against, the terrain type, quantity, layout, objectives, player 'skill', and a dozen other variables. Unless you can create a self-correcting algorithm that can account for all of that, you will never have an accurate points system.
The truth is there is only so much developers can do, and be expected to do. Personally, I put some of the responsibility on players. Do I blame them for the flaws in the system? No, but I don't hold them as faultless when they take the flaws, grab them with both hands, run with them, and beat their opponents over the head with them, while shrugging their shoulders and pretending there was nothing they could do. On a point of principle, Just because it's in the book doesn't make things 'right' or 'fair ' or that you have to do it. There is a reason 'we were just following orders' doesn't get much traction at The Hague.
LunarSol wrote:
I think there's a lot of reasons people stick to standard size games. The pick up game factor is pretty obvious and generally speaking it's actually pretty hard to just cut points in most systems. Very rarely do you have an easy 500 to drop without significantly reworking things, particularly when there are other restrictions like detachment slots at play. Even against long time friends, having the points down before you start reduces a lot of the already significant setup time.
The pragmatism of the 'pick-up-game' should certainly be valued. There is good value in just being able to get on with it. That said. A lot of things get sacrifice on the altar the make that happen. And it isn't always worth it.
quote=LunarSol]
I tend to skew towards the competitive end of list building simply because that's where I feel like points start to work like players think they do.
The problem with this is it leaves 97% of the game behind, and that isn't worth it in my eyes. I also disagree that points somehow only work at the ultra, or more optimised levels of the game.
LunarSol wrote:
I honestly see stomps happen way more often when players are trying to negotiate a game at a lower tier simply because they're doing so without any real frame of reference beyond "stuff that's not too good".
That 'frame of reference' is called experience, and like getting good at tournaments and competitive play, 'game-building' is a skill that needs to be learned, and gets better over time.
LunarSol wrote:
The thing I still don't wrap my head around is the idea that an army from a single codex is somehow more true to the fluff than what you see in competitive armies in 8th. Truth be told, I've only recently been a fan of the game on the tabletop, but rather enjoyed the universe through other means and I've just never seen in that way.
On the scale of Epic - sure. On the scale of 40k, I'll personally disagree. A company or two of Marines deployed as the 'tip of the spear' alongside 80,000 guardsmen - awesome. 3 one chapter masters, a couple of titans and 32 guardsmen strikes me as more gamey than fluffy. IMO, of course.
It's all kind of relative. I'm mostly used to stories that top out the marines at something around 10 or so plus like 1 dreadnaught. The 17 from a minimum Battalion is honestly a little on the high side for me, but its all very subjective.
LunarSol wrote:
I tend to skew towards the competitive end of list building simply because that's where I feel like points start to work like players think they do.
The problem with this is it leaves 97% of the game behind, and that isn't worth it in my eyes. I also disagree that points somehow only work at the ultra, or more optimised levels of the game.
At the moment its no where near 97%. Most of the factions in the game have a place in a competitive environment and that's actually pretty rare and incredible. There are definitely things in each codex left behind, but in most systems there'd really only be maybe 3 codexes to even consider. Sure, you might not be able to run a bunch of White Scar Terminators with Missile launchers or something, but the stuff you can run at the moment is really quite varied unless the only thing you consider valid is literally the 2000 points in the one list that won the latest tournament.
Absolutely not. The list building is part of personalization and player identity
Unfortunately does in no way reward that approach. It does, however, reward min/maxing, and 9 out of 10 players that I have ever encountered see 40k and aos as a listbuilding-first game where the goal is to win the game in the listbuilding phase if at all possible.
We can say square peg round hole and thats great, we can say "thats not what gw wants", but I don't think thats true. I don't think GW cares so long as they are selling you models.
In the end the majority of the player base sees it the other way around... and the game is defined by how the playerbase plays the game. And from where I am sitting, the player base has always been about listbuilding-first, min/max play over anything else. You typically have to dig deep to find players willing to play in a different way, whereas playing the min/max version of the game is as simple as walking into an LGS and plopping models down and setting up a pickup game and going as thats the default.
Sqorgar wrote: Part of that, though, is that nobody has tried anything else. When GW said, during early AoS, to bring one hero, one monster, several units, no more than 30 wounds - very few people actually tried it.
Of course nobody tried it. It's a system that is clearly worse than the conventional point system so why waste time on proving that 1+1=2? The only reason to even consider playing a game that way is because GW, out of sheer unbelievable incompetence, failed to provide anything better and nearly killed half of their company in the process. If you have a functioning point system available there's no reason to use anything else.
Actually, campaign systems in general do very well here, such as Firestorm, Urban Conquest, Necromunda's Dominion campaign, and so on - the goals of the games are not about winning ONE game, so per-game imbalances are largely unimportant.
Campaigns can do well for certain things. But:
1) Campaign systems are useless for pickup gaming. A game that can only function if you can devote weeks/months to playing an extended campaign is a game that will hardly ever be played just for logistics reasons. The expectation is that two players can show up to a store, quickly agree on the details of the game (usually picking from a standard format or three), and start playing. A game that fails to support this is, at best, a niche-market product and is likely to be a financial failure.
2) Campaign systems, unless they are played between very similar forces, still require a conventional point system to set up the initial unit pool for each player and determine what can appear in a particular game. Maybe Necromunda works without it because everyone is playing the same poorly-equipped street gangs and any differences between forces are minor, but that kind of thing can't handle a game where you can have guardsmen and space marines fighting on the same battlefield.
3) Campaign systems are extremely vulnerable to snowball effects. The winner of one game gains advantages, making them more likely to win the next game and gain even more advantages. Often the campaign is decided in all but name by early successes and the rest of the campaign is a tedious slog through one-sided battles until the loser is finally officially eliminated. This isn't an automatic failure, of course, but campaign systems that appear to have even a chance of avoiding it seem few and far between.
But it probably isn't better than something else.
Not true at all. Point systems are the single most effective way of evaluating the strength of an army and allowing pickup games between customized forces. Other alternatives either don't work or are just point systems that are less accurate than they could be.
But imagine that there were a dozen different common list building formats out there. One uses wounds, one power levels, one price based (no more than $200 worth of models), one based on limiting warscrolls, one path to glory, one skirmish, one firestorm, and so on. If there was someone who exploited one of those formats, he would not be able to exploit the other ones at the same time. It's because we've made points the standard that we've allowed this abusive list building exploitation to become standard as well. If we played more than one type of game, it would solve the problem largely because the individual values of each model would change with each type of game, making "list building for advantage" virtually impossible
Uh, no, that's not how it would work at all.
1) Most of those list building ideas are just plain terrible. Nobody is going to play a game where you bring $200 worth of models because the dollar cost of the models is a terrible way of evaluating the strength of an army and creating a game where each player has a fair chance of winning. It doesn't matter if a game publisher puts that format in their rulebook, it's going to have zero effect on the game.
2) Competitive players can play multiple formats. Just like MTG players have standard decks, modern decks, and a lot of practice with drafting a competitive miniatures player would have armies for multiple formats. All of them would be competitive and optimized for that particular format. In fact, the non-competitive player would likely be at more of a disadvantage because they'd have an army that works ok in the format it was built for and not have the experience or interest to make it function at all effectively when the list building rules change.
I think this was exaggerated and largely a hypothetical put forth by the competitive players who didn't actually play the game. The idea that people would show up with a dozen bloodthirsters just because the rules didn't say they couldn't was one born from paranoia rather than experience.
Well yes, of course it rarely, if ever, happened outside of theory. Everyone realized how incredibly stupid AoS's army construction rules were as soon as they were published and went straight to work on third-party point systems. And the game was pretty much dead until those third-party point systems were established. So no, "nobody really exploited that" isn't very convincing when the reason is that nobody was playing AoS until the exploit was no longer legal.
Because competitive players have literally made us afraid of playing with each other. The way they've ruined the game community is so absolute that the idea that we might have to confront these players and negotiate a fair game has us quaking in our boots.
If you're so afraid of competitive players that it has ruined your experience then that's a problem with you and your lack of social skills. And the competitive players could equally legitimately argue that people like you have ruined the community by making them afraid to have to deal with a "casual" player and all their self-serving unwritten rules about what is playing "the right way".
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Sqorgar wrote: The list building is part of personalization and player identity, and should be viewed in exactly the same manner as which color your paint your models. It is absolutely not intended to be a spreadsheet that you minmax to model your army for advantage. People do that because they can, not because they are supposed to, should, or told to.
That's an awful lot of words to spend on saying "you're having fun the wrong way because I don't enjoy that".
That was the biggest problem with AOS' release. People would show up to an FLGS with players they didn't know very well, and it was really difficult to find a balance between the armies and create relatively fair games.
I think this was exaggerated and largely a hypothetical put forth by the competitive players who didn't actually play the game. The idea that people would show up with a dozen bloodthirsters just because the rules didn't say they couldn't was one born from paranoia rather than experience.
I disagree with a lot of what you posted here, but this in particular seems utterly incorrect. You're correct that the 12 Bloodthirsters was hyperbole and possibly paranoia, though I'm not sure any one really thought people would show up with such an army, it's more the fact the lack of list building rules allowed it that people were complaining about. The biggest problem with AoS at launch wasn't that it allowed silly armies of nothing by Nagash, or whatever. It was that even attempting to put together a balanced army was an exercise in futility. My first couple of games involved Dark Elves against Orcs, using pretty typical, varied armies for each. They were disastrous. The Orcs were vastly better than the Dark Elves to the point that in both games there was absolutely no contest. Neither of us were trying to break the game, just explore a new system with our existing collections. This was a game between two experienced gamers, literally in my house, so it wasn't even a case of trying to get a pick-up game, which is largely impossible with the lack of system AoS launched with. I'm sure we could have negotiated our way to a balanced game but why bother? There are plenty of other games on the market that have at least attempted to provide a balance system.
So no, I don't think the problem was exaggerated at all. Further proof comes from the huge drop-off in players from WH to AoS. I remember one of our FLGSs posting a comment after their first AoS event along the lines of "worrying times ahead for Fantasy" due to the tiny numbers of people who showed up. I don't think it had anything to do with hypothetical worries and it had everything to do with actual problems with the absence of a points system.
Playing without points is easier if you always play the same people and know eachother and units inside and out. It doesn't work so well in new environments...
Because competitive players have literally made us afraid of playing with each other. The way they've ruined the game community is so absolute that the idea that we might have to confront these players and negotiate a fair game has us quaking in our boots.
As Peregrine points out, if you're literally afraid of playing with other people that seems like a personal social issue. Either that or it's at least as exaggerated as you accuse others of being above. It also presupposes that the issue doesn't exist in reverse by blaming the competitive players rather than more casual players. The thing you seem to be missing about points is that the benefit of being able to show up with a standard army and play anyone is absolutely huge for a lot of people. They game maybe 1-2 times a month if they're lucky. They don't want to spend time negotiating a scenario and army composition, and they shouldn't have to. Even if there wasn't this supposed issue of competitive players terrifying people, the negotiation aspect of arranging a game would be too big a barrier for the vast majority of players I've met. Among a group of people who play together a lot it can work, but if that's the only way you play it makes it very difficult for outsiders to get involved. It's nothing to do with fear of losing or anything like that, it's just an unnecessary step that has too high a risk of causing either conflict or leading to an unsatisfying game.
AoS had its most balanced period starting at about 6 months in, when several fan comps had solidified to offer points that were revised based on testing & feedback. Those were good times for me; I could make a list however I wanted and show up to play anyone else expecting a decent game. I didn't have to worry if my list was too strong or too weak, didn't have to ask ahead of time what my opponent was bringing so I could match it in strength. I could just run what I wanted to run.
lord marcus wrote: And the spikey bitz posted 3D printed custodes tanks winning a tourney and everyone loses thier minds
Because they're a bunch of content stealing, sensationalist, clickbaity scum. A guy on Reddit, who attended the tournament they were at told the full story where these were temporary stand-ins as the actual models did not turn up in time and no-one gave a gak. Only Spikeybits trying to stir up some gak made this an issue.
lord marcus wrote: And the spikey bitz posted 3D printed custodes tanks winning a tourney and everyone loses thier minds
Because they're a bunch of content stealing, sensationalist, clickbaity scum. A guy on Reddit, who attended the tournament they were at told the full story where these were temporary stand-ins as the actual models did not turn up in time and no-one gave a gak. Only Spikeybits trying to stir up some gak made this an issue.
This. Spikey Bitz needs to be consigned to the compost heap of bad 40k sites that trade on controversy.
Sqorgar wrote: Part of that, though, is that nobody has tried anything else. When GW said, during early AoS, to bring one hero, one monster, several units, no more than 30 wounds - very few people actually tried it.
Of course nobody tried it. It's a system that is clearly worse than the conventional point system so why waste time on proving that 1+1=2? The only reason to even consider playing a game that way is because GW, out of sheer unbelievable incompetence, failed to provide anything better and nearly killed half of their company in the process. If you have a functioning point system available there's no reason to use anything else.
Actually, campaign systems in general do very well here, such as Firestorm, Urban Conquest, Necromunda's Dominion campaign, and so on - the goals of the games are not about winning ONE game, so per-game imbalances are largely unimportant.
Campaigns can do well for certain things. But:
1) Campaign systems are useless for pickup gaming. A game that can only function if you can devote weeks/months to playing an extended campaign is a game that will hardly ever be played just for logistics reasons. The expectation is that two players can show up to a store, quickly agree on the details of the game (usually picking from a standard format or three), and start playing. A game that fails to support this is, at best, a niche-market product and is likely to be a financial failure.
2) Campaign systems, unless they are played between very similar forces, still require a conventional point system to set up the initial unit pool for each player and determine what can appear in a particular game. Maybe Necromunda works without it because everyone is playing the same poorly-equipped street gangs and any differences between forces are minor, but that kind of thing can't handle a game where you can have guardsmen and space marines fighting on the same battlefield.
3) Campaign systems are extremely vulnerable to snowball effects. The winner of one game gains advantages, making them more likely to win the next game and gain even more advantages. Often the campaign is decided in all but name by early successes and the rest of the campaign is a tedious slog through one-sided battles until the loser is finally officially eliminated. This isn't an automatic failure, of course, but campaign systems that appear to have even a chance of avoiding it seem few and far between.
But it probably isn't better than something else.
Not true at all. Point systems are the single most effective way of evaluating the strength of an army and allowing pickup games between customized forces. Other alternatives either don't work or are just point systems that are less accurate than they could be.
But imagine that there were a dozen different common list building formats out there. One uses wounds, one power levels, one price based (no more than $200 worth of models), one based on limiting warscrolls, one path to glory, one skirmish, one firestorm, and so on. If there was someone who exploited one of those formats, he would not be able to exploit the other ones at the same time. It's because we've made points the standard that we've allowed this abusive list building exploitation to become standard as well. If we played more than one type of game, it would solve the problem largely because the individual values of each model would change with each type of game, making "list building for advantage" virtually impossible
Uh, no, that's not how it would work at all.
1) Most of those list building ideas are just plain terrible. Nobody is going to play a game where you bring $200 worth of models because the dollar cost of the models is a terrible way of evaluating the strength of an army and creating a game where each player has a fair chance of winning. It doesn't matter if a game publisher puts that format in their rulebook, it's going to have zero effect on the game.
2) Competitive players can play multiple formats. Just like MTG players have standard decks, modern decks, and a lot of practice with drafting a competitive miniatures player would have armies for multiple formats. All of them would be competitive and optimized for that particular format. In fact, the non-competitive player would likely be at more of a disadvantage because they'd have an army that works ok in the format it was built for and not have the experience or interest to make it function at all effectively when the list building rules change.
I think this was exaggerated and largely a hypothetical put forth by the competitive players who didn't actually play the game. The idea that people would show up with a dozen bloodthirsters just because the rules didn't say they couldn't was one born from paranoia rather than experience.
Well yes, of course it rarely, if ever, happened outside of theory. Everyone realized how incredibly stupid AoS's army construction rules were as soon as they were published and went straight to work on third-party point systems. And the game was pretty much dead until those third-party point systems were established. So no, "nobody really exploited that" isn't very convincing when the reason is that nobody was playing AoS until the exploit was no longer legal.
Because competitive players have literally made us afraid of playing with each other. The way they've ruined the game community is so absolute that the idea that we might have to confront these players and negotiate a fair game has us quaking in our boots.
If you're so afraid of competitive players that it has ruined your experience then that's a problem with you and your lack of social skills. And the competitive players could equally legitimately argue that people like you have ruined the community by making them afraid to have to deal with a "casual" player and all their self-serving unwritten rules about what is playing "the right way".
Automatically Appended Next Post:
Sqorgar wrote: The list building is part of personalization and player identity, and should be viewed in exactly the same manner as which color your paint your models. It is absolutely not intended to be a spreadsheet that you minmax to model your army for advantage. People do that because they can, not because they are supposed to, should, or told to.
That's an awful lot of words to spend on saying "you're having fun the wrong way because I don't enjoy that".
As loathe I am to admit it, Peregrine has made several points quite well.
