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.

Hello, I picked up the rulebook and the Codex for my army on Saturday. Aside from a small tutorial game done at a real table, I haven't had much of a chance to play 40K yet other than by using Vassal. I kind of felt like I knew what I was doing, until I started to see some very strange and baffling things occurring during games. I haven't even come close to winning a game yet. Most of my games have lasted 3 or less turns. I'll try to describe what happened in my last few games on Vassal:

Game #1, my first game on Vassal (2nd game of 40K if you include the tutorial)

1,500 points of my Daemons vs Space Marines + Tau
My opponent brought 4 or 5 drop pods, with Vulkan as a commander. He had several small groups of 'Army of the Damned', some Tactical Marines, some Assault Marines, and Fire Warriors with a group of Tau battlesuits, the kind that jump around after shooting. I had a Great Unclean One, two units of about 8 Fleshhounds of Khorne, two units of Daemonettes, two units of Bloodletters, one unit of Plaguebearers, a Daemon Prince of Khorne and a Soulgrinder.

The first thing he did was to drop 2 drop pods right in front of my units. He said the pods were empty, so I wasn't sure why he bothered to do that. The next thing he did was use his Tau battlesuits to blast away almost an entire unit of my Flesh Hounds, which had scouted forward. The battlesuits were twin-linked, and had very strong weaponry. They also jumped away so I couldn't even assault them afterwards. On my turn, I basically just tried to close the distance with him. The only things he had on the table were the two Tau units and the two drop pods, so I didn't really have any options. I rolled my Warp Storm and got a -1 penalty to my invuln saves, making my saves 6+.

Turn two, he landed 3 more Drop Pods all over my army, and used deep strike to insert his Army of the Damned guys. The Army of the Damned guys shot my Soulgrinder with 3 meltas, and killed it because he said I wasn't allowed to take cover against it. Despite being a Nurgle unit, and having it hiding in the woods. So the Soulgrinder dies. I then lose most of one of my deamonette units to flamethrowers and shooting, and a big chunk of my bloodletters. He finishes off my injured flesh hounds and knocks the other unit of flesh hounds down to 3 models. My turn comes, I move my units around and prepare for assaults. I roll warp storm, and am forced to make a leadership check on one of my characters, vs Daemon Instability. It hits my Great Unclean One, and knocks him down to 2 remaining wounds. I charge into combat with much of my army, against his scattered units. I don't do that great in melee, but I win a couple of combats. I overrun him, so the combat continues because he's marine. My hounds die from overwatch, from the Tau battlesuits.

Turn three arrives, and he brings in more reinforcements from reserve. He shoots my Great Unclean One with the battlesuits. There was a hill in the middle of the map, and I had him hiding behind the hill. I asked how his guys could see my warlord, if he's behind a hill? He says that the hill won't hide the model. So, I lose my warlord. My daemon prince cleans up Vulkan's unit, I lose most of my remaining troops. I had about 15 bloodletters and maybe 10 daemonettes left at that point, and there was no way I could survive crossing the whole map to reach his Tau units, and the tactical marines which he walked onto the board. I would just get blown away by the battlesuits. So, I surrendered.

Game #2, my second game on Vassal

This one was bad. Really, really bad.

1,500 Daemons vs Daemons.

I brought what I felt would be an improvement to my old list, trading in some slower units for faster things. I brought a Bloodthirster, a Herald of Khorne on a Juggernaught, 8 Flesh Hounds, 6 Flesh Hounds, 2 units of Daemonettes, 1 unit of Bloodletters, and 1 unit of Pink Horrors.

My opponent brought Fateweaver, 4 Heralds of Tzeentch on Discs, 6 Screamers of Tzeentch, 2 units of deamonettes, and a big pack of 15 Flesh Hounds.

