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 Zweischneid wrote:
You still have the option to agree to "let's have a cutthroat competitive game" with "double-blind" lists.

Except you don't, because when the game is badly balanced the chances of having an enjoyable game with "blind" lists go down significantly, especially if one or both players is making a list based on something other than pure winning potential. And then you have awkward situations where a player makes an army that they love and then someone else tells them they can't use it because it's too powerful.

Plus, there's all your complaining about how competitive players have done "damage to the game that will take decades to fix". It's pretty obvious that what you want is for the bad rules to push all the competitive players into their own little corner where they can't "ruin" the game for you.

Nobody is taking that option away from anyone. It's simply about adding other options as well, having more than just one "default way" to play the game.

And what you can't understand (or deliberately won't understand) is that a well-balanced game with clear rules benefits every style of play. A narrative game is better when both players can show up with appropriate narrative armies and have an interesting game with both players having a fair chance of winning. A "casual" game is better when the game is playable and fun "out of the box" without the players having to spend a bunch of time reading forums and understanding what units are overpowered so that they can negotiate properly about what will make the game more fun.

Literally the only reason that poor balance makes a game "better" is that terrible rules force the players to go through your beloved masochistic rituals about "making it their own game" instead of just deciding to play a game and playing it.

 Peregrine wrote:

Plus, there's all your complaining about how competitive players have done "damage to the game that will take decades to fix". It's pretty obvious that what you want is for the bad rules to push all the competitive players into their own little corner where they can't "ruin" the game for you.
.

Because there is a difference between a certain group of players doing their thing, while also respecting and tolerating other styles, and a certain group dictating everyone's game.

I would equally argue against narrative players, if their style of game were to dictate everyone's game. Luckily, it doesn't, because you can tweak a loose (!) set of rules easily to get the competitive experience you want. At its most "competitive", perfect mirror-matches will always be perfectly balanced and provide the pure test of player-skill you crave, utterly independent of point costs, FoC, etc.. .

It just so happens, that competitive play (or players) exerted a strong influence over the game in the past years, not any other type of players. Just the way it is. I cannot apologize for historical circumstance. I can only repeat that the "competitive" slice of the pie isn't getting any smaller, just because the pie as a whole is growing to allow more people to join the feast.

 Peregrine wrote:

And what you can't understand (or deliberately won't understand) is that a well-balanced game with clear rules benefits every style of play.

No. It doesn't. Repeating it ad infinitum against all reason won't make it come true.

 Zweischneid wrote:
Luckily, it doesn't, because you can tweak a loose (!) set of rules easily to get the competitive experience you want.

You must be an utter genius if you can take an unbalanced badly written rule set and ad lib a balanced, competitive game from it.

 Zweischneid wrote:
At its most "competitive", perfect mirror-matches will always be perfectly balanced and provide the pure test of player-skill you crave, utterly independent of point costs, FoC, etc.. .

And yet again, we must tell you that improved rules and better balance does not mean the "perfect mirror-match". You could at least pretend to argue against what people say rather than what you choose to hear.

And at both you and unit, nowhere did I talk about removing things from the game. Again, you just heard what you wanted to respond to.

I have been observing this thread for a while.

There are a lot of good points from both sides of the argument, but there is something about this game that simply baffles me. I would argue that the majority of the people in opposition to a 'gentleman's agreement' approach to a fun game for both players legitimately dislike this game.

So many people on these forums literally do nothing but bemoan GW and bombast its ruleset.

Here is an honest question for you- why are you still posting here/playing the game?

If it's so bad, I want to know (it's not as if GW is holding a gun to your head).

The general attitudes towards what legitimately is supposed to be a ridiculous and over the top game where you roll some dice and blow gak up almost always devolves into legitimate animosity.

Are you really such masochists that you enjoy talking about things you hate and involving yourself with it? Perhaps it's time to find a hobby that upsets you less.

It's that the hobby could be so much better.

It's a hobby that requires a substantial investment in time, money and effort. Many have already done this, so to see the company plot a course toward the drain is understandably upsetting.

Saying this company was always this way is a cop out and nothing more.

Saying the game is just a light "beer & pretzels" game is also a fallacy.

