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Should you expect your opponent to tell you what army they'll be bringing to a friendly game? Obviously this is just a matter of etiquette, as there's nothing forcing anyone to reveal anything about their army, but I'm curious what the rest of you think.

I have a regular opponent who never tells me beforehand what army he's bringing (in the past, he has played Tyranids, Orks, Khorne, Grey Knights and Craftworld Eldar). For my part, I almost always tell him what I'm bringing (either Cadians or Drukhari). In a recent game, I decided not to tell him, and he seemed a bit blindsided when I brought Cadians and not Drukhari like in our past few games. I did not do it to send a message or anything, but I just felt it was fair to keep it a secret in order to avoid the "disclosure asymmetry" of our past games. Especially given that such an asymmetry gives a bit of a "meta" advantage to players who own several armies vs. those who own only one.

I think players planning a friendly game should at least indicate beforehand what codex they'll be using, while their opponent still has time to build or modify their list. No need to tell any other details, like "I'm running Kharn the Betrayer" or "you'd better bring some anti-aircraft guns", unless you're planning to bring a Lord of War (in which case I think you should definitely warn your opponent, or maybe even ask for permission).

Thoughts?

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I generally declare my largest detachment faction before the start of the game.

It goes without saying that there's going to be some guardsmen in there.

In an ideal world, a friendly game is fun for both players. That’s the goal, right? It’s not fun just to steamroller your opponent, as it’s not fun just to spend a few hours getting curb stomped. So ideally you need some negotiation about what kind of game you are playing. If you have a regular opponent, you should have a feel for how strong his lists are, and can adjust yours to make for an even balance. Not list tailor to crush, but to ensure that it’s not going to be one sided.

Does that change depending on what army they bring? Yes. If all they armies are generic, little bit of everything TAC lists, it’s not much of a change. But if some of their lists lean towards skew, with a heavy slant towards certain factors, you can end up with a rock/paper/scissors scenario. Which are generally less then fun.

But if he’s not telling you what he’s bringing, and has a deep pool of armies to choose from, you not telling him which of the two you have should not be an issue. It might have just been the surprise of you changing tacs. In all fairness, both players should have the same level if information about the other when building lists.

Your games don't sound like what I would personally describe as friendly. To answer the question, both players should be doing the same thing. If one player is announcing their faction when scheduling the next game, the the other player should do it as well. If one player is not announcing what army they are bringing, then they shouldn't expect the other to do so either. Basic Golden Rule stuff.

Also, what's up with that font size?

I can't really comment since I only have one faction I play, and they pretty much only have one as well

A few thoughts:

1) In a friendly match what is acceptable is what you BOTH agree to. Therefore it doesn't really matter what other people do, what matters is between you and your opponent. If you agree to declare armies before the game then that's fine, its also equally fine if only one of your declares or if neither of you declares.

Heck you can give them your entire army list weeks before or not at all.

The key is that you both agree to it and any imbalance in the information shared is also agreed upon before the game.

2) Typically my experience is most people in friendlies declare the army/faction as a standard.

3) Even if you both agree not to declare anything, its perfectly acceptable to expect your opponent to use what they know of you and your collection. IF they know you've got 1 army that never changes then well they know what you're taking and overtly or not they will use that information.

Now they can use that information to build a counter list; or perhaps you can both agree to try something else because his counter lists have been beating your 1 army for weeks now and you want a change etc...



Basically sit down with your opponent and agree to a fair situation where you're both happy. and if you can't either one or both takes a compromise or don't play and try someone else to play against at the club.

No disclosure of faction/units/etc is required, but if there's going to be disclosure then it should be symmetrical. You shouldn't have one player getting information but keeping their own information hidden, unless it's specifically for some kind of "fog of war" narrative scenario.

And no, LoW do not require special permission or disclosure. They're just units like any other unit and that obsolete mindset needs to die.

 Saturmorn Carvilli wrote:
To answer the question, both players should be doing the same thing. If one player is announcing their faction when scheduling the next game, the the other player should do it as well. If one player is not announcing what army they are bringing, then they shouldn't expect the other to do so either. Basic Golden Rule stuff.

Maybe it's my fault for being too proactive in announcing what army I'm bringing. I'd much rather both players reveal it than keep it secret.

Also, what's up with that font size?

On my browser at least, the default font size on this website is annoyingly tiny.

 Peregrine wrote:
And no, LoW do not require special permission or disclosure. They're just units like any other unit and that obsolete mindset needs to die.

For the big Forge World stuff like a Warhound Titan, I would definitely expect advance warning. It's not necessarily that they're OP, but simply that a take-all-comers army might find itself with many units that are almost completely useless.

-Guardsman- wrote:

 Peregrine wrote:
And no, LoW do not require special permission or disclosure. They're just units like any other unit and that obsolete mindset needs to die.

For the big Forge World stuff like a Warhound Titan, I would definitely expect advance warning. It's not necessarily that they're OP, but simply that a take-all-comers army might find itself with many units that are almost completely useless.