Turn one was his, so he flew his Fateweaver forward and used Grimore on his Hounds to make them tougher to kill. He then spread his hounds out in a big, long line that prevented me from assaulting unless I wanted to attack the dogs. He advanced a little, didn't do much other than to shoot Flickering Fire at my hounds, and some debuffs at the hounds. My Flesh Hounds did Deny the Witch on most of it. On my turn I pulled my hounds back some, hoping he would leap his hounds far forward and leave them unsupported while the rest of his army lagged behind. I flew my Bloodthirster forward, hit his Fateweaver, didn't wound and Fateweaver passed his grounding check, so I had nothing to assault. My horrors tried to Flickering Fire at Fateweaver, but rolled double 6 for the psychic test.

Turn two, everything fell apart. He advanced on me, and set up for a massive assault and used Grimore on the hounds again. Fateweaver did Vector Strike on my Bloodthirster, knocked it out of the sky and put Misfortune on my Bloodthirster. Then his four Heralds of Tzeentch combined together and fired FIFTY FIVE twin-linked, str6 shots at the Bloodthirster. I had to make 31 saves, and reroll any successful saves. So he goes splat. The Fateweaver shot Flickering Fire and killed most of my smaller unit of Hounds. He then charged into me with his Hounds and locked my surviving unit of Hounds, plus the Herald into combat. I lost the combat, and my unit was destroyed by Instability.

I had 2 units of deamonettes, 1 unit of horrors and 1 unit of bloodletters left.. versus his entire army. I didn't cause more than 3 wounds to his entire army. I just surrendered at that point.

Game #3, my third game on Vassal

1,500 points of my Daemons vs Marines + Imperial Guard

I brought a similar list, with a few changes. I made my Hounds unit bigger and put in 2 Heralds. I brought a Bloodthirster, 1 unit of Horrors, 1 Soulgrinder and 2 units of deamonettes. My opponent's army consisted of Marines with a psyker warlord named Tigarius. He had 3 small, 5 man units of tactical marines. He had a Thunderfire Cannon. He had a MASSIVE 50 man unit of Imperial Guard troopers. He had a Leman Russ tank, and a Griffon Mortar Tank. He had a Vendetta flyer, and a Marine flyer, which I don't remember the name of.

Turn one was just me advancing up the middle while he shot at me. Using his Thunderfire Cannon, he decimated one of my deamonette units. He used some kind of Imperial Guard order to fire a ton of shots at my Hounds, also. He started giving his IG troops a 4+ invuln, also. Which he would continue to do the entire time.

Turn two, I used my Grimore to buff up the Hounds and charge them into combat with his Imperial Guard. It was at that point that I realized he had 50+ models in the unit. I won combat by 11 kills, and he failed leadership. I tried to sweep him, but he had one space marine model in the unit.. and it prevented the unit from being swept. His turn two, he finished killing off one of my units of deamonettes, and brought his space marine flyer on the board to attack my other deamonette unit. His IG flyer hit my Bloodthrister with 3 lascannon shots, and inflicted 3 wounds, and I failed them all, then got grounded with 2 wounds left.

Turn three, my Grimore failed and gave my hounds -1 invuln. My deamonettes failed to join the combat, and I sent my Bloodthirster to attack what I thought was his command squad. But, he had two small IG squads close together, and said they were two separate units. He critic'd my choice of targets, said I should have attacked something else. My Soulgrinder hit his IG flyer with 2 shots, and failed to penetrate. With so few units left, and getting annoyed at the way my opponent would brag everytime the dice rolled badly for me, I went ahead and called the match.


Criticism?

What am I doing wrong? Is it my list? Is it my eagerness to attack? I've tried to explain events as detailed as possible, and as neutral as possible. Can someone tell me why I am so terrible at this game, please?

Not very descriptive, but I can guess.
You need to deny LOS as much as possible to your assault units.
You need more MC's. This is Daemon's main strength. They have the most individually powerful MC's. Every HQ you have should be a greater daemon. Take Fateweaver instead of the herald and keep the Bloodthirster.
You need to treat Chaos marines and Daemons like they're almost the same codex. They kind of are in the fluff. They're the single biggest BFFs there are in the fluff. You need to take helldrakes, and stuff like noise marines, or plague marines. or better..both!
Did you notice his movement tactics? That thing with lining up the hounds was pretty good right? Take that maneuver for yourself.
You should probably take Beasts of Nurgle. Those things are beautiful at tarpitting and actually pretty good at killing stuff.