Of course nobody tried it. It's a system that is clearly worse than the conventional point system so why waste time on proving that 1+1=2? The only reason to even consider playing a game that way is because GW, out of sheer unbelievable incompetence, failed to provide anything better and nearly killed half of their company in the process. If you have a functioning point system available there's no reason to use anything else.
It's not worse than regular points. It's pretty much the exact same thing. When there is some ultimate limitation, people will naturally try to minmax it to some degree. So, if one unit is clearly a better value (be it in points or wounds), they'll choose to play that. Just like 2000 points of one army is by no means equal to 2000 points of another army, 30 wounds of one army is not equal to 30 wounds of another army, but for some reason, you think the latter is unbalanced because of it.
My point is that nobody actually tried it. It doesn't matter if it was better or worse - people made assumptions about it and never bothered to test those assumptions. I see people doing mathhammer theorycrafting all the time, making assumptions about how units play based on theories built around faulty premises and misunderstandings of how statistics work. More than anything about the competitive community, I hate how they think they are a lot better at math than they really are.
1) Campaign systems are useless for pickup gaming....A game that fails to support this is, at best, a niche-market product and is likely to be a financial failure.
While games like Frostgrave and Necromunda do technically support pick up games, their popularity is entirely due to campaign play. Granted, most people who play these games are playing with friends on kitchen tables rather than going and playing strangers at game centers - but I think more people play games in this manner than not. With miniature games increasingly targeting solo and coop, I think kitchen table campaign play will become more of the standard way to play miniature games rather than game center competitive matched play with strangers. Being useless for pickup gaming may actually be a selling point one day soon.
3) Campaign systems are extremely vulnerable to snowball effects.
Some are. Some use handicaps. Some use a variety of unbalanced scenarios that can allow even the underdogs to be overpowered in a scenario. And some make it so that the underdogs can gang up against the leader, keeping them in check. I think many, if not most, campaign style games have something in them to slow snowballing, just like many three player games have something in them to keep kingmaking from being the dominant strategy.
Not true at all. Point systems are the single most effective way of evaluating the strength of an army and allowing pickup games between customized forces. Other alternatives either don't work or are just point systems that are less accurate than they could be.
Are they? It should be pointed out that the most popular tournament customizable game doesn't use points at all (Magic the Gathering). There's pickup games of that all the time.
And points will only be an accurate evaluation of any army if they start measuring interactions. For example:
- Multiples tax. Each unit of the same type costs more (having three bloodthirsters is not equal to three times the power of one bloodthirster).
- Combo tax. Units that work well together should cost more when used together than when they are used separately.
- Environment tax. An amphibious ability is worthless in a desert, valuable in a swamp. Pay more for in the swamp.
- Exploitation tax. Certain strategies and combos are absurdly powerful and game breaking. This should be included in the cost of the army divided by the chance of it occurring. A strong strategy that happens once every 10 games should be 10x cheaper than a strong strategy that happens every game - but both should cost something.
And so on. Basing the points only on the internal stats of a unit and ignoring how that unit interacts with the table, the enemy, and its allies will never produce a point value that accurately represents its true value in the game.
1) Most of those list building ideas are just plain terrible. Nobody is going to play a game where you bring $200 worth of models because the dollar cost of the models is a terrible way of evaluating the strength of an army and creating a game where each player has a fair chance of winning. It doesn't matter if a game publisher puts that format in their rulebook, it's going to have zero effect on the game.
I think we've already established that competitive gamers aren't interested in fair games. They want to minmax points in order to give themselves a clear advantage when possible. Whether it is 200 points or $200, that's still possible. My point is that if you have a dozen different systems by which armies are built, it prevents a single meta from defining the value of a model. If you really like a particular character, you can find a format in which he is worth playing.
2) Competitive players can play multiple formats.
But they generally don't. At least in 40k. AoS just released rules for a new Meeting Engagements format for 1000 pt armies, and I guess we'll see if this becomes popular enough to change the meta surrounding AoS - but I get the impression that competitive gamers are far less dominant in AoS, and that AoS players are perfectly happy playing Skirmish, Path of Glory, Meeting Engagements, and 2000 pt Pitched Battles without any one of them becoming the "Right Way to Play". I think AoS's Three Ways to Play is more generalized across the line than 40k's. Like, I think 40k needed Kill Team to be a separate game for people to be okay with playing it, while AoS was okay making Skirmish a minor variation of the regular rules.
Well yes, of course it rarely, if ever, happened outside of theory. Everyone realized how incredibly stupid AoS's army construction rules were as soon as they were published and went straight to work on third-party point systems. And the game was pretty much dead until those third-party point systems were established. So no, "nobody really exploited that" isn't very convincing when the reason is that nobody was playing AoS until the exploit was no longer legal.
NinthMusketeer wrote: AoS had its most balanced period starting at about 6 months in, when several fan comps had solidified to offer points that were revised based on testing & feedback. Those were good times for me; I could make a list however I wanted and show up to play anyone else expecting a decent game. I didn't have to worry if my list was too strong or too weak, didn't have to ask ahead of time what my opponent was bringing so I could match it in strength. I could just run what I wanted to run.
The day that "official points" came back to AOS was a bad bad day for me for that very reason. I knew things would go back to the same old same old GW with the same old same old listbuilding tea-bagging and chasing the meta year after year churn and burn.
Sqorgar wrote: It's not worse than regular points. It's pretty much the exact same thing. When there is some ultimate limitation, people will naturally try to minmax it to some degree. So, if one unit is clearly a better value (be it in points or wounds), they'll choose to play that. Just like 2000 points of one army is by no means equal to 2000 points of another army, 30 wounds of one army is not equal to 30 wounds of another army, but for some reason, you think the latter is unbalanced because of it.
It absolutely is worse. A conventional point system can, in theory, come close to a correct evaluation of an army and a balanced metagame, especially if you're talking about a less-competitive environment where everything isn't pushed to the limits. It may not always work, but the flaws are with the execution of the system not with the idea. A system of "take a monster, a hero, and a few units" suffers from fatal conceptual flaws and can't work in a game like AoS. As long as "a hero" or "a monster" applies to units of vastly different strengths trying to count out a number of each for each player will lead to broken results. Adding up 30 wounds for each side can't possibly be balanced when 30 wounds with a 2+ save and 30 wounds with a 6+ save both count as 30 wounds. Etc. And, assuming even minimal competence from the people creating the point system, the points will have fewer unbalanced units to exploit and their margin of superiority will be less extreme.
So yes, nobody tried it, because it's an obvious dead end that doesn't hold up under even superficial analysis. At absolute best it might be on par with a badly executed conventional point system and it's probably going to be worse. So why waste time on something that fails so badly on a conceptual level?
While games like Frostgrave and Necromunda do technically support pick up games, their popularity is entirely due to campaign play. Granted, most people who play these games are playing with friends on kitchen tables rather than going and playing strangers at game centers - but I think more people play games in this manner than not. With miniature games increasingly targeting solo and coop, I think kitchen table campaign play will become more of the standard way to play miniature games rather than game center competitive matched play with strangers. Being useless for pickup gaming may actually be a selling point one day soon.
This seems rather out of touch with reality. 40k is designed to support pickup games. AoS is designed to support pickup games. LOTR is designed to support pickup games. Kill Team is designed to support pickup games (and has a whole competitive play expansion to go with its campaign system). Blood Bowl is designed to support pickup games. In fact, the only GW games that aren't designed with support for pickup games are what, some of the more niche-market fantasy ones? And going outside of the dominant company in the market X-Wing is designed primarily for pickup games, WM/H is designed primarily for tournament-style pickup games, Infinity is designed to support pickup games, etc. In fact I can't honestly think of a major game on the market that isn't either designed primarily for pickup-style games or at least giving support to that style of play.
Are they? It should be pointed out that the most popular tournament customizable game doesn't use points at all (Magic the Gathering). There's pickup games of that all the time.
That's a terrible comparison because MTG has essentially nothing to do with miniatures games. The mechanics are completely different and the purpose that points serve in a typical miniatures game doesn't exist in MTG because of how the mana system constrains the power level of what you can play (helped by WOTC being willing to have 95% of the game be draft fodder that never sees constructed play).
And points will only be an accurate evaluation of any army if they start measuring interactions.
Not true at all. Points will only be a perfectly accurate evaluation if they do those things. But perfectly accurate is not the same as accurate enough to do the job. For example, you can simply price the amphibious rule based on a 50/50 chance at relevant water features being present, with the understanding that in most cases (and all tournament cases, where competitive optimization has its strongest presence) players are selecting their units before they know the terrain layout and over a large number of games the value of the rule will work out to about that much. Or maybe taking multiple copies of a unit does provide additional value, but the additional value is small enough that it doesn't skew the overall win percentages too badly.
And of course it needs to be noted that no other balancing mechanic does any better. A system of "bring $200 worth of models" doesn't evaluate the strength of ignoring water features any better than conventional points. The 40kPL system is just a less accurate point system and has the same inability to account for combos or spamming. So yes, the conventional point system isn't perfect, but it's still better than any other alternative.
If you really like a particular character, you can find a format in which he is worth playing.
Assuming that anyone plays these alternative formats. Nobody is going to play the $200 format, so who cares if a character is great in that format? And how exactly is lobbying for a certain balance system because it favors your army any better than building an army to be effective within a standard point system?
But they generally don't.
Well yes, because in the real world there is only one relevant format: matched play with points. Playing a 1000 point game or a 1500 point game or a 2000 point game is still matched play with points. If there was a genuinely interesting and relevant alternative format competitive players would probably use it, and if they did use it they'd still be playing competitively in that format. But currently the only "alternatives" are irrelevant nonsense that have no reason to exist.
And Kill Team is an entirely separate game with very different mechanics, not an alternative 40k format. Trying to claim that it had to be a separate game to appease the 40k tournament players is like trying to say that BFG had to be a separate game because nobody would play it as an alternative 40k format.
This is some revisionist history.
Hardly. The financial numbers speak for themselves. AoS had dismal sales numbers on launch, GW's profits took a significant hit, and AoS didn't recover until it had conventional point systems added (first from third party sources and eventually by GW, just as soon as they could get a book rushed through the print cycle).
This seems rather out of touch with reality. 40k is designed to support pickup games. AoS is designed to support pickup games. LOTR is designed to support pickup games. Kill Team is designed to support pickup games (and has a whole competitive play expansion to go with its campaign system). Blood Bowl is designed to support pickup games. In fact, the only GW games that aren't designed with support for pickup games are what, some of the more niche-market fantasy ones? And going outside of the dominant company in the market X-Wing is designed primarily for pickup games, WM/H is designed primarily for tournament-style pickup games, Infinity is designed to support pickup games, etc. In fact I can't honestly think of a major game on the market that isn't either designed primarily for pickup-style games or at least giving support to that style of play.
It doesn’t take a genius to see where the industry is going. Campaigns are becoming more omnipresent, while matched play is increasing less emphasized. Walking Dead: All Out War, Fallout (and Skyrim), Rangers of the Shadow Deep, most Osprey games (Frostgrave, Last Days, Ragnarok, Dracula’s America, etc), Necromunda, Blood Bowl, Warhammer Quest. Then look at some of the recent expansions for other games. Kill Team had Rogue Trader, Armada’s next expansion is a campaign, Infinity’s latest book adds the Paradiso campaign, Warmachine is getting Oblivion, 40k recently got Urban Chaos, Middle Earth has Gondor at War, AoS has Path of Glory and Firestorm - and we don’t even know what is going on with Warcry yet (all signs point to a campaign game).
At the very least, you can say that there is enough interest in campaign games to support several popular game systems (Frostgrave, Necromunda), new games are being created that are campaign focused (Fallout, Skyrim, Rangers of the Shadow Deep), and that even older miniature games are now starting to see the value in campaign games. I mean, Warmachine is getting a campaign. Warmachine!
Maybe, 40k’s tournament style is like Magic or World of Warcraft. There’s really only room for one big one and everybody else is scrambling around for table scraps. You can find a game of 40k at your local game shop, but will it be a fun one? Meanwhile, Infinity is nowhere to be seen in the local meta. Sooner or later, they are going to realize that they’ll find more success appealing to kitchen table gamers over tournament gamers. Campaign games are just the first volley in that particular salvo. Next, I think AI opponents and solo/coop play is going to be the big thing (WD:AOW, Fallout, Skyrim, WHQ, Rangers of the Shadow Deep, Deadzone). AI opponents is a relatively new feature, but it is going to become increasingly common and tournament gamers will end up being replaced by tables and dice rolls - to the hobby’s benefit. Nobody really likes pickup games. As soon as necessary evils stop being necessary, people stop doing them.
I really like a lot of what you've posted in this thread, but I don't believe you've asked everybody so this statement just won't fly. I, for one, don't mind pick-up games per se. I don't like getting stomped, but a pick-up game doesn't automatically guarantee that I will.
This seems rather out of touch with reality. 40k is designed to support pickup games. AoS is designed to support pickup games. LOTR is designed to support pickup games. Kill Team is designed to support pickup games (and has a whole competitive play expansion to go with its campaign system). Blood Bowl is designed to support pickup games. In fact, the only GW games that aren't designed with support for pickup games are what, some of the more niche-market fantasy ones? And going outside of the dominant company in the market X-Wing is designed primarily for pickup games, WM/H is designed primarily for tournament-style pickup games, Infinity is designed to support pickup games, etc. In fact I can't honestly think of a major game on the market that isn't either designed primarily for pickup-style games or at least giving support to that style of play.
It doesn’t take a genius to see where the industry is going. Campaigns are becoming more omnipresent, while matched play is increasing less emphasized. Walking Dead: All Out War, Fallout (and Skyrim), Rangers of the Shadow Deep, most Osprey games (Frostgrave, Last Days, Ragnarok, Dracula’s America, etc), Necromunda, Blood Bowl, Warhammer Quest. Then look at some of the recent expansions for other games. Kill Team had Rogue Trader, Armada’s next expansion is a campaign, Infinity’s latest book adds the Paradiso campaign, Warmachine is getting Oblivion, 40k recently got Urban Chaos, Middle Earth has Gondor at War, AoS has Path of Glory and Firestorm - and we don’t even know what is going on with Warcry yet (all signs point to a campaign game).
At the very least, you can say that there is enough interest in campaign games to support several popular game systems (Frostgrave, Necromunda), new games are being created that are campaign focused (Fallout, Skyrim, Rangers of the Shadow Deep), and that even older miniature games are now starting to see the value in campaign games. I mean, Warmachine is getting a campaign. Warmachine!
Maybe, 40k’s tournament style is like Magic or World of Warcraft. There’s really only room for one big one and everybody else is scrambling around for table scraps. You can find a game of 40k at your local game shop, but will it be a fun one? Meanwhile, Infinity is nowhere to be seen in the local meta. Sooner or later, they are going to realize that they’ll find more success appealing to kitchen table gamers over tournament gamers. Campaign games are just the first volley in that particular salvo. Next, I think AI opponents and solo/coop play is going to be the big thing (WD:AOW, Fallout, Skyrim, WHQ, Rangers of the Shadow Deep, Deadzone). AI opponents is a relatively new feature, but it is going to become increasingly common and tournament gamers will end up being replaced by tables and dice rolls - to the hobby’s benefit. Nobody really likes pickup games. As soon as necessary evils stop being necessary, people stop doing them.
That all seems like it's grasping at straws a bit. All of those systems you mention are insignificant in terms of market share even when compared to relatively smaller games like Infinity or Malifaux and are entirely inconsequential next to the likes of 40k, AoS and even the likes of WM/H and Bolt Action. I suspect the popularity of these kind of systems among manufacturers is the lower costs associated with games that aren't mass battle systems. However, I wouldn't call any of the games you've listed as being particularly popular or relevant in the market when taken as a whole. They're small fry. That in itself is possibly an indication that your argument is flawed - the biggest games aren't of the type you're saying the industry is headed towards. The most successful companies are producing pick-up games as their most successful products. The reason seems simple to me: convenience. The big problem all campaign-style games have always had is the extra effort required to run them and the inability to easily just jump in whenever you want. They cater to a small part of an already niche group.
Your conclusions seem to fly in the face of the rising popularity of 40k as a system in general and the huge increase we've seen in numbers at competitive events. I'd argue your point about Inifinty (for example) being nowhere to be seen in the local meta apply even more so to most systems you mention in your opening paragraph, with the possible exception of other GW games. Local metas are easily skewed by one or two enthusiastic gamers or random chance of a game picking up steam. When you look at it on a wider scale you get a more accurate picture, and all these games like Walking Dead or Fallout have absolutely tiny market share and penetration.
Sqorgar wrote: Nobody really likes pickup games. As soon as necessary evils stop being necessary, people stop doing them.
Wo there. Pick up games are an important part of a hobby. A hobby world where pick up games are frowned upon is not one that I want to be in. I've met most of my wargaming friends through pick up games at one point or another. When I learned how to play 40K, I would show up to a hobby shop and play a game with somebody I've never met because my friends never met. I've played wargaming through 2 moves across the United States, and I wouldn't have been able to do that without pick up games.
