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.

 Manchu wrote:
[Yep, just like in WHFB.

So whoever has the biggest wallet wins?

 Kilkrazy wrote:
What story, over what time frame, featuring what characters for what objective?

You asked what it meant to those who played, I explained my experience. Currently in my stores league of legends campaign my Jötunn are beginning their rampage, sudden death objectives set to one side range from capturing X number of enemy models in their pouches to food, to decimating enemy siege engines to straight up fights. The story is progressing slowly but each player has ideas for their own faction and as a community we are growing those ideas.

Going back to the theme of "forging a narrative", I have played many tabletop battles with narratives like:

Argentinian task force consisting of X, Y and Z ships attempts to prevent British Task Force consisting of A, B and C ships from reaching the Falkland Islands (detailed combat resolution...) and fails.

Persian army attempts to prevent Spartan army from destroying it (detailed combat resolution...) and succeeds.

Federal ACW army defends a road running through hills against a superior Confederate ACW army that needs to break through...

Soviet Guards tank division attacks German panzer division at Kursk...

Primitive Shaztec indigenes supplied with modern grenades for their slingshopts rebel and attack Imperial power reactor defended by Space Marines...

1st Airborne platoon supported by helicopter gunships and jet fighter bombers attacks Vietnamese village harbouring Viet Cong forces...

Are these scenarios what you would recognise as narratives?

Yes, but if both players go into it knowing those narratives then its understandable. To use the 300 as an example if all the spartans stood on really high ledges so they couldnt be hurt by the persians the story would be brief and dull, a heroic stand to spare an empire becomes forgettable. If you and your opponent want to play "well I butcher you and demand you sit ther and take it" then thats between you. It makes a poor story but if its what you want then its cool.

Surely the point of the game is to see what happens, otherwise you would just read a novel or a history book.

Isn't that true of any wargame?

Wargames give context. Tournament players might favour points balanced straight combat bash, and certainly there are players at my local that just want to play straight kill points. However campaigns, scenarios, objective led missions all give greater context.

I for one am super excited about AoS. I never managed to clock in enough games in either WHFB or WH40k so I could play without constantly referencing the rulebook. Battles ended up being long, drawn out affairs. Eventually I stopped playing altogether. Fast forward to summer 2015: AoS hits stores. 4 page rules? 1-2h play time? Hell yeah!! Finally a thirtysomething like myself, with a job and a bunch of commitments can actually consider getting back into the hobby. For people like me AoS is a blessing. And from what I hear games seem to be lots of fun. My starterbox should arrive soon and I am looking forward to my soon to be Stormcast Eternal army (awesome models by the way). Other friends who have not been part of the hobby for some years are seriously considering to give AoS a spin as well. Fun times!

 Kilkrazy wrote:
Surely the point of the game is to see what happens, otherwise you would just read a novel or a history book.

Isn't that true of any wargame?

I guess. Between 1988 and 2000, I think my idea of a wargame was, "I line up my Eldar, you line up your Imperial Guard, and let's move them around and shoot at each other til one side is dead." About the only "what happens" was who was wiped out, or what models were left when we had to pack it up and go home


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Kilkrazy wrote:
Going back to the theme of "forging a narrative", I have played many tabletop battles with narratives like:

Spoiler:

Argentinian task force consisting of X, Y and Z ships attempts to prevent British Task Force consisting of A, B and C ships from reaching the Falkland Islands (detailed combat resolution...) and fails.

Persian army attempts to prevent Spartan army from destroying it (detailed combat resolution...) and succeeds.

Federal ACW army defends a road running through hills against a superior Confederate ACW army that needs to break through...

Soviet Guards tank division attacks German panzer division at Kursk...

Primitive Shaztec indigenes supplied with modern grenades for their slingshopts rebel and attack Imperial power reactor defended by Space Marines...

1st Airborne platoon supported by helicopter gunships and jet fighter bombers attacks Vietnamese village harbouring Viet Cong forces...

Are these scenarios what you would recognise as narratives?

These are all great examples of narratives. If only they had futuristic glowy weapons, I'd be so in.

 Kilkrazy wrote:
Surely the point of the game is to see what happens

Yes an no. For some, "seeing what happens" is more a matter of outcome: did I or my opponent prove superior in skill? For others, "seeing what happens" is more a matter of enjoying how things unfold for their own sake. The difference between these POVs is dramatically revealed in their respective attitudes toward randomness in gaming.

