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I enjoyed this post, and agree

Tyranno wrote:
Just something I was thinking about.
There are people who played earlier editions, who complain about how 40K these days is so terrible, etc.

As you allude to, this is in large part due to the emphasis on winning and the willingness to jump through hoops of fire to do so, something that was not as prevalent in 2nd and 3rd edition eras. In addition, back then there wasn't really high speed Internet, meaning a an exploitative idea didn't get refined and shared with the entire universe overnight.

Tyranno wrote:
These days theres an attitude - I suspect it might come from the video game community - about how winning is everything, and it seems like those people try to apply it to 40K where it doesn't fit. Presumably that's where the attitude of the people wanting the rules to be set in stone comes from, though I've even seen complaints about rules that require interpretation or even common sense, which frankly is... I don't even know...

This is absolutely true. In a competitive/ranked multiplayer (or duel) video game, the system does the matchmaking, and your only objective is winning. There is really no point to playing other than to improve your skills and try to win, because losing to a stranger is not rewarding.

On the other hand, this attitude is terrible for wargaming, in my opinion. It just sucks all the fun out of it. To me, Wargaming is supposed to be about junk food, pop, and epic battles between friends

AllSeeingSkink wrote:

 insaniak wrote:
Except that's exactly the problem. What if a competitive player also wants to be a fluffy player?

The fact that the game creates that distinction is absurd.

You shouldn't need to hold interviews in order to find an opponent that you might have a chance of having an enjoyable game with.

I mostly find distinctions like WAAC, competitive and fluffy to be pointless because it seems odd to me that someone would actually fall entirely in to 1 category.

On this forum I'd probably be considered competitive, bordering on WAAC because I like to win and I think the rules should be played as written unless agreed to beforehand and I have no problem calling people out on moving their models 6.2" instead of 6". It's a game and I think it should be played as I'd play any other game, I play to the rules and I expect my opponent to do so as well.

But then personally, I identify more as a fluffy player. I collect armies because I like the fluff and the aesthetic. There's not an army I didn't start because of fluff/aesthetics, I didn't start any of my armies because I thought they were the best competitively.

...but then once I am collecting an army I look for the best builds and I tend not to take things that suck. This might get me labelled as competitive but IMO it's actually because I'm fluffy, it breaks my immersion when my army is repeatedly tabled by turn 3 so even if I like certain troops from a fluff and aesthetics point of view I won't take them if they're a crutch.

But anyway, yeah, the fact we make these distinctions is because we are trying to fit within the crappy rules not because they are genuinely useful distinctions.

I don't think any of the things you describe are WAAC. Packing an army with wave serpents and fire dragons, riptides, IKs, or wraithknights, or any other gimicky army is WAAC, in my book.

Desiring to win and calling out cheating, and knowing the rules and enforcing them is just bring competent. I think a casual player (like me) will do the same thin as golf and offer a handicap if I know it's a skewed fight. When it comes to golf, I will happily take a handicap too

Frankly, I don't know why WAAC is a bad thing, anyhow. These players are identified very quickly and stick to themselves.

Oh, regarding 2nd ed -- I actually miss the small scale nature of it . A very different game.

 insaniak wrote:

Talys wrote:
Packing an army with wave serpents and fire dragons, riptides, IKs, or wraithknights, or any other gimicky army is WAAC, in my book.

What if you packed your army with wave serpents, fire dragons and wraithknights because you just happen to like the models?

Whatever, man, play with what you like . If nobody wants to play with ya, deems the breaks.

Our gaming groups has unit limits on super-heavies (based on game point cost) and ratio requirements that scale up the cost of certain units past 3 to discourage cheesy lists.

 insaniak wrote:

Talys wrote:
Whatever, man, play with what you like . If nobody wants to play with ya, deems the breaks. .

But that was the point. This isn't a problem of player attitude... it's a flaw in the rules for building those armies.

A player shouldn't be penalised or looked down on for bringing a legal list. That's just an absurdity, and the fact that so many players are so happy to just accept that this is the way it is and try to section the community off into different 'groups' is a constant source of incredulity for me.

Let's just agree to disagree. I don't have a problem recognizing that tabletop games have flaws and that some tuning may be required to suit a play group. To me, this does not reduce the funness of the game even a little.

On an online game with matchmaking, I'm full-on WAAC. First thing I did when Hearthstone went live was spend money until owned every card, and then I mercilessly tuned lists until I got to Legendary, and them worked my way up the ladder. I would never do that in an RL game with friends, because if nothing else I'd rather they keep talking to me.