Frankly, I think you need to try and get your opponents to tone down their lists during your first games so you can get a better idea of the flow of a battle. Screamerstar and an aggressive DP/tau build are not going to be very interesting games.

Thats the problem with vassal. Nearly everyone brings tourney optimized lists all the time.
I am not against tough competition, but it is inappropriate to bring something like a screamerstar against a noob.

Hey, guy.

When I first started playing Warhammer 40,000, I lost every game I played for years, except those I played against my younger brother.

At first it was obvious why I lost; my allowance was 2 dollars and 50 cents a week, and I only got it if I cleaned my room that week. I cleaned my room every week for over three months just to get my first box of models. I picked a box of Dire Avengers (the ones with the plastic bodies and the metal heads and metal exarch arms) because I thought they looked the coolest. Eventually my allowance went up as my parents were able to afford more, and I was able to get a unit or vehicle every month or so. I armyswapped a few times, selling off my Eldar and buying Imperial Guard, then selling off my Imperial Guard and buying Space Marines. I'd grown frustrated with my lack of ability to win, at all, except against that one particular person.

I even lost a game I played in a small tournament against a young Tyranid player (I wasn't that much older myself at the time) who didn't have a big enough army to fill up to the maximum points allowed (It was a 1500 point tournament, and he had less than 900 points of models to play with). Again, I was frustrated with my seeming lack of ability to win, and I saw what I thought would be an easy win and I went for it. I still feel like a total dick whenever I remember it.

I fell out of the gaming habit when I got too sick to go to the store to play. By the time I was well enough to even try going back, it was years later, and I apparently showed up at the wrong time for the WH40k gamers, because even though I waited there for an hour, not a single person I remembered, not a single WH40k gamer at all, showed up. By the time I went back again, months or maybe a year or two later, the store had moved to a different mall, and their gaming room had been closed (it later became some sort of medical place). My WH40k life had been crushed entirely, with no one to play against, until...

Later, I was painting some Sisters of Battle. I'd gotten them because they were neat, because I'd wanted them years earlier when their Codex was still "Sisters of Battle" instead of "Witch Hunters", but I could finally justify their cost because a box of 10 Tactical Marines was 45 dollars, and a box of 10 Sororitas was 50 dollars. I griped a little about how I'd never be able to use them in a game, because I had no opponents, an off-hand remark really. My mom was in the room, and she offered to play the game with me.

I learned, or maybe re-learned, over the next few years, that my mom was in the strategy club when she was in college. She very much liked tabletop games. We turned out to be pretty evenly matched, I'd win as often as I'd lose. My WH40k life suffered a setback in September 2011, just after the release of the second part of the Sisters of Battle WD codex, because some nice folks on Dakka Dakka saw how optimistic and cheerful I was in seeing the good parts of the new codex, and they said to themselves, "No, we can't have this. We can't have anyone enjoy themselves." And finally, after months of absorbing the constant negativity on Dakka and regurgitating phrases and arguments and facts I'd heard in 45 minute rants every couple of days, I broke. I broke, and just couldn't enjoy WH40k anymore. In the two years since then, I have played at most 3 games.

Sorry, I like tangents, and since I didn't get any sleep since I woke up yesterday afternoon, I lack the cognitive faculties to avoid them and stay on point and often REMEMBER what my point was.

Point is, everyone loses a lot at first. Don't get discouraged, and stick with the army you like. Every army has the opportunity to be great, it just takes experience.