 Talys wrote:

 Kilkrazy wrote:
Surely the point of the game is to see what happens, otherwise you would just read a novel or a history book.

Isn't that true of any wargame?

I guess. Between 1988 and 2000, I think my idea of a wargame was, "I line up my Eldar, you line up your Imperial Guard, and let's move them around and shoot at each other til one side is dead." About the only "what happens" was who was wiped out, or what models were left when we had to pack it up and go home

I reckon people still play this way, regardless of what extra mechanic you throw in there. Pen and paper games are only as good as the minds present. If games were that repetitive and boring back then, they will still be in this age, that boring and repetitive. Adding more crap in the rule set will not fix it other than add more global complexity rather than supplemental (bad). Oversimplifying it in kind, will not do it either as it defeats the purpose of the genre - being inherently a game of details about war/battle.

The rules in both 40k and now especially AoS seem even more fake - even in an imagined setting.




Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Manchu wrote:

 Kilkrazy wrote:
Surely the point of the game is to see what happens

Yes an no. For some, "seeing what happens" is more a matter of outcome: did I or my opponent prove superior in skill? For others, "seeing what happens" is more a matter of enjoying how things unfold for their own sake. The difference between these POVs is dramatically revealed in their respective attitudes toward randomness in gaming.

I use to think there was a delineation between types of gamers (as to why they play). Think about this though, what's the hard nose, logical point of playing a game? To win. It's the inexorable part of the definition of a game.

'Seeing what happens' in the context of enjoying it for the sake of it, is a personal objective to winning and thus, is actually less about the game you're playing with another person. So, from a purely logical standpoint, its a disservice to the opponent who's attempting to play the game than 'your game'. ;P

I've played plenty of games that were not about winning. I completely disagree with your definition and implore you to open your mind to the idea that a game can be a collaborative experience where both players can have fun and succeed, where 'winning' is not the point at all.

 kveldulf wrote:
Think about this though, what's the hard nose, logical point of playing a game?

To have fun.

 Manchu wrote:

 kveldulf wrote:
Think about this though, what's the hard nose, logical point of playing a game?

To have fun.

This. I play all the time as simply "you set up there, I set up here, we kill each other" and for casual games it works great for me. The rulesets I play generally have enough strategy baked into them that I don't need anything else for the match to be engaging. For that matter, real life is tiring enough for me and a lot of days I find low/mid-level depth to be perfect.

 Manchu wrote:

 kveldulf wrote:
Think about this though, what's the hard nose, logical point of playing a game?

To have fun.

A game can also really suck. Sure some people may find these games great, but one has to ask; at one point does one's sanity comes into question.

This isn't a statement to be deconstructed to be whatever we want it to be. Some things are simply awful.

Also, if you're playing to have fun, are you winning/succeeding at that?

 kveldulf wrote:

 Manchu wrote:

 kveldulf wrote:
Think about this though, what's the hard nose, logical point of playing a game?

To have fun.

A game can also really suck. Sure some people may find these games great, but one has to ask; at one point does one's sanity comes into question.

This isn't a statement to be deconstructed to be whatever we want it to be. Some things are simply awful.

Also, if you're playing to have fun, are you winning/succeeding at that?

Yes! When we are both playing for the same goal of just having fun.

 BobtheInquisitor wrote:
I've played plenty of games that were not about winning. I completely disagree with your definition and implore you to open your mind to the idea that a game can be a collaborative experience where both players can have fun and succeed, where 'winning' is not the point at all.

I play to win ( RPGs as well as wargames) and have fun doing that People seem to enjoy my company too. If you're playing a game that doesn't have an objective(s) about succeeding, you're not playing a game.

As far as collaborative experience goes, yea, sure. People come to play a game, so that's sort of the inferred contract, and the 'collaborative effort'. I do think it is important to be civil, courteous and even jovial. I'm not advocating the sneering behavior sometimes common in a game.

You know, sometimes the opposite of cohesive collaborative agreement creates some interesting things. For example, when there's a party disagreement - in an RPG. That's amusing.

 kveldulf wrote:

 BobtheInquisitor wrote:
I've played plenty of games that were not about winning. I completely disagree with your definition and implore you to open your mind to the idea that a game can be a collaborative experience where both players can have fun and succeed, where 'winning' is not the point at all.