Maybe you have this amazing friend group with a wide degree of different armies and playstyles and can get awesome games in all the time... as well as such stability in your life that you don't need to introduce new people into the community. But the truth is most of us aren't so blessed. Sure I've met some lame people out there, but I've also met some really good people out there. And being able to play a game where everybodies expectations are in line is an amazing experience. Even when I play games with my buddies we usually don't do full on campaigns. Because we don't always play regularly, and we like jumping systems, and there are a huge variety of reasons why a player might not want to commit to a campaign system.
Honestly... to use a Churchillhism "Points are the worst form of balance, except for all the others". There are balanced points systems, or at least more balanced points systems. Truthfully, people attacking points are more often than not just excusing Games Workshop's shoddy profit oriented balancing, by saying;
"Its not GWs fault the game isn't balanced, points are a flawed system, its the players fault for abusing it"
That is ridiculous. Book 1 and Book 2 Malifaux 2E were point based and exceptionally well balanced, with far more complex game workings than 40K. Warlord's Bolt Action is points based and while far from perfect is far closer to balanced than GW. The 9th Age is more balanced than any edition of WFB that I had played. I haven't played a mini game that is perfectly balanced, I probably never will, but I have played minigames that are more balanced than GW products. I love GW, I have played 40K and Fantasy for a long time now, and their world building is best in class. But I am not going to make any excuses for the shoddy game design that leads to massive imbalances.
Slipspace wrote:
That all seems like it's grasping at straws a bit. All of those systems you mention are insignificant in terms of market share even when compared to relatively smaller games like Infinity or Malifaux and are entirely inconsequential next to the likes of 40k,
With the exception of a few games, the entirety of miniature gaming is small potatoes. A healthy industry has variety in purpose and audience, but competitive gaming does allow for variety of purpose or audience. The smaller games must differentiate themselves from the market leader to find a niche audience - and that can’t happen with a competitive mindset. And remember, Infinity isn’t just competing against 40k. It’s also competing against board games (especially with Aristeia and Defiance). Increasingly, miniature games are being hybridized with the board game market.
However, I wouldn't call any of the games you've listed as being particularly popular or relevant in the market when taken as a whole. They're small fry. That in itself is possibly an indication that your argument is flawed - the biggest games aren't of the type you're saying the industry is headed towards.
But that’s my point. Something like Frostgrave could NEVER succeed as a competitive game. The market can’t support many of those. Because it is purely a kitchen table miniature game, it has found success (a dozen expansions, two spin offs, and a miniature line) despite originally intended to be a one off book and nothing more.
The most successful companies are producing pick-up games as their most successful products.
But there’s only 2 of them (GW, FFG). The next biggest miniatures line is D&D unpainted! Games like Warmachine are only popular when 40k is not. Competitive gaming is a zero sum game. Competitive gamers are neither created nor destroyed, they just change games. That’s an industry that can not grow or even really support the sheer volume of miniatures being released ever month.
The reason seems simple to me: convenience. The big problem all campaign-style games have always had is the extra effort required to run them and the inability to easily just jump in whenever you want. They cater to a small part of an already niche group.
Board games like Imperial Assault, Shadows of Brimstone, Arkham Horror, Arcadia Quest, etc are all more popular than Infinity or Malifaux. Campaigns aren’t the problem. The problem is that campaign players usually don’t all invest in their own copies of the game. How do you sell a player on something like that when they have to buy the books and miniatures, then list build before they even know if they like it?
auticus wrote:The vast bulk of all 40k games played in my area are pickup games.
How would you know, when they aren’t playing where you can see them? I think for every game of 40k you see, there’s probably a dozen games you don’t see, played in dens or on kitchen tables.
akaean wrote:Pick up games are an important part of a hobby.
Not for board games. And that industry is arguably heartier and more successful than the miniature game hobby (it does have an unsustainable addiction to kickstarter though). At the very least, there is plenty of room in that hobby for expansion and different player types.
That is ridiculous. Book 1 and Book 2 Malifaux 2E were point based and exceptionally well balanced,
And what happened with books 3 and beyond? Out can balance small games or a known, static version of the game. Infinitely expanding games ALWAYS become increasingly unbalanced over time. M2E’s first two books were written at the same time, balancing the existing models from 1E. After that, new models changed the formula. You can’t successful chase balance as a moving target. Not for long.
Warlord's Bolt Action is points based and while far from perfect is far closer to balanced than GW. The 9th Age is more balanced than any edition of WFB that I had played.
Haven’t played these, but isn’t Bolt Actions between armies of roughly similar abilities and make up? And does 9th Age have new releases to catch up to?
auticus wrote:The vast bulk of all 40k games played in my area are pickup games.
How would you know, when they aren’t playing where you can see them? I think for every game of 40k you see, there’s probably a dozen games you don’t see, played in dens or on kitchen tables.
How would YOU know? I really doubt this is true. In basically every 40k forum or facebook group I see, most people play at a FLGS or GW, or at tournaments. Some have home gaming setups, but those are not as common. The fact that you need a 6x4 table with a large amount of terrain to play 40k really pushes it towards a gaming store environment, where these things are supplied.
How would you know, when they aren’t playing where you can see them? I think for every game of 40k you see, there’s probably a dozen games you don’t see, played in dens or on kitchen tables.
I run a facebook group for my city for our wargaming community. It currently has 623 members. Nearly all games played by those people are played as pickup games or tournaments.
The number of games played at home in the kitchen or wherever are miniscule.
There is another city wide get together of people that play RPGs and wargames, with a lot of crossover. Again with them, nearly all games are played in public as pickup games or event games.
The RPGs have a lot more played at home groups. Wargames, not so much.
Unless there are legions of players in my area that completely buy all of their product online and never go to a store, nearly all games are public pick up or tournament games. There are some games played at home, but those are by and far the stark minority.
And I know that seems to be very common with a lot of people spread out across the USA. I can't speak to europe or other places.
Horst wrote:
How would YOU know? I really doubt this is true. In basically every 40k forum or facebook group I see, most people play at a FLGS or GW, or at tournaments. Some have home gaming setups, but those are not as common. The fact that you need a 6x4 table with a large amount of terrain to play 40k really pushes it towards a gaming store environment, where these things are supplied.
auticus wrote:Unless there are legions of players in my area that completely buy all of their product online and never go to a store, nearly all games are public pick up or tournament games. There are some games played at home, but those are by and far the stark minority.
And I know that seems to be very common with a lot of people spread out across the USA. I can't speak to europe or other places.
So, people’s local worldview skews their answers to this one quite a bit. A few points as someone who has played in various different situations on both sides of the Atlantic.
- First, GWs market includes an absolute TON of kids and younger teenagers playing against friends and siblings at home on the kitchen table or in after school clubs. All of those games count, as they’re a valid market GW aim at. I would guess that those games outnumber adults at the FLGS.
- Pickup games seem to be really common in the US, but relatively uncommon outside that. Most European gaming situations I’ve been in have been at games clubs, where people organise games ahead of time through Facebook groups or the like. Especially here in London, you’re not going to carry an army around on public transport on the offchance you might get a game!
- Tournaments are a terrible measure of how much ‘competitive 40k’ there is because tournaments are also social events, and the majority of people at a tournament aren’t really there expecting to compete or to win. Those people do exist, but in my experience the majority of tournament attendees are there for a weekend of gaming and beer with new people. I’m certainly not a competitive player and I go to tournaments pretty often.
- GW have not made a game ‘for pickup games’. Matched play does not equal pickup games, and even if it did, ⅔ of the ways to play are specifically non-Matched. I think it’s pretry clear that GW primarily make a narrative war game centred around cool action and playing friends, but realise that some people like to play pickup games and tournaments and cater for them too.
ArbitorIan wrote: GW have not made a game ‘for pickup games’. Matched play does not equal pickup games, and even if it did, ⅔ of the ways to play are specifically non-Matched. I think it’s pretry clear that GW primarily make a narrative war game centred around cool action and playing friends, but realise that some people like to play pickup games and tournaments and cater for them too.
Yeah, it's obvious that if one was going to design a game for more competitive play, it wouldn't have 40K's number of factions and subfactions and detachments and formations, all loaded onto a creaky and straining points system for balance. You'd keep it tighter and focused, and build more balance directly into the ruleset.
Yeah, that is all hilariously wrong. In addition to what other people have said:
1) Focusing on coop/solo at-home play is inherently kind of an underdog strategy. You trade the vastly superior customer engagement and networking of in-store pickup games for the ability to tell people "you can buy this and play even if nobody else in your area is buying in". If you have a successful game already then that advantage has minimal value to you. It's only useful if you're a tiny company trying to get any space at all in the market and you know that your first few customers will have to take a leap of faith by buying in before anyone else in there area is playing. So yeah, I'm not surprised that lots of new companies are doing it, but the dominant players in the market are still focusing heavily, if not exclusively, on pickup/tournament style gaming.
2) FFG is kind of a complicated situation because of license issues. Yeah, Armada is getting campaigns, but FFG is legally prohibited from releasing card-only expansions because that counts as a "card game" and someone else has that license. A campaign is an easy way to release pickup/tournament gaming cards without violating the license, and you'll notice that both of the campaign expansions have that content in addition to the campaign system itself. And you might notice that FFG has effectively killed off Imperial Assault, the game that is the closest fit for what you claim is the future of miniatures gaming, in favor of a 40k-style alternative in Legion. X-Wing just got a 2.0 reboot (a perfect opportunity to introduce the kind of things you believe are the future) that continued its focus on pickup/tournament style gaming while adding essentially nothing for solo/coop play. It's pretty clear based on FFG's business decisions that they do not agree with you about the future of the market.
Maybe. From a product design standpoint GW's mass of product is kind of a gold standard for how it's done. I couldn't tell you exactly how, but it seems like they're doing it right.
Yeah, it's obvious that if one was going to design a game for more competitive play, it wouldn't have 40K's number of factions and subfactions and detachments and formations, all loaded onto a creaky and straining points system for balance. You'd keep it tighter and focused, and build more balance directly into the ruleset.
A truly competitive game would require something like Magic's rotation, where specific models (probably older ones) are purposely excluded from tournament play in an effort to create a tightly controlled ruleset. As it is, 40k has 30 years of models available and accessible - probably close to 500 individual unit types across two dozen factions, and freeform tables with a dozen different terrain types, in a dozen different formats. Honestly, "good enough" balance for 40k is still an incredible achievement. But it's never, ever going to be the competitive game experience that people want to make it. Even Warmachine, the tournament game of choice in mk2, was buckling under the weight of its ever expanding options.
1) Focusing on coop/solo at-home play is inherently kind of an underdog strategy.
Currently. But the market is changing. I feel like miniature games are following the same basic trajectory that the board game industry did, just slower. Right now, we are kind of in the CCG boom - tournament and competitive play defines the market, but it is starting to change. Miniature gaming has been growing over the past few years, and what the market looks like now is completely different from even when AoS launched.
I think solo/coop play is a GREATLY underrepresented market in miniature gaming. In fact, outside of Fallout and Rangers of the Shadow Deep, I don't think there's any full on miniature games which hit that focus. And, watching the board game community, solo gaming has gone from a novelty (Race For the Galaxy had an AI player this one time) to something that is featured in nearly every game, and one of the first questions asked of any kickstarter. The "solitaire games on your table" geek list on BGG has gone from a dozen entries a month to 973 for June 2019.
People like to buy models, build and paint them, and they like playing with them - but they don't like packing 50 models and traveling an hour to the nearest game center for the chance of playing a game. Playing with children, wives, and girlfriends is a market that competitive miniature games does not target, nor solo game experiences. But that's going to be the biggest room for growth in this industry going forward.
And you might notice that FFG has effectively killed off Imperial Assault, the game that is the closest fit for what you claim is the future of miniatures gaming, in favor of a 40k-style alternative in Legion.
You forget that FFG has to share profits with Hasbro on Imperial Assault. They can't even sell Imperial Assault on their own website. They have the miniatures license for Star Wars and tried to pass Imperial Assault off as a miniatures game, but it didn't work. Even then, FFG is still releasing digital expansions for the game through the app - solo/cooperative expansions. In fact, the solo/coop app was so popular for Imperial Assault (and Descent) that they now have multiple games that use that format (Mansions of Madness and Journeys In Middle Earth). The just released Star Wars: Outer Rim also has a solo mode. In fact, I think FFG releases more soloable games than not these days - and I remember when it was a novelty with the Gears of War board game.
Edit: Imperial Assault is even getting a new mode with the new Skirmish map. Some sort of horde defense raid mode that incorporates the app. So Imperial Assault is still getting development, even if miniature design is focused on Legion right now.
X-Wing just got a 2.0 reboot (a perfect opportunity to introduce the kind of things you believe are the future) that continued its focus on pickup/tournament style gaming while adding essentially nothing for solo/coop play. It's pretty clear based on FFG's business decisions that they do not agree with you about the future of the market.
X-Wing 2.0 was contentious for many reasons and it was pretty obvious from the get go that deviating too far from the expected would've been disastrous. That's because competitive gamers hate change and their obsessive need to control the game prevents it from every expanding beyond their own selfish wishes. And it's obvious that X-Wing has lost a considerable amount of popularity through the edition change, to the point where now Legion is more popular. Competitive gamers keep games from growing, then abandon them at the earliest sign of fault, making for a notoriously fickle audience that will kill your game overnight (Warmachine mk3?)
Yeah, it's obvious that if one was going to design a game for more competitive play, it wouldn't have 40K's number of factions and subfactions and detachments and formations, all loaded onto a creaky and straining points system for balance. You'd keep it tighter and focused, and build more balance directly into the ruleset.
A truly competitive game would require something like Magic's rotation, where specific models (probably older ones) are purposely excluded from tournament play in an effort to create a tightly controlled ruleset. As it is, 40k has 30 years of models available and accessible - probably close to 500 individual unit types across two dozen factions, and freeform tables with a dozen different terrain types, in a dozen different formats. Honestly, "good enough" balance for 40k is still an incredible achievement. But it's never, ever going to be the competitive game experience that people want to make it. Even Warmachine, the tournament game of choice in mk2, was buckling under the weight of its ever expanding options.
1) Focusing on coop/solo at-home play is inherently kind of an underdog strategy.
Currently. But the market is changing. I feel like miniature games are following the same basic trajectory that the board game industry did, just slower. Right now, we are kind of in the CCG boom - tournament and competitive play defines the market, but it is starting to change. Miniature gaming has been growing over the past few years, and what the market looks like now is completely different from even when AoS launched.
I think solo/coop play is a GREATLY underrepresented market in miniature gaming. In fact, outside of Fallout and Rangers of the Shadow Deep, I don't think there's any full on miniature games which hit that focus. And, watching the board game community, solo gaming has gone from a novelty (Race For the Galaxy had an AI player this one time) to something that is featured in nearly every game, and one of the first questions asked of any kickstarter. The "solitaire games on your table" geek list on BGG has gone from a dozen entries a month to 973 for June 2019.
People like to buy models, build and paint them, and they like playing with them - but they don't like packing 50 models and traveling an hour to the nearest game center for the chance of playing a game. Playing with children, wives, and girlfriends is a market that competitive miniature games does not target, nor solo game experiences. But that's going to be the biggest room for growth in this industry going forward.
And you might notice that FFG has effectively killed off Imperial Assault, the game that is the closest fit for what you claim is the future of miniatures gaming, in favor of a 40k-style alternative in Legion.
You forget that FFG has to share profits with Hasbro on Imperial Assault. They can't even sell Imperial Assault on their own website. They have the miniatures license for Star Wars and tried to pass Imperial Assault off as a miniatures game, but it didn't work. Even then, FFG is still releasing digital expansions for the game through the app - solo/cooperative expansions. In fact, the solo/coop app was so popular for Imperial Assault (and Descent) that they now have multiple games that use that format (Mansions of Madness and Journeys In Middle Earth). The just released Star Wars: Outer Rim also has a solo mode. In fact, I think FFG releases more soloable games than not these days - and I remember when it was a novelty with the Gears of War board game.
Edit: Imperial Assault is even getting a new mode with the new Skirmish map. Some sort of horde defense raid mode that incorporates the app. So Imperial Assault is still getting development, even if miniature design is focused on Legion right now.
X-Wing just got a 2.0 reboot (a perfect opportunity to introduce the kind of things you believe are the future) that continued its focus on pickup/tournament style gaming while adding essentially nothing for solo/coop play. It's pretty clear based on FFG's business decisions that they do not agree with you about the future of the market.
X-Wing 2.0 was contentious for many reasons and it was pretty obvious from the get go that deviating too far from the expected would've been disastrous. That's because competitive gamers hate change and their obsessive need to control the game prevents it from every expanding beyond their own selfish wishes. And it's obvious that X-Wing has lost a considerable amount of popularity through the edition change, to the point where now Legion is more popular. Competitive gamers keep games from growing, then abandon them at the earliest sign of fault, making for a notoriously fickle audience that will kill your game overnight (Warmachine mk3?)
Oh Oracle, regale us with your knowledge of the future!