 Anpu42 wrote:

No, I am equating being a jerk with WAAC.

I was a WAAC Back in 2nd or 3rd, now I am Semi-Competitive-Fluffy Player. I get my enjoyment form the socializing and playing a good game, winning just makes the game better.
Here is the other difference: I will play an Ultra-Competitive Player dragging out 6 Riptides and as long they are cool about it and when I ask for a re-match they don't reply "No Not Until You Play Better." The last line was from WAAC Player.

You know, I think the *concept* of a horde of Orks grunts being able to fight 6 Riptides is actually a cool idea, as in, "What would happen if...". I like that the gaming system supports such a battle. And I like Riptides, IK's, Wraithknights, and Baneblades. I mean, these are awesome models that look epic on a gaming table.

However, I dislike a guy who just wants to play 6 Riptides because he knows that the person he's playing against can't win against them.

I mean, once we figure out a battle is a bad idea (no fun, and totally predictable) -- whether it's Riptide spam or Wave Serpent spam, a "friendly" player would move on, *especially* if no strategy, playskill or luck is involved. I mean, just save everyone the time, right? A WAAC player, instead, would want to keep replaying such lists and to feel that they are "better" player.

 insaniak wrote:
Whether it be a casual game or a tournament, my experience has been that the vast majority of rules issues never even went as far as a roll off. It usually comes down to one player saying 'x', the other player saying 'No, it's 'Y'', and the first player then saying 'Oh, ok then' and getting on with the game.

Even in a tournament, it generally only goes any further than that if it's something that might have a fairly pivotal impact on the game.

I'll second this. I can't recall the last roll-off.

The only time there is an issue at all is when both players are absolutely sure the rules say X or Y. Usually, it's resolved by asking the next table over (occasionally, the minority is right, and then they get to say, "I told you so" a few hours or the next week), and more often than not, it's not as you say, something that would cause a pivotal impact in the game anyways.

 Mr. Burning wrote:
Remember, rolling off disputes become a key issue within GW itself since they write about it in their publications and in their own rules.

It shows a disregard for the paying public that they do not hand over their publications to proper proofreaders or editors who can spot glaring grammatical errors and defects.

Let alone inconsistencies within the rules themselves.

This is not entirely correct. The roll-off is there in case two players disagree on a rule, and it can't be resolved quickly. Many times, this occurs because neither player knows where the exact rule is, and the choice is to take 5 minutes to look something up, or to simply get on with it.

It is very seldom that a rule in 7th ed is so ambiguous as to allow two contrarian interpretations, because in 7th ed, most of the complex rules include specific examples. Quite commonly, players disagree over special rules precedence -- for example, whether they get a save or not, when their character's ability says they always get a save, but some special circumstance says they don't get one. Almost universally the rules are very explicit, but to dig up a codex or rulebook and find the language is time-consuming.

Also, many of these type of questions are specific to one army, and one player is simply not familiar with that codex.



Automatically Appended Next Post:

 insaniak wrote:

Then the Studio told us that it was perfectly acceptable to paint Marneus Calgar orange and use him in your own home-brew Chapter.

Should we still go by the older material? Or should we go by the more recent statement and assume that what the studio originally intended has little bearing on the current game?

Well, the rules in the current Space Marine Codex is pretty clear -- you can invent your own Chapter (and paint it whatever color you want), but it is descended from one of the original chapters, and gets the benefits of that Chapter. You just have to tell your opponent before the game starts.

 insaniak wrote:

Speaking of things that were said in old White Dwarf articles... When Epic 40K was released, the studio guys explained the new 'firefight' mechanic as being repesentative of what was essentially a 40K battle happening in the middle of the overall conflict. The idea was that your games of 40K aren't intended to necessarily reflect the whole engagement. They're just a snapshot of a small part of it. The Epic battle was the full shebang.

Within that context, it's perfectly reasonable for a 1500 point army to include nothing but Wraithknights. They're not the only units in the whole battle... just the only units currently taking part in the part of the battle being represented by your current game of 40K.

Yeah, and I *LIKE* that the rules allow for a game to occur with 1500 point armies with only super-heavies on one end. However, I think someone's a major ass if they play such an army against an opponent that clearly is not set up to fight it.

PhantomViper wrote:If someone builds a legal army for a determined point level, then that army should have a reasonable chance to defeat and be defeated by every other army of the same points level. If this doesn't happen, then it is not the player's fault, its the rules!

Why do you people insist on blaming the players for the mistakes of the rules creators?

