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I have recently heard people talking about a 'six foot rule' or a 'ten foot rule' in regards to judging wether or not a model is of sufficient paint quality to be entered into a tourney.

I have never heard of this rule. If it is printed somewhere, could someone direct me to the source? If it is just one of those things that is commonly adopted by TO's, then could someone explain it?

Jimsolo wrote:I have recently heard people talking about a 'six foot rule' or a 'ten foot rule' in regards to judging wether or not a model is of sufficient paint quality to be entered into a tourney.

I have never heard of this rule. If it is printed somewhere, could someone direct me to the source? If it is just one of those things that is commonly adopted by TO's, then could someone explain it?

Not printed anywhere that I know of. Seems to simply imply the distance you can be from a model where it looks good. As in this paint job looks okay from 10 feet, but upon close inspection looks poor. 6 feet being better than 10. Not sure however, just a guess as I have never heard that before.

That was only when Jim-bob was ruling, since he was a bit farsighted.

I have never heard of this rule at all...

My boss at work (who used to play 40k) claims that he was barred from a tournament because he failed their 'six foot rule.' According to him, they said that any paint job on a mini had to be good enough that someone could tell what it was supposed to be from a distance of six feet. The problem that I had is that he didn't get specifics, he just said 'okay' and packed it in. I want to know if other TO's out there are using this rule, and how specific it is.

Do you just have to be able to tell what army it is? (Space Marines, Guard, Tyranids)
Do you have to be able to pick out sub-faction? (Specific Chapter, Craftworld, Legion, etc)
Or do you have to be able to discern the unit type? (ie, not only being able to tell that its a Space Marine, but being able to tell whether its an assault marine with no jump pack, or a sergeant from a tactical squad.)

I am not a great painter. I don't think I have a problem with option one, and option two would only give me problems on a few models. But option three is ridiculous. Has anyone else encountered something like this?

well i think upto option 2 is reasonable. I want to be able to tell whether i'm facing Black Templars or Raven Guard, but in reality i could always just ask my opponent

Each event is different. If you have questions you should check at the store/events you intend to play at.

Most events post their painting and modeling requirements beforehand, and usually list the specific criteria (example .. model must be painted with at least 3 colors and be based).

But really, if your store does it differently they are the ones you need to talk to.

Sorry, kept the story simple so I didn't get off topic. This was not a local tourney, it was out of state. My local game store uses no such rules that I have been made aware of. I have just heard the term tossed around before, but when asked no one seems to have a clear definition on it.

Jimsolo wrote:Do you just have to be able to tell what army it is? (Space Marines, Guard, Tyranids)
Do you have to be able to pick out sub-faction? (Specific Chapter, Craftworld, Legion, etc)
Or do you have to be able to discern the unit type? (ie, not only being able to tell that its a Space Marine, but being able to tell whether its an assault marine with no jump pack, or a sergeant from a tactical squad.)

I am not a great painter. I don't think I have a problem with option one, and option two would only give me problems on a few models. But option three is ridiculous. Has anyone else encountered something like this?

Option 2 goes out the window if you're using your own color scheme or varient chapter (i.e., The owner wants to use the BA Codex but paints his figures blue. He calls his chapter the Blue Blood Angels.) How the heck would you know that info and what bearing does the paint job have on the game? Obviously, he would have to tell his opponent that he was using the BA Codex but the TO wouldn't neccesarily know that on first inspection.

This may show how old I am, but what ever happened to the "3 colors minumum" rule for tourneys? I remeber if you had a minimum of three colors on your models (and no plastic or metal showing) that your were tournament legal...of course it has been a while.

Gwar! wrote:I have never heard of this rule at all...

!!!!!!!!

zeshin wrote:This may show how old I am, but what ever happened to the "3 colors minumum" rule for tourneys? I remeber if you had a minimum of three colors on your models (and no plastic or metal showing) that your were tournament legal...of course it has been a while.

One of my local stores has made it a "3 colors not dots" rule, somebody showed up with an army primed with 3 different color dots on each fig (yes, that does make it 4 collors) and was angry that he got a 1 on his painting score...

Draon1976

My only regret is that between the last painting discussion and this one that I didn't have time to paint a "Three colors, all gray" model or two.

I can just see it though. You walk in with a figure with nicely blended shades of blue, like for a horror, and hear "I'm sorry sir. Even though you wet blended the paint to do shading, you still only used two colors for the model and I'll have to disqualify you." :-/

VikingScott wrote:

Gwar! wrote:I have never heard of this rule at all...

!!!!!!!!

I know. I can thus conclude that it's not a real rule!

Jimsolo wrote:I have recently heard people talking about a 'six foot rule' or a 'ten foot rule' in regards to judging wether or not a model is of sufficient paint quality to be entered into a tourney.

I have never heard of this rule. If it is printed somewhere, could someone direct me to the source? If it is just one of those things that is commonly adopted by TO's, then could someone explain it?

The only "10 foot rule" I've ever heard of concerned how a woman looked when you were out at a club....

Saldiven wrote:

The only "10 foot rule" I've ever heard of concerned how a woman looked when you were out at a club....

We call that "good from far, far from Good" locally

can also be applied to models.

Kommissar Kel wrote:

Saldiven wrote:

The only "10 foot rule" I've ever heard of concerned how a woman looked when you were out at a club....

We call that "good from far, far from Good" locally

can also be applied to models.

10 at 2 but a 2 at 10 is a phrase I've always liked.

The 5' rule is a rule of thumb for the quality of a paintjob. It is not an actual game rule.

It means that a model/army looks great from that distance but up close..not so much. Basically synonymous with tabletop quality.

I have never heard of it associated with tourney rules though.

To answer your question, there is no such rule printed in any rulebook.

However, each tourney organizer is free to run their tournament as they see fit, and the TO in question may have a "10 foot rule". To understand more about it, you'd have to ask that specific TO.

GW run tourney's used to have a "three color minimum", where as each model in your army had to be painted with at least 3 colors.

The intention of any "painted" rule really is to just prevent players from showing up with unpainted or primed armies, and has nothing to do with actually discouraging people from playing that are not Golden Demon quality painters. (I know I'm not!)