Saying a game can't be a good narrative or interesting without imbalance is also a fallacy. For example, side A has 4+4+4 strength units and side B has strength 2+3+5+1+1 strength units. Both sides have the same strength despite different values.

How is 4+4 Vs. 6+5 a better game? If one prefers no accountability for any measured success in playing the game this is a great system. For anyone else, it simply sucks.

XenosTerminus wrote:
I have been observing this thread for a while.

There are a lot of good points from both sides of the argument, but there is something about this game that simply baffles me. I would argue that the majority of the people in opposition to a 'gentleman's agreement' approach to a fun game for both players legitimately dislike this game.

So many people on these forums literally do nothing but bemoan GW and bombast its ruleset.

Here is an honest question for you- why are you still posting here/playing the game?

If it's so bad, I want to know (it's not as if GW is holding a gun to your head).

The general attitudes towards what legitimately is supposed to be a ridiculous and over the top game where you roll some dice and blow gak up almost always devolves into legitimate animosity.

Are you really such masochists that you enjoy talking about things you hate and involving yourself with it? Perhaps it's time to find a hobby that upsets you less.

We are optimists. We believe in the best of all possible worlds. Or at least in trying to make things better than they are and that they can be made better than they are. Few people play WH40K over other games for the rules. We play it because we love the fluff and the models, generally. But we see many people driven off both by the rules / game balance issues, and by attitudes that they are wrong for wanting the game to be balanced and the rules to be better. What we would like (and I do not pretend to speak for all arguing for better rules and balance in this thread, but I think most would at least agree), is to see the rules and balance improved so that (a) people who are bothered by rules and balance problems are not forced to choose between a setting they like and a rules set they like, thus increasing the number of people playing and helping the hobby we care about; (b) having more satisfying games ourselves and (c) encouraging more varied and thematic lists through improvements. It's not only boring to see, for example, yet another pack of Farseer and Warlock councils dominating the table, but it's not good for the fluff when you'd expect to see a variety of elder forces and not just the same outcome every time, but a variety of outcomes. Thus by improving the rules and balance, we not only get something that is better as a game, we get something that lets us tell better and more varied stories.

And we want it to be that when some poor kid spends their precious money on an Eldar titan because they think it's awesome, they don't show up at the club to find everyone calling them names / looking down on them / refusing to play them. Which is what happens.

XenosTerminus wrote:
I have been observing this thread for a while.

There are a lot of good points from both sides of the argument, but there is something about this game that simply baffles me. I would argue that the majority of the people in opposition to a 'gentleman's agreement' approach to a fun game for both players legitimately dislike this game.

So many people on these forums literally do nothing but bemoan GW and bombast its ruleset.

Here is an honest question for you- why are you still posting here/playing the game?

If it's so bad, I want to know (it's not as if GW is holding a gun to your head).

The general attitudes towards what legitimately is supposed to be a ridiculous and over the top game where you roll some dice and blow gak up almost always devolves into legitimate animosity.

Are you really such masochists that you enjoy talking about things you hate and involving yourself with it? Perhaps it's time to find a hobby that upsets you less.

For me it is because prior to maybe the last 6 months (and even for some of that) I have really enjoyed the game (so much so that I run events for other people at a personal cost). I have also spent thousands of dollars and countless hours on the game...so to see the company running it essentially turn it into gak....pisses people off.

Honestly this is the first time I have really thought about just hanging it up because the game is so imbalanced (especially in casual play) that it is no longer enjoyable...I don't want to need to carry my whole collection with me down to the club, and negotiate a fair game....I already hold myself back plenty....I still fail to see how balancing units to their points cost in anyway hampers other ways of play.

XenosTerminus wrote:
Here is an honest question for you- why are you still posting here/playing the game?

Probably involves people already being heavily invested in the game. its kind of a shame to just throw/sell/stow all those models away when you spend that much money and time on it.
as well a lot of people enjoy the fluff and setting vs other more balanced games. (like i cant stand warmahords)

Seriously though something is wrong when you spend half the game play time looking up rules faqs and forums.

