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Mostly a personal opinion. I like the way Fluffy based games play out. I feel it is more in line with the lore? Alot of the people who play in my area are very much the mega lethal combo finders that have amazingly competitive armies, but they are super not fluffy. Who prefers what and why?

Other referring to trying for the "pitched battle" where you and your opponent(s) match each others armies in a sense.

Been discussed several times, including a large thread just recently - should be on the first or second page still I'd think.

I would change the title. The title comes off as very aggressive, but your post is much more reasonable.

I like playing to win more than I'm concerned about the narrative, but I like playing a close game the most, and as such, I'll always try to match my list to my opponent's preferred level.

Good point, forgot to change the title prior to hitting post

Also, there's other kinds of play. I don't go for the fluffy play, but nor am I WAAC. I play for a close game.

Mayhaps call it "What Style Of Play Is Your Favorite?"

If i just wanted to tell a story and push plastic soldiers around like it doesn't matter, i wouldn't be playing a game of 40k in the first place.

Both.
I enjoy competition, combo building and list making - as Smith from the A-Team puts it "I love it when a plan comes together".

With the right people playing fluffy is great fun. I hate to make sweeping statements but even in competition Ork players are great, never had a match where we didn't both drop into character during challenges.

I feel that the story is what gives the game its entire feel. I played a game this weekend with a friend where he had around 2000-2500pts of necrons (using the deathly phalanx style of gak loads of warriors backed by a monolith and some ghost arks.) Where I had ~1750 of SM (using Imperial Fist CT and such.) We played out what ended up being a valiant last stand of some Sternguard and devastators with a few tactical marines tossed in for flavor. Took about 3hrs to play out, but was amazing to add to my custom chapters history ( I created one about 4 years ago and keep a running Roster of the Brothers, deeds , so on)

I'm not big into 'Fluff' - if by fluff one means background, story, and such.

What I definitely am into is aesthetic, conversions, theme, and general uniqueness. I love my recent conversion-heavy Daemons, but am not feeling inspired with my earlier Space Marines.

I also try to wield Strong armies, but not super competitive ones. Losing too often really turns me off a game system, and I don't want to buy models JUST to cheese things out and win every time. This part also connects to my desire for creativity and uniqueness - I like to put my own spin on things, maybe even come up with unexpected combos and lists.

What is "fluff play"? And what is "WAAC"? Is this not a game, which has the objective of winning?

Is fluff play working out forces consistent with the 40k setting, such as a fluffy Marine company, or Tau strike force, instead of ridiculous SuperFriends lists? If so, then the objective is still to win.

Is it bringing things that are intentionally suboptimal, and bending the rules, to make the game more "casual"? If so, then is your game really "fluffy" or is it merely an overly-weak force?

Or, is it putting your models on the board, and acting out a predetermined outcome, in true Jervis Johnson style? If so, why are you putting models on the board, instead of writing about it and staring at your opponent's army in its display case?

There should really be no reason why both of them can't intertwine. Unfortunately the issue of balance has crept in, which has resulted in such a divide between "casual" and "competitive" players. As long as the rules remain exploitable for a clear advantage, then people will exploit it. Whether you believe that is right or wrong is up to you.

You should always be playing to win at some level anyway, but never at the expense of the fun.

As for an answer to your question, fluffy lists all the way back when I played the game, since the universe plays a massive part in my enjoyment of the hobby. Just a shame that fluffy lists typically aren't at all competitive.

 General Annoyance wrote:
There should really be no reason why both of them can't intertwine. Unfortunately the issue of balance has crept in, which has resulted in such a divide between "casual" and "competitive" players. As long as the rules remain exploitable for a clear advantage, then people will exploit it. Whether you believe that is right or wrong is up to you.

You should always be playing to win at some level anyway, but never at the expense of the fun.

As for an answer to your question, fluffy lists all the way back when I played the game, since the universe plays a massive part in my enjoyment of the hobby. Just a shame that fluffy lists typically aren't at all competitive.