This is clearly a statement made from ignorance of the rules. The big FW titans are so ridiculously overpriced that taking one is a great way to lose a game and an average TAC list equipped to deal with sub-titan threats is going to wipe a Warhound list off the table. If anything the person with the Warhound list should inform their opponent that it's going to be a very low-optimization game and bringing a toned down list would be appreciated.

(And of course anything bigger than a Warhound can't be taken in normal games, so those aren't an issue at all.)

In pick-up games at my local gaming group it's 800 points - find an opponent and off you go, so no prior sharing or planning goes on. In friendly games against mates we play anywhere between 700 and 1500 points, and generally share BattleScribe rosters before hand.

Depends on who I'm playing. My current group posts lists to the group chat, in previous groups several players tended to list tailor if given the chance so we kept it vauge.

I generally only play to test tournament lists. I always declare what I'm bringing, down to giving them my exact list. If they bring a TAC list, then its decent practice. If they tool specifically to kill my list, then it's also great practice in dealing with a worst case scenario.

For a friendly game I usually ask when arranging it if there is anything my opponent specifically wants to face or avoid, we have had some very good smaller games with stuff like "No 2+ saves please" or "no T8+ please" and "You still got your orks?"

etc.

its a sort of part way between a full on narrative type game and 'anything goes', think of it as a bit of advanced intel, those orks and marines are expecting to face each other and would perhaps have noticed the arrival of a Tyranid fleet (though perhaps not), or would be aware this is a small scale skirmish so serious armour is unlikely.

yes you can get some list tailoring, but you get used to those who try it and can have fun with them - e.g. someone expecting green tide facing a kan wall etc

 Peregrine wrote:

-Guardsman- wrote:

 Peregrine wrote:
And no, LoW do not require special permission or disclosure. They're just units like any other unit and that obsolete mindset needs to die.

For the big Forge World stuff like a Warhound Titan, I would definitely expect advance warning. It's not necessarily that they're OP, but simply that a take-all-comers army might find itself with many units that are almost completely useless.

This is clearly a statement made from ignorance of the rules. The big FW titans are so ridiculously overpriced that taking one is a great way to lose a game and an average TAC list equipped to deal with sub-titan threats is going to wipe a Warhound list off the table. If anything the person with the Warhound list should inform their opponent that it's going to be a very low-optimization game and bringing a toned down list would be appreciated.

(And of course anything bigger than a Warhound can't be taken in normal games, so those aren't an issue at all.)

It is kind of hilaribad watching my Warhound in comparison to knights on the tabletop.for what the warhound gets for a 2k point investment.

-Guardsman- wrote:

 Saturmorn Carvilli wrote:
To answer the question, both players should be doing the same thing. If one player is announcing their faction when scheduling the next game, the the other player should do it as well. If one player is not announcing what army they are bringing, then they shouldn't expect the other to do so either. Basic Golden Rule stuff.

Maybe it's my fault for being too proactive in announcing what army I'm bringing. I'd much rather both players reveal it than keep it secret.

I have usually only played PUG or a narrative (historical) where both armies where pre-constructed and players just picked which side they wanted to play. In PUGs, I almost never knew who or what I was playing even if most of the group only had one faction.

I am with you. I would much rather be able to discuss a future game with my opponent on what armies we are bringing in 40k since their is such a wide range of stuff making it very easy to unfun games for both parties. However, not all players feel that way, and some want to win games so badly as to want the edge of being able to tailor their army to what they know their opponent is bringing. Most of my gaming is in Kill Team which puts me in a weird spot as I have full rosters of 20 units to create a team out of. Occasionally, I encounter an opponent that has barely enough models to get to the minimum points of a game. I have a full sideboard to tailor my team against their faction. It feels wrong to create that team, as the same time, it don't quite feel right making a team the is purposely not built to face that faction. The good thing is most of the factions I have for Kill Team aren't the upper tier ones, and my rosters aren't full of the best options a lot times too. So I haven't ever crushed a player with minimum kill team choices yet.

My buddy at the flgs brings a different army & different variations of lists to nearly every game. We basically play narrative with some matched play rules and have fully painted armies. We definitely play to win against each other but that boils down to creating/adding lore to our forces.

He roughly knows what I'm going to bring (Salamanders)and vice-versa(SOB, BT, Saim-Han, TS) so we have battle plans in mind. But we play WYSIWYG with the open war deck and have NEVER had a bad/unfun game out of 50 odd games. We are at the point where we dont even need to see each others list or even ask about it.

The other players @ our FLGS range from full on tourney players to guys even more casual than me(and that's sayin somethin). So I am familiar with a wide range of lists(faction/content) and they know when they play my Salamanders that they'll have to work for the win. When I play them we go over lists before we play but

It is entirely up to the players to agree on what info, playstyle, cut-throatness, content of lists. It's pretty easy to have a 5 min conversation about stuff before you play.

I usually just share a list maybe 5 minutes or so before we start. That way my opponent can look it over and start planning/strategizing, but it'll be too late to tailor the list to counter. Tends to work out fine.