Edit and half the time even with narrative or competitive players, its near impossible to get an agreement in about a rules dispute with no clear answer. at which point you roll off and still feel cheated in the end. that makes for a bad time period.

Breng77 wrote:
Honestly this is the first time I have really thought about just hanging it up because the game is so imbalanced (especially in casual play) that it is no longer enjoyable...I don't want to need to carry my whole collection with me down to the club, and negotiate a fair game....I already hold myself back plenty....I still fail to see how balancing units to their points cost in anyway hampers other ways of play.

Yeah. I'm a returning player. Started with 1st edition a long time ago. Returning to these boards full of enthusiasm I found that the competitive side consists almost entirely of a handful of deathstar lists and a whole crew of people who told me "get off my fething cross" when I said I thought D-weapons spoiled the game.

Damn near killed my enthusiasm and indeed I put the minis back in the box and stop posting for a while. Honestly, the attitudes in this thread and the sheer contempt I can feel makes me genuinely wonder whether I can be bothered getting back into it after all.

Apparently I "lack social skills" for not wanting to begin each game I hold with a stranger hashing out house rules and because I don't like telling them they can't use their choice of models.

I agree the game is a mess- GW has arguably ruined pick up games, and is forcing TO's to house rule in essence.

What I will say though is from the perspective of a player who has a small group of like minded friends with open minds to agree upon and improve the guidelines GW has given us, we have never enjoyed it as much as we have now.

As far as we are concerned, GW is a company that makes really nice models, provides a great background, and basic rules for which to craft your own enjoyable experience.

Hell, the fact GW no longer hosts their own tournaments, and in many cases have no available space in their own stores for pick up games may just illustrate that this is in fact the direction the game is going.

I wish all parties involved were sufficiently accommodated, but that does not appear to be the direction the game is going.

XenosTerminus wrote:
I agree the game is a mess- GW has arguably ruined pick up games, and is forcing TO's to house rule in essence.

What I will say though is from the perspective of a player who has a small group of like minded friends with open minds to agree upon and improve the guidelines GW has given us, we have never enjoyed it as much as we have now.

And that's great. But I'm sure you agree that an improved rule set that required less in the way of agreements between friends would still be better. Especially if you don't only play with friends.

Absolutely. The reality is GW really should address their rules developmental issues. Honestly though, it's always been this way.

I started in 4th, and as long as I can remember the rules have been pretty mediocre. I am lucky to have a group that shares my ambition and vision for enjoying the game, and I certainly understand the frustration for people that do not have similar circumstances for which to approach GW's design philosophy.

I just think people could really redirect their frustration and try to embrace the game for what it is, and look for ways to improve it based on what we have been given.

The rules have never been great...but when they started to pile broken stuff on top of more broken stuff it got even worse.

XenosTerminus wrote:
I just think people could really redirect their frustration and try to embrace the game for what it is, and look for ways to improve it based on what we have been given.

And that too, is fine. But people are passionate about what people are passionate about, and by no means object if someone finds it better for them to let their exasperation out than to bottle it up. Besides, you misjudge things if you think any of us who want change, want long unproductive threads that go round in circles. Had it just been Peregrine, myself and the others, we probably would have just all said our piece in answer to the OP's question and be satisfied we had answered. The reason this thread is so long is that having said our piece, we keep getting told things like it is not possible to improve the game without spoiling things for people who don't care as much about the rules (a nonsensical position the more you think about it) or that altering the points cost of some models violates some arbitrary venn diagram. Or my favourites - that wanting to avoid having to tell someone we've just met they're not allowed to use a model that the book says they can means we "lack social skills" and that players interested in competition aspects are best "shut out" from playing with others.

Faced with attacks like that, of course we write more. By all means "embrace the game for what it is" yourself - enjoy it! Sincerely! But don't object to the rest of us expecting better. Who knows - one day you might even benefit from our higher expectations.

Automatically Appended Next Post:

knas ser wrote:
we keep getting told things like it is not possible to improve the game without spoiling things for people who don't care as much about the rules (a nonsensical position the more you think about it) or that altering the points cost of some models violates some arbitrary venn diagram. Or my favourites - that wanting to avoid having to tell someone we've just met they're not allowed to use a model that the book says they can means we "lack social skills" and that players interested in competition aspects are best "shut out" from playing with others.

