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 Rik Lightstar wrote:

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:
We live in the age of the internet. If you didn't know super simple combos, that's honestly on you. Zero info is hidden. We have people doing codex reviews and tactics, whether it be from Goonhammer or 1d4chan.

This attitude simply doesn't stand up to any real scrutiny....

There are currently 35 Factions listed on the GW Webstore, let's assume someone plays one other game and it's a relatively simple one like Underworlds, but hang on there's another 32 Factions for that.

Lets take a very conservative estimate of 4 combos on average per Faction, each comprising 3 components.

That gives us 268 "combos" with 804 individual components.

Suddenly it becomes apparent that for a lot of people with a job, family, another hobby, whatever that the level of interaction and number of individual pieces to the puzzle can make it difficult.

Rik

Let's be realistic here, it isn't exactly 35 Factions. Many of them share exact statlines (Chaos Knights and Imperial Knights ring a bell?), many Factions share similar Strats (just because Eldar don't have Auspex EXACTLY it doesn't mean you don't know what it does essentially), and there are Subfactions that have pretty much the same rules. You don't even NEED exact memorization for this.

If it's a week after a codex has been released whatever, but a couple of weeks to a month? You should know better.

yukishiro1 wrote:

 skchsan wrote:
What if what you want is a game of wits (augmented by luck of the dice), and not tutorial game?

"My opponent didn't know about my army's special rules" isn't a contest of wits, it's a contest of knowledge, in a hobby where knowledge is gated behind expensive books. Most competitors don't find "I won the game because my opponent didn't know I could do something" a satisfying victory. If you enjoy the kind of victory that comes from your opponent not knowing the rules, more power to you I guess if you can find a bunch of like-minded people, but it's not how most people in the hobby feel, and that's particularly true when it comes to tournaments.

Competitive 40k is actually quite interesting because it's the complete opposite of cutthroat, at least when it comes to tabletop "manners." Even people who play the most cutthroat competitive lists, taking advantage of the most dubious and obviously unintended of interactions, will typically bend over backwards to make sure your actual experience of playing them is positive and friendly and that you don't feel like you lost because of a lack of information or because you were ambushed with strange rules interactions. In fact, generally the more a player relies on a "gimmick" to win the game, the more likely they are to fully explain that gimmick to you ahead of time to make sure you're aware of it.

So while it isn't technically "cheating" to ambush your opponent with rules, it is very much on the list of behaviors that get you labelled as a bad competitor in 40k.

It's a game of wits precisely because you expect your opponent to know everything you're going to do (my army rules), and you know everything your opponent is going to do (their army rules). Then, it becomes about how you create advantage when playing with an open hand (the army list). You know that thing is coming, you just don't know how it's going to come at you or play out (since dice).

So are you saying:

1. Your opponents should be aware of your financial situation and work around it, since the rulebooks for the game are "so" expensive?
2. You should be morally inclined/responsible for making sure your opponent is up to date on the rules, because otherwise it's not a honorable win?
3. People will feel better about losing to somebody if how they were going to lose was explained to them beforehand?

Last time I checked, it's more rude to be "that guy" who doesn't come prepared to an event (i.e. doesn't bring his own dice, borrows other's rulebooks/rulers, asks others to check the rules for them instead of checking it your own, touches others' models with CHEETOS POWDER COVERED FINGERS, etc). And, knowing others' armies and how they work most certainly falls under 'preparation for an event'.

I would be inclined to believe that people who consistently place top in tournaments are practicing against other factions in preparation to play well at events. In saying, not knowing how others' armies work is largely attributed to your lack of experience, exposure, and/or interest in the game and not because the other person 'cheated' (with single quotes) you. One's lack of experience is not the fault of the experienced.

Also, if you're rules lawyering and relying on exploiting the ambiguity in the rules as the basis for your wins, then you ARE cheating because you are just straight up lying and making up rules. If you're going to rely on technicality, then you should be playing with an arbitrator/judge at an arm's length than telling your opponent "this is actually what the rules mean, even though it reads otherwise."