Heh, you should see my mom playing World of Warcraft. Her first video game ever. She dies very frequently.

the last line of what Pouncey said is true in this situation to. personally I lose allot, and I feel like my lists are ok, not great but not terrible. just keep playing and you'll get the hang of it. and pay attention to the tatics forum that's helped me allot. in game strategy also is important, that's where I lose because I forget to do things or do dumb things.

overall I say just hang in there and try to get more games in

 Pouncey wrote:
My mom was in the room, and she offered to play the game with me.

Your mom played 40K with you? That is the best thing i've heard all day, possibly all month. Give that awesome lady a big hug for me, that's excellent. More parents should be like that.

To the OP: Don't be discouraged, 40K is a very deep game with a lot of different facets to it. Don't be hard on yourself if you feel like you just don't get it. Personally, when I was getting back into the hobby after 15 or so years I started by going on to YouTube and watching as many 6th edition battle reports as I could. I really enjoy the reports from a channel called MiniWargaming. They're a great bunch of guys who take the time to explain their choices and strategies, and through their commentary you can get a good feel what each army is generally capable of.

Best of luck to you my friend in your future gaming endeavours.

@Pouncy - that's a story to remember

Anyways, like everybody has said, nobody starts off good - if you win a game during your first days, it was pure luck. The only to improve is to keep on playing games. If you lose, you ask your opponent what you did wrong, so he can advise you on what to do next time. If you win, keep in mind what you did during the game against your opponent's army. As long as you remember what you did, and either adopt or change your strategies, then soon you will be seeing consistent wins.

Wow, so much good has been said already.

Firstly, I'd echo the comment that to start 40k is to lose games. I, myself started 40k with allowance money as well, and it was eldar, and I only picked the models I thought looked cool. And I lost, a lot. 40k is a relatively difficult game to learn. Thankfully, it's relatively easy to master once it clicks.

Secondly, you're playing the game on hard mode. 6th ed doesn't like foot lists. 6th ed outright hates horde armies. 6th ed has an inhuman, burning, passionate loathing for assault armies. And you're bringing an assault foot horde.

By now you're already getting the appreciation for just how easy it is to avoid close combat if you don't want your opponent getting to assault you, and just how powerful shooting is right now. Unfortunately, there just sort of isn't anything for it at the moment. You either play the game on very easy mode with a gunline, or easy mode with a shooty army, or you accept that you're playing the game on very hard mode with a foot assault list and temper your expectations of winning.

Thirdly, while you're playing the game on very hard mode, your opponents aren't. As mentioned, screamerstar is one of the strongest builds right now, which means that even if your opponent was just as complete and total of a noob as you are right now, he'd still very likely win. Likewise, allying in tau doesn't exactly make space marines weaker, and guard blobs led by a space marine character aren't that great, except they ARE good against exactly the kinds of things you're bringing in your army.

As such, the relative list strength disparity only exacerbates the player skill disparity that already exists. Fixing this could involve many things, from building a stronger list (as mentioned above), or it could mean finding worse players (to make the overall discrepancy not so bad), or you could find players willing to play with a worse list.

If it's at all possible, I'd try and find the latter. People who are willing to play the game on a tougher difficulty level in order to handicap themselves so that you're playing a fair game with actual competition are exactly the kinds of person that you're likely going to want to play games with in the future. People who are flexible, creative, and willing to risk losing if it means that he doesn't play a game that's boring for you wherein you just remove pieces from the table as he roflstomps you are going to be the kind of people who will work with you to learn the game best.

Fourthly, and it's tough to tell without data, but you don't exactly seem to be a lucky player. Not much you can do about that, but there it is.

Anyways, keep your head up. Keep learning and playing games. Keep looking for the right kind of people to play against. Also, as much as is possible, try to play actual games with actual miniatures, rather than just playing on vassal. A lot of what 40k is is the hobby side. Playing with real things that you've customized and crafted and put effort into looking nice is always going to be a more satisfying experience than clicking on stuff on a screen. On a similar note, I'd keep reading as well, not just places like dakka, but read your army fluff and get more immersed into the literature as well.

There's a lot that 40k has to offer other than horribly losing games to up-powered netlists on vassal. Finding it might take a bit of work, but it's worth it.