Faced with attacks like that, of course we write more. By all means "embrace the game for what it is" yourself - enjoy it! Sincerely! But don't object to the rest of us expecting better. Who knows - one day you might even benefit from our higher expectations.

Exalted

But ya, 6th ed has been the entitlement edition. You give people stuff and when you try and clear some of the clutter for organized play it's like you shot the person's dog or something. I hated fortifications from the get go, and it wasn't the concept or idea, it was the implementation. 40k games are at best a grid square on the map of a large conflict, one in which the initiative of a force is determined randomly from game to game. Assuming a pickup context where both opponents are going in blind and the mission is randomly determined, trying to mix fortifications in with that is a terrible idea. And I know that makes me sound like a debbie downer, and the reality is I'm totally fine for playing a big game where someone defends and someone attacks, but not all the god damn time. I like narrative battles, especially big ones if planned well and there is a lot of communication, but I understand from experience that that is the only method of quality control. I've played good apoc games and bad and the good ones required planning and balancing of sides and restrictions, it only took one game with flank march in for pretty much all sides to see what a fun sponge it was, the fact that both sides could take it balanced nothing, it was a race to the bottom.

There was a local tournament earlier in the year called golden marine, 1107 points. The idea or concept was to take something "fun" or "fluffy" or "goofy" something in that "spirit". To help underline the concept of a fun event, there would be no prize for top general. The problem as always is fun is a word and is terribly subjective. There was a lot of bad air before and after in terms of what people brought and played, accusations were made without knowledge of intent. Sometimes fluffly lists also do well, sometime goofy lists get a good matchup and steamroll. Sadly it wasn't a simple dichotomy of the waac player and the fluff bunny's, my no, it was far more complicated than that. The tournament allowed allies, any fortification, forgeworld, the whole thing; it even let you choose psychic powers and warlord traits. Everyone had a picture in their mind of what a "golden marine" army should look like and logically it tended to differ from person to person, and really how could it not? Adjectives don't make for good game organization. I saw that the concept just wasn't going to gel with the total lack of restrictions, especially seeing how people were commenting on eachothers army lists prior to the event, it became political. So I chose not play and instead just elected to take pictures; because like all things, there was a silver lining and that was that the tournament still had painting requirements and there were plenty of awesome armies on display. But sadly, this wasn't a game I wanted to play because everyone was fooling themselves if they thought it was "one game" and that everyone would miraculously have "fun" or "fluffy" or "goofy" armies.

I look no further than arma 3. It's a sandbox but it's not really a game, we, the gamers have to build games within it, the developer gives us the world and the units and the guns but we, the gamers have to build the game. And that's kinda the problem with arma 3 right now, not everyone has time for that, not everyone wants to sit in an editor for 12 hours defining what the game is to them. It's a lot of things to a lot of people and what that means is if I told someone I play arma 3, I'm not telling them very much. Their experience is likely so different and subjective it likely won't at all resemble my own. Right now if someone I just met told me they were into 40k, I don't even think I'd try to engage them on the topic because I don't even know what that is anymore. I did a few weeks ago, back when there was a wall between apoc and 40k,

I feel about GW the same way I feel about BIS (the arma 3 developer) I feel like they're not living up to their responsiblities. There's nothing wrong with demanding at the very least proper compartmentalization of rule sets from GW, at the very least. Updated faq's and errata's too, nothing wrong with expecting that. With arma 3, I expect there to be a game in there somewhere, one I don't have to make myself. A big sandbox with a bunch of toys in it is fine if I wanna play all by myself, the second pvp enters into it, there has to be a framework, a game, a semblence of balance, a purpose, a goal.

The irony of this meme is that the more it gets repeated the more events for tournament/competitive gamers spring up.

Games Workshop plc is a multinational multimillion pound corporation.

It charges a premium price for its game related publications.
It does NOT deliver a premium level of proof reading or editing in these publications.

Which is a basic requirement delivered by every other company selling these type of publications.
Despite these smaller companies having much fewer resources than GW plc , they seem more focused on delivering a better quality product.