Wise words.

I love every kind of combination, fluffy, thematic armies, competitive ... BUT both lists must be created with the same purpose.

That's why we typically contact each other before playing and arrange our lists.

Two TAC lists don't guarantee a balanced game (most likely the opposite) and I'm not interested in winning or losing, only in playing a game that should be open till turn 4 at least. Sometimes it doesn't happen even tailoring each other lists but the only thing that matters to me is to have fun. And a non balanced game means zero fun, even if I win.

We do whatever it takes to win but only after arranged two lists that seem on a similar level.

They're not mutually exclusive, so both.

Personally, I build an army around a theme or idea, but maximize it within that theme.

I just like to play with an army and units within said army that interest me. The unit could be considered cheese or underpowered I really don't care as long as it's fun and somewhat synergizes with my strategy.

I like the fluff, but I'm more about just having fun (not Unbound... CAD or Formations). If I play, I don't play to win. I play to just enjoy the game. If I win, great. If I lose, not a problem.

Just my $0.02

SG

I like playing with my army as I would imagine them fight in the universe, which can make for some interesting battles. So for list-building I lean towards a fluff list that has a theme to it. This does not mean that it can't be good, it just tends to be sub-optimal. When my models are on the battlefield I go for glory, attempting to win the match is a part of the fun. Now you can also play out campaigns to create a story for your army, which can be fun as well but you still play each match to win. I think too many people try to separate players into 2 categories: WAAC or fluff players. You shouldn't divide players like this as there are different aspects each player likes about the game. I enjoy finding good combos in my army and playing them. I also like making my lists different for every match to test new combos. I don't like net-listing and pigeon-holing my options to the optimal units. I also like creating a story with my army as I play. When people ask these questions it divides players and creates arguments that just keep coming back, and that is tiresome.

Both... plus mixes.

I usually bring a lot of models with me think 20-30k points of whatever I brought. I bring premade lists of fun and fluffy to WAAC tournament play. I love playing narrative games where there is a reason for the armies to be fighting complete with doing voices and reactions from particular units (orks in particular for this, though I do a variety of pious SM voices, and snobby elder ones). but if a person is getting ready for a tournament or wants to run against one of my tournament level lists to see how they will fair I oblige.

I play odd lists quite often just to try a random thing or to show off models I just finished painting. I am looking to unleash a SM armor company I have been working on for a few months because I decided to buy 10 razorbacks due to a good deal and commissioned 3d printing of 20 assault cannons for them. it should be a fun little list still working on it but probably more fluff end than WAAC tournament play.

I remember the first time I fought a WAAC player with my fluffy SM army. I was tabled in less than 3 turns. It was slaughter. My fluffy SM army doesnt really have any vehicles, mainly due to IRL money constraints, but fluff wise it was becuase of the necrons annihalating their chapter fleet and reducing them to about 25% strength, they then allied with the remnants of another chapter forming a new ad hoc chapter called the United. I dressed the fluff around the army to match IRL things, such as different paint jobs, lack of cash for tanks and what not.

There seems to be a common confusion between WAAC and high-power play level. WAAC is an attitude of a player not aiming at mutual fun - highest power tournament lists aren't WAAC tools in a tournament setting, because everyone aiming at serious tournament competition must utilise such lists. There is even more confusion regarding the word "fluffy" - perfectly fluffy lists can have ridiculous power levels, yet still provide a spectacular and entertaining matchup if both players know exactly what they want. OTOH - you can have a "perfectly fluffy WAAC TFG" when someone shows up to a friendly casual game with a perfectly fluffy Saim-Hann list or an Eldar Warhost with Wraith Titans support choice against an entry level player with more or less random collection of underdog units... Or you can have totally "till the last dice rolled" close matchups of carefully designed low-power yet not boring armies. Everything comes down to mutual understanding really, and most TFG stories I see on Dakka are results of silent assumptions of what exactly word "fun" means for both players. That is why I preffer cross-tailoring lists outside of tournaments to adjust relative power levels and actual conversation going beyond "casual or competetive?" or "1850p Eternal War without Superheavies" simple but disfunctional shortcuts...