Start by finding out what the best army out there is and buying that army. Then buy the models necessary to compose the nastiest net list you can. THen you will be as good as most of the best players out there, just a little practice and you will be the best.

No really, Being a good player in the 40k realm could mean all kinds of different things to different people. 40k is NOT meant to be played in a competative fashion. thats why all the codex lack any sort of balance internally or externally.

I think that what you should do is buy a army that you would enjoy painting and modelling. Then ask some people what a list for that army would have in it. Begin buying, assembling and painting those models to the best of your ability. Once enough is assembled to play with, get some games in at a local shop. Win or loose be the best sport you can be. Make sure that your opponent enjoys the game they have with you as much as possible.

Done. You are now a great 40k player.

^^This.

40k is a game of army list construction. As soon as I saw that OP was up against Daemons and IG, I knew exactly what their army composition would be (screamerstar and 4++ IG horde). Only reason I don't know Tau is because I've never played them (and never intend to if I can avoid it, feth Tau)

That speaks volumes about the game.

OP, you can become a better gamer by dropping all the stuff you like and using the broken power builds. If you take Daemons and don't have a "screamerstar", you lose. If you take Chaos and don't have Helldrakes, you lose. If you take something thats not Tau and face Tau, you lose. If your a child of the 90s, a good analogy would be that old cartoon Dragon Ball Z - every list has a "power level" and the games are literally like a comparison of whose "power level" is higher. Each army also has a very, very narrow band of what constitutes their most powerful list, and if you want to be 'good' at this game you need to run units from this very narrow band every single game.

Or you could just play it casually with your mates, ie Beerhammer. This is what GW advertises the game as, and it can be *fantastic* if you actually play it the way the designers intended.

edit:

Frankly, I think you need to try and get your opponents to tone down their lists during your first games so you can get a better idea of the flow of a battle.

But Imotek, Screamerstar, 4++ IG and Tau *are* the flow of 40k.

 sennacherib wrote:

I think that what you should do is buy a army that you would enjoy painting and modelling. Then ask some people what a list for that army would have in it. Begin buying, assembling and painting those models to the best of your ability. Once enough is assembled to play with, get some games in at a local shop. Win or loose be the best sport you can be. Make sure that your opponent enjoys the game they have with you as much as possible.

Done. You are now a great 40k player.

I'd have to agree! Pick an army that you like. Read the Codex. Read the BRB. Read the forums about your army specifically. Read/watch battle reports about your army. Then put a list together and post it on the forums and see what people have to say about it. After that, start building/painting your army. Have fun. Find a FLGS/group of friends that like to play and start getting some games under your belt. Then have some more fun. Heck, even eventually break out a couple different lists. One for serious/tournament/competitive play, and one for FUN with models in it that you really liked painting or the way they look but don't really make it into a "competitive list" in 6th edition (who knows, those may be the exact MUST HAVES in 7th edition!) And then have some more fun. Winning helps, but so does having someone fun to play with that isn't win-at-all-costs every game too.

Other than that, know that my Grey Knights are hunting you Daemon! I know your name!!!!!!!!!

Honestly? Just play games, against a variety of armies if you can. You'll learn what works and what doesn't the hard way, and eventually you'll wind up making far less mistakes than you did.

...even then, the Dice Gods will find ways to make you suffer...

SO my first advie would be to stop playing on vassal for a while. I know it is a nice program, and saves money while play testing. But it has several problems.

1.) It is not 100% like the game, there is no True LOS, movement is less precise etc.

2.) People don't always share game exepctations. From some of the lists you played against your opponents seem far more competitive than you are ready for. Playing against people you know on Vassal is always better than random strangers.

Essentially if you can get into a local gaming group it will be much easier to work on your game. Make friends that play and will help you practice and get better.

Vassal is a great tool for testing lists, and fore experienced players, but for the new player I think it iwill handicap your play in the long run (you will get used to vassal and return to losing when playing a bit worse when you get on an actual table.)

