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Hey people!

Over my time as a war gamer, I have read numerous tacticas from many armies and I can't help but feel that the tactic articles that play at the strengths of armies to the max tend to take the feel out of story line and fluff behind the game.

I've concluded that it just comes down to what type of wargamer you are. If you are a masterful tactician/general, then you would probably go down the path of these tactics. However, if you are someone like me then things are different

An example is with the tactics people come up with for my army, Dark Eldar.

Dark Eldar have the Haemonculi who are like the Space Marines of Eldar, and have all these bonus perks and stuff. Most of the tactic articles advise you to attach any IC's to Haemonculus squads to give the IC the bonus perks like starting the game with FNP. Sure this is a viable option if you are just serious about winning, but the way that I would play the game is to be true to the story line. In Dark Eldar fluff it's makes more sense for Haemonculi to rule Haemonculi troops, Archons to rule Kabals, Succubi to Wych cults.

I'm not saying that it is a bad thing, nor am I trying to draw a stereotype or criticize anyone, but this is just my opinion and I'd like to see if any others agree.

It would be nice if the rules coincided with making fluffy units and formations the best.

They don't, and people like to win, so people will always ignore the fluff.

That said, I like to field armies I can justify in the fluff while still being reasonably effective on the tabletop.

(Also, SOME forces do allow fluffy armies as compettitive forces, but not all)

Building lists is only half the tactics. I have an awesome fluffy army and can be viable as well as crazy.

For me, fluff takes precedence over optimisation every time, hence my guardsmen often making assaults, using low-tech weapons and using less-competative units like ogryn and stormtroopers. I still win most of my games, but am happy to lose so long as a good story was told. Luckily, I mostly play with others who hold a similar mindsets, so don't have to deal with many non-fluffy or hyper-competative lists.

I usually build two kinds of lists. My usual lists which are made to fit the fluff of the army I'm building (for instance, for my IG army I found myself arming them with more sub-optimal Special Weapons since it didn't make a whole lot of sense for them to have 2 dozen Plasma Guns when Plasma Guns are supposed to be this rare and honored weapon). Then, I have my other lists designed for tournaments that are more min/maxed and competitive.

Thankfully, this is how my local club plays. In normal play time we play very casually and play to a story-line because that's what we all find fun. However, to compensate since humans naturally kinda like competition, our tournaments are usually pretty WAAC hahaha, but it's still all in good fun of course

You get this kind of advice because winning games is the only objective standard to judge a list by. Two people can have a productive discussion on how to optimize a list to win games since they both agree on how to judge success (did you win?), but a discussion of how to make a fluffy list rarely goes anywhere because "fluff" is subjective and there's no way to say that option X is wrong and you should take option Y instead.

 Peregrine wrote:
You get this kind of advice because winning games is the only objective standard to judge a list by. Two people can have a productive discussion on how to optimize a list to win games since they both agree on how to judge success (did you win?), but a discussion of how to make a fluffy list rarely goes anywhere because "fluff" is subjective and there's no way to say that option X is wrong and you should take option Y instead.

This is very true in 40K as the fluff is not held up to any specific standards or canon even by the black library and GW. There are in fact many contradictions.

Having said that a large number of the lists which I see declared as not being fluffy are in fact very fluffy. Here is a short selection which people commonly declare as being WAAC and not fluffy but are in fact exactly as the fluff says the army works;
SM: Drop pod spam, Mech spam, dreadnought spam, SM/IG combine lists (specifically ATSKNF led infantry blobbs), 3x TFC
IG: Aircav (there are entire planets which focus on these-Terrax and Elysian being famous), IG allying with everyone (as a note IG dex is supposed to represent PDF forces as they do not have their own list)
Necron: Flying bakery (how do you think they do a raiding list)

The army list that kills me when people use it and call themselves fluffy is the SM defensive force. This list is usually composed of random selections of units for a "balanced" list (which is not actually balance) and usually includes 1-2 rhinos...what type of commander sends 4 squads with a single transport and a random mixture of assault, siege, skirmish, and defensive units? How does such a force even manage to determine march order?

Your example is a form of this sort of narrow thinking. DE like drugs and pain correct? Why would a unit not have a Haemonculi with them when they are raiding for slaves? You have to remember that the haemi is not a squad leader he is a company level leader and is qualified to lead the entire battle force. If he is the warlord he is leading the entire force and if he is just an HQ then he could be under observation from the warlord or he could be there to help secure a specific objective, take a living gene seed from a SM, or remove a potential rival. Or he could just be there to hand out the drugs or pain to where it is needed.