A well defined intuitive rule set allows players to play the game with a minimum of fuss.
This makes the game better for everyone.

I am JUST talking about proper proof reading and editing so the instructions to play are clearly defined and reflect what the game developers actually intended in the rules.

Can every one agree this is a good thing?

Unless you are a rules lawyer who lives on exploiting these ambiguities perhaps?

IF you are into making up your own games by player agreement, based on senarios/campains etc.
ALL you need are clearly defined core rules to base your game on .
FOC and PV are NOT of any interest to you at all are they?

However, IF you are a new player wanting to play a few pick up games at the local GW shop- FLGS.
Then having ALL options as viable and enjoyable to play IS VERY IMPORTANT.

So clear well defined rules are important to everyone.

FoC and PV used to provide enjoyable pick up game balance for NEW PLAYERS , who do not have an established game group/experience to make up their own version of the game.
ARE important to GROW the customer base!

So those that say it is OK to ignore game balance issues are not really thinking of the long term future of 40k are they?

It's not being a rules lawyer if a rule has two equally legitimate interpretations. That is called genuine confusion.

 Ascalam wrote:
When every box comes with a bottle of beer and a bag of pretzels, then it's officially a beer and pretzels game.

Until then it's every shade from uber-competitive to ultra-casual, depending on the mood of the players.

They have said that you can ignore any of the rules you like in favor of your own, if this makes your games more enjoyable. This is fine for home games/games with friends.

Random pickup games/tourneys tend to be played a lot closer to the rules, naturally, but even then there are local houserules/tweaks. This is fine too, as long as everyone knows what page they are on.

Then there is the RAW-only level of play, where people can spend hours debating the meaning of the word 'and'. Some people get off on this, lothers not so much. This is fine too.

40K is what you want to make of it.

Well that says pretty much everything, right there. Tournaments have always had their own "house rules" to try and fix things, so I doubt your precious 'competitive play' is in danger. GW has *always* (even in the glory "hobby-focussed" days of 2nd ed) favoured the newest Codex, and apparently so do other games.

For what it's worth, I prefer 'friendly' and 'fluffy' games above the WAAC mentality of "Competitive" *play*, and I see the new supplement (as well as all the Forge World products) as a chance to add some new toys to my collections

 Peregrine wrote:
And what you can't understand (or deliberately won't understand) is that a well-balanced game with clear rules benefits every style of play

I will never understand people that don't get this. When I used to play Magic, I could walk into any store, anywhere in the world and (barring lack of knowledge on the cards themselves) play a game with anyone in the store, regardless of language spoken. I didn't need to, and rarely did, bring out my FNM land destruction deck. I would bring out my cleric deck, and have fun. My friend would love to play his goblin deck, and would at any chance he got. It stopped being competitive when Skull Clamp was banned, but that didn't top him. He loved to toy with little kids with his sliver deck. I could bring out my Myr deck at any time. Hell, nothing was more fun than the 20 person round table game we played, where 3 of us conspired to bring sliver decks, or the guy that brought red DD, he removed someone from the table then died as the next 4 people all attacked him, but it was still hilarious, one guy brought a 200 card legendary deck.

The best part? We didn't need a rulebook. We didn't need to dice off, or argue about obscure rule interactions. We got to enjoy each others company, without sweating. My friends and I would even do the uber casual, 1-hour common deck build, where we raided everyone's common piles (shared piles because who cares about commons right?) to build a deck in 1 hour then have a tourney after. One of those spawned my favourite deck idea I ever had. The Ultimatum deck. Using cards like Book Burning, Blazing Salvo and such, where I used really obscure cards to do what I wanted, or my opponent could pay life points to stop me. Everyone always let Book Burning do it's thing once, and from then on paid the life.

All this was enabled through tight rules.

*edit to add* This isn't even talking about balance, that's neither here nor there. A better balanced game would be more fun, but a tight ruleset would be the first step, and better for everyone.

 Zweischneid wrote:

 Peregrine wrote:

And what you can't understand (or deliberately won't understand) is that a well-balanced game with clear rules benefits every style of play.

No. It doesn't. Repeating it ad infinitum against all reason won't make it come true.