I play to win ( RPGs as well as wargames) and have fun doing that People seem to enjoy my company too. If you're playing a game that doesn't have an objective(s) about succeeding, you're not playing a game.

As far as collaborative experience goes, some interesting things tend to happen when there's a party disagreement - in an RPG.

No, that is how You play a game. How anyone plays a Game, To-Win or To-Have-Fun is the right way to play the game for Them.

There are quite a few games like Pandemic and Lord Of The Rings (the Knizia cooperative one) where the objective is for the players to combine skills to beat the game system. Death Angles Space Hulk card game is another example if you play multi-player.

Whether these are any more narrative than competitive games is a matter for debate.

Pandemic is still competitive, it's just that the people are competing against the design. The point is still to win. This is not true of, for example, Dungeons & Dragons.

 Anpu42 wrote:

 kveldulf wrote:

 BobtheInquisitor wrote:
I've played plenty of games that were not about winning. I completely disagree with your definition and implore you to open your mind to the idea that a game can be a collaborative experience where both players can have fun and succeed, where 'winning' is not the point at all.

I play to win ( RPGs as well as wargames) and have fun doing that People seem to enjoy my company too. If you're playing a game that doesn't have an objective(s) about succeeding, you're not playing a game.

As far as collaborative experience goes, some interesting things tend to happen when there's a party disagreement - in an RPG.

No, that is how You play a game. How anyone plays a Game, To-Win or To-Have-Fun is the right way to play the game for Them.

The right way to play a game. So your view of how to play a game is right?

Playing a game involves winning or losing. Having a good/bad time is a separate issue that is less related to gaming and more to do with your world view.




Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Manchu wrote:
Pandemic is still competitive, it's just that the people are competing against the design. The point is still to win. This is not true of, for example, Dungeons & Dragons.

Sure it is. I've been playing D&D for awhile and the more 'rewarding' times revolve around solving issues (winning) the GM or player puts in front of us. Hark, one may say that we were victorious (won) in some of our endeavors.

I know what you're saying though. I use to say it to people when they asked about how my gaming night went. Invariably they would ask who won, and I would reply 'no one, its not like that'. But in actuality, I was buying into a pretense that was, less than true.

Really, I was competing against something or someone. One could say that surviving is a big factor to victory in RPG - but that depends on what type of character you are attempting to play.

 kveldulf wrote:
Sure it is.

No, it honestly isn't. In D&D, all antagonistic forces are contained within the world of the story. This is because the DM's job is not to oppose the players. Nor is the player's job to oppose the DM. When the PCs overcome challenges, it is not because they are competing against another player or a system of rules, considering the rules are themselves simply guidelines for the DM after all. PCs fight monsters and avoid traps and solve riddles, etc. The reward for all of this is abstracted into "experience points" for the sake of mechanics but the actual reward is experiencing the unfolding story. It is the play, not the outcome of the play, that matters. This is dramatically (literally and figuratively speaking) different from the kind of games where the reward is winning. In Pandemic, players collaborate to win (i.e., not lose). In D&D, players collaborate to see what happens to their characters. Even when a PC dies seemingly (and indeed truthfully) at random, this can be exciting, interesting, fulfilling, etc.

 Manchu wrote:
Pandemic is still competitive, it's just that the people are competing against the design. The point is still to win. This is not true of, for example, Dungeons & Dragons.

That's true. I wasn't thinking about RPGs. Of course some people play them as party versus GM, which never made sense to me. Then again, if you play scenario modules in a sense you are trying to win against the scenario designer.

Sam Mustafa's Longstreet offers an example of a competitive wargame with a narrative campaign structure. By competitive I mean that two players play against each other.

 Kilkrazy wrote:
Then again, if you play scenario modules in a sense you are trying to win against the scenario designer.

Ah yes, tournament D&D. This also involves playing against the DM -- albeit in a sense radically different from an opponent in a different kind of game. The point here was ostensibly to demonstrate skill and resourcefulness, and to prove that you were the superior D&D player. Of course, such a concept (tongue in cheek as it was) only makes any sense at all in a context where such things are taken quite a bit less seriously in the way something like modern competitions involving (for example) Magic the Gathering are taken. It was certainly a different spirit for a different time and has fallen away completely.

The point of a game doesn't even have to be to have fun. I'd try to summarise the point as being: "to experience the game."