I'm just telling you how it is. You can disagree as much as you want and insist that taking advantage of your opponent not knowing your rules is fair game and shows what a good tactician you are. I'm not interested in fighting you over it, it's your games you're playing.

It's just not how most people in the hobby feel, so you may have trouble finding like-minded people, and if you try to play that way on the tournament circuit, you are likely to develop a bad reputation. People will evaluate you by the prevailing sportsmanship standards of the hobby, whether or not you agree with those standards.

40k competitive etiquette is very much that you should not take advantage of people's lack of knowledge of your rules, and that you should be open to explaining those rules to them if they ask. You can disregard that etiquette as you wish, and at your own peril.

I would say that core rules things that people should know better (like Heroic Intervention) I will not mention.

But if my army has a special rule that does a thing? I will absolutely mention it. Some of them should even be mentioning without the opponent having to ask.

Just recently this bit me in the ass because I played against someone who did know mono-Slaanesh could advance and charge (near characters). To me, it is an obvious thing about the army that *everyone* knows, so I didn't even say it. When it finally came up, it was far too late - his whole deployment had been predicated on me not advancing and charging. We would have had to restart the game from before the deployment phase.

That was a real feels bad moment.

That's absolutely not something to feel bad about, and that's your opponent's own fault.

A ruined game because someone didn't know a rule is something it's perfectly reasonable to feel bad about, and discussing whose fault it is doesn't change the fact that the game was ruined because someone didn't know about a rule.

If you personally enjoy winning a game before it even starts because your opponent didn't know your army's rules, you do you - honestly, that's not being snarky - but many of us don't find a game like that enjoyable, so it is pretty much the definition of "feels bad" when it happens.

If you have units that "step outside" the standard rules such as Keepers of Secrets that can Advance and Charge then I think it is sporting to tell your opponent before the game. This isn't real war where you take every advantage including surprise about your capabilities. In war you don't want to play the other guy again. In wargaming you should want the other guy to want to play you again.

Getting wins purely based on an error is feel bads IMO.

Back in 8th I was playing an ITC game to help someone practice for a tourney. My oponent teleported a unit of DG termies as close to shadow specters as he could as they were really doing the work against his pox walker blobs.

I declared forewarned (CWE strategem where I can immediately fire at a unit arriving via DS if farseer is nearby) I assumed he was aware of the stratagem as its a pretty well known one.

Despite the offer of a take back (as I felt it was really harsh) he stuck to his move, and we played on. He lost 3 blightlords crippling his unit and pretty much costing him the game.
In his words we were playing a tourney simulation game so any mistakes had to be worn and we both made some goofs up to that point. However Id say this is perfect example of a gotcha moment.

In a casual pick up game I would insist my opponent re-deploy out of range/ change deploy location coz its pure gotcha moment.

BUT, i think it is also on you as the player to gather intel on your enemy. I.e. "Do you have any way to increase this units movement?" "Whats this units shooting? Oh ok. Can you improve this units shooting with anything?" And so on.

Pretty much all the unit information is declared at the start during deployment/ list introduction commonly. But lets be real nobody will remember entire enemy loadout from in a torrent of information. Therefore asking questions when planning strategy is mark of good general IMO.

 Unit1126PLL wrote:
I would say that core rules things that people should know better (like Heroic Intervention) I will not mention.

But if my army has a special rule that does a thing? I will absolutely mention it. Some of them should even be mentioning without the opponent having to ask.

Just recently this bit me in the ass because I played against someone who did know mono-Slaanesh could advance and charge (near characters). To me, it is an obvious thing about the army that *everyone* knows, so I didn't even say it. When it finally came up, it was far too late - his whole deployment had been predicated on me not advancing and charging. We would have had to restart the game from before the deployment phase.

That was a real feels bad moment.