Zweischneid: the rules of a game determine the expectations of players sitting down to give it a go. It doesn't matter what kind of game you want to play, if it is unclear how to move your models or how two models interact then this is going to lead to various people unintentionally playing it differently. Which leads to conflict during a gaming session which is absolutely not desired in any setting as that sucks all of the fun out of it.

It's one thing for a group of people to come together and agree that all infantry move 8". It's quite another when a player, having read the book, thinks their infantry should move 8" while their opponent, having read the very same book, believes it's only 6". It doesn't matter which way those "dice off" rolls go or any type of negotiation, someone is going to come away from that game thinking that they were cheated.

How is a game that requires $200-300investment a "Beer and Pretzel" game? I always thought those games were uberly casual and easy to pick up. This game is anything but that. Not only are the rules needlessly complicated but they are incredibly vague. They also don't cover serious issues that can arise from their stupid rules like MFA.

40k as it stands now is a broken mess of half baked concepts, incompetent balance and poorly written rules. The all to common excuse of it "Not being designed for competitive play" is a pretty weak one, IMO. A ruleset that is made for a competitive style of play just means that it's well written and well balanced. I get the impression that, for some people at least, that a better written Warhammer 40,000 would be more boring and would only benefit competitive players. Wouldn't a ruleset that doesn't require you to make up stuff and is easy to understand be better for people who just want to roll dice?

A friend of mine has 4 armys and a lot of Forge World. I don't have as much disposable cash, if I did I'd be able to keep up. So to make the game more enjoyable he tones down the OP forge world, fortifications and masses of flyers. My BAs are still playing against chaos SMs with demon allies, but its certainly a game im willing to play. Will I win? Well, if my current ratio of 1-3 is an indicator my future games will continue to be disappointing. Its an uphill battle but its closer to a fare fight. The more and more expansions they throw out faster and faster the less I can keep up. Its coming closer to "buying a win" than it ever has before.

I think beer and pretzels is where the games headed because I cant expect that kind of charity from strangers. If I go to a store for a PUG im looking down the barrel of a lean, mean Taudar list with fortifications or SHs. Any pre-game negotiating would be weird, probably even rude. Why should I only be able to play my buddys? Why cant old dexes play new ones without a diplomatic effort? How come my budget of a $150 a year isn't enough to keep up anymore? Is GW engaged in a socio-economic crusade to make me only play in my own community or class? Change is the only constant. I understand GWs a company that needs to sell more models and make a profit. But the beefed up production schedule only for new material is creating a powercreep of epic proportions that's never been seen before. The self applied field dressing of charitable self handicapping is only gonna keep 40k going for so long.

Im really hoping that 7th edition is akin to 3rd. An edition where we get a serious reset. In 3rd there was a single pamphlet with all the army lists in it, and you waited to get a full codex. The only problem was back in the 90's there release schedule was 2 codexes a year. Nowadays they could easily pump out a codex a month. This way they could take a serious look at all the rules at once and make a more unified, balanced rules set.

 Red Marine wrote:
The self applied field dressing of charitable self handicapping is only gonna keep 40k going for so long.

Agreed. I'm lucky that a lot of my regular opponents have like 3000pts or more to make lists from. But other players literally only have like 1500-1850pts total, there is very little chance for them to adjust or tweak their lists game to game. It's nice that opponents are willing to tone things down but in my experience that has the potential to create resentment over time, often on both sides of things. And that's really part of the problem with trying to contain all this crap under a single banner and call it 40k. I think you wanna get to a point where your army can stand on its own before adding stuff like allies or fortifications or super heavies or all the other crap.

 Red Marine wrote:
The self applied field dressing of charitable self handicapping is only gonna keep 40k going for so long.

You say that but I'm on 20 years and counting.

I wanted to weigh in because in part I agree with Zweischneid. The social aspect of 40k has always existed, talking to your opponent before the game working out what you both want from the game. I've said it before but 6th ed is my favourite edition and my local group has never had such fun games. We have the core rules set, always used the cooperative terrain deployment rules but have also occasionally made up scenarios that seemed cool.
Now we may make some oddball lists but once we start playing we will use our tools to their optimum.