Meh, I don't know if i like the concept of saying something like "my list is fluffy!"

You can forge a narrative (hate on those words all you want, I don't care) to justify any alliance.

And if you claim your list is fluffy, I would want to see fully painted miniatures with no proxies. Because a coke can drop pod or a foam daemon prince isn't fluffy.

What about the Coke Can men from Fizzyius IIX?

If you wrote a story explaining them, I'd tolerate it. Once.

 Rysgame wrote:
Mostly a personal opinion. I like the way Fluffy based games play out. I feel it is more in line with the lore? Alot of the people who play in my area are very much the mega lethal combo finders that have amazingly competitive armies, but they are super not fluffy. Who prefers what and why?

Other referring to trying for the "pitched battle" where you and your opponent(s) match each others armies in a sense.

To what fluff are we referring to? Like the Night Lords having Raptors in their forces, or are we referring to something else? Are we talking themed?

Fluffy is tough because I for example have read MANY codex's and have read exactly one book, the Night Lords Omnibus. One. So I am probably not as tuned in as say another player who has read more than a dozen books and he knows the "extened" lore so to speak.

THEMED armies are another thing. for example my Dark eldar were originally designed to mimic a dark circus. So I have a Beastpack and I went with all the FREAKS in my list, had Hellions as my trapeze artists kind of, and Talos that I wanted to put in green tinted glass thingees and so on. I took Wracks for troops when that was originally allowed. I'm not sure that there was ever any fluff to support my army but it was themed.

I like to try and theme the army as much as i can and still be effective. I made a force based on the picture in the Tau Codex that showed all the battlesuits lined up in a row by size; so i made a list that included every single battlesuit the army has. that was pretty cool and it did well. I also had a list that won a lot back in 5th that had only the one Commandeer Crisis suit I was forced to take. No other crisis teams.

I dont think its wise to throw competitiveness out the window, but what i learned is that there are MANY ways to skin the cat and you don't have to be completely "optimal" in the internets opinion as long as you're good with the strategy you have mastered with a list you know very well.

fluffy to mean means a few things. one it is something that an army might use, or something fun with lots of troops and no lords of wars. think playing intro armies against each other. not to many special rules, likely no names character, can include lesser used formations that are not game breaking.

honestly rule of thumb on a fluff building list for me is 40% points in troops. if playing elder 1 scatter laser per 3 bikes. team leads in troops get upgrades to be worth a damn. hq is generic like a librarian/farseer, a tau commander, warboss, or commissar. Str D stays at home. It is not written in stone but that is pretty much my whole clubs definition of "fluffy"

I wonder how many missunderstandings regarding the term "fluffy" comes from treating this word as a synonym of "cuddly" or "cute" and not as "true to background 40K 'fluff' depictions of factions".

 G00fySmiley wrote:
fluffy to mean means a few things. one it is something that an army might use, or something fun with lots of troops and no lords of wars. think playing intro armies against each other. not to many special rules, likely no names character, can include lesser used formations that are not game breaking.

honestly rule of thumb on a fluff building list for me is 40% points in troops. if playing elder 1 scatter laser per 3 bikes. team leads in troops get upgrades to be worth a damn. hq is generic like a librarian/farseer, a tau commander, warboss, or commissar. Str D stays at home. It is not written in stone but that is pretty much my whole clubs definition of "fluffy"

Yeah, that doesn't necessarily seem fluffy. It seems casual and low-powered, but if I'm running Ravenwing, why would I have any troops?