The companies that make up the market are not changing, and it doesn't matter what some niche-market company is doing with their 0.1% market share. It doesn't matter if there are 973 games on BGG if the total sales revenue of those games is $10. What the market is currently doing is continuing to put pickup/tournament style gaming somewhere between "the only thing that matters" and "very important", and treating solo/coop "kitchen table" play as a minor side thing at best.
I think solo/coop play is a GREATLY underrepresented market in miniature gaming. In fact, outside of Fallout and Rangers of the Shadow Deep, I don't think there's any full on miniature games which hit that focus.
And this is your concession that everything you have said is wrong. How exactly can this be the future of miniatures gaming if you can't think of more than two niche-market games that fit your vision of the future? It sounds like, contrary to your original claims, the industry is pretty thoroughly ignoring your "future of the industry".
Peregrine wrote: And this is your concession that everything you have said is wrong. How exactly can this be the future of miniatures gaming if you can't think of more than two niche-market games that fit your vision of the future? It sounds like, contrary to your original claims, the industry is pretty thoroughly ignoring your "future of the industry".
Look at co-op board games compared to miniatures war games. One of these two is doing stunningly well in recent years for more than a handful of major players. It does something amazing, it turns that rules abusing jackass no one wants to play against, into the useful aspect of the team.
That absolutely could be something in mini war gaming, but there is the slight problem of needing the added minis for non-player models, but there's also significantly less need for player models to balance that out a bit. There's a reason that places like miniwargaming are trying some experimental stuff with this at the moment, people are revisiting things more in the spirit of rogue trader than competitive 40k and finding something they like. Like a lot of the old necromunda scenarios in which there was a primary goal above and beyond shooting each other that you could compete for, or even better, a reason not to shoot each other until the reason was dealt with. It's hardly new. Co-op games can be a great deal of fun and as I've said before, just playing the game is supposed to be fun, not just winning it.
You, you have a rather extreme focus on your competitive community, so you see a lot of value there. Often to the point you feel the need to deride people who don't see that same value you do. Well, the value people see here is well outside of what you care about, but that does not mean there's nothing there.
Because the board game market already HAS changed. There is increasingly little difference between the miniature and board game market - to the point where board game manufacturers have full on miniature games now.
The companies that make up the market are not changing, and it doesn't matter what some niche-market company is doing with their 0.1% market share.
How can you say that when GW is completely different to what it was three or four years ago? Warmachine is in deep trouble. X-Wing is no longer the top miniature game. Miniature companies are trying to break into board games (Aristeia, Warhammer Quest, Defiance, Underworlds) while board game companies are trying to break into miniature games (FFG, CMON). Kickstarter has completely changed how games are funded and made. How in the hell can you say that the market isn't changing?
It doesn't matter if there are 973 games on BGG if the total sales revenue of those games is $10.
Oh, they are doing fine. Middara (1-4 player cooperative game) has a kickstarter going right now that has made over $2 million (and still has 18 days to go). Gloomhaven's second printing kickstarter made almost $4 million. Kingdom Death Monster, $12 million. Zombicides routinely make around $4 million. Dark Souls $4 million. Assassin's Creed over a million. Bloodborne $4 million. All solo/coop games.
How exactly can this be the future of miniatures gaming if you can't think of more than two niche-market games that fit your vision of the future?
Because Rangers of the Shadow Deep and Fallout Wasteland Warfare are NEW. It's easy to see the direction the industry is going if you look at the recent successes. Both these games are less than a year old and wildly successful beyond their initial goals. In fact, Rangers of the Shadow Deep was one popular board game reviewer's #2 game of all time. And Fallout was successful enough that they aren't just expanding the line, but creating a Skyrim spin off. Meanwhile, The Other Side - a major effort by the Malifaux guys - made as much impact as a fart in the wind and appears to be dead already. CMON's Song of Ice and Fire seems to be doing okay, but it is majorly propped up by the tv show finale hype and it'll be little more than a rumored part of history in a year.
Total sales of all of those games you mention, combined: $31 million.
Your "new direction of the market" is making 10% of the annual revenue of the dominant company in the market, and that's assuming all of those kickstarters were in the same year and so can be combined like that. Good for them for identifying a niche market and making some money from it, but they're still dwarfed by the sales of the tournament/pickup-focused market leader. And that market leader is not in any way backing off from their focus.
Total sales of all of those games you mention, combined: $31 million.
GW isn't making all that money on models. They sell books and license out their IPs for video games and yoga pants. And a large portion of what GW sells is not explicitly competitive focused, like paints and terrain. If you look at GW's products that are explicitly competitive... there's only a handful, like the KT Arena expansion. Most releases include that Three Ways to Play thing, so are of value to non-competitive players as well - certainly to the point where it is impossible to say that competitive or non-competitive players are the primary purchasers of any one product.
And by the way, Asmodee North America's annual revenue is $500 million (and it is all kitchen tabletop gaming), so shut up.
Peregrine wrote: Good for them for identifying a niche market and making some money from it, but they're still dwarfed by the sales of the tournament/pickup-focused market leader. And that market leader is not in any way backing off from their focus.
Tournament/pickup focused?
In what way are GW ‘focused’ on tournaments and pickup games, any more than they are on kids in their bedrooms or narrative gaming?
GW has always treated tournaments as an optional subset of the community, which is what they are. It’s only recently they’ve been throwing them a bone and utilising them occasionally rather than ignoring them completely. The majority of their output is not tournament-focused. And making a points system for matched play doesn’t in any way mean they’re specifically supporting pickup gaming.
Im sorry that is simply untrue. It has gone through some testing times after the release of Mk3 but much of that has been fixed. PP as a company has also done well with MonPoc and they have announced another full wargame is coming net year. Hardly the moves of a company that is in toruble.
Im sorry that is simply untrue. It has gone through some testing times after the release of Mk3 but much of that has been fixed. PP as a company has also done well with MonPoc and they have announced another full wargame is coming net year. Hardly the moves of a company that is in toruble.
I said Warmachine was in trouble, not PP. They've lost a lot of players and have dropped from the second biggest game to not even on the chart, and a lot of FLGS have stopped carrying the line. The tournament mindset is what essentially destroyed that game, inside and out, and one of the major reasons why I rail against this mindset.
I'm a huge MonPoc fan, and I'm thrilled that the line is doing well (the stuff they showed at L&L was great). I'm even looking forward to their new Warcasters game, and I may even try out Riot Quest - but Warmachine is basically dead to me (and a lot of other people).
Im sorry that is simply untrue. It has gone through some testing times after the release of Mk3 but much of that has been fixed. PP as a company has also done well with MonPoc and they have announced another full wargame is coming net year. Hardly the moves of a company that is in toruble.
just ignore the demons behind the curtain, no End Times here...
Im sorry that is simply untrue. It has gone through some testing times after the release of Mk3 but much of that has been fixed. PP as a company has also done well with MonPoc and they have announced another full wargame is coming net year. Hardly the moves of a company that is in toruble.
There's evidence that warmachine is doing poorly, at the very least it has dried up in a lot of areas based on fb posts. Also not a good sign that the value of the miniatures has plummeted and don't forget about the mystery boxes. It's odd because it's such a better tournament game than 40k. Anyone with delusions about 40ks "strategy" would get a lot more out of wm.
Sqorgar wrote: The tournament mindset is what essentially destroyed that game, inside and out, and one of the major reasons why I rail against this mindset.
That's hilarious because WM/H was, from day one, intended to be a tournament game and marketed heavily to that audience. Did you also complain about how the "tournament mindset" is destroying the game while WM/H was growing and thriving, or did you save that complaint hoping that it would eventually (as most games do) decline and suddenly you could use it as an example in your anti-tournament crusade?
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ArbitorIan wrote: In what way are GW ‘focused’ on tournaments and pickup games, any more than they are on kids in their bedrooms or narrative gaming?
Their games are all designed to support games against random strangers with minimal preparation beyond choosing a point level and mission type. Army construction is exclusively with a generic point system where each player is free to independently choose their force up to an equal point limit, missions are designed to work with any pairing of armies, the basic structure of the game involves each player taking sole responsibility for their rules/models/etc and does not involve a third-party DM or game host or whatever providing a set to play with, etc. GW may accept that they will sell to people with other approaches to the game, but all of their major products are designed to support tournament/pickup style gaming. And none of their core products involve Sqorgar's vision of the "future" of the hobby.
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Sqorgar wrote: GW isn't making all that money on models.
Uh, sure, GW's various license deals are totally more important than the models and would exist if GW stopped selling the miniatures games...
Most releases include that Three Ways to Play thing, so are of value to non-competitive players as well - certainly to the point where it is impossible to say that competitive or non-competitive players are the primary purchasers of any one product.
A token mention of a "third way to play" that consists of what, a single paragraph of content, is not genuinely targeting a market. The full extent of GW's marketing to that group is to acknowledge that they're allowed to play the game, their real efforts are focused almost exclusively on pickup/tournament style gaming. And why wouldn't they? That's where the money is, a person who plays pickup games in a game store is a far more valuable customer than one who plays a kitchen table campaign with one friend.
And by the way, Asmodee North America's annual revenue is $500 million (and it is all kitchen tabletop gaming), so shut up.
Talking about FFG's parent company, which mostly exists in the board game industry, as if it is relevant to miniatures games is rather dishonest.
ArbitorIan wrote: In what way are GW ‘focused’ on tournaments and pickup games, any more than they are on kids in their bedrooms or narrative gaming?
Their games are all designed to support games against random strangers with minimal preparation beyond choosing a point level and mission type. Army construction is exclusively with a generic point system where each player is free to independently choose their force up to an equal point limit, missions are designed to work with any pairing of armies, the basic structure of the game involves each player taking sole responsibility for their rules/models/etc and does not involve a third-party DM or game host or whatever providing a set to play with, etc. GW may accept that they will sell to people with other approaches to the game, but all of their major products are designed to support tournament/pickup style gaming.
Um... pretty much all of those things have been part of the game since before American pickup game culture OR wargame tournaments existed. They’re also all elements that are really good ideas in a game that involves a huge range of models, which either player can pick and choose from and frequently add to (which is their core business model). They’re not designed for tournaments any more than they’re designed to fit their business model of selling individual units of toy soldiers. After all, the majority of their customers don’t play tournaments.
GW may accept that they also sell to people with other approaches to the game, but all their major products are designed so that frequent, repeat customers can add new models to armies at will. Everything you suggested supports that model.
Part of the problem is that "competitive" 40k is basically all listbuilding, with little or no actual strategy despite the competitive 40k people lauding the game for its "tactical depth". Most of that depth is what unit to pick and what to attack, very little in the way of real strategy yet somehow people seem to claim it has so much skill involved.
I have now read a lot of things trying to make 40k into an e-sport with paid sponsorships and the ability to get a living wage by playing it. This mindset is so far away from what wargaming is meant to be that it's like trying to prove the world is flat against all proof otherwise.
The funny think is that competitive 40k insists on a single format, with only a few quirks like Highlander (one of each). It would be neat to see a fixed format, for example, like the organisers hand out a standardised competitive list and players bring models for the list for that army.
Wayniac wrote: Part of the problem is that "competitive" 40k is basically all listbuilding, with little or no actual strategy despite the competitive 40k people lauding the game for its "tactical depth". Most of that depth is what unit to pick and what to attack, very little in the way of real strategy yet somehow people seem to claim it has so much skill involved.
I have now read a lot of things trying to make 40k into an e-sport with paid sponsorships and the ability to get a living wage by playing it. This mindset is so far away from what wargaming is meant to be that it's like trying to prove the world is flat against all proof otherwise.
Try playing something other then ITC missions,
The latest CA for example.
heck, go wild. Play Maelstrom.
Wayniac wrote: Part of the problem is that "competitive" 40k is basically all listbuilding, with little or no actual strategy despite the competitive 40k people lauding the game for its "tactical depth". Most of that depth is what unit to pick and what to attack, very little in the way of real strategy yet somehow people seem to claim it has so much skill involved.
I have now read a lot of things trying to make 40k into an e-sport with paid sponsorships and the ability to get a living wage by playing it. This mindset is so far away from what wargaming is meant to be that it's like trying to prove the world is flat against all proof otherwise.
Try playing something other then ITC missions,
The latest CA for example.
heck, go wild. Play Maelstrom.
Something something only ITC is balanced for competitive play.
Wayniac wrote: Part of the problem is that "competitive" 40k is basically all listbuilding, with little or no actual strategy despite the competitive 40k people lauding the game for its "tactical depth". Most of that depth is what unit to pick and what to attack, very little in the way of real strategy yet somehow people seem to claim it has so much skill involved.
I have now read a lot of things trying to make 40k into an e-sport with paid sponsorships and the ability to get a living wage by playing it. This mindset is so far away from what wargaming is meant to be that it's like trying to prove the world is flat against all proof otherwise.
Do you play competitive? How often? It sounds like you don't. There is a lot of decision making that goes into winning an ITC mission. I am at a GT right now, just finished day 1 and got back to my hotel room. Game 1 I lost, 22-23. My opponent made an inordinate amount of saves that really helped him win the game, but I am the one who lost it, choosing to try to use my smash captain to kill some Kataphrons, banking on them failing enough 5++ saves to die. I only killed 6 after spending all my CP to do it, partially because of bad rolls, but partially because I took a huge risk and should have focused fire elsewhere and using the copious amounts of terrain to block LOS to my Knights. It was a close game, with minor tactical mistakes like that costing me the game.
Game 2, I also lost, 26-30... I saw a chance to charge and kill some Tankbustas with my Knights so I took it... and it left me open to a counter charge from the Orks next turn and I lost a Knight. I should have done the smart thing, which would have been to charge the Tankbustas with my Infantry, to tie them up for another turn, while I focus on the 90 other Ork boys bearing down on me. Another tactical error, cost me the game.
Game 3, vs Custodes jetbike spam. I won, because my opponent rushed in and tried to just yolo into my Knights with 15 jetbikes. He killed pask, 2 Knights, and a smash captain, but Custodes are an army that requires finesse... running headlong into a meatgrider with Knights isn't a winning tactic with them...
Then there are tactics based on what secondaries you pick, what secondaries your opponent picks, what the terrain is, what the deployment is, etc. I find ITC matches to be extremely tactically demanding. Yes, listbuilding is important. But it's only part of the game.
Wayniac wrote: Part of the problem is that "competitive" 40k is basically all listbuilding, with little or no actual strategy despite the competitive 40k people lauding the game for its "tactical depth". Most of that depth is what unit to pick and what to attack, very little in the way of real strategy yet somehow people seem to claim it has so much skill involved.
I have now read a lot of things trying to make 40k into an e-sport with paid sponsorships and the ability to get a living wage by playing it. This mindset is so far away from what wargaming is meant to be that it's like trying to prove the world is flat against all proof otherwise.
Do you play competitive? How often? It sounds like you don't. There is a lot of decision making that goes into winning an ITC mission. I am at a GT right now, just finished day 1 and got back to my hotel room. Game 1 I lost, 22-23. My opponent made an inordinate amount of saves that really helped him win the game, but I am the one who lost it, choosing to try to use my smash captain to kill some Kataphrons, banking on them failing enough 5++ saves to die. I only killed 6 after spending all my CP to do it, partially because of bad rolls, but partially because I took a huge risk and should have focused fire elsewhere and using the copious amounts of terrain to block LOS to my Knights. It was a close game, with minor tactical mistakes like that costing me the game.
Game 2, I also lost, 26-30... I saw a chance to charge and kill some Tankbustas with my Knights so I took it... and it left me open to a counter charge from the Orks next turn and I lost a Knight. I should have done the smart thing, which would have been to charge the Tankbustas with my Infantry, to tie them up for another turn, while I focus on the 90 other Ork boys bearing down on me. Another tactical error, cost me the game.
Game 3, vs Custodes jetbike spam. I won, because my opponent rushed in and tried to just yolo into my Knights with 15 jetbikes. He killed pask, 2 Knights, and a smash captain, but Custodes are an army that requires finesse... running headlong into a meatgrider with Knights isn't a winning tactic with them...
Then there are tactics based on what secondaries you pick, what secondaries your opponent picks, what the terrain is, what the deployment is, etc. I find ITC matches to be extremely tactically demanding. Yes, listbuilding is important. But it's only part of the game.
The three examples you gave are all picking what to attack and which target to attack it with, which is what he said...
It involves positioning models to attack things. I lost my smash captain and blew way too much CP on him in game one. In game 2, I was baited into getting my Knights too close to an ork charge. In game 3, my opponent moved all his custodes into the open where all my Knights could see them to try to one shot my army in a single turn before I could kill him.
Yes, my 3 examples involved just picking where to move models and what to shoot... but that's literally the entire game. You can't just easily dismiss "just move and shoot things right" as non tactical choices.
Its tactical. But games of checkers can also be tactical.
If you want a deeper game, 40k is not it. Nor is competitive 40k. Indeed competitive or plain 40k is primarily about listbuilding and then target priority. Maneuvering into position can pedantically be called into play but in a game where things can move as fast as they can move, and can move in whatever direction they want with no facing concerns, movement in 40k is very shallow as far as tactical depth is concerned, which is compounded by there being almost no terrain rules that are meaningful.