Because it's really hard to have that in a very complex game that caters to the veterans, who are more likely to have with vast (unit) resources. There is nothing wrong with a Baneblade being 525-640 points, *as long as the other side has ways to deal with them*. In fact, 640 is perfectly balanced, in my opinion, relative in costs to units like Stormclaw, Wraithknight, Hammernators, et cetera.

You can't have a game with THOUSANDS of possible playing pieces ranging in size from Gretchin to Imperial Knights, from powerful Psykers to lumbering units with the intelligence of "Hulk, Smash" and perfectly balance them in every scenario.

insaniak wrote:
If the game was actually written with some consideration for unit balance, it would be far more acceptable for someone to rock up to that game with their super-heavies.

The fact that so many people are so willing to put all the blame on players for building legal armies rather than expecting the guys who write the game to put some actual effort into it is just mind-boggling.

If you made a real-life type wargame, an army of guys with pistols could not take on a mechanized armor or a fleet of bombers, even though all those units would certainly have points attached to them.

This is what 40k is like: the universe has all of these units, and in order to create a maximally effective battleforce, you need to have access to little units and big units that do all sorts of things. But, not every player has the money to do this, and when they start, and for a long time, it's easy to have invested in a non-optimal battleforce.

I don't think this makes 40k a bad game at all, and I don't blame developers for allowing ineffective combinations. I do think there are simpler games that avoid these issues, but to achieve this, they sacrifice the rich complexity that exists in real life.

I do believe in this thing called sportsmanship and I, personally, don't really get any great pleasure out of winning a game simply because I have a overwhelmingly superior force.

But, anyhow, I digress: play how you like; I don't fault players that just want to play their specialty armies, though I won't actively seek out games with them, either. In my play groups, I know who they are, and I will field armies accordingly, if we happen to be the last matchups possible (or if I have to swap with someone), but frankly, there aren't many of them.

AllSeeingSkink wrote:

Even something like gretchin and imperial knights COULD be balanced against each other. They can't in the current rules because the IK can't be hurt by gretchin. But if you changed the rules so that gretchin could hurt the IK, but the IK just had a bucket load of wounds then you could balance them against each other. That's actually somewhat how Epic 40k balanced hordes vs super heavies.

Why should they be?

Why should an army of farmers with pitchforks be able to defeat a military unit whose armor can't be damaged by pitchforks? Why should a ground infantryman with a pistol have even a fractional chance against a gunship beyond the pistol's range?

Why must a game system force balance, and take away the possibility of asymmetric warfare, when that adds rich complexity? Maybe the farmers need to distract the tank platoon, and win if they a unit is able to destroy a fuel depot. Maybe the infantry need to reach and hold a fortification until reinforcements arrive.

All I'm saying is, just because model A is 10 points, and model B is 500 points doesn't mean that in every case, 50 of A can defeat 1 of B. Case in point: how many infantry does it take to sink a submerged nuclear sub?


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 insaniak wrote:

Talys wrote:
Because it's really hard to have that in a very complex game that caters to the veterans, who are more likely to have with vast (unit) resources.

'It's really hard' is not an excuse for supposedly professional games designers to do a half-assed job.

Seriously, if you buy something other than a wargame and discover that it doesn't word properly, would you dismiss the problem on the basis that making that thing is hard?

Why should we accept it for 40K when we wouldn't accept it for anything else?

You can't have a game with THOUSANDS of possible playing pieces ranging in size from Gretchin to Imperial Knights, from powerful Psykers to lumbering units with the intelligence of "Hulk, Smash" and perfectly balance them in every scenario.

Then the answer is to either hire new writers who can do that, or narrow the focus of the game to something that the existing writers are capable of doing properly.

Again, excusing shoddy product on the basis that it's hard to do it properly is not the answer. Particularly not for the company that claims to be the best at what it does.

As a system tries to allow for more freedom, more possibilities of imbalance occur. I will take the freedom, in exchange for playing with adults that responsibly use this to create interesting battles rather than jerks that just want to say, "haha you suck".

I accept imperfection in practically all video games now. Can we say Diablo 3 and Battlefield 4? There was never a s buggy a game than BF4.... I accept imperfection in government, in bad movies and in takeout food. I accept imperfect relationships, family, and business dealings. Actually... life is pretty much just a tradeoff of pros and cons, and I just happen to think that the 40k world and crappy GW policies, happen to have enough marks on the plus side for me to enjoy their product and keep throwing them money. As I said... this is the case with so many video games I love now that it isn't even funny.