Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

There have been a great many pessimistic threads as of late, bemoaning the current state of the rules, GW's business policies (or lack thereof), and price increases.

But we're still here. Holding on for some reason. What is your reason?

Mine is that for me, the 40k universe is a source of great fun and imagination. TT battles of silly, fluffy proportions like "how many IG can my friend's psyker kill before he gets a bayonet to the face" and "stab the witch, STAB IT!!" bring up familiar storylines with my friends, watching as our favoured champions fight for glory.

I'm here on this forum because I'm at work and rather bored. I'm currently not in the game because of the obvious "Blah blah GW sucks blah" reasons.

Doom and glooming is a personal hobby of mine.

Mainly a beer & pretzels player with mates (who are more competitive and have more to spend on hobby). Painting a lot these days too. It's a good distraction after a serious session of uni work.

I'm here cause I still like 40k. If you see me ever complain about it I'm just poking fun at the whole thing cause it's a bit silly to get that upset over it.

There's always pessimistic threads and always threads complaining about them. It's not like they effect whether you like it or not.

This forum is has a ton of traffic and lots of great discussions on current events, geek topics, and modelling possibilities. I can always find something new to read, discuss, or look at. If the Infinity or Firestorm Armada forums had such traffic I'd rarely be here.

I don't play any GW games anymore, got tired of the walletrape.

Because I only play casual games, don't go to tournaments, find the universe and the TT version to be a fething blast, and can't be bothered to get into another game. I've tried WarmaHordes and several other TT games, but nothing holds my attention quite like 40k.

Also, I find most of the rules aren't that bad. Are they unclear and overbloated? Sometimes, but games with experienced players usually go fairly fast with no rules issues.

I'm not, but occasionally I see a thread on the main page which piques my curiosity and I drop in.

No one goes on forums to mention the good stuff.

I'm still playing the hobby because...
-I love the setting
-Miniatures are the best around (atleast the newer ones)
-The manager of my local GW is a great friendly guy and helps everyone enjoy and get the most of the hobby
-I like the direction the game is going in even if a lot of the rules writing is terrible. The "Decurion" formations means you're actually playing against logical armies of basic infantry with a few elite and heavy units alongside as opposed to just minimum troops and loads of wraithknights.

However I have to say I am considering getting an Xbox One this christmas.

Because I do still live in the faint and, quite frankly, naive hope that GW will:
A) reduce the costs to something close to sane
B) fix the glaring mistakes within the rules and maybe try to balance them out a little
C) actually release a decent Imperial Guard codex

Of these three things it is the latter most of which keeps me playing still. In all honesty the next IG codex will be the crunch time for me - my make or break moment. If it is good I may well stay on and keep playing but if it is anything like the current one (IE, a pile of crap) I shall just stop playing all together.

I have two fairly large built-up 40K armies -- Tau and Tyranids --- but I gave up playing during early 6th edition (2012)having played since early 4th (2004). The reasons were I didn't like the way GW had developed the rules and prices.

I am still here because I hope GW might be persuaded to reverse a lot of the bad decisions they have made, and return 40K to the kind of game I would like to participate in.

For me its the gaming group, the Saturday games, 30k and HH.

I'm here for the news and rumors and answering people's questions and asking my own questions and showing off my sweet, sweet painting skills.

Taffy17 wrote:
No one goes on forums to mention the good stuff.

I'm still playing the hobby because...

It's not a hobby, it's a game that's part of the tabletop wargaming hobby. Love or loathe 40K, getting out of the mindset that it is in any way a self contained pastime will benefit you in the long term. There's a whole world of other games and models out there.

-Miniatures are the best around (atleast the newer ones)

Entitled to opinion etc, etc, but this is a really difficult argument to support once you take a wider view of what else is out there. You could perhaps narrow it down to "some of the best designed wargaming, HIP kits" and have a case, but "best" is difficult to argue credibly.

-The manager of my local GW is a great friendly guy and helps everyone enjoy and get the most of the hobby

Again, not a hobby.

-I like the direction the game is going in even if a lot of the rules writing is terrible. The "Decurion" formations means you're actually playing against logical armies of basic infantry with a few elite and heavy units alongside as opposed to just minimum troops and loads of wraithknights.