And thats ok. It caters to what it caters to.
The problem comes when your entire community will only play 40k because everyone else plays 40k. Then you get the annoyance and negative commentary.
To touch back on the original question, I can see some competitive players being salty and angry towards casual or non tournament players for insisting that the game is nothing but an exercise in listbuilding, and that tactical choices in the game are not very important next to just bringing a strong list. Unless you regularly attend ITC events and generally do quite well, I don't particularly value your opinion on the complexity of competitive 40k. I find it to be complicated. Maybe I'm just dumb.
I spent 10 years playing GT level 40k and whfb. I traveled the country going to the various GTs and was highly competitive at both games.
Its still the least complicated tabletop game I have ever played and the keys to winning were being good at min/maxing your spreadsheet coefficients to get the most mathematical juice out of each point, and target priority. If you could do both of those things, you were pretty golden.
Take a step back from 40k and play some other games to get a better understanding of what some people are talking about in terms of 40k's lack of depth.
Also note lack of depth is not the same as bad game. It just means that the number of meaningful decisions is pretty small.
Yes, my 3 examples involved just picking where to move models and what to shoot... but that's literally the entire game. You can't just easily dismiss "just move and shoot things right" as non tactical choices.
That's kind of the point. The game is tactically shallow because, by your own admission, it's all about "just move and shoot things". Even within that fairly wide definition of the game the decision trees involved are very simplistic. Other games have many other factors to consider outside of "what do I want to kill". To give 3 examples from other games I know well enough to comment on:
1. WM/H involves relatively short ranges and fairly short movement distances. Positioning your units to maximise damage and minimise risk is a non-trivial skill due to the fact you can't generally put units exactly where you want and shoot/charge whatever you want. You also need to be aware of the mission parameters at all times as instant victories are possible. Terrain has proper rules and influences the movement and shooting of most units in the game. Units tend to be quite specialised in what they are good against so it's possible to be caught out quite badly if you deploy or position units incorrectly. 40k's extremely long ranges and extremely fast movement speeds almost completely negate most of these decisions. Knights are the perfect example - they're a unit with effectively infinite range guns given the size of the table, they have very fast movement speed and are impossible to pin down in combat while simultaneously being very dangerous in close combat. They involve basically no decision making at all other than "what do I want to shoot".
2. X-Wing involves movement decisions based on hidden information and resource management in the form of actions that allow you to buff your units for a round. Each round you'll have to try to out-think your opponent in the planning phase by predicting where they want to move and formulating a plan to counter that, all while not actually knowing which move they are planning. You also have to think about whether to spend tokens offensively or defensively at different times. The uncertain nature of the movement further affects target priority. You may want to shoot specific ship but you've got a perfect opportunity to damage or maybe even kill another, which you may not get again due to the nature of the movement system.
3. Epic. The alternating activation system, combined with the blast marker system and the difficulty involved in completely killing enemy units makes for a very deep game. There are usually pros and cons to every decision and the standard mission encourages aggressive play without making to the only way to play. Units are generally very specialised, or mediocre at both AT and AP duties, and ranges are meaningfully short for the most part. Different units are used for different roles and its important to have a mix of these for success. Titans are very scary, for example, but the system allows opponents to completely ignore them if they want as their destructive power may not be enough to influence the game on its own. Co-ordinating formations in assault is a real skill and acts as a force multiplier that rewards careful planning and execution.
I think one of the main things that separates out these games from 40k is how unpredictable they can be. While there are still patterns of play for all armies/squadrons/warbands in any game, I can play the same game of Epic or X-Wing with the same forces on identical tables and end up with very different games as a result, Why? Because my opponent's decisions meaningfully change the way I play and because I can change the way I play without it being detrimental to me because there are many, many different ways to utilise the forces at my disposal. Compare that to 40k, where the pattern of play in the first turn for a given army is almost always fixed. This is down to a whole host of factors but mainly due to very long weapon ranges meaning many weapons always have range to what they want to shoot, fast movement speeds allowing units to get where they want to go easily and non-functional terrain rules not menainfgully hampering either of those things. Additionally, things like Stratagems involve no real decision-making or even CP management since 40k vastly rewards front-loaded damage in the first 1-2 turns. There's no reason not to use the "shoot twice" stratagem, for example, or the "extra damage" stratagem for your given army. Psychic powers are the same. There's very little interaction in the psychic phase. You pick your powers and cast them without any decisions from your opponent beyond "I'd like to stop that one" but the shallow system means there's no tactics involved beyond that.
So yes, 40k is very shallow compared to other games, mainly due to the fact it really is just about picking where to move and what to shoot, because those two decisions don't have enough restrictions applied to them to make either require sufficient trade-offs. That's not to say it's a terrible game in general. I think between two armies that aren't fully optimised tournament lists it can be an enjoyable experience and I think it provides a decent framework for creating a more rewarding and enjoyable game. The background is also a huge draw and the spectacle of two well-painted armies clashing on the tabletop is very impressive. It's a social experience. It's artistic and creative. What it isn't is tactically deep.
Um... pretty much all of those things have been part of the game since before American pickup game culture OR wargame tournaments existed. They’re also all elements that are really good ideas in a game that involves a huge range of models, which either player can pick and choose from and frequently add to (which is their core business model). They’re not designed for tournaments any more than they’re designed to fit their business model of selling individual units of toy soldiers. After all, the majority of their customers don’t play tournaments.
GW may accept that they also sell to people with other approaches to the game, but all their major products are designed so that frequent, repeat customers can add new models to armies at will. Everything you suggested supports that model.
.
I think it's fairer to say they can support games against random strangers with minimal preparation (i.e. Pick up games) etc, rather than stating it's designed to support it. The writers at gw often come from the 'traditional' school of thought, which often does involve, if not co-operation, at the very least collaboration. They can also support narrative games, tournaments, campaigns, and whatever else. I think it's fairer to say gw intend it to be an open-ended game, and leave the specifics up to the players and how they want to approach their games, rather than anything else and claiming 'well my way of playing is obviously what they intended, and anything else is an unfortunate bonus' - that's just projection d confirmation bias,in my mind.
Another point to consider is the rise of boxed/boardgames in the industry over the last few years and how this has changed things. Speaking to retail (one of my buddies is a manager at a national chain of game stores), you get the impression that these sell better, have greeter market penetration and better sales margins. Stores definitely have a preference for these - boxed games have a wider audience than collectible army games, and anecdotally, quite a few of my friends, especially the older one have a preference for the boxed/board game these days to the tabletop game. Game design has been drifting more and more to a 'hybrid' model that exists in a space somewhere between what we regard as a more traditional wargames and 'boardgames out of a box'. It's getting to the stage where the traditional walls between these distinct types of games are blurring, or even disappearing.
Gw have not been idle or ignorant of this, and have also jumped on the 'boxed/board game' wagon - betrayal at calth, burning of prospero, blackstone fortress, rogue trader, bloodbowl, lost patrol, shadespire/underworlds, titanicus, heck even necromunda to a large extent. I remember reading that a large part of what kept gw up a few years ago with the debacle of the Aos launch was betrayal at calth, almost on its own - by all accounts, bac was a monstrous success. I don't know if this means the game was excellent (never met anyone who played it) or if people were just happy to see a really good discount (to be fair. I've bought 2 bac boxes for this reason) on their wardollies. Regardless, gw have diversified into this direction in addition to their traditional 'big two', and a lot of their old specialist games seem to have found a home here, as well as new releases. I think any talk on gw's continued success should also consider this, at the very least rather than just state there's more 40k tournaments, therefore more 40k tournament players therefore competitive 40k is driving gw's success. I know, from my perspective, as well as a better social media presence, communication, and some awesome models (primaris got me back into 40k on their own), I find these games more appealing than 'traditional' 40k. I know with the guys I play with, our favourite game last year was probably shadespire/underworlds, and blackstone fortress is going down an absolute storm at the moment (2 strongholds conquered, we're getting ready to raid the third soon). Next wanted game? Necromunda. Tournaments? Meh.
The main problem with competitive 40k is that it requires a completely different mindset than what gets presented virtually everywhere else. GW focuses on the spectacle of the armies, and how you should pick an army/units based on the background, what you think is cool, etc. and it's pretty clear that's how the studio approaches the game internally.
Competitive play requires you to completely separate the background from the game and approaches the game as only a game in a void. You don't give a damn about the background or the source material (despite that being probably the only good part about 40k, as the rules are pretty awful), or really anything else other than "how good is this" and your typical competitive army barely looks like anything even remotely resembling how the army is presented in the books. Very much like how you barely meet anyone who plays Magic who knows or cares about the lore, despite there being a pretty rich background to the game. It's just totally ignored because the game is a game first, and everything else second.
That, I think, is the hardest part to get in. It seems to me that most competitive 40k players seem to have come to 40k either from other competitive games (e.g. Magic, not necessarily wargames) or play 40k just because it's the most popular game, rather than actually being invested in the game for its rich source material, since I would guess people who came to 40k many years ago for its cool background would be less inclined to throw it away (which is exactly the problem I have).
In other games, I had no issue with it. I played WM/H and didn't give a gak about the background (and some of it was pretty good) when I was playing the game: The game was completely independent of its lore. With 40k though, the background is what attracted me, and to this day it feels "dirty" to do things like mix in some Tzeentch daemons just for a cheap battalion with a primarily Nurgle force (because I remember a time when that wasn't allowed at worst, or at best your group would consider you a douchebag for crapping over the background if you did it) or just take little bits and pieces from various forces without anything to really tie them together.
Not Online!!! wrote: Comparativley speaking auticus, what do you think is a better Wargame then?
I am just curious.
Saga, battletech, bolt action, infinity, kings of war, 6th ed whfb, , dba, warmaster, epic, warlords of nowhere, lord of the rings/middle earth, adeptus titanicus, squad leader. To name some ive played most of my life or throughout their lifespan.
Im not a fan of wm/h but would agree it too is deeper, though was one of the first games to begin the whole deckbuilding game as a “wargame” that 40k and aos became.
My first two years doing gt play i played eldar (3rd ed) and won 99% of my games solely because of my list and everyone rlse played marines almost exclusively. I won a bunch of rtts and placed high at gt with leaf blower IG ... because of my list. The list and pucking targets was the main skill then and is the main skill today.
Wayniac wrote: Part of the problem is that "competitive" 40k is basically all listbuilding, with little or no actual strategy despite the competitive 40k people lauding the game for its "tactical depth". Most of that depth is what unit to pick and what to attack, very little in the way of real strategy yet somehow people seem to claim it has so much skill involved.
I have now read a lot of things trying to make 40k into an e-sport with paid sponsorships and the ability to get a living wage by playing it. This mindset is so far away from what wargaming is meant to be that it's like trying to prove the world is flat against all proof otherwise.
Try playing something other then ITC missions,
The latest CA for example.
heck, go wild. Play Maelstrom.
CA is even more list buildy. ITC is all about stopping the, say, tau gunline from winning the game because there's no effective LOS blocking terrain terrain and they just tabled you in one turn.
Wayniac wrote: Part of the problem is that "competitive" 40k is basically all listbuilding, with little or no actual strategy despite the competitive 40k people lauding the game for its "tactical depth". Most of that depth is what unit to pick and what to attack, very little in the way of real strategy yet somehow people seem to claim it has so much skill involved.
I have now read a lot of things trying to make 40k into an e-sport with paid sponsorships and the ability to get a living wage by playing it. This mindset is so far away from what wargaming is meant to be that it's like trying to prove the world is flat against all proof otherwise.
Try playing something other then ITC missions,
The latest CA for example.
heck, go wild. Play Maelstrom.
CA is even more list buildy. ITC is all about stopping the, say, tau gunline from winning the game because there's no effective LOS blocking terrain terrain and they just tabled you in one turn.
This I don't agree with, ITC focuses on list building more than anything else I've seen. CA has its gimmicks, Maelstrom is entire gimmick so it's harder to build a list around because you may get the mission that you didn't prep for. ITC you know exactly what to do since all the missions (this might have changed with the last Champions missions set but it was true before) are essentially identical other than where objectives get placed, so you don't have to even think of the mission changing what your goals are to win.
I personally do not play 40k any longer and sold all of my stuff off over the last couple of years. I get why people do play it though, largely because its the only game in existence where you know whatever city you travel to there will be a 40k group for you to play in so your investment will not get wasted.
Unlike pretty much every other game where you are risking having a model collection sitting around and not getting to use it.
I'd guess its like auticus said, it may be a wonky game but its often the only game in town, also, at least in the UK, outside of larger cities, a lot play is done at clubs so the social element plays a part
If you want to play something else, then do the work and build the community to support it.
To paraphrase Blade, you have an easier time trying to ice-skate uphill.
I've tried several times to get the "other game" going on and given up every single time when people just were not willing to put the effort in and/or saw I was bringing both armies so saw no reason to invest in it. Eventually we got an FLGS in our city so interest for non-GW things picked up slightly but even then people were not interested and only wanted to play Tragic the Saddening. I was glad when GW did a hard reboot on 40k and I've not played many games but it was not through lack of trying (another victim of MTG. 40k of all things...), but looking at how 8th has been twisted and abused and some of the abominations of "armies" that rear their heads I'm kinda glad I'm not actively playing at times.
Um... pretty much all of those things have been part of the game since before American pickup game culture OR wargame tournaments existed. They’re also all elements that are really good ideas in a game that involves a huge range of models, which either player can pick and choose from and frequently add to (which is their core business model). They’re not designed for tournaments any more than they’re designed to fit their business model of selling individual units of toy soldiers. After all, the majority of their customers don’t play tournaments.
GW may accept that they also sell to people with other approaches to the game, but all their major products are designed so that frequent, repeat customers can add new models to armies at will. Everything you suggested supports that model.
.
I think it's fairer to say they can support games against random strangers with minimal preparation (i.e. Pick up games) etc, rather than stating it's designed to support it. The writers at gw often come from the 'traditional' school of thought, which often does involve, if not co-operation, at the very least collaboration. They can also support narrative games, tournaments, campaigns, and whatever else. I think it's fairer to say gw intend it to be an open-ended game, and leave the specifics up to the players and how they want to approach their games, rather than anything else and claiming 'well my way of playing is obviously what they intended, and anything else is an unfortunate bonus' - that's just projection d confirmation bias,in my mind.
Oh yeah, I totally agree. This was in response to Peregrine’s claim that GW games are ‘designed’ specifically for tournaments and pickup games. My point was like yours - they’re designed to be flexible, and one of the ways that CAN be played is, say, pickup games.
The boar game market is really interesting. I think that board games have become such a big market (and a much more mainstream one) that moving ‘sideways’ into that industry is a really good way of GW moving their game more into the mainstream and hopefully attracting more adult players.
I remember at my last job a few years back the game director and I were trying to get a few of the designers into 40k since and he and I were long time fans who decided to come back after hearing about 8th edition shaking things up. Everyone picked their factions and put their armies together and even got most of them fully painted before we sat down and scheduled a few intro games after work. After one or two games, both new players (both professional game designers) immediately grasped that:
1. A game of 40k is largely decided in the list-building phase
2. The optimal configuration for a given faction will always be drawn from an highly limited pool of units
3. The optimal game plan for a given list will nearly always be identical every time you play
So of the two new players, one guy lost his first game, studied his faction, came back a few weeks later, executed his faction's best combo, won, and then completely lost interest. The other guy was more enthusiastic about the physical spectacle, and while the game itself didn't capture him, he wanted to give it a chance and finish painting his army first... to "experience the feeling of playing with a fully painted army." In the end, that wasn't enough either.
The really unfortunate thing about the design of 40k is that the thing it asks you to do to win a game is almost completely separate and isolated from the initial promises of fun it makes to draw you in. 40k says to a new player, "Hey check out these cool models, you'll have fun choosing whatever you want, mixing/matching units to suit your unique, individual playstyle and then laying them out on the tabletop." But a new player quickly learns that isn't the case and that to win they're only allowed to do one thing and one thing only. Or at most a very limited handful of things.
For people who want deep alignment between the most enjoyable/advertised parts of the game and the thing the game design asks you to do in order to win, this is a huge problem.
I have been an event organizer for 20 odd years. I do build the events for the other games.
Problem is why invest in saga or bolt action even if people consider them better when at any time my investment gets nullified by no one wanting to show up?
Meanwhile my groups 40k narrative regularly pulls over 30 people and our aos has 20.
The gw games are not played for their deep and tactical rules, they are invested in and played because everyone else plays and youre money is relatively safe.
Crimson Devil wrote: So you guys have determined that 40k is a shallow and badly written game with few redeeming values.
Why do you play? 40k sounds like a horrible waste of time.
For all the reasons I set out at the end of my post a few up from this one. I still like the background and the models, the social aspect is appealing and the group I play with aren't trying to play 40k as a cut-throat competitive event so we can get enjoyable games without hyper-optimised lists. We all mostly have at least 2 different armies each so we can vary what we bring, which helps keep things fresh too. It's also one of only 2-3 wargames you can consistently play in my area, which possibly helps with overlooking many of the flaws.