What are you doing wrong? NOTHING. The question you asked was "How to become a better player". Better players still loose games.

So the way I see it, (I loose all the time almost when I use to play), is are you playing for fun, or are you asking to "become a better player" to win with plastic toy soldiers?

As I said, I loose all the time. I suck. The dice Gods hate me. But so what, I still keep playing. If I don't keep playing, I will never learn. You just started. It will take you a while to learn all the rules of 40K in a baldy written formatted book.

TL;DR

So since you just stared you need learn and just have fun. It will take time, and just learn from the stuff when you loose.

It seems the other opponents just want to win, not advise you and let you know what to do and most importantly WHY.

Hit me up on vassal if you want a friendly learning game bud, same name on there as here.

Also, what was the name of the dude using the screamer council?

I lose often. This is because I don't build my army lists to be these amazing synergies that are meant to flatten the world. I like bringing units that I've painted amazingly or I like the rules for because they're cool or have awesome fluff. I don't really care what stat lines and such I've brought. The minute this game becomes min/maxing or die, I stop playing. This is precisely why online MMOs have lost their appeal to me, except EVE.

Keep at it man, a game as deep as Warhammer takes years to get good at, and even longer to master. I've been playing chess since I was a kid and I still learn new stuff when I play a better opponent. Good luck, friend!

One important note, in regards to some of the comments (sarcastic or otherwise) about getting a strong army....

Winning games with a very strong army or build, makes a person a WORSE player in my opinion. Really.

Sure, you might win games...but when that gimmick army/rule/build gets nerfed....the player can fall apart.

Don't get me wrong, no one likes to lose all the time...but if you want to be a better player, then try not to use a super strong build ..it will be a crutch.

I learned the game on armies that were at the time, considered quite bad (at one tourney, a fellow player looked at my army and said "wow, you are playing X? that takes fortitude".

Later on, when I tried a codex that was considered a "power" army (I wanted to learn them to learn their weaknesses) - the game was laughably easy - because I had learned to rely on my decisions, tactics and builds - not some new OP toys.

So anyway, keep playing, read as much as you can, and watch as many battle reports as you can...and try to pay more attention to the players that are less emo, and more objective in their games...or who might be a little more self critical than "of course I lost, they were playing X".

Also, see if you can find a player in your area you respect, and see if they can give you some advice or practice games. There are a couple of guys in my area who can usually beat me, and I try to learn as much as I can from them.

best of luck, and have fun!!!

Should build a proper demon army list and learn to play with it and not pick random models . That is a waste of testing time.

Best would be to find an good tournament wining demon list and learn to play with it .After you learn to play with that, you can start modifing it to fit your local meta.

This list for example could be a good start

Sorcerer
ML3, Terminator Armor, Spell Familiar, Brand

Herald of Tzeentch
ML3, Exaulted (Grimoire), Locus of Conjuration

Herald of Tzeentch
ML3

Herald of Khorne
Lesser (Axe of Khorne), Locus of Wrath, Juggernaught

Horrors x20
Plaguebearers x10
Plaguebearers x10
Cultists x10

Screamers x9
Flesh Hounds x16
Heldrake x1

Obliterators x3
Mark of Nurgle

davethepak wrote:Sure, you might win games...but when that gimmick army/rule/build gets nerfed....the player can fall apart.

Well, or, more likely, they merely move on to the next most powerful things. I knew someone years ago that would ride the game like a surfer - going from most powerful army build to most powerful army build. He didn't have an army, he had the minis required to play the strongest build at any moment.

That said, I certainly agree with your overall sentiment. Winning the lazy way with the cheese de jure will make it harder for you to become a better player faster, and will ultimately cap your player skill to a low level over all over time.

I too am new to the game. I have won once. I play AT least 3 or 4 games a month. Been playing about 7 months. I have taken every single loss in stride. including the absolute horendus game where I lost about 1/2 my army to Wave Serpent's the very first turn of the game. I hadnt even moved yet. Oh well. It happens.