The only flaw on your side is that you didn't share the rules of your faction trait at the beginning of the game. Not telling your opponent about your Locus of Swiftness is like not telling your opponent about your Chapter Tactic. I always tell my opponent what that is and what it does.

It's not like anyone ran mono-Slaanesh before 9th Edition

Right right, I should have said something.

I assumed people knew, but even something like an army trait for one of the strongest armies in the game can be unknown, not to mention obscure things like specific Stratagems or WLTs. That game was evidence that the game is too big to remember now.

 Unit1126PLL wrote:
Right right, I should have said something.

I assumed people knew, but even something like an army trait for one of the strongest armies in the game can be unknown, not to mention obscure things like specific Stratagems or WLTs. That game was evidence that the game is too big to remember now.

Amen. Especially for new players who are going to struggle to remember even all the rules for their own army, nevermind anyone else's.

There must of plenty of innocent 'gotchas' but it is heartening that the general feeling seems to be that we should reduce the incidence of them occuring at all. No one wants to see this kind of thing again:



For young or non-uk readers, that's TV personality Noel Edmunds with a 'Gotcha' award.

I find the pre-game ritual usually includes a run-down of each other's lists, highlighting things that step outside the normal rules. Time is tight at tourneys, but a quick discussion is worth the time investment. Usually starts with "Have you played against this army before?" It's not a full Codex preview, but at least cover the shenanigans. I'll remind my opponent of my Chapter tactics, Warlord Trait, key relics and maybe some unique DA Strats that I am sure to use.

In the words of Achilles:

"Get up, Prince of Troy! Get up! I won't let a stone take my glory!"

To be honest, the topic isn't really about honest mistakes/ assumptions the other player knows. It's more about the players who know the other player doesn't know, takes full advantage of it and decide not to say anything before winning only thanks to that and think / gloat about how he's a great competitor because of it.

To me, that's a true "gotcha" moment. And I still think it's not cheating per se, but it's just being a dick to the other...so it's normal to face the social consequences of it, meaning bad reputation as a competitor and people less willing to engage / play with you in the future.

I also believe it's not the norm and that most of the high level competitors know perfectly a bad reputation isn't especially worth a perfect win record. Particularly when sportmanship begins to be a factor to evaluate you as one of the best.

After all, knowing that you won just because the other player wasn't aware of the rules of what you were doing doesn't make you that great a tactician per se. It just means you took advantage of your opponent's weakness, not of your own strong points. And you learn nothing much from your own victory either.

Sarouan wrote:
To be honest, the topic isn't really about honest mistakes/ assumptions the other player knows. It's more about the players who know the other player doesn't know, takes full advantage of it and decide not to say anything before winning only thanks to that and think / gloat about how he's a great competitor because of it.

To me, that's a true "gotcha" moment. And I still think it's not cheating per se, but it's just being a dick to the other...so it's normal to face the social consequences of it, meaning bad reputation as a competitor and people less willing to engage / play with you in the future.

I also believe it's not the norm and that most of the high level competitors know perfectly a bad reputation isn't especially worth a perfect win record. Particularly when sportmanship begins to be a factor to evaluate you as one of the best.

After all, knowing that you won just because the other player wasn't aware of the rules of what you were doing doesn't make you that great a tactician per se. It just means you took advantage of your opponent's weakness, not of your own strong points. And you learn nothing much from your own victory either.

And how can one know whether their opponent knows their army or not or needs 'my army 101' to every opponent they meet? In what ways are we bound by the moral obligations to ask each and every opponent "did you ever play against my faction? if not, would you like a comprehensive overview of my army so that you are not caught off guard by 'gotcha!' moments?"

This is precisely why we are arguing that it is the responsibility of the player that doesn't know to ask the specific, relevant questions, instead expecting the other player to give a full run down of all the key points and nuances of their army unsolicited because that's 'sportmanship' and your moral obligation to fellow hobbyists.