I think the fact we've largely accepted the game is pretty shallow and completely unsuited to competitive play actually helps us enjoy it more than we otherwise would because we no what to expect and what not to expect from our games.
auticus wrote: I have been an event organizer for 20 odd years. I do build the events for the other games.
Problem is why invest in saga or bolt action even if people consider them better when at any time my investment gets nullified by no one wanting to show up?
Meanwhile my groups 40k narrative regularly pulls over 30 people and our aos has 20.
The gw games are not played for their deep and tactical rules, they are invested in and played because everyone else plays and youre money is relatively safe.
I think I'd do something else before I played a game just because everyone else was playing, seems like you'd be wasting time/forcing yourself. It's possible to be critical of 40ks rules from a competitive perspective and still enjoy the game.
Crimson Devil wrote: So you guys have determined that 40k is a shallow and badly written game with few redeeming values.
Why do you play? 40k sounds like a horrible waste of time.
MOD. THAT. gak.
Going through digital copies of my old WD back catalogue (and some on either side of that) I'd forgotten just how often both the WD crew and the actual game designers would throw the traditional rules out of the window to make a different style of game. Many of the campaigns they produced articles for essentially advocated some variation of "ignore all these elements of the main game and do this instead", almost always centred around the list construction phase oddly enough, almost like a tacit admission that the base list building system was horribly broken a lot of the time and would produce gakky games. There's plenty of WD articles for WHFB for example that basically advocate taking only lvl 1 or 2 wizards, no monsterous creatures, limits on war machines, no characters above hero level and a cap on magic items across the whole army (usually 100 or so), often followed by carefully worded statements that can be paraphrased as "you'll find this more fun".
I don't play that much 40k anymore, but normally when I do it's a bastardised version of 2nd edition (complete CC over haul, unless it's a smallish game) with enough house rules that it practically qualifies as its own edition, played using custom(ish) missions. This is one of the reasons I don't understand the tournament mindset of using basically a very narrow, fairly generic mission set and letting people choose some of their own objectives etc. The easiest and fastest way to stop people trying to exploit certain broken combos or negative styles of play is to use mission variety to severely punish people whose lists are designed to do things like just sitting in a corner of the table (we have a custom mission for example called Over The Top, which basically involves you carrying out a WW1 style attack across the battlefield. You sit in your deployment zone and you WILL lose).
This is part of the problem with 40K. It has a base rule set so that two random people can meet up and play a game using an agreed set of principles, such as the army lists. This version of the game does that incredibly poorly and is overall an unsatisfying experience. So why do I care? Because I'd like to be able to play more games with people outside of just a small group of friends. And we shouldn't have to fall back on a heavily modded older version of the game with a bunch of custom made missions to have any fun with it.
auticus wrote: I have been an event organizer for 20 odd years. I do build the events for the other games.
Problem is why invest in saga or bolt action even if people consider them better when at any time my investment gets nullified by no one wanting to show up?
Meanwhile my groups 40k narrative regularly pulls over 30 people and our aos has 20.
The gw games are not played for their deep and tactical rules, they are invested in and played because everyone else plays and youre money is relatively safe.
I think I'd do something else before I played a game just because everyone else was playing, seems like you'd be wasting time/forcing yourself. It's possible to be critical of 40ks rules from a competitive perspective and still enjoy the game.
The problem seem to be is they can't enjoy the game because other people are playing it wrong.
I bet most tournament players don't realize they have this power over them.
If you want to play something else, then do the work and build the community to support it.
To paraphrase Blade, you have an easier time trying to ice-skate uphill.
I've tried several times to get the "other game" going on and given up every single time when people just were not willing to put the effort in and/or saw I was bringing both armies so saw no reason to invest in it. Eventually we got an FLGS in our city so interest for non-GW things picked up slightly but even then people were not interested and only wanted to play Tragic the Saddening. I was glad when GW did a hard reboot on 40k and I've not played many games but it was not through lack of trying (another victim of MTG. 40k of all things...), but looking at how 8th has been twisted and abused and some of the abominations of "armies" that rear their heads I'm kinda glad I'm not actively playing at times.
It's not easy, but it is doable. I've succeeded several times, and had some spectacular failure. You never know which games will stick, but I can tell you card players are a bad fit for miniatures war games.
Crimson Devil wrote: So you guys have determined that 40k is a shallow and badly written game with few redeeming values.
Why do you play? 40k sounds like a horrible waste of time.
I did largely stop playing 40k. But apoc rules at their core are really good, though the faction to faction and unit to unit balance is off. Like I’d be happy to see competitive 40k turn into competitive apoc, but 40k is too well established these days
I continue to play 40K because the community is more vibrant, so even if I play other mini games more regularly I will always make sure I have at least one 40K army on hand. I also continue to enjoy 40K because I find GW's world building in that respect to be top class. Its easy to get excited about 40K based on the fluff alone, and in a casual setting it can be a lot of fun to put my Emperor's Children on the table and have a battle with them. Its exciting to bring the fluff alive on the table.
That said, I agree with others that 40K is much poorer in terms of actual gameplay compared to other games I play;
Bolt Action adds random activation and a detailed moral and pinning system that forces players to constantly adapt to changing circumstances. The problem with Bolt Action is that while the community is growing, it is more fragmented and can be difficult to get games in. Also WW2 is great, but sometimes you just have a Sci Fi itch that Bolt Action cannot satisfy.
Malifaux adds alternating activations, is a skrimish game with far more model to model interactions, and is heavily objective focused, taking some of the pressure off of generic "kill them all" style lists that plague many other systems. Malifaux has been suffering a decline in active players during the later parts of 2E. Third Edition has just released last month, so it will be interesting to see if the community can build up steam.
Freeblades is a really small skrimish game. It is very well designed and I have enjoyed it a lot. It has a very very small community though, although I am lucky to have a pocket of players near me that are dead set on building a community out here. (Which is how I got in in the first place).
To those saying that "you should just build a community" for games you like... that is pretty unrealistic. Most of us have "Jobs" or "School / University" or "children" which are major time commitments. Building a community of any type and organizing events and tournaments is a big time commitment and requires dogged consistency as well. Many wargamers just don't have time to build a community from scratch. So we pick up armies that feature in the local we play in.
auticus wrote: Be that as it may that is the #1 cited reason why people keep buying in. Because they can always get a game.
This is so true.
But I will say that 40K is often played "sloppily", and will result in the sort of game that relies on going first with a gunline and doing crippling damage before the opponent can get out of the gate. Or the list building matchups where one army is just either flatly superior, or a hard-counter to the other army. However, the experience of the game can be heavily adjusted with terrain, missions or game-size, without even modifying any rules. So you can do the customization necessary to get a different experience if you want to, and having such a large player pool means you're more likely able to convince others to go along with a few adjustments.
I like playing 40k both casually and in tournaments. I also like the game. It scratches a particular itch for me and I get buggy if I don't play it enough. I think if I could discover the secret ingredient I'd bottle and sell it.
Crimson Devil wrote: So you guys have determined that 40k is a shallow and badly written game with few redeeming values.
Why do you play? 40k sounds like a horrible waste of time.
MOD. THAT. gak.
Going through digital copies of my old WD back catalogue (and some on either side of that) I'd forgotten just how often both the WD crew and the actual game designers would throw the traditional rules out of the window to make a different style of game. Many of the campaigns they produced articles for essentially advocated some variation of "ignore all these elements of the main game and do this instead", almost always centred around the list construction phase oddly enough, almost like a tacit admission that the base list building system was horribly broken a lot of the time and would produce gakky games. There's plenty of WD articles for WHFB for example that basically advocate taking only lvl 1 or 2 wizards, no monsterous creatures, limits on war machines, no characters above hero level and a cap on magic items across the whole army (usually 100 or so), often followed by carefully worded statements that can be paraphrased as "you'll find this more fun".
I used to like reading those bat reps as much as playing the game back then, my favorite part of the mag, with al the pics and counters and arrows showing movement and interviews after each match. Man, that was the shizzle...
I don't play that much 40k anymore, but normally when I do it's a bastardised version of 2nd edition (complete CC over haul, unless it's a smallish game) with enough house rules that it practically qualifies as its own edition, played using custom(ish) missions. This is one of the reasons I don't understand the tournament mindset of using basically a very narrow, fairly generic mission set and letting people choose some of their own objectives etc. The easiest and fastest way to stop people trying to exploit certain broken combos or negative styles of play is to use mission variety to severely punish people whose lists are designed to do things like just sitting in a corner of the table (we have a custom mission for example called Over The Top, which basically involves you carrying out a WW1 style attack across the battlefield. You sit in your deployment zone and you WILL lose).
This is part of the problem with 40K. It has a base rule set so that two random people can meet up and play a game using an agreed set of principles, such as the army lists. This version of the game does that incredibly poorly and is overall an unsatisfying experience. So why do I care? Because I'd like to be able to play more games with people outside of just a small group of friends. And we shouldn't have to fall back on a heavily modded older version of the game with a bunch of custom made missions to have any fun with it.
I wish I had the peeps and the time, cuz this sounds right.
I was so hoping that so-called 8th ed would do something this smart, but instead AO$ified it.
The tourble has been the CCG player base influence, plus declining attention in both target market and design mindset, imho.
slave.entity wrote: I remember at my last job a few years back the game director and I were trying to get a few of the designers into 40k since and he and I were long time fans who decided to come back after hearing about 8th edition shaking things up. Everyone picked their factions and put their armies together and even got most of them fully painted before we sat down and scheduled a few intro games after work. After one or two games, both new players (both professional game designers) immediately grasped that:
1. A game of 40k is largely decided in the list-building phase
2. The optimal configuration for a given faction will always be drawn from an highly limited pool of units
3. The optimal game plan for a given list will nearly always be identical every time you play
I think they needed to play far more than a few games to better assess. New players are almost always going to get beaten, mostly because lack of skill and experience, like in anything else. Veteran players win, because of experience. And those with equal playing experience win on skill.
Also, my tourney experience disagrees with these conclusions.
#1? Largely? I would say from experience that it ought to be said in the same breath (or typed in the same paragraph) that 'list building' is a good chunk of winning, with some dice luck, but by far the larger portion of winning comes from player skill. Give me a top rated list, lemme get in 12 or so good practice games. Then give a top level GT player the same list, brand new to him, and I am going to lose because the player with the better skills will make better target priority decisions, keep objectives in focus, and simply win the game on skill. Give us both poor, awful lists, and we'll likely get the same results; I will lose.
As equals?
45% list building?
45% skill?
10% match up, terrain & dice luck?
46, 46, 8%?
49, 49 2%?
I think more like:
51 to 65% skill
48 to 34% list
the rest to match up, terrain & dice.
Approximately.
Yes, there is a sizable degree of list building involved in winning. If one shows up with only 2k worth a regular tactical squads (3e thru 5e, PFist Sgt, meltagun or plasmagun, ML/LasCan), and minimum HQs for the battalions, then yes, you're likely to lose against most other lists that show up at tourneys, unless the opponent is far more a chump than you.
I just find that too often in discussion here on dakka, that list building and GW's codex writing, are the scapegoats of players who don't do well at tourneys, or are unhappy with the game, and like to gripe and complain.
The data available from ITC shows that there are many more variations on lists that win, than in previous editions. That's a point that one might argue against, by saying, 'it is disingenuous because there are *more* codices and builds than ever', but I would re-counter "that as 8e gets older, we continue to see new, untried combos that do well" (not just evolution because of bi-annual FAQ/nerfs).
For example, Don Hooson (ITC, Calif) does well with unconventional lists: 3rd place this last BAO with Lords Discordant and Hell Turkeys, 1st place last year with a 'different' Plague Marine build that elicited much commentary on how unusual/not-previously-experienced it was).
For the many on this thread that are in the "list building is the main reason you win or lose" group, are you using BCP, BestCoastPairings? Are you looking at lists that place at top tables? I invite you to check those top table lists and those on down to the kiddie pool. See how many of Brandon Grant's long standing A.M., 6 to 9 BullGryn+Castellan+60 footer (does it have a name?) list there are at the big GTs that finish less than 50% W/L. See how well the dual Callidus/Forgeworld Custodes lists:
My opinion about listbuilding comes from having been a powergamer running the abusive lists for about 10 years. I thought I was hot ****.
So did all of my tournament mates that ran with me. We destroyed our casual community. We were likely "TFG".
I regularly placed in GTs in the top 20 and in whfb made it to a top 5 placing and a top 8 placing and have a trophy room with a dozen RTT eagles.
Take away my power lists though and my win/loss ratio drops to about 50/50.
My "awakening" came when a really good player beat my powerlist with an average list, not once... but twice in a row. I started questioning my own ability and then started taking weaker lists to improve my play.
That was when I discovered just how much of a crutch my list was.
And every-single-player that played with me, traveled across NA to GTs, had an identical experience. Take their powerlist away and they were by far not destroying people any longer. They'd win as much as they lost.
I have in 20 odd years run into about four or five individuals that were truly just great no matter what list they took. But those guys are very very rare. The majority of all powergamers, including myself, were reduced to shells of ourselves when not flaunting our mathhammer monstrosities.
Because math is a powerful force in this dice game and when you aren't stacking the odds in your favor, you find that you will succumb most of the time like even the filthy casuals because they are running the same tier of lists as you.
I have also noted over the past decade that the guys that do well with their math hammer monster lists in 40k and whfb/aos are only average at best at games that require table skill and don't lean on listbuilding as heavily.
auticus wrote: My opinion about listbuilding comes from having been a powergamer running the abusive lists for about 10 years. I thought I was hot ****.
Spoiler:
So did all of my tournament mates that ran with me. We destroyed our casual community. We were likely "TFG".
I regularly placed in GTs in the top 20 and in whfb made it to a top 5 placing and a top 8 placing and have a trophy room with a dozen RTT eagles.
Take away my power lists though and my win/loss ratio drops to about 50/50.
My "awakening" came when a really good player beat my powerlist with an average list, not once... but twice in a row. I started questioning my own ability and then started taking weaker lists to improve my play.
That was when I discovered just how much of a crutch my list was.
And every-single-player that played with me, traveled across NA to GTs, had an identical experience. Take their powerlist away and they were by far not destroying people any longer. They'd win as much as they lost.
I have in 20 odd years run into about four or five individuals that were truly just great no matter what list they took. But those guys are very very rare. The majority of all powergamers, including myself, were reduced to shells of ourselves when not flaunting our mathhammer monstrosities.
Because math is a powerful force in this dice game and when you aren't stacking the odds in your favor, you find that you will succumb most of the time like even the filthy casuals because they are running the same tier of lists as you.
I have also noted over the past decade that the guys that do well with their math hammer monster lists in 40k and whfb/aos are only average at best at games that require table skill and don't lean on listbuilding as heavily.
slave.entity wrote: I remember at my last job a few years back the game director and I were trying to get a few of the designers into 40k since and he and I were long time fans who decided to come back after hearing about 8th edition shaking things up. Everyone picked their factions and put their armies together and even got most of them fully painted before we sat down and scheduled a few intro games after work. After one or two games, both new players (both professional game designers) immediately grasped that:
1. A game of 40k is largely decided in the list-building phase
2. The optimal configuration for a given faction will always be drawn from an highly limited pool of units
3. The optimal game plan for a given list will nearly always be identical every time you play
I think they needed to play far more than a few games to better assess. New players are almost always going to get beaten, mostly because lack of skill and experience, like in anything else. Veteran players win, because of experience. And those with equal playing experience win on skill.
Also, my tourney experience disagrees with these conclusions.
#1? Largely? I would say from experience that it ought to be said in the same breath (or typed in the same paragraph) that 'list building' is a good chunk of winning, with some dice luck, but by far the larger portion of winning comes from player skill. Give me a top rated list, lemme get in 12 or so good practice games. Then give a top level GT player the same list, brand new to him, and I am going to lose because the player with the better skills will make better target priority decisions, keep objectives in focus, and simply win the game on skill. Give us both poor, awful lists, and we'll likely get the same results; I will lose.
As equals?
45% list building?
45% skill?
10% match up, terrain & dice luck?
46, 46, 8%?
49, 49 2%?
I think more like:
51 to 65% skill
48 to 34% list
the rest to match up, terrain & dice.
Approximately.
Yes, there is a sizable degree of list building involved in winning. If one shows up with only 2k worth a regular tactical squads (3e thru 5e, PFist Sgt, meltagun or plasmagun, ML/LasCan), and minimum HQs for the battalions, then yes, you're likely to lose against most other lists that show up at tourneys, unless the opponent is far more a chump than you.
I just find that too often in discussion here on dakka, that list building and GW's codex writing, are the scapegoats of players who don't do well at tourneys, or are unhappy with the game, and like to gripe and complain.
The data available from ITC shows that there are many more variations on lists that win, than in previous editions. That's a point that one might argue against, by saying, 'it is disingenuous because there are *more* codices and builds than ever', but I would re-counter "that as 8e gets older, we continue to see new, untried combos that do well" (not just evolution because of bi-annual FAQ/nerfs).