 G00fySmiley wrote:
fluffy to mean means a few things. one it is something that an army might use, or something fun with lots of troops and no lords of wars. think playing intro armies against each other. not to many special rules, likely no names character, can include lesser used formations that are not game breaking.

honestly rule of thumb on a fluff building list for me is 40% points in troops. if playing elder 1 scatter laser per 3 bikes. team leads in troops get upgrades to be worth a damn. hq is generic like a librarian/farseer, a tau commander, warboss, or commissar. Str D stays at home. It is not written in stone but that is pretty much my whole clubs definition of "fluffy"

Most of that sounds less like fluff and more like "Friendliness ratings". You know? Im not knocking it Im just saying i would never associate "fluffy" with keeping your scatted bieks to one per three. That sounds more like what the OFCC use to do which was moderate list strength so people don't have a terrible time at their event (its a free for all now, but it used to be that way and even a named character was questioned at one point in its evolution as was letting thwe Sisters player take two Exorcists).

These don't seem like fluff considerations though?

I don't think there's a wrong way to play as long as both players are on the same page. That said, I personally think that putting some consideration into winning is important as it is a game. On the other hand, I view the fluff as a restriction kind of like the FOC or formation restrictions, except it's pretty much voluntarily enforced. Figuring out how to make an army good and still be fluffy (in terms of being lore-friendly) is a fun mental exercise.

I think WAAC players are often playing the fluff version of Unbound. That can be fun for some people, but I figure most people would like to play within the restrictions of the lore most of the time.


Fluffy does have multiple meanings that can make it confusing. An allied list of Crimson Fists scouts and Orks would be very fluffy in terms of being underpowered, but would probably make ork and Crimson Fists players die a little inside every time they see it.

JNAProductions wrote:

 G00fySmiley wrote:
fluffy to mean means a few things. one it is something that an army might use, or something fun with lots of troops and no lords of wars. think playing intro armies against each other. not to many special rules, likely no names character, can include lesser used formations that are not game breaking.

honestly rule of thumb on a fluff building list for me is 40% points in troops. if playing elder 1 scatter laser per 3 bikes. team leads in troops get upgrades to be worth a damn. hq is generic like a librarian/farseer, a tau commander, warboss, or commissar. Str D stays at home. It is not written in stone but that is pretty much my whole clubs definition of "fluffy"

Yeah, that doesn't necessarily seem fluffy. It seems casual and low-powered, but if I'm running Ravenwing, why would I have any troops?

more a guideline, we have a dark angels player and grey knights player who mostly run paladins and deathwing so they do formation to allow it but keep the cheese to a minimum I guess as below my group uses fluffy to mean friendly. fluffy as in themed, and kid gloves on.

Jancoran wrote:

 G00fySmiley wrote:
fluffy to mean means a few things. one it is something that an army might use, or something fun with lots of troops and no lords of wars. think playing intro armies against each other. not to many special rules, likely no names character, can include lesser used formations that are not game breaking.

honestly rule of thumb on a fluff building list for me is 40% points in troops. if playing elder 1 scatter laser per 3 bikes. team leads in troops get upgrades to be worth a damn. hq is generic like a librarian/farseer, a tau commander, warboss, or commissar. Str D stays at home. It is not written in stone but that is pretty much my whole clubs definition of "fluffy"

Most of that sounds less like fluff and more like "Friendliness ratings". You know? Im not knocking it Im just saying i would never associate "fluffy" with keeping your scatted bieks to one per three. That sounds more like what the OFCC use to do which was moderate list strength so people don't have a terrible time at their event (its a free for all now, but it used to be that way and even a named character was questioned at one point in its evolution as was letting thwe Sisters player take two Exorcists).

These don't seem like fluff considerations though?

yea we probably twist fluffy to mean friendly, but we do some narrative and are literally on week 6 of a narrative 3 month campaign, plus we have a fairly big core group because nobody is brining massive cheddar, it works for us all to have a good time. helps that the shop we play at has good drinkage/snacks and has cultivated a very friendly atmosphere