There is no moral obligations to make sure my opponent is on same footing as me. In tournament settings, everyone is expected to come prepared to a certain degree. And because of that expectation, the underlying assumption is that "if my opponent has any specific questions, they will ask." It's completely understandable to not understand others' army 100%, but its a whole different issue when you ask "hey, I never played against DE despite all the meta hype right now. What are your strongest units? What does that unit do? What does this unit do? What are your stratagems?"

Under no circumstances are you expected nor required to tell/instruct your opponent on how to beat you, or rather, how not to lose to you.

Now, I'm not claiming this is THE ONLY questions you should be asking/answering, but acceptable kinds of questions would be specific, relevant, and would look like somewhere in the lines of:
"which one of your units are CORE?"
"any non-troop units ObSec?"
"what kind of deep strike options do your units have?"
"do you have any faction specific interrupting stratagems or abilities that I need to take into consideration during the game".
"can I see your codex/print outs on your stratagems so I can familiarize them myself?"

There's nothing "ass" about the guy that didn't answer the questions that weren't asked to him.

In my experience, 9 out of 10 times my opponent would give me his information parsed in his own language which sometimes convey information that isn't quite same as per rules. If I need details of his army, I ask for documentations, rather than his rundown.

TLDR: it is obligation of the opposing player to be able to furnish relevant information/documentation upon request, however, in no way is the opposing player REQUIRED to give a full comprehensive rundown of their army as a prerequisite for conducting a "legal" (i.e. 'not-cheating') game. This is neither unspoken rule in tournaments or a moral obligation/contract of attending such tournaments.

The competitive code of conduct for 40k tournaments goes well beyond just "don't cheat," and freely explaining your army's rules is very much both an unspoken rule and a moral obligation in the code of competitive 40k as it exists today. You may not get kicked out of a tournament for not being open to explaining your rules to your opponent, but you *will* develop a reputation as a bad competitor if you frequently take advantage of your opponent's lack of knowledge of your rules. That's just the reality of the 40k competitive culture.

You are welcome to disagree and either pay the reputational consequences for violating those community standards, or to start up your own tournaments where these standards don't prevail, but being open with your rules and making sure your opponent isn't ambushed by them is very much part of current competitive 40k etiquette, no matter how much you say it isn't. You're also welcome, of course, to argue that we should change our current code of conduct to be less stringent and to allow for more profiting from the ignorance of your opponent. But I'm not sure you're going to get very far.

 skchsan wrote:
And how can one know whether their opponent knows their army or not or needs 'my army 101' to every opponent they meet?

Simple : you ask him.

Nothing prevents you from talking to your opponent during the game. Unless you believe that doing so completely exposes your master plan or something. But I really doubt that's the case in all situations.

This is precisely why we are arguing that it is the responsibility of the player that doesn't know to ask the specific, relevant questions, instead expecting the other player to give a full run down of all the key points and nuances of their army unsolicited because that's 'sportmanship' and your moral obligation to fellow hobbyists.

There's not much to argue, actually. When in doubt, just ask. It never hurts. I can understand some may be shy or aren't especially talkative, but it's better than having a bad taste in your mouth because of a ruined game.

And no, the responsability isn't solely on the other player. It's also on the one knowing the rules themselves. Sure, sometimes it's hard to tell if the other player really doesn't know - but other times, you can see it clearly. Especially when you meet a lot of different players with different levels. And I wonder if you know you already had those moments during your own games. Maybe then you simply chose not to say anything anyway, knowing you would win an easy advantage by doing so. And maybe you're trying to justify your behaviour here.

Whatever is the reality, it's never an excuse, though. It's a deliberate choice. And those who made it know very well what they did.

There is no moral obligations to make sure my opponent is on same footing as me. In tournament settings, everyone is expected to come prepared to a certain degree.

Of course there is no moral obligation. Even being polite to your opponent isn't one as well. Morality varies depending on your beliefs and education.