For example, Don Hooson (ITC, Calif) does well with unconventional lists: 3rd place this last BAO with Lords Discordant and Hell Turkeys, 1st place last year with a 'different' Plague Marine build that elicited much commentary on how unusual/not-previously-experienced it was).
For the many on this thread that are in the "list building is the main reason you win or lose" group, are you using BCP, BestCoastPairings? Are you looking at lists that place at top tables? I invite you to check those top table lists and those on down to the kiddie pool. See how many of Brandon Grant's long standing A.M., 6 to 9 BullGryn+Castellan+60 footer (does it have a name?) list there are at the big GTs that finish less than 50% W/L. See how well the dual Callidus/Forgeworld Custodes lists:
... actually do when in the hands of mediocre players who are not in the top 100 ITC scoring ranks.
40k doesn't have that many layers of gameplay/decision making. Again compared to warmachine which has list chicken, 3 separate win conditions, resource management in the form of focus/souls/corpses/etc, feats, themes, much shorter ranges that make positioning important, multiple formats, and for better or worse way more rules and abilities across models that interact and combo in an almost mtg like fashion. The game can be won or lost instantly from a lot of these and I'm certainly missing some. 40k is fun, I think it has the best setting and miniatures but I'd like to hear how anybody who has played in tournaments for both of these systems can think 40k isn't shallow by comparison.
auticus wrote: My opinion about listbuilding comes from having been a powergamer running the abusive lists for about 10 years. I thought I was hot ****.
So did all of my tournament mates that ran with me. We destroyed our casual community. We were likely "TFG".
I regularly placed in GTs in the top 20 and in whfb made it to a top 5 placing and a top 8 placing and have a trophy room with a dozen RTT eagles.
Take away my power lists though and my win/loss ratio drops to about 50/50.
My "awakening" came when a really good player beat my powerlist with an average list, not once... but twice in a row. I started questioning my own ability and then started taking weaker lists to improve my play.
That was when I discovered just how much of a crutch my list was.
And every-single-player that played with me, traveled across NA to GTs, had an identical experience. Take their powerlist away and they were by far not destroying people any longer. They'd win as much as they lost.
I have in 20 odd years run into about four or five individuals that were truly just great no matter what list they took. But those guys are very very rare. The majority of all powergamers, including myself, were reduced to shells of ourselves when not flaunting our mathhammer monstrosities.
Because math is a powerful force in this dice game and when you aren't stacking the odds in your favor, you find that you will succumb most of the time like even the filthy casuals because they are running the same tier of lists as you.
I have also noted over the past decade that the guys that do well with their math hammer monster lists in 40k and whfb/aos are only average at best at games that require table skill and don't lean on listbuilding as heavily.
This is why my opinion is colored the way it is.
OK... but by your own admission in this post then, a truly skilled player can beat a player with a monster meta list. Why not simply try to figure out why you lost, and modify how you play? If you can be beaten by someone who isn't powergaming with a meta list, then isn't he just better at the game than you, and it proves there is a component to this game beyond listbuilding? Yes, build a good list is a part of it. Two players of equal (or even nearly equal) skill will often have their match decided if one has a much better list than the other, but skill is definitely a factor.
Skill is generally speaking ONLY a real factor when the lists are of similar tiers/quality or a player is horrible with a strong list taking on a great player with a really bad list.,
A good player with a monster list will destroy a good player with a weaker tiered list pretty much every time. Skill hardly plays a role in that setup.
A bad player with a monster list will often beat an ok player with a weaker tiered list.
A bad player with a monster list is a good game against a good player with a weak list, though the good player has to rely on skill at that point.
There are VERY FEW truly skilled players good enough to take a weak list and roll players with great lists. Very few. I've seen great players try by taking a weak list and get beaten by ok to bad players because of list disparity and then they just go back to the crutch power list.
This is only as bad in 40k (and AOS). In other games, I hardly see this phenomenon.
By my own admission I am an ok player. This ok player was a GT placing player though with a monster list. Which is why when I see guys puff their chests out and people laud them for being warhammer napoleons, I don't really put stock into it unless they are doing so with a weaker list, because I know by my own experience that I myself was just an ok player but I was placing high every time because list.
then isn't he just better at the game than you, and it proves there is a component to this game beyond listbuilding?
I will also say that this was happening in WHFB 7th edition, where table skill was still a thing. He was better than me. But as the game has moved to simply target priority and listbuilding, I have already beaten that player with a more powerful list in modern 40k AND AOS (and he has quit GW games for that reason, and we have good games in other systems where table skill means something).
He beats me a fair bit in those games because he is often a superior player, but in modern 40k and AOS he knows I will stomp him if I take my ball crusher list and he doesn't want to spend money to chase the meta to get his own ball crusher list that will be valid for a year before GW makes you cycle a new army.
slave.entity wrote: I remember at my last job a few years back the game director and I were trying to get a few of the designers into 40k since and he and I were long time fans who decided to come back after hearing about 8th edition shaking things up. Everyone picked their factions and put their armies together and even got most of them fully painted before we sat down and scheduled a few intro games after work. After one or two games, both new players (both professional game designers) immediately grasped that:
1. A game of 40k is largely decided in the list-building phase
2. The optimal configuration for a given faction will always be drawn from an highly limited pool of units
3. The optimal game plan for a given list will nearly always be identical every time you play
I think they needed to play far more than a few games to better assess. New players are almost always going to get beaten, mostly because lack of skill and experience, like in anything else. Veteran players win, because of experience. And those with equal playing experience win on skill.
Also, my tourney experience disagrees with these conclusions.
#1? Largely? I would say from experience that it ought to be said in the same breath (or typed in the same paragraph) that 'list building' is a good chunk of winning, with some dice luck, but by far the larger portion of winning comes from player skill. Give me a top rated list, lemme get in 12 or so good practice games. Then give a top level GT player the same list, brand new to him, and I am going to lose because the player with the better skills will make better target priority decisions, keep objectives in focus, and simply win the game on skill. Give us both poor, awful lists, and we'll likely get the same results; I will lose.
As equals?
45% list building?
45% skill?
10% match up, terrain & dice luck?
46, 46, 8%?
49, 49 2%?
I think more like:
51 to 65% skill
48 to 34% list
the rest to match up, terrain & dice.
Approximately.
Yes, there is a sizable degree of list building involved in winning. If one shows up with only 2k worth a regular tactical squads (3e thru 5e, PFist Sgt, meltagun or plasmagun, ML/LasCan), and minimum HQs for the battalions, then yes, you're likely to lose against most other lists that show up at tourneys, unless the opponent is far more a chump than you.
I just find that too often in discussion here on dakka, that list building and GW's codex writing, are the scapegoats of players who don't do well at tourneys, or are unhappy with the game, and like to gripe and complain.
The data available from ITC shows that there are many more variations on lists that win, than in previous editions. That's a point that one might argue against, by saying, 'it is disingenuous because there are *more* codices and builds than ever', but I would re-counter "that as 8e gets older, we continue to see new, untried combos that do well" (not just evolution because of bi-annual FAQ/nerfs).
For example, Don Hooson (ITC, Calif) does well with unconventional lists: 3rd place this last BAO with Lords Discordant and Hell Turkeys, 1st place last year with a 'different' Plague Marine build that elicited much commentary on how unusual/not-previously-experienced it was).
For the many on this thread that are in the "list building is the main reason you win or lose" group, are you using BCP, BestCoastPairings? Are you looking at lists that place at top tables? I invite you to check those top table lists and those on down to the kiddie pool. See how many of Brandon Grant's long standing A.M., 6 to 9 BullGryn+Castellan+60 footer (does it have a name?) list there are at the big GTs that finish less than 50% W/L. See how well the dual Callidus/Forgeworld Custodes lists:
... actually do when in the hands of mediocre players who are not in the top 100 ITC scoring ranks.
40k doesn't have that many layers of gameplay/decision making. Again compared to warmachine which has list chicken, 3 separate win conditions, resource management in the form of focus/souls/corpses/etc, feats, themes, much shorter ranges that make positioning important, multiple formats, and for better or worse way more rules and abilities across models that interact and combo in an almost mtg like fashion. The game can be won or lost instantly from a lot of these and I'm certainly missing some. 40k is fun, I think it has the best setting and miniatures but I'd like to hear how anybody who has played in tournaments for both of these systems can think 40k isn't shallow by comparison.
Any time I check in on warmahordes, I see most of the games end via some crazy end run assassination strike by stacking spells and powers on a guy to murder the general
It's down to balance and player types.
People play games for different reasons (a combination of them really, but one is usually ahead of the others). Some people are really into building and painting, they might as well play with the things. Some people just want to put their cool models down and have some fun. Others want to figure it out, they play to win, but it's the journey. The last bunch like to win, the feeling of it, don't much care how they get there.
The last two make up the competitive community. It's the subset of the players who are in it only to win and have no regard for if their opponent (or anyone really) enjoys the game too. What does it matter, if only one player wins then only one person has fun anyway, right? These players are toxic. They bring the worst the game has to offer and get salty if it doesn't win for them. Other players still want to win, so they slowly get sucked into an arms race, adopt a "can't beat them join then" attitude or let their inner donkey-cave free because it's apparently acceptable. The WAAC attitude spreads, even casual players get tired of getting stommped all the time and either leave, start playing that game too and/or get salty. All the salt this generates makes people act and speak horribly too and once that's the discourse it gets a normalised
A game with terrible balance, like Warhammer, attracts that kind of rotten apple.
The easiest way to win (which is all they're after) is to bring something that can't be beaten by the other army, win before you start. Poor balance enables that so that's the game a WAAC player plays. Noob stomping is even better for them.
Even if another game gets people like that, WAACs can't be as bad and often get frustrated.
It's down to balance and player types.
People play games for different reasons (a combination of them really, but one is usually ahead of the others). Some people are really into building and painting, they might as well play with the things. Some people just want to put their cool models down and have some fun. Others want to figure it out, they play to win, but it's the journey. The last bunch like to win, the feeling of it, don't much care how they get there.
The last two make up the competitive community. It's the subset of the players who are in it only to win and have no regard for if their opponent (or anyone really) enjoys the game too. What does it matter, if only one player wins then only one person has fun anyway, right? These players are toxic. They bring the worst the game has to offer and get salty if it doesn't win for them. Other players still want to win, so they slowly get sucked into an arms race, adopt a "can't beat them join then" attitude or let their inner donkey-cave free because it's apparently acceptable. The WAAC attitude spreads, even casual players get tired of getting stommped all the time and either leave, start playing that game too and/or get salty. All the salt this generates makes people act and speak horribly too and once that's the discourse it gets a normalised
A game with terrible balance, like Warhammer, attracts that kind of rotten apple.
The easiest way to win (which is all they're after) is to bring something that can't be beaten by the other army, win before you start. Poor balance enables that so that's the game a WAAC player plays. Noob stomping is even better for them.
Even if another game gets people like that, WAACs can't be as bad and often get frustrated.
You just answered OP's question... why the hate? Because people like you call competitive players toxic WAAC donkey-caves. There is no unbeatable army in this game. There are armies that have bad matchups, but there's nothing that can't be beaten.
Maybe instead of throwing around insults, try learning about the game.
It's down to balance and player types.
People play games for different reasons (a combination of them really, but one is usually ahead of the others). Some people are really into building and painting, they might as well play with the things. Some people just want to put their cool models down and have some fun. Others want to figure it out, they play to win, but it's the journey. The last bunch like to win, the feeling of it, don't much care how they get there.
The last two make up the competitive community. It's the subset of the players who are in it only to win and have no regard for if their opponent (or anyone really) enjoys the game too. What does it matter, if only one player wins then only one person has fun anyway, right? These players are toxic. They bring the worst the game has to offer and get salty if it doesn't win for them. Other players still want to win, so they slowly get sucked into an arms race, adopt a "can't beat them join then" attitude or let their inner donkey-cave free because it's apparently acceptable. The WAAC attitude spreads, even casual players get tired of getting stommped all the time and either leave, start playing that game too and/or get salty. All the salt this generates makes people act and speak horribly too and once that's the discourse it gets a normalised
A game with terrible balance, like Warhammer, attracts that kind of rotten apple.
The easiest way to win (which is all they're after) is to bring something that can't be beaten by the other army, win before you start. Poor balance enables that so that's the game a WAAC player plays. Noob stomping is even better for them.
Even if another game gets people like that, WAACs can't be as bad and often get frustrated.
You just answered OP's question... why the hate? Because people like you call competitive players toxic WAAC donkey-caves. There is no unbeatable army in this game. There are armies that have bad matchups, but there's nothing that can't be beaten.
Maybe instead of throwing around insults, try learning about the game.
Hold your horses, there, sir! All I see in DarkBlack's post is that they're saying the WAAC type is to be found as a subset of competitive players and that the WAAC approach in and of itself is both toxic and generates further toxic behaviour. I don't think anyone's being insulted.
slave.entity wrote: I remember at my last job a few years back the game director and I were trying to get a few of the designers into 40k since and he and I were long time fans who decided to come back after hearing about 8th edition shaking things up. Everyone picked their factions and put their armies together and even got most of them fully painted before we sat down and scheduled a few intro games after work. After one or two games, both new players (both professional game designers) immediately grasped that:
1. A game of 40k is largely decided in the list-building phase
2. The optimal configuration for a given faction will always be drawn from an highly limited pool of units
3. The optimal game plan for a given list will nearly always be identical every time you play
I think they needed to play far more than a few games to better assess. New players are almost always going to get beaten, mostly because lack of skill and experience, like in anything else. Veteran players win, because of experience. And those with equal playing experience win on skill.
Also, my tourney experience disagrees with these conclusions.
#1? Largely? I would say from experience that it ought to be said in the same breath (or typed in the same paragraph) that 'list building' is a good chunk of winning, with some dice luck, but by far the larger portion of winning comes from player skill. Give me a top rated list, lemme get in 12 or so good practice games. Then give a top level GT player the same list, brand new to him, and I am going to lose because the player with the better skills will make better target priority decisions, keep objectives in focus, and simply win the game on skill. Give us both poor, awful lists, and we'll likely get the same results; I will lose.
As equals?
45% list building?
45% skill?
10% match up, terrain & dice luck?
46, 46, 8%?
49, 49 2%?
I think more like:
51 to 65% skill
48 to 34% list
the rest to match up, terrain & dice.
Approximately.
Yes, there is a sizable degree of list building involved in winning. If one shows up with only 2k worth a regular tactical squads (3e thru 5e, PFist Sgt, meltagun or plasmagun, ML/LasCan), and minimum HQs for the battalions, then yes, you're likely to lose against most other lists that show up at tourneys, unless the opponent is far more a chump than you.
I just find that too often in discussion here on dakka, that list building and GW's codex writing, are the scapegoats of players who don't do well at tourneys, or are unhappy with the game, and like to gripe and complain.
The data available from ITC shows that there are many more variations on lists that win, than in previous editions. That's a point that one might argue against, by saying, 'it is disingenuous because there are *more* codices and builds than ever', but I would re-counter "that as 8e gets older, we continue to see new, untried combos that do well" (not just evolution because of bi-annual FAQ/nerfs).
For example, Don Hooson (ITC, Calif) does well with unconventional lists: 3rd place this last BAO with Lords Discordant and Hell Turkeys, 1st place last year with a 'different' Plague Marine build that elicited much commentary on how unusual/not-previously-experienced it was).
For the many on this thread that are in the "list building is the main reason you win or lose" group, are you using BCP, BestCoastPairings? Are you looking at lists that place at top tables? I invite you to check those top table lists and those on down to the kiddie pool. See how many of Brandon Grant's long standing A.M., 6 to 9 BullGryn+Castellan+60 footer (does it have a name?) list there are at the big GTs that finish less than 50% W/L. See how well the dual Callidus/Forgeworld Custodes lists:
... actually do when in the hands of mediocre players who are not in the top 100 ITC scoring ranks.
40k doesn't have that many layers of gameplay/decision making. Again compared to warmachine which has list chicken, 3 separate win conditions, resource management in the form of focus/souls/corpses/etc, feats, themes, much shorter ranges that make positioning important, multiple formats, and for better or worse way more rules and abilities across models that interact and combo in an almost mtg like fashion. The game can be won or lost instantly from a lot of these and I'm certainly missing some. 40k is fun, I think it has the best setting and miniatures but I'd like to hear how anybody who has played in tournaments for both of these systems can think 40k isn't shallow by comparison.
It's not that there's no skill involved. There totally is. Top tables 40k is always a blast to watch because great players do have the ability to pull off some amazing stuff with how they drive their maximally optimized lists.
I suspect what's frustrating for some people is that list building can feel like such a deciding factor that it feels almost pointless for them to even play the game in many situations.