That said there are 1-2 things that could be tightened up rule wise but nothing particularly game breaking until D-Weapons in normal games. This caused quite a stir as we debated, some thought they were too strong (myself included) others weren't sure. We simply agreed to not field D-Weapons or 7/10" templates. Problem solved. Now while I disagree with some of what Zweischneid has said (competitive gamers poisoning the well as it were) my own opinion stands at only a minor tangent.

If both players talked first then both extremes of gamer WAAC, Fluff Bunny and everything inbetween could live in peace. No-one should be forced to compromise and no-one should be forced to play a game they don't want. It means more talking but the quality of game goes up.

Now the MtG example, this game has the same problem they are just being glossed over. In a 1 on 1 game (like most 40k) some decks will walk over others 99% of the time. For both players to enjoy themselves both need to be in the game (not necessarily winning but able to take actions that could result in victory whether they choose them or not) and the only way you can know this ahead of time that both your decks/lists/armies/meeple are in the same league is if the game is balanced to perfection (that has never been managed) or by talking.
In the days of the FPS "find me a random lobby so you can pwn some people you don't know" the reason I stick with 40k is that wonderful social aspect.

Now I'm not agreeing with the interpretation of Zweischneid's comments that people who are having these problems have no social skills, but, how many people who are having these problems with people abusing Escalation, Stronghold, 2++ rerolls etc are missing/skipping that conversational step?

Edit: Terrible punctuation hopefully made mediocre.

I've personally always felt that 40k was a 'whisky and beer type game until you black out and destroy the table' .

I approve of this discussion. I think its one that needs to be had. In my case, most everything that I wanted to say has already been said, so there isn't much point in beating a dead horse.

The one thing I do want to add is this: regardless of what direction you think the game is going or what the state of the game is now, it has gotten me to the point of questioning whether or not I wish to continue spending money on this hobby.

I consider myself a pretty devoted 40k fan. In my opinion, I'm their ideal customer: lots of disposable income and love of the game. Even still, with the recent changes to the game, I'm enjoying it less and less. To the point where I've decided to stop spending my money on the game. Sure, I still play it with friends, but when I see a new model, there's that thing inside my head that says "I choose not to support the direction this company is going".

Do I think that my viewpoint is representative of the whole hobby? Certainly not. But I also know I'm not the only one.

My one piece of advice to anyone else who is feeling this recently: try Malifaux. You can thank me later.

 Dunklezahn wrote:

 Red Marine wrote:
The self applied field dressing of charitable self handicapping is only gonna keep 40k going for so long.

You say that but I'm on 20 years and counting.

I wanted to weigh in because in part I agree with Zweischneid. The social aspect of 40k has always existed, talking to your opponent before the game working out what you both want from the game. I've said it before but 6th ed is my favourite edition and my local group has never had such fun games. We have the core rules set, always used the cooperative terrain deployment rules but have also occasionally made up scenarios that seemed cool.
Now we may make some oddball lists but once we start playing we will use our tools to their optimum.

That said there are 1-2 things that could be tightened up rule wise but nothing particularly game breaking until D-Weapons in normal games. This caused quite a stir as we debated, some thought they were too strong (myself included) others weren't sure. We simply agreed to not field D-Weapons or 7/10" templates. Problem solved. Now while I disagree with some of what Zweischneid has said (competitive gamers poisoning the well as it were) my own opinion stands at only a minor tangent.

If both players talked first then both extremes of gamer WAAC, Fluff Bunny and everything inbetween could live in peace. No-one should be forced to compromise and no-one should be forced to play a game they don't want. It means more talking but the quality of game goes up.

Now the MtG example, this game has the same problem they are just being glossed over. In a 1 on 1 game (like most 40k) some decks will walk over others 99% of the time. For both players to enjoy themselves both need to be in the game (not necessarily winning but able to take actions that could result in victory whether they choose them or not) and the only way you can know this ahead of time that both your decks/lists/armies/meeple are in the same league is if the game is balanced to perfection (that has never been managed) or by talking.
In the days of the FPS "find me a random lobby so you can pwn some people you don't know" the reason I stick with 40k is that wonderful social aspect.