Simply put, if you act like a dick, you'll be treated like a dick. That's all.

Now, I'm not claiming this is THE ONLY questions you should be asking/answering, but acceptable kinds of questions would be specific, relevant, and would look like somewhere in the lines of:
"which one of your units are CORE?"
"any non-troop units ObSec?"
"what kind of deep strike options do your units have?"
"do you have any faction specific interrupting stratagems or abilities that I need to take into consideration during the game".
"can I see your codex/print outs on your stratagems so I can familiarize them myself?"

If you're a good player at the game, you know perfectly when these questions are especially important during the game, given the situation, deployment and how the turns are doing. Hell, you can even see when your opponent is making mistakes, and with experience you can suspect when someone does it because he was mystified by your tactical genius or simply forgot a rule (against me, it's most of the time about forgetting a rule ).

So it's not such a "hard science" at all. You're nitpicking on purpose here, trying to make it look like it's really difficult in all situations while it's not the case at all.

In the end, the real question you should ask yourself is "do I really want to tell my opponent if he made a honest mistake and miss an easy win ?" If your answer is "no", then there is no reason to go any further. You know exactly what you want to do and you'll face the consequences. Anything else is just mere justifications for your behaviour.

I feel like this should be a general point about 'tournament discussion' but it's probably worth bringing up here but:

The majority of players in any given tournament are there primarily for the social event, not to compete at 'serious 40k'. Tournaments are primarily gamer meets, the competition is an excuse.

So, even in a tournament setting, I'd err on the side of sportsmanship, allowing takebacks, etc. Why? Because I don't really care about where I'm gonna place - that's just not the point for most people there! I'm there for fun games against new people.

Yeah, that's my feelings exactly. "Gotcha Moments" is not cheating, but they are usually from a chain of events planned by an expert of the game, whether Warmachine, MTG, or 40k. One reason I dropped
Warmachine was the harsh learning curve for a new player/someone that doesn't play very often and the senior players drooling waiting to "curb stomp" you if you didn't realize what they were setting up and stopped the monster combo before it hit you with full force.

Yeah, different games have very different cultures when it comes to competition. 40k, for whatever reason, has a competitive culture that leans very far towards the "don't take advantage of people, especially not newer or less well informed players" side of things; some other games have cultures that strike a different balance. WHFB was a bit different in my memory, people were less forgiving and more willing to take advantage, both of other players and of abusive mechanics, which is perhaps not coincidentally part of the reason it was so much less successful as a game, to the point where they eventually just pulled the plug.

Sarouan wrote:

 skchsan wrote:
And how can one know whether their opponent knows their army or not or needs 'my army 101' to every opponent they meet?

Simple : you ask him.

Nothing prevents you from talking to your opponent during the game. Unless you believe that doing so completely exposes your master plan or something. But I really doubt that's the case in all situations.

That's fine, and I don't think anyone disagrees with that. But, how far do you go? Especially in a tournament setting where time is often tight there's a limit to how much explanation you can give. A basic overview of your army and its rules are fine (things like Chapter tactics, if a unit has Deep Strike on its datasheet, etc) but I think beyond that it's really down to your opponent to ask the right questions. A lot of the time the strats you'll be concerned about are common things like fight/shoot twice or extending Heroic Intervention or consolidation ranges so even without knowing specific names of strats it's possible for opponents to at least be aware of the kind of possibilities you have open to you.

Warning your opponent about strats or special rules you could use seems to go a little too far towards playing the game for them. If they ask, tell them, but if not it's not up to me to remind them. Maybe they already know and my constant interruptions just serve to annoy them, maybe they are planning something completely different to what I think so my interjection is irrelevant. None of this applies when you're facing a newer player but even that is a judgement call. I've had new players get annoyed after a gotcha moment and some who would vastly prefer to be caught out by them to help them learn the game better. There's no hard and fast right answer so communication is absolutely key.

Slipspace wrote:


That's fine, and I don't think anyone disagrees with that. But, how far do you go?