I'm not sure you can divorce one from the other. Sure, encouraging people to play balanced armies is broadly a positive thing, but giving them ridiculous incentives for free is not the way to go about it. A much better approach would be to work hard to give all units a purpose and not have any be an auto take or be flat out better at a given task than other options in the same codex, but that would require a level of effort and investment in development GW are apparently not prepared to undertake.

GW are afraid of drawbacks, and that's the chief thing that holds them back. Offering a player an array of choices that offset bonuses with handicaps is one of the major ways you can create an environment where players can experiment with a variety of different things and still compete, as it stands, if you're serious about winning, you need only identify a faction's most efficient choices and use as many as possible, and if one faction's options are skewed more than all others towards efficiency, you get a stale meta and disgruntled players, because the time and money invested makes switching horses much harder than say a videogame, and while not everyone is out to win every game, in fact many probably don't care if they lose every game, there's a distinction between a loss and a foregone conclusion.

Taffy17 wrote:

However I have to say I am considering getting an Xbox One this christmas.

I made a move into PC gaming to offset the fact I have been unable to get many games in the last two years, due to schedules and friends moving out. Hoping to move to Cardiff in the future, where I'll be able to get games reliably.

 master of ordinance wrote:

C) actually release a decent Imperial Guard codex

Big hope of mine. Had to move a bunch of stuff around the house this weekend, and got a good look at my IG stockpile. So much want...

...7 Russ Tanks...

I still like 40k, local store closed due to owner personal issues rather than lack of interest in miniatures, thankfully there's another store in the area to play at and the community is coming back together.

Something important to remember about doom and gloom threads for a game(and almost all games have them) is that it is generally a very vocal minority of the actual player base.

I have a vast collection of books, minis and the rest - I still enjoy them and especially the fluff but seldom play the game much any more - even then its massively house ruled.

Hardly play the game anymore but I do enjoy the fluff and the jaded pessimist in me still sees the tiniest glimmer of hope that GW will wake the feth up and crank some decent rules out... though the flame grows dimmer and dimmer with each new release.

jreilly89 wrote:Because I only play casual games, don't go to tournaments, find the universe and the TT version to be a fething blast, and can't be bothered to get into another game. I've tried WarmaHordes and several other TT games, but nothing holds my attention quite like 40k.

Also, I find most of the rules aren't that bad. Are they unclear and overbloated? Sometimes, but games with experienced players usually go fairly fast with no rules issues.

Apart from trying other games (I can't even be bothered to try other games, not after 20 yrs of GW), all of the above. jreilly's nailed it for me. I still love the game and the fluff. Yeah, there's some stuff that's not quite right and yeah it's expensive, but you can control the former by choosing opponents well, in my case people I know well with similar attitudes, and you can control the latter by not playing the 'arms race' game. I've got enough old stuff that the occasional new purchase doesn't break the bank. It's cheaper than a season ticket to a Premier League club, or a season of golf fees and a set of clubs (this doesn't mean I'm okay with GW's prices, I just live with it!).

There's a lot of apparent negativity on Dakka generally because how many threads can you have saying "these rules are awesome, let's discuss how well written rule X is", "this game is awesome" etc.

I'm on deployment, can't play so only outlet is 40k forums.

I own a massive collection of 40k minis from various armies. It's hard to walk away from that kind of investment.

I still love the universe. It's still my favorite setting, though I tend to focus more on the specialist games and RPG's/VG's than the actual table top.

If 40k was ever fixed I'd drop WMH fast. It's a great game, but I'm not in love with any of the factions like I am with so much of 40k.

Because I'm still having fun. Yes the rules are even less tight than they have been in the past. I still have fun, and still get in multiple pug games a month. The only thing limiting the amount I play is how busy I am.

My local area is a healthy mix of very competitive, very casual, and everything in between. We see very little Uber cheese, and less crazy rules abuse. People usually clear up the rules problems in less than a few minutes and the games run fluid.

Despite what the Internet thinks I like:
Maelstrom missions. With the basically universally accepted house rule of mulligan the ones that you can't do (ex use a psyker but you didn't bring one), it works pretty well. I have 4 of the tac obective decks, so even if my opponent doesn't I can share. We always have a blast, and it is very rare, at least in the games I play and see, for the cards to make a drastic one sided fight. I admit it can happen, but nothing to the Internet extreme you hear about.