Just remember, every last person you play wether they destroy you or just barely win, were in the SAME BOAT you were at some point. Try and learn something from every game. even if its only Dont bunch up against Eldar. or Shoot down the Flying deamon prince asap. Or run from great unclean ones.

on the army aspect. pick your army, the one you like for your own reasons. Learn it, try different lists, lose, maybe win. enjoy it. we play a game to have fun...othewise why play any game?

So many replies! Thank you all so much for all of the advice. I cannot respond to you all individually, but, please know that I've read every post here.

To answer some of the major points:

My army is Chaos Daemons, it's the one I have a Codex for so far, and some models. I picked them after asking around locally and discovering not many people play them and that they are considered a decent army, but not overpowered. I didn't want to try to jump into the hobby with some kind of super overpowered army and earn the ire of other players. Besides, I kind of liked the idea of customizing my HQs and champions with various weapons. I also liked the idea of the Warp Storm table. (I reeeally don't like the Warp Storm now, though. It has hurt me far more than it's helped me. I dread each of my shooting phases.) What I did not realize, was just how weak the Chaos Daemons were in shooting. It feels crippling, not having a decent way to do ranged damage.

I expected to lose a lot. I just had not expected to lose so quickly or decisively. I've watched tons and tons of battle reports on youtube, and I've never seen anyone lose as quickly as I do. What the heck!

I suppose it will just take lots and lots of practice. But, being a mostly assault focused army, I'm not sure what else I can do other than try to close the distance as quickly as possible to reduce the amount of shooting that I have to absorb. I played my 2nd real game at a local game store today. It was versus Tau at 1,000 points. I got decimated by tons and tons of str5 shooting at really good ballistic skill. Plus a big Tau mecha that was firing large blast templates at me. I'm just not sure what else I could do, except charge into the guns and hope I get to the enemy before I lose all my models.

SneakyDragon wrote:I played my 2nd real game at a local game store today. It was versus Tau at 1,000 points. I got decimated by tons and tons of str5 shooting at really good ballistic skill. Plus a big Tau mecha that was firing large blast templates at me. I'm just not sure what else I could do, except charge into the guns and hope I get to the enemy before I lose all my models.

Not a lot I can do but reiterate my previous points. You're a new player playing CC demons against a more experienced player playing the easiest army in the game to win with right now. You really are in a david vs. goliath situation.

... well, no... because david won that one. More like... well, all those other dudes goliath killed vs. goliath.

If you're going to play those kinds of odds, then you could consider yourself a winner of a game if you don't get tabled until turn 4, for example, as that would probably be the best you're going to be able to achieve with that kind of list matchup. Without, that is, a great deal more player skill, or a great deal more luck.

In fact, that might be a good way to go about it in general. Set up victory conditions for yourself outside of merely winning the game. You win if you can finally get those flesh hounds into close combat, or if you can manage to take down your opponents' mechvets or riptide, or manage to kill a single wave serpent. Stuff like that. More realistic goals.

Hey Sneaky, it's Aftermath. I watched your game #2. You stood no chance.

A big problem with Vassal is you are playing very experienced players using the most powerful\cutting edge lists in the game.
You don't stand much of a chance against them when you are new.

How do you get better?

1 - Play LOTS of games. Don't worry about loosing, you WILL loose a lot in the beginning. Focus on learning the mechanics of the game and how the different armies play.
2 - Don't just play on Vassal. Play in real life as well with real models.
3 - Spend at least an hour\week on Dakka studing tactic and list threads.
4 - You MUST have a strong list to compete on Vassal, and you MUST learn all of the codexes inside and out. This takes time. I have been playing for 15 years, and I still learn
new things constantly. And believe it or not, I have been known to loose a game on occasion.
5 - The game is very complex, with constant changes and FAQs happening. If you want to get and stay good, you have to be on top of the changes. This takes time and you are
not at this point yet.

PM me on vassal and we can play one. I will take a moderate list and we can go over strategy more.