Now I'm not agreeing with the interpretation of Zweischneid's comments that people who are having these problems have no social skills, but, how many people who are having these problems with people abusing Escalation, Stronghold, 2++ rerolls etc are missing/skipping that conversational step?

Edit: Terrible punctuation hopefully made mediocre.

I mean no offense at all by this but the "Talk things out" defense is a bunch of boloney.

If a game was well written and competently balanced you shouldn't have to negotiate a proper game. Well, to be more specific, you shouldn't have to negotiate beyond what army you wish to play, points level and any expansions you wanted to play. The fact that you have to impose all these restrictions, in a conversation before a pick up game no less, is a glaring flaw with Games Workshop's design philosophy. The social aspect of 40k shouldn't be trying to balance the game yourself. It should be talking about whatever cool thing you're doing with your army, something amusing that happened or whatever.

To address one of your points about different player demographics I will say this: A fluffy bunny should be able to take on a WAAC player if the codices had proper internal balance. A "Fluffy bunny" is someone who writes lists according to a theme of some sort or more in step with what an army typically fields while a WAAC player takes whatever will win him the game. The main reason why a latter will stomp the former is because there is a huge divide between the "Tournament lists" and "Fun lists". This isn't to say all lists will have a good chance against each other. Obviously, someone who throws a bunch of random units together with no coherent strategy will lose to someone who had some forethought.

Does your argument have any merit? Sure, it could make the best out of the flying rodent gak insane ruleset we have right now. But it is no substitute for good rule design as not everyone wants to talk things out.

Honestly I feel this rule set and codices are utter garbage, if you pay for a ruleset you should get a ruleset, not a part of a ruleset that has many loopholes and ways to break the game e.x. a squad of 5 cron warriors enters a NS, the NS then goes boom since it can't move at least 18", the warriors are then put in reserves, what happens to the relic? It has already been removed from the table by the special permission that dedicated transports have and it has nowhere to be placed since the unit is in reserves. I used to be a big fan of this game back when it was more streamlined and had rules that didnt have so many loopholes and grey areas like in 5th. Because of the awfulness of this ruleset I have finally stopped buying GW and moved onto malifaux where the fluff player can play with the waac player with no problems with balance and can have plenty of variety and social interaction such as which crews/masters they would like to play against/dont feel like playing against and which missions they would like to play and how many points. I dont have to worry about certain situations that might break the game or units that dont work (the tau bomber comes to mind) and I also dont have to worry about units that are imbalanced and can ruin the game, all that I need to be concerned about is what masters/crews I think are fun/boring and which ones my opponent think are fun/boring.

TL: DR this game has too many loopholes and things that take away from the fun when other rulesets provide a more enjoyable experience for both sides and still can involve plenty of social interactions

 TheCustomLime wrote:
The main reason why a latter will stomp the former is because there is a huge divide between the "Tournament lists" and "Fun lists". This isn't to say all lists will have a good chance against each other. Obviously, someone who throws a bunch of random units together with no coherent strategy will lose to someone who had some forethought.
...
Does your argument have any merit? Sure, it could make the best out of the flying rodent gak insane ruleset we have right now. But it is no substitute for good rule design as not everyone wants to talk things out.

There is no game that involves list building where this is not the case. In 40k's case trying to balance over a dozen codicies each with a couple dozen units who each have a potential list of weapon options against each other with perfect balance is impossible.
If I walk into any local gaming store with any heavily tuned list a good proportion of the players in that store will not enjoy the game because they will spend all their time completely on the back foot/removing models/rolling for injured players etc with no control over the result regardless of the game system. Another finely tuned "list" however will create a game we both enjoy.

So you talk, I may sound like an old fuddy duddy but it's true that it's becoming a lost art. You don't need to have a 2 hour discussion on the merits of D-weapons and Riptides or whatever. A 5 minute chat about how *hard* your list is compared to your opponents will get the job done, everything else is just gravy. If you're gonna invest 2+ hours to play a game what 5 minutes to make sure your lists were designed to fight in the same league.

You may not want to talk but it does remove most of the issues of any list building system. Once you and your opponent are on the same page the fun begins.