I’m a fan of declaring armies as soon as possible. Friendly games mean different things to different folks, but at its core a friendly game should be enjoyable. The easiest way to ensure both players have fun is to have roughly equally capable lists.

I prefer to not know what I’ll be facing though against more casual friends I’ll always ask them which one of my armies they want to play against.

Here most players do share faction and list info freely. It's a big part of the hobby for many. That said we also regularly roll in with surprises. Really the only unspoken or rarely spoken rule is if you plan on bringing something unusually hard then let your opponent know in advance so they can be similarly equipped.

The main reason I'd say is most players we have enjoy using their models. Power gaming is reserved more as a challenge or to test rather than the norm.

Stupid question, but how does the known in advance work. Lets say a DA player gets informed their opponent is bringing a chaos soup, there can't really prepare for anything, unless they change the army, and I doubt there is many people who can buy, build an army in a few hours before a game.

Some people simply have a lot of models already painted, which makes it a lot easier for them to "tweak" their list before a game starts.

If you’re running something brutal, be up front about it. I plan to run Magnus and Morty with a Kytan, so I basically announced it at the store; if people accept a game with me, they should be aware what’s coming.

Likewise, if I run a Slaanesh Daemon army, I’m not declaring it ahead of time. It’s not a triple LoW list, it shouldn’t require a heads up before we even get to the store.

Personally, I enjoy surprises and variation when it comes to what gets played (I only play friendly games) but I'm definitely up front about what I expect to get out of the game: whether or not I'm bringing a 'hard' list or not and what kind of missions/setup we'll be using (maelstrom, or open war cards, or whatever else and whether or not we're using city fight rules etc). I also am one of the 5 people in the world that actually likes to play through all of the weird mission types like Planetstrike and Stronghold assault which have unique list-building requirements.

Like others have said, the point of the game is for BOTH people to have fun. What gets you to that point is going to vary from person to person. Granted, when I was younger I didn't really understand that because I was only used to competitive games/sports where other people's enjoyment isn't really relevant. It wasn't until I started playing D&D that I realized that there were games where the whole point was for everyone to have fun rather than have someone win. That's easier said than done and requires constant communication. From that point on I have played 40k as something more like D&D where the competition to win is present but secondary to the goal of both players having fun. To me, that's what a 'friendly' game is but your mileage may vary based on what you're trying to get out of the experience.

We don't often declare lists ahead of time. When we do it's because that'd be important to the type of game we're setting up.

Myself? Currently I'm alternating between 4 armies: Admech (just about to start to hit the table), Khorne Demons, 100% SM Dreadnaughts, & Space Wolves. I can do about 5k pts of any of these, so you will not likely see the same list week after week.
I'll run an army for 5-6 weeks & then rotate. I do this in alphabetical order. So if anyone cares? They could figure out what I'll be bringing/bringing next just by keeping track of what I'm currently playing & how many weeks its' been on the table.

As for what others are bringing? I don't care.

I like friendly games with tournament caliber lists simply because there's none of this. Bring your best, do your best, and win or lose have fun. I'd rather get trounced than win because I didn't nebulously "hold back enough".

I think it’s reasonable to declare what army you’re bringing (or at least primary detachment), but I wouldn’t go much beyond that, as too much info spoils the fun. Still gives you plenty of room to do something unexpected (wistful memories of bringing a dread mob list against Space Marines kitted out with flamers and anti-horde infantry options, oh what a glorious day! Well, for the Orks anyway...)

If you can't trust your opponent to not list tailor against you then a lot of the good will inherent in having a "friendly" game just isn't there. Don't play with those people.

For me the defining characteristic of a friendly game is that it is against someone I know and that I still want to be friendly with afterwards. So no nasty surprises and no setting the level all wrong for the player.

As one of the stronger players in my local scene that means when playing against the less experienced or weaker players I have a conversation with them about what they are feeling up for and then I will not bring whatever they don't feel up for. With the better players it may be more a question of which tournament list I bring that they want to try their list out against - and visa versa.

Ultimately I don't give a monkeys whether I win or lose a friendly game. When I'm playing another of the more competitive players we are trying stuff out and testing our ideas. If my opponent knows what I am bringing and chooses to bring its hard counter then that is the best practice game of all, you learn the most about how to win tournaments when you learn to scrape out wins in your most terrible match-ups. When I'm playing one of the less competitive players I switch into a more narrative mode and have fun with some models that don't make the cut for my tournament lists.

Whichever way round it is I expect to have a conversation with my fellow player before the game and will usually as part of that conversation give a pretty strong indication of the sort of thing I am going to be bringing. There is no reason not to.

I always tell my opponent what faction(s) I will be playing. I expect him or her to do the same. Sometimes, I'll share specific army lists beforehand, without any expectation that my opponent will do the same. It's a friendly game, so I'm not concerned with winning or losing as much as I am about putting models on a table and moving them around while making blim-blam noises.