Ailaros, it was not very much fun playing against the Tau to be quite honest. The majority of his models sat in one spot and didn't move for the entire game. They just shot their str5 guns at me.

Hey, Aftermath! Funny that you found me here.

The lesson the Tau are teaching you is that "run forward and charge" is not a viable plan in 40k. You need an optimized list that is designed to execute a strategy as efficiently as possible, and if you're going to assault you need a way of getting there that isn't just "move 6" closer every turn". Tau are beatable, but they're very good at massacring bad lists.

And if all else fails, just bring the death star with a re-rollable 2+ invulnerable save. Tau shooting can't damage it effectively, and once you get into charge range you win.

SneakyDragon wrote:Ailaros, it was not very much fun playing against the Tau to be quite honest.

You're not alone. Gunlines are boring to play against, and tau are a gunliney army in a gunliney rules edition. Worse, they have a bunch of specific tau things that negate your ability to actually use your miniatures against them, and to do things that traditionally break up gunline hegemony a bit.

In the end, though, it's who you play more than what army, per se. It is, in theory, possible to not play tau as a gunline, and it's also very possible to play boring gunline games against people who don't play tau (though most people who want to play gunlines play tau now). In the end, though, it's a social game, which means that the gaming experience is only as good as the people actually playing the game make it. Find bad opponents, and you'll have a worse time of it. There's not a whole lot you can do about it other than to find different opponents, change your definition of fun to match whoever you're playing against, or sort of grin and bear it while trying to play the game the way you want to and get what you want from it.

It's best to ignore Ailaros on this. He has his own personal rules about what units/armies he will allow himself to use, and always blames his opponents for "ruining the fun" if he can't win without breaking his arbitrary rules. For example, he refuses to play with Vendettas in his IG lists even if they would give him a much better chance of winning, and you're TFG/"playing on easy mode"/etc if you don't do the same. It's a really defeatist attitude where he ensures that he will do badly and then congratulates himself on playing 40k on "hard mode".

If you want useful advice Tau can be as much fun to play against as any other army. They just have a codex that makes it easy to avoid some of the common newbie mistakes* in list building so even a newer Tau player is probably using a reasonably powerful list. If you're still in the early days yourself you're probably making those newbie mistakes and the Tau will exploit every one of them. But once you figure out how to play the game and make a strong list you'll start winning against Tau and having a lot more fun.


*For example, never split your army between shooting and assault. Tau solve this by not having any assault units.

It's best to ignore Peregrine on this. He hates it when people have fun in ways he doesn't approve of or when they don't have fun the ways he approves of. He doesn't understand that there is more to the game than winning and it is a toxic attitude that'll burn a lot of people out quickly and risk you losing your money buying into the hobby.

OP, try making friends with the players at the local game store. Ask them for advice too, and try to figure out what kind of environment it is. If they're all of a competitive mindset, you might have problems if you want to build an army like you want to build. If they're more open to casual play though, you should be able to communicate what you're trying to achieve with your army which would hopefully lead to games against appropriate lists within a relatively similar power level. Communication always helps. It is a social hobby rather than a video game, after all.

 Talore wrote:
It's best to ignore Peregrine on this. He hates it when people have fun in ways he doesn't approve of or when they don't have fun the ways he approves of. He doesn't understand that there is more to the game than winning and it is a toxic attitude that'll burn a lot of people out quickly and risk you losing your money buying into the hobby.

You know, it's funny that you post that little rant when one of my favorite targets on this site is "fluff/fun at all costs" people who whine and cry if anyone says they have fun playing the game competitively.

And the OP asked for help with winning. Telling them "stop caring about winning and have fun" is not constructive advice.

Oh look, lots of stuff I never said. Super post! You might be surprised to learn that I have nothing against competitive play. I also told him that he would have problems with his list in a competitive environment, not to just ignore trying to get better as a player. What I will NOT do is set him up to waste a ton of money trying to play a game in a way that might not work for him. We're not all made of money like you are. The models he has could be all that he has to work with.