There's no general case here, it all depends of the situation. It's obvious you don't act the same when time is limited to play or when it's not a factor.

Basically, it all ends up about being a "gotcha" moment or not. And that's the responsibility of the player who knows the rules. If there is something the opponent is doing that is obviously wrong and most likely happening because he's not aware of a rule, there's no harm to ask him at that moment.

So it's all about how you're feeling about it : would you feel "right" if you won just because of that or not ? Or do you want to have a victory that you earned fairly ?

Like said before, there's no moral obligation enforcing you to do so except your own moral code. Thing is, other people will evaluate you on your actions with their own moral code according to your behaviour.

It's really about how to act in gaming society. In some areas, "gotcha" moments are accepted. In others, they're not. It's also a culture issue. For example, if I play in a republican area with high competivity point of view in life (like the strong eat the weaks to get stronger), I expect player groups here will have a more tolerant view about "gotcha" moments and will blame entirely the other player for not knowing. Because that's how they see the whole world and to them, there is nothing wrong in that. In Rome do as the Romans : it's a bit that as well.

Still, to me, I can't help but see that as being a dick to the other player. But in some areas, I totally do understand it's not especially seen as a problem in itself (if the other feels offended, he can always defend himself like a true man or something like that). Or they just believe people learn things better the hard way.

But it's always a deliberate choice from the part of the player who knows.

Sarouan wrote:
So it's all about how you're feeling about it : would you feel "right" if you won just because of that or not ? Or do you want to have a victory that you earned fairly ?

As an opponent, I would rather lose a game in which I made a critical error and got caught out. Next time, I'll know better. I wouldn't feel "right" if I only won because my opponent warned me that I was making a mistake, and I wouldn't feel as if I had earned it fairly.

If you made mistake fine. If it was because gw introduced yet another combo requiring 3 books none related to your army?

That ain't skill.

Do you want to win because you are　better? Or just want to win even if it means admitting you suck as a　player? If you feel need to hide paywall info to bolster your winning chances it just means you suck in game tactics

Yes, but that's still not a justification for mandating someone with the books to teach those without, or else get called names and labelled as "that guy". 40k tourney scene is not where one practices noblesse oblige.

Imagine if you and your friend went to McDonalds. You order a sandwich a la carte, your friend orders a meal with fries and a drink. You ask him to share his drink and his fries, and your friend says no because he doesn't want to share. Is your friend a bad person for not sharing his own fries & drinks?

No. That just makes him someone who doesn't like sharing food. Like Joey. It's nice to share, but that doesn't mean you're not a nice person if you don't share. Stop making this into a binary condition, because it really isn't.

There's no reason to call someone "that guy" just because play A didn't know play B's rules, and player B didn't ask player A whether he knew the rules. The burden is on the player that doesn't know to ask for help because we're not mind readers. Stop trying to claim false labels on people who you don't even know.

40k tournaments are friendly competitions, not charity events (although some events do donate to charity). Everyone is expected to bring their A-game, and no player should be asked to pull their punches because someone didn't know the rules.

 skchsan wrote:
40k tourney scene is not where one practices noblesse oblige.

But it is, based on the standards we've developed over the years. We have established standards of conduct in 40k that have built up over the years, and they include avoiding taking advantage of your opponent's ignorance of your army's rules where possible. You obviously don't think they should include that - and it's your right to argue that - but most 40k tournament players don't agree, and they will evaluate you according to the prevailing standards whether you agree with them or not. You can complain about how unfair it is to be called "that guy" because you behave in the way that we have categorized as "that guy," but people aren't going to stop applying the community sportsmanship standards to you just because you don't agree with them.

Play the way you want to play, and face the consequences for doing so. If someone calls you "that guy" because of it, either modify your behavior or just accept that they feel you're a bad competitor. They have at least as much right to label you a bad sport for violating the standards of behavior they think apply to the game as you do to demand they change those standards to accommodate your desire to be able to take greater advantage of those who don't know better.