Formations/detachments. Despite the fact that some are a little over the top, I enjoy playing and seeing most of them. The execution can use some fine tuning, but the idea, and the implementation of some of them, are great. Different was to field armies help keep things fresh, and IMHO is a better solution than "hq x unlocks y as troops".

Most of the 7th ed rules. Yes they are a mess. But I like where the game is at. Tighten them up and it would be great. I like the concept of removing models from the front. The system needs some tweeting, but I like the concept of vehicles having hull points. The idea that you can kill a vehicle with glances yet if it gets glanced isn't useless next turn is great. Maybe a slight increase in hull points or a change to vehicle cover or something could really improve it, but I don't really mind where it's at.

The place dark angels are at. I have always love my DA, but they have almost always (at least since I started them late 3rd early 4) been an uphill battle. I used to have to also get the vanilla dex and run that if I wanted to be competitive. Our new book is in a sweet spot where we aren't quite OP like necrons/eldar/vanilla, but we aren't far behind either. I can play fluffier lists against the older dexes and play harder list and not feel hopeless against the newer ones. I do wish that the Ravenwing formation clearly stated any hq on a bike, and that we could still somehow take an all terminator force without going unbound, but overall it was a vast improvement.

Things that I do feel need improvement:

FAQS. This is actually my biggest gripe with GW right now. WTF is going on? Get back on this already. I understood that they had a huge focus on AoS right after the DA release until now, but I will remain disappointed if after the Tau release they don't at least make some effort to get FAQS going again.

Some of the codex lagging behind. Once again, the 40k stall out due to AoS. Except during this time new books were coming out at a fast pace and we don't really have reason to belive this won't continue again. I just hope that the remaining 6th and early 7th codex at least get thrown a few bones without cranking it to 13 because the 7.5 dexes are at 11.

Things that I am neutral(ish) about:

Prices. Yes they keep going up, yes I would like to play less. But I knew this has always been and always will be am expensive hobby. Most of the kits are improving in quality. Maybe not all, and maybe not in proportion to their prices. I buy my stuff about 60/40 new/ebay or second hand.

The release speed. Yes it is fast. But before 6th people constantly complained it was too slow. The problem before is if you got a codex that didn't transition well into the new edition or just wasn't very good, unless you were vanilla marines, you were waiting a long time for a fix. Why they redid eldar before updating the older 6th ed codex I'm not sure, but it is unlikely players will wait 6+ years for their chance to get their codex fixed. Yes this gets a little more expensive buying new books every other year, especially for people with multiple armies or the pokemon syndrome for codex (gotta buy em all). I'd still rather that than be using the DA 6th book for the next 4+ years.


Overall, yes there are several areas with room for improvement. Rules, prices, FAQS. But at the end of the day, I'm still having fun with 40k, and really, that's all I need.

I'm still here because I still have fun with 40k. I have yet to find a game with the depth of background like 40k has (besides Fantasy, and I play that too). So as long as the background stays glorious, and my LGS doesn't close, then I shall continue to fight on in the Emperor's name

 pwntallica wrote:
Because I'm still having fun. Yes the rules are even less tight than they have been in the past. I still have fun, and still get in multiple pug games a month. The only thing limiting the amount I play is how busy I am.

My local area is a healthy mix of very competitive, very casual, and everything in between. We see very little Uber cheese, and less crazy rules abuse. People usually clear up the rules problems in less than a few minutes and the games run fluid.

No offense, but if you aren't seeing rule abuses or uber cheese, your meta probably isn't very competitive. Locally we are competitive, but had to ban formations and LoW in most armies since they just result in a stomping of armies that don't have good formations/LoW.
Some of the formations are great, but the few broken ones are ruining what could have been a great idea.
We also had to change allies for similar reasons.

 pwntallica wrote:

Despite what the Internet thinks I like:
Maelstrom missions. With the basically universally accepted house rule of mulligan the ones that you can't do (ex use a psyker but you didn't bring one), it works pretty well. I have 4 of the tac obective decks, so even if my opponent doesn't I can share. We always have a blast, and it is very rare, at least in the games I play and see, for the cards to make a drastic one sided fight. I admit it can happen, but nothing to the Internet extreme you hear about.

