How to encourage "Keeping it Casual"

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**generalchaos34**

gwarsh41 wrote:
So its a fine line to walk, "keeping it casual" that is. When you implement rules, you stop keeping it casual. Everyone has their own definition of casual play, some people like high tier competitive games, but play them casually. Others like what you call fluffy lists, and play them. Then there are fluffy competitive lists. Look at say, Blackmanes Great Company for a Space Wolf Strike force. Its a bunch of drop pods, has blood claws, grey hunters, and wolf guard. Very fluffy for Space Wolves, but also pretty potent as all pods are free and arrive turn 1, plus, counter charge is beefy.

What I am trying to get at here, is that instead of putting in rules to force your version of fluffy, talk to people and see if they would be interested in a less competitive and more relaxed environment. Personally, I think some of the "less competitive" formations are super cool and fluffy, like Arjacs shield brothers, its just a bunch of TH/SS terminators, but some new players in my area thing TH/SS terminators are cheesier than pizza. So if I brought this +500pt formation alongside a cad, no deathstars or any power units. They might think I am being super competitive when I am just trying to have some fun.

There are a lot of good ideas in the thread, mainly, CAD. Sticking to CAD is always a good idea. Removing LoW can be too, it brings the game back down to earth in a sense. Most importantly though, I think that stating your intentions clearly is the most important thing. It's been working for me very well so far, I tell people I want a casual game, I am not looking to table anyone or be tabled, and I get what I am looking for. I was recently in a narrative where "Casual fluffy" was understood, but army imbalance can throw a nut into that. I brought a chaos knight to a 3000pt team game, it was the only big nasty I had. I didn't know my opponent had nothing that could easily handle it and we had a massive imbalance. They felt that I was playing to win, when I had a narrative I was following for my army.

I think competitive casual can only really work when there is some sort of trusted arbiter who can say "fluffy but fine", "nice but no one here can handle it" type decisions. As in this case you had taken something that is understood to be a regular part of the game but no one was was prepared for knights so it really killed the vibe, maybe someone could have reviewed it before hand and said "nah" or let the other team add in something last minute to allow them the ability to deal with it.

Another idea is that everyone can post and vote on your lists ahead of time (or list ideas, maybe not exact points or unit sizes so there is no list tailoring) on a forum or better yet google forms, maybe have choices like Fluffy to Average to Competitive and if you get X competitive votes you go up for review. (once again this can be abused but if you notice only one guy is voting that way to ruin other lists then you can ignore him)

**Nomeny**

I think keeping an ongoing conversation going about what people want to play is something. If people really want to play pick-up games, keep talking about how it's important that you both have fun, and if people talk about set-piece battles they want to try or whatever, or challenge-matches, then manage expectations accordingly.

**Slayer-Fan123**

oldzoggy wrote:
I would gladly trade a limit on those for a slight bias against the one unit no one even owns.

This is a gak attitude. Lots of people own gakky units.

**Desubot**

Talk. actually talk to people about what you want to do.

house rule out obvious nonsense between your selves.

talk out the wonky stuff that doesn't work or is too vague.

and have fun.

You shouldn't have to do anything beyond that.

**NInjatactiks**

Alright so maybe calling it a league is a bad idea. I think "community" fits a bit more on what I'm trying to go for.

**oldzoggy**

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:
oldzoggy wrote:
I would gladly trade a limit on those for a slight bias against the one unit no one even owns.

This is a gak attitude. Lots of people own gakky units.

I have to disagree with you on this one. This is what making your own balancing house rules is all about. All limiting rule sets are trade-offs.
You try to find the best rule that prevents the unwanted stuff from happening while keeping the unwanted side effects to a minimum.
Lets take the 1x CAD and no LOW house rule for example.
It kills off super friends, OP low and all other allies shenanigans at the cost of killing off inquisition, Harlequins, Skitatii, Knights and assasins and severely crippling tyranids and orks who need at least multiple cads in order to compensate for their abysmal internal codex balance. But it still allows things like screamer stars and Wulfy wulf madness.
The Community comp is no exception in it. It is however a lot more precise. It kills off no armies to start with, and allows nearly all casual lists to be build even those who include Ogryn. It does however require quite a lot of book keeping and severely cripples all popular competitive builds and punishes competitive builds with Ogryn in them for some reason even more.

I would gladly choose the trade off that eliminates nearly all death stars and spam lists at the costs of no longer being able to field a traditional competitive builds that also includes Ogryn's.