You're falsely equating one with another.

At tournaments, the organizers expect the attendees' to maintain a degree of acceptable behavior. That's a euphemism for "don't be a toxic player at our events".

By no extension of that means "in our 40k community we developed over the decades of gaming, we don't condone the act of not sharing information to people who don't own rulebooks for armies they don't own. We find that to be extremely un-sportsman like because there's a high pay wall to play the game, and it creates unfair advantage to the people who actually paid for the rulebooks. The paywall to play is prohibitive for many hobbyists, and often causes 'gotcha' moments where unknowing players get caught off guard because they didn't have access to the rule. The only way to know others' armies without costing an arm and a leg is to utilize the vast resource called internet, but this act borders piracy, and by that extension, by not teaching the unknowing player you are forcing them to commit the crime of piracy and IP infringement. Thus, we have no choice but to consider you as "that guy" and as a community we will make all attempts to discredit your victories because you didn't share your information that is exclusive to you, and to you only."

Talk about false equation.

Refusing to explain your rules to your opponent is very much bad sportsmanship in the culture of competitive 40k. If you don't believe me go ahead and do a poll of tournament players, I am absolutely certain you will find a strong majority saying that you should be always be ready and willing to explain how your army's rules work to your opponent, and that refusing to do so in order to take advantage of their lack of knowledge is "that guy" behavior.

Quit moving goal posts. Purposely refusing to provide answers to explicit questions being asked is an entirely different issue.

I'm talking about this incessant claim that there's an unspoken rule in tournaments that players are REQUIRED TO confirm with the opponent that they have comprehensive knowledge of your army, and if they don't you must provide them with the in's and out's of your army because 'that's the right thing to do.'

That's literally not a thing - not in 40k tourney or any other type of tourneys. People chat with each other pregame because they want to chat and get a greater understanding of each others army, not because they're forced to due to this unspoken rule you're referring to.

What you are saying is "the common unspoken law of tournament mandates you ask me the question before we play. If you don't, your victory shall not be an honorable one, and i will get everyone to see that you didn't ask the question so that they never play with you."

If your opponent fails to communicate they don't know, then it's not your fault for not knowing whether your opponent knew or not. It's not on you to tell your opponent "If you do this, then I can do that and it'll insta-wipe you, so watch out for that 'GOTCHA!' moment! Love you!" By constantly telling your opponent what they can and cannot do, and should and should not do, at best it's coercion, and at worst manipulation. You are required to answer and provide the relevant information being requested for them to base their decision on. You are in the wrong to direct & manipulate people with the fear of being caught by "gotcha!"s.

Show me any tournament guideline that states "Your sportsmanship/conduct score will be deducted if you don't make sure your opponent has full, comprehensive knowledge of your army."

 skchsan wrote:
Quit moving goal posts.

...

Show me any tournament guideline that states "Your sportsmanship/conduct score will be deducted if you don't make sure your opponent has full, comprehensive knowledge of your army."

Wow. Where's that Nathan Fillion gif when you need it?

You stated above that you feel it's acceptable to refuse to explain your army's rules to your opponent if they don't ask questions you consider sufficiently specific. I am telling you clearly: that attitude is not in keeping with 40k's competitive code of conduct as most of us understand it. You will absolutely develop a reputation as a bad competitor if you do that.

You don't have to ask if your opponent understands you army; nobody said you did. But it makes a lot of sense to do so, because it's the easiest way to make sure you're not going to be profiting from their ignorance, which is what you want to avoid and what the competitive 40k community considers bad form.

You're really trying too hard here to come up with a justification for profiting from another player's ignorance of your army's rules. Just don't take advantage of other players' ignorance of your army's rules, it's really that simple. The easiest way not to do that is to make sure they understand by actually asking them, but there are other ways too if for whatever reason just asking them a simple question really is not something you're willing to do.