Even with the mulligan rules we find that they still don't work well.
The issues we have come from the 2 facets;
Some of the objectives are much more difficult than others. Having a psyker cast a power is nearly automatic, destroying a flier can be hard. Both are worth a d3.
The random value of the objectives. We've been tweaking assigning values based on how difficult they are, and it seems to be working better.
As written the malestorm rules don't work however.

 pwntallica wrote:

Formations/detachments. Despite the fact that some are a little over the top, I enjoy playing and seeing most of them. The execution can use some fine tuning, but the idea, and the implementation of some of them, are great. Different was to field armies help keep things fresh, and IMHO is a better solution than "hq x unlocks y as troops".

I love the idea of formations. Their execution is so poor we had to implement a blanket ban on them however.
Which is a shame, since they could be very cool.

 pwntallica wrote:

Most of the 7th ed rules. Yes they are a mess. But I like where the game is at. Tighten them up and it would be great. I like the concept of removing models from the front. The system needs some tweeting, but I like the concept of vehicles having hull points. The idea that you can kill a vehicle with glances yet if it gets glanced isn't useless next turn is great. Maybe a slight increase in hull points or a change to vehicle cover or something could really improve it, but I don't really mind where it's at.

I agree that hull points is a great way to fix the transport problem of 5th. I also think every tank could use 1-2 more hull points, or have the pen table changed (probably both). Right now, glance spam is more effective than anti-tank weapons at destroying tanks, and that feels very weird to me.

 pwntallica wrote:

The place dark angels are at. I have always love my DA, but they have almost always (at least since I started them late 3rd early 4) been an uphill battle. I used to have to also get the vanilla dex and run that if I wanted to be competitive. Our new book is in a sweet spot where we aren't quite OP like necrons/eldar/vanilla, but we aren't far behind either. I can play fluffier lists against the older dexes and play harder list and not feel hopeless against the newer ones. I do wish that the Ravenwing formation clearly stated any hq on a bike, and that we could still somehow take an all terminator force without going unbound, but overall it was a vast improvement.

I love what happened with DA, and hope all my armies get that treatment.

 pwntallica wrote:

Things that I do feel need improvement:

FAQS. This is actually my biggest gripe with GW right now. WTF is going on? Get back on this already. I understood that they had a huge focus on AoS right after the DA release until now, but I will remain disappointed if after the Tau release they don't at least make some effort to get FAQS going again.

They have never done FAQs that were any good. The biggest questions remain unanswered or the FAQs themselves are nerfs.

 pwntallica wrote:

Some of the codex lagging behind. Once again, the 40k stall out due to AoS. Except during this time new books were coming out at a fast pace and we don't really have reason to belive this won't continue again. I just hope that the remaining 6th and early 7th codex at least get thrown a few bones without cranking it to 13 because the 7.5 dexes are at 11.

How they handle the future codexes, IMO, will determine the future of 40k. Another bad dex for Chaos and Nids and I'll most likely be out of the game forever.

 pwntallica wrote:

Things that I am neutral(ish) about:

Prices. Yes they keep going up, yes I would like to play less. But I knew this has always been and always will be am expensive hobby. Most of the kits are improving in quality. Maybe not all, and maybe not in proportion to their prices. I buy my stuff about 60/40 new/ebay or second hand.

For me, who owns a lot, the prices aren't bad. I make great money and can buy 1 kit a month if I chose.
I can't imagine a new player getting involved. For the cost of 1 2k point force, I can buy 2-3 WMH armies, maybe more if they are from the same faction (depends on faction, cygnar tends to use more of their range than Cryx does).

 pwntallica wrote:

The release speed. Yes it is fast. But before 6th people constantly complained it was too slow. The problem before is if you got a codex that didn't transition well into the new edition or just wasn't very good, unless you were vanilla marines, you were waiting a long time for a fix. Why they redid eldar before updating the older 6th ed codex I'm not sure, but it is unlikely players will wait 6+ years for their chance to get their codex fixed. Yes this gets a little more expensive buying new books every other year, especially for people with multiple armies or the pokemon syndrome for codex (gotta buy em all). I'd still rather that than be using the DA 6th book for the next 4+ years.