Since when is war meant to be fun, anyway?!

It's true that some people (of course including pros) play games purely to hone and demonstrate their skill at those games. But one rather suspects they derive enjoyment from so doing.

 HiveFleetPlastic wrote:
Since when is war meant to be fun, anyway?!

Since when are games war?

 Manchu wrote:
It's true that some people (of course including pros) play games purely to hone and demonstrate their skill at those games. But one rather suspects they derive enjoyment from so doing.

I'm not thinking of demonstrating skill. More like, you know. Schindler's List or something. I don't know enough tabletop games to be able to think of one off the top of my head with that same purpose, but there are computer games like it. Games that are meant to provide a new perspective or grounds for introspection or learning.

Oh, I just sort of thought of one: Monopoly, which was designed by an anti-capitalist to be a miserable experience.

 Manchu wrote:

 HiveFleetPlastic wrote:
Since when is war meant to be fun, anyway?!

Since when are games war?

One thing that wargames could do, for example, is give us a greater appreciation of war and its cost. Make war a little less abstract. I don't think this is a thing that Age of Sigmar really does, but it's something a game can do other than be "fun."

 Manchu wrote:

 kveldulf wrote:
Sure it is.

No, it honestly isn't. In D&D, all antagonistic forces are contained within the world of the story. This is because the DM's job is not to oppose the players. Nor is the player's job to oppose the DM. When the PCs overcome challenges, it is not because they are competing against another player or a system of rules, considering the rules are themselves simply guidelines for the DM after all. PCs fight monsters and avoid traps and solve riddles, etc. The reward for all of this is abstracted into "experience points" for the sake of mechanics but the actual reward is experiencing the unfolding story. It is the play, not the outcome of the play, that matters. This is dramatically (literally and figuratively speaking) different from the kind of games where the reward is winning. In Pandemic, players collaborate to win (i.e., not lose). In D&D, players collaborate to see what happens to their characters. Even when a PC dies seemingly (and indeed truthfully) at random, this can be exciting, interesting, fulfilling, etc.

" it is not because they are competing against another player or a system of rules, considering the rules are themselves simply guidelines for the DM after all"

The characters can either succeed at what they are doing or they don't (victory conditions). Most characters are played with the idea of overcoming something (an objective) at different times, and degrees throughout their 'life'. The DM is tasked with making a believable story that is inviting and consistent with the world being portrayed and orchestrating difficulty (again difficulty implies a victory condition). The only difference between this and a wargame is that granted, you are usually not opposed against players, but rather at things more imagined (the quest, etc). Either way, its still a matter of winning.

"It is the play, not the outcome of the play, that matters."

And what outcome of the play matters most? What's the incentive of the play without future tense? Any story can unfold, its the interesting one we want to see - which usually implies victory/defeat in some essence.

 kveldulf wrote:
Either way, its still a matter of winning.

Still no. PCs can try and fail. Tragic stories can be intensely interesting to play out.

Truth is, you can have fun with any game system, even the most basic one like just rolling dice to have the biggest result win (wait...that sounds familiar ).

It depends from the mindset of players - and having a fun time together is all that matters.

That doesn't mean rules are well written or work as intended, though. Saying people have fun with AoS as it stands shouldn't be used as an argument to say everything is fine as it is and rules shouldn't be any different.

 HiveFleetPlastic wrote:

 Manchu wrote:

 HiveFleetPlastic wrote:
Since when is war meant to be fun, anyway?!

Since when are games war?

One thing that wargames could do, for example, is give us a greater appreciation of war and its cost. Make war a little less abstract. I don't think this is a thing that Age of Sigmar really does, but it's something a game can do other than be "fun."

No game will ever give you an appreciation for war and its effects. Im not sure I want my free time that I give to my hobby to be filled with the reality of warfare.

Reading a few memoirs of those who have done it might open you to the true reality of war... Or go talk to some guys who have done it. Look into their eyes and then you will see the cost of war.



Playing with toy soldiers wont... and yes, I know some miltaries use tactical exercises (with and without models) but they are to suggest and experience tactical scenarios.

They do not give you a sense of the horror, boredom, mental strain and pyhsical endurance a military conflicts imparts.


If you want to experience most wars, then do as Blackadder suggested.

Dig a hole in your garden, fill it partly with water, and sit in it for a few days while someone intermittantly shoots at you.