It's not just a skill disadvantage for the weaker player. It's likely the weaker player doesn't even have the right models. They might not even like the models required to make a faction "viable" after learning what they are. The game promises you all of this amazing variety and lore, then turns around and tells you that oh, actually 70% of the models you bought are considered trash-tier and will put you at a major disadvantage every time you field them. That's probably a really crappy feeling for someone getting into the game.
slave.entity wrote: I remember at my last job a few years back the game director and I were trying to get a few of the designers into 40k since and he and I were long time fans who decided to come back after hearing about 8th edition shaking things up. Everyone picked their factions and put their armies together and even got most of them fully painted before we sat down and scheduled a few intro games after work. After one or two games, both new players (both professional game designers) immediately grasped that:
1. A game of 40k is largely decided in the list-building phase 2. The optimal configuration for a given faction will always be drawn from an highly limited pool of units 3. The optimal game plan for a given list will nearly always be identical every time you play
I think they needed to play far more than a few games to better assess. New players are almost always going to get beaten, mostly because lack of skill and experience, like in anything else. Veteran players win, because of experience. And those with equal playing experience win on skill.
Also, my tourney experience disagrees with these conclusions.
#1? Largely? I would say from experience that it ought to be said in the same breath (or typed in the same paragraph) that 'list building' is a good chunk of winning, with some dice luck, but by far the larger portion of winning comes from player skill. Give me a top rated list, lemme get in 12 or so good practice games. Then give a top level GT player the same list, brand new to him, and I am going to lose because the player with the better skills will make better target priority decisions, keep objectives in focus, and simply win the game on skill. Give us both poor, awful lists, and we'll likely get the same results; I will lose.
As equals? 45% list building? 45% skill? 10% match up, terrain & dice luck? 46, 46, 8%? 49, 49 2%?
I think more like: 51 to 65% skill 48 to 34% list the rest to match up, terrain & dice. Approximately.
Yes, there is a sizable degree of list building involved in winning. If one shows up with only 2k worth a regular tactical squads (3e thru 5e, PFist Sgt, meltagun or plasmagun, ML/LasCan), and minimum HQs for the battalions, then yes, you're likely to lose against most other lists that show up at tourneys, unless the opponent is far more a chump than you.
I just find that too often in discussion here on dakka, that list building and GW's codex writing, are the scapegoats of players who don't do well at tourneys, or are unhappy with the game, and like to gripe and complain.
The data available from ITC shows that there are many more variations on lists that win, than in previous editions. That's a point that one might argue against, by saying, 'it is disingenuous because there are *more* codices and builds than ever', but I would re-counter "that as 8e gets older, we continue to see new, untried combos that do well" (not just evolution because of bi-annual FAQ/nerfs).
For example, Don Hooson (ITC, Calif) does well with unconventional lists: 3rd place this last BAO with Lords Discordant and Hell Turkeys, 1st place last year with a 'different' Plague Marine build that elicited much commentary on how unusual/not-previously-experienced it was).
For the many on this thread that are in the "list building is the main reason you win or lose" group, are you using BCP, BestCoastPairings? Are you looking at lists that place at top tables? I invite you to check those top table lists and those on down to the kiddie pool. See how many of Brandon Grant's long standing A.M., 6 to 9 BullGryn+Castellan+60 footer (does it have a name?) list there are at the big GTs that finish less than 50% W/L. See how well the dual Callidus/Forgeworld Custodes lists:
... actually do when in the hands of mediocre players who are not in the top 100 ITC scoring ranks.
40k doesn't have that many layers of gameplay/decision making. Again compared to warmachine which has list chicken, 3 separate win conditions, resource management in the form of focus/souls/corpses/etc, feats, themes, much shorter ranges that make positioning important, multiple formats, and for better or worse way more rules and abilities across models that interact and combo in an almost mtg like fashion. The game can be won or lost instantly from a lot of these and I'm certainly missing some. 40k is fun, I think it has the best setting and miniatures but I'd like to hear how anybody who has played in tournaments for both of these systems can think 40k isn't shallow by comparison.
It's not that there's no skill involved. There totally is. Top tables 40k is always a blast to watch because great players do have the ability to pull off some amazing stuff with how they drive their maximally optimized lists.
I suspect what's frustrating for some people is that list building can feel like such a deciding factor that it feels almost pointless for them to even play the game in many situations.
It's not just a skill disadvantage for the weaker player. It's likely the weaker player doesn't even have the right models. They might not even like the models required to make a faction "viable" after learning what they are. The game promises you all of this amazing variety and lore, then turns around and tells you that oh, actually 70% of the models you bought are considered trash-tier and will put you at a major disadvantage every time you field them. That's probably a really crappy feeling for someone getting into the game.
Well again, the issue is that "skill" in 40k is incredibly shallow. It's pretty much picking what to attack, and most of the major choices are decided in listbuilding. If you watched a high end Warmahordes game, for example, there's a lot more tactical maneuvering there because it matters more. Terrain matters more, positioning matters way more (it's entirely possible to lose a game because you moved a single model in a unit a fraction of an inch too far forward), etc. Listbuilding is still a major factor there as well, but there looks to be way more depth afterwards. 40k, even the tournament games I've watched, are mostly list building exercises with some very superficial tactical application during the game itself.
That's not to say there's no skill involved, since there is, but it's not exactly deep and complex.
I agree with that. As mentioned earlier the optimal game plan for any competitive list will pretty much be the same every time you play. After your list is optimized playing the game is mostly about going through the motions. There is a skill factor for sure but listbuilding is number one.
For a casual player, learning how much an average pick-up game is decided by listbuilding can be really disappointing.
For a competitive player, it's easy for things to get stale since the decision tree in optimal play is always extremely limited.
The #1 reason I see for people leaving GW games, and often the hobby, is that they go in to the store, love models, buy those models, and find out that the game is about listbuilding and they chose wrong and get stomped.
Because we are all sold on the laughable fallacy that GW points are supposed to equal balance (see my sig).
They either sell their stuff off and buy a broken army list, or they sell their stuff off and leave entirely because they had a major negative hit in their enthusiasm.
The #2 reason I see people leave GW games and this hobby is that even if they love listbuilding and min/max play, the excitement of playing basically the same game over and over going through the motions lasts as long as they enjoy the social company of their opponents. Largely 2-3 years before the burnout hits and they leave from boredom.
A big cause of angst with the "casual or narrative" crowd, and it is not acceptable to lambaste anyone period, but it comes from the competitive groups being easier to organize and attract the most people, so the narrative casual crowd has to fight for new blood, while the competitive crowd is like a woman on a dating site, she merely has to log in.
It's down to balance and player types.
People play games for different reasons (a combination of them really, but one is usually ahead of the others). Some people are really into building and painting, they might as well play with the things. Some people just want to put their cool models down and have some fun. Others want to figure it out, they play to win, but it's the journey. The last bunch like to win, the feeling of it, don't much care how they get there.
The last two make up the competitive community. It's the subset of the players who are in it only to win and have no regard for if their opponent (or anyone really) enjoys the game too. What does it matter, if only one player wins then only one person has fun anyway, right? These players are toxic. They bring the worst the game has to offer and get salty if it doesn't win for them. Other players still want to win, so they slowly get sucked into an arms race, adopt a "can't beat them join then" attitude or let their inner donkey-cave free because it's apparently acceptable. The WAAC attitude spreads, even casual players get tired of getting stommped all the time and either leave, start playing that game too and/or get salty. All the salt this generates makes people act and speak horribly too and once that's the discourse it gets a normalised
A game with terrible balance, like Warhammer, attracts that kind of rotten apple.
The easiest way to win (which is all they're after) is to bring something that can't be beaten by the other army, win before you start. Poor balance enables that so that's the game a WAAC player plays. Noob stomping is even better for them.
Even if another game gets people like that, WAACs can't be as bad and often get frustrated.
You just answered OP's question... why the hate? Because people like you call competitive players toxic WAAC donkey-caves. There is no unbeatable army in this game. There are armies that have bad matchups, but there's nothing that can't be beaten.
Maybe instead of throwing around insults, try learning about the game.
Hold your horses, there, sir! All I see in DarkBlack's post is that they're saying the WAAC type is to be found as a subset of competitive players and that the WAAC approach in and of itself is both toxic and generates further toxic behaviour. I don't think anyone's being insulted.
Indeed. Thank you for responding for me, more politely than I would have. You even got my screen name right. Good show!
Taking list-building out of the equation shows some of the strengths of Warhammer as a game, as well as who's a skilled player. It's like how they make game length random so it wasn't just Eldar shooting you and then jumping on the objectives at the end of the game; without that suddenly the possibilities in the game-space open up.
After twenty years of proposing the idea and getting slagged, I think you have a better chance of playing 40k as a professional player making six figures a year before you ever see a tournament with set army lists.
Yeah, it's obvious that if one was going to design a game for more competitive play, it wouldn't have 40K's number of factions and subfactions and detachments and formations, all loaded onto a creaky and straining points system for balance. You'd keep it tighter and focused, and build more balance directly into the ruleset.
The last time I remember GW running an official competitive gaming experience was the gaming league in 1991. In the 40k league, the only army list available was a cut-down version of the Space Marine army list with Imperial Guard and Squat infantry squads as allies. No orks, chaos, Eldar, whatever. Just Marines.
Because we are all sold on the laughable fallacy that GW points are supposed to equal balance (see my sig).
This is fairly true for any points system; not just GW. They mostly exist to provide an exchange rate between different classification of models, but the dream of granular pricing making hard choices in minor unit differences doesn't really pan out in any system I've played. Points help standardize game size but most of the time granularity mostly creates odd choices elsewhere in the list. Personally, I find systems with little granularity work better, because developers are forced to price a lot of things the same and instead focus on ensuring each model at that point has a distinct role.
40k often struggles because everything kind of does the same thing. Right now Terminators kind of suck, but if they were good, something else would be bad because ultimately they're just another unit defined by their survivability per point and around 10 bolter shots. GW would do well to focus on changing their rules to make them more functionally unique rather than trying to get them correctly costed.
Every other game i play has points, and none of them have the gw issues. If points were an accurate reflection of balance, listbuilding would not be as prominent, because 2000 points would be 2000 points.
Listbuilding is about making 2000 points worth 3000 or 4000 points while hoping your opponent does not make his list as much as yours to give you a clear advantage.
auticus wrote: Every other game i play has points, and none of them have the gw issues. If points were an accurate reflection of balance, listbuilding would not be as prominent, because 2000 points would be 2000 points.
Listbuilding is about making 2000 points worth 3000 or 4000 points while hoping your opponent does not make his list as much as yours to give you a clear advantage.
I find they all have similar issues. They might not have as many competing choices to make them quite as problematic, but pretty much every system out there has models that are too similar to another for a slightly better/worse price that determines their viability. The main advantage other game systems have is rules that allow for more diverse roles on the battlefield that puts fewer models in direct competition for the same design space. It still happens in any game that's had years to get big enough, but they do a better job having more specialized units. 40k struggles because so much of it can be boiled down to stats as simple as Offensive and Defensive Efficiency per point.
Since 40k is not a tactically complex game, it should be possible to make a computer simulation which runs two lists against each other a few hundred times, then spitting out a balance number based on wins versus losses. "These two lists are compatible" or "List B has a serious advantage over list A". Based on the win-loss ration (and the severity of loss), it could suggest an appropriate handicap value, allowing the disadvantaged list to add X points worth of models. I'd be really curious to know that X handicap would be between the most competitive list and the most casual one. I suspect it is large.
Sqorgar wrote: Since 40k is not a tactically complex game, it should be possible to make a computer simulation which runs two lists against each other a few hundred times, then spitting out a balance number based on wins versus losses. "These two lists are compatible" or "List B has a serious advantage over list A". Based on the win-loss ration (and the severity of loss), it could suggest an appropriate handicap value, allowing the disadvantaged list to add X points worth of models. I'd be really curious to know that X handicap would be between the most competitive list and the most casual one. I suspect it is large.
This is obviously not possible. Chess is not a "tactically complex game", you simply choose which pieces you move, and which pieces take other pieces. It has a defined grid of 64 spaces. It is not solved by a computer simulation yet, there too many possible permutations of the board.
Warhammer 40k has significantly more possible moves and interactions. It is absolutely not a computer solvable game.
This is obviously not possible. Chess is not a "tactically complex game", you simply choose which pieces you move, and which pieces take other pieces. It has a defined grid of 64 spaces. It is not solved by a computer simulation yet, there too many possible permutations of the board.
Warhammer 40k has significantly more possible moves and interactions. It is absolutely not a computer solvable game.
First, it wouldn't be solving the game. It would simply be playing the game. The same AI opponent playing two different teams against each other using the same basic decision making process - this would be the control for "player skill", with the relative powers between the lists themselves be the variable tested. Instead of creating a mathematical equation to calculate this stuff, it simply brute forces it - playing thousands or even millions of match ups between the two. Law of really big numbers says that the more data points you have, the closer the results should approach the average.
Second, the simulation does not need to be a true one to one simulation of playing 40k. A simplified model of play could be designed that is easy for a computer to calculate in a rough approximation of the game. For instance, movement can get kind of twisty, with each model moving individually in cohesion. There's things that matter there for charging and piling in, not to mention blocking, but for the most part, the computer can just treat a unit of models as a single object, maybe even breaking the field into a grid (computers love grids). We don't need to create a true 40k AI (though I'm sure that could be great for solo play). Again, you just need to control for player skill, so having an inefficiently played list should be okay as long as the same inefficiencies play out on both sides. As long as the model maintains a relative power balance with the real game, the results should be largely applicable.
Third, the results will not guarantee a particular outcome. Because of the way dice work and the way different terrain can have an affect, playing even the same game a dozen times could yield vastly different results. I suspect that a competitive list will have a near 100% win rate against a casual list of the same points, but I think that most of the time, even a list which wins 80% of the time could yield a good game between most players if the win margins for that list is relatively small.
I have written that app, I used to use it to gauge my power coefficients in my tournament lists. It worked very well.
What it did was help me create the most mathematically efficient lists that I could. It would also compare two lists against each other and predict within 5% accuracy the winner.
It was how I cracked a couple of nasty GT lists that had stumped me way back in the day, by helping me create a list that could compete against it based on numbers and estimated terrain (very little in tournaments) and player skill error probability.
It was also the basis of Azyr Comp which was the first AOS fan comp system to give AOS points before official GWGHB points removed fan systems entirely.
Sqorgar wrote: Since 40k is not a tactically complex game, it should be possible to make a computer simulation which runs two lists against each other a few hundred times, then spitting out a balance number based on wins versus losses. "These two lists are compatible" or "List B has a serious advantage over list A". Based on the win-loss ration (and the severity of loss), it could suggest an appropriate handicap value, allowing the disadvantaged list to add X points worth of models. I'd be really curious to know that X handicap would be between the most competitive list and the most casual one. I suspect it is large.
On a similar note there was a "drama" tournament ending I think a year or two ago now, I forget the tourney but it was the one where the final round, that was being live streamed I might add, a guy conceded because his opponent won the roll to go first and he wasn't able to seize. He immediately conceded the game (without playing a single round) and they spent a while talking about how the game would have turned out using mathhammer. No game was actually played, it was essentially two guys talking about a simulation of what would have absolutely (it's not like we're using dice, right?) happened and they both came to the conclusion that the guy who conceded would have lost anyway.
I think that says it all right there. That basically happened, albeit not with an app, in the final round of a major GT.
On a similar note there was a "drama" tournament ending I think a year or two ago now, I forget the tourney but it was the one where the final round, that was being live streamed I might add, a guy conceded because his opponent won the roll to go first and he wasn't able to seize. He immediately conceded the game (without playing a single round) and they spent a while talking about how the game would have turned out using mathhammer. No game was actually played, it was essentially two guys talking about a simulation of what would have absolutely (it's not like we're using dice, right?) happened and they both came to the conclusion that the guy who conceded would have lost anyway.
I think that says it all right there. That basically happened, albeit not with an app, in the final round of a major GT.
I don't blame or disagree with the guy who conceded (playing out a forgone conclusion isn't fun).
That's not a good sing regarding how well designed the game is though.
On a similar note there was a "drama" tournament ending I think a year or two ago now, I forget the tourney but it was the one where the final round, that was being live streamed I might add, a guy conceded because his opponent won the roll to go first and he wasn't able to seize. He immediately conceded the game (without playing a single round) and they spent a while talking about how the game would have turned out using mathhammer. No game was actually played, it was essentially two guys talking about a simulation of what would have absolutely (it's not like we're using dice, right?) happened and they both came to the conclusion that the guy who conceded would have lost anyway.
I think that says it all right there. That basically happened, albeit not with an app, in the final round of a major GT.
I don't blame or disagree with the guy who conceded (playing out a forgone conclusion isn't fun). That's not a good sing regarding how well designed the game is though.
The main issue was that you know, it's a dice game. His opponent might have rolled poorly, he might have rolled well. I get conceding a game that after a couple turns you realize you can't win, but before even playing the first turn? I would have even understood if he had played the first turn, lost half his army, and then was like yeah I can't win this. At least there was an attempt. It was pretty bad to see a live-streamed final last 30 minutes, a few seconds of which were actually part of the game (the initiative roll).
IMHO pretty much shows why "competitive" 40k is a massive joke and this desire to turn it into an e-sport (t-sport if you will) is utterly ridiculous. That entire mindset seems so far off from how tabletop games were intended that it actually makes me physically angry to think about.
) posting the more base and bad of human diatribes.