I like the codex release speed, dislike the edition release speed.

 pwntallica wrote:


Overall, yes there are several areas with room for improvement. Rules, prices, FAQS. But at the end of the day, I'm still having fun with 40k, and really, that's all I need.

I'm glad someone is enjoying it

I'm still posting here because I'm still having fun playing the game at a friendly level at my FLGS. Mocking trolls is just icing on the cake.

I still love 40k, have fun playing,and enjoy my armies.

 TheNewBlood wrote:
I'm still posting here because I'm still having fun playing the game at a friendly level at my FLGS. Mocking trolls is just icing on the cake.

See, this sort of gak is why any sort of discussion on this topic always devolves into mud slinging. People who have a different opinion to you are not trolls. In fact, mocking people for their opinion is about as trolly as you can get.

I'd be interested to see the frame of reference for players who are "having a blast" with 40K is in terms of other games played. Are there many who have tried all sorts of other games and returned to GW because they find it the superior game, or are they not so much wargamers as GW customers?

 Azreal13 wrote:


I'd be interested to see the frame of reference for players who are "having a blast" with 40K is in terms of other games played. Are there many who have tried all sorts of other games and returned to GW because they find it the superior game, or are they not so much wargamers as GW customers?

I have tried Warmachine and Malifaux and while they are good games, I enjoy 40k much more than those games.

 Azreal13 wrote:

 TheNewBlood wrote:
I'm still posting here because I'm still having fun playing the game at a friendly level at my FLGS. Mocking trolls is just icing on the cake.

See, this sort of gak is why any sort of discussion on this topic always devolves into mud slinging. People who have a different opinion to you are not trolls. In fact, mocking people for their opinion is about as trolly as you can get.

I'd be interested to see the frame of reference for players who are "having a blast" with 40K is in terms of other games played. Are there many who have tried all sorts of other games and returned to GW because they find it the superior game, or are they not so much wargamers as GW customers?

I think he got you... Need to take a step back and relax sometimes. Place can get so uppity/angry so quickly.

Personal experience: I've tried all of the other major TT games, was not a fan of any of them. 40K still holds my interest the most. I'm having a blast with 7th, even as a CSM player. Just make sure to play with halfway decent people and you can have great games.

Never seen that much rule abuse or cheesy lists at my LGS or with my gaming group. Seems like most of the complaints are with competitive environments and tournaments.

 clamclaw wrote:

 Azreal13 wrote:

 TheNewBlood wrote:
I'm still posting here because I'm still having fun playing the game at a friendly level at my FLGS. Mocking trolls is just icing on the cake.

See, this sort of gak is why any sort of discussion on this topic always devolves into mud slinging. People who have a different opinion to you are not trolls. In fact, mocking people for their opinion is about as trolly as you can get.

I'd be interested to see the frame of reference for players who are "having a blast" with 40K is in terms of other games played. Are there many who have tried all sorts of other games and returned to GW because they find it the superior game, or are they not so much wargamers as GW customers?

I think he got you... Need to take a step back and relax sometimes. Place can get so uppity/angry so quickly..

No, he didn't get me, I was well aware of the "cunning" trap he was attempting to set, and was deliberately springing it so some other poor poster didn't accidentally get their leg stuck in it.

Because it's the biggest miniature wargaming forum ( I guess ) with lots of content, and if we're talking about 40K specifically; Because the game is fun and can be played in multiple ways, competitively and casually. Just doesn't work well casually against randoms. The newer miniatures are great, if not the greatest asfar as I'm concerned and the kits are well designed. Also, most players around for me. Could play every day if I wanted. Currently I'm playing WM/H and WH40K in equal amounts, and I have a history of over 10 years in both.

 Selym wrote:
There have been a great many pessimistic threads as of late, bemoaning the current state of the rules, GW's business policies (or lack thereof), and price increases.

It's been like this for the last 15 years and I doubt it'll ever change, no need to interpret this as a sign of changing times. GW will probably keep doing things their way and some people can handle it and other's can't, there's a plethora of options to choose from if WH40K isn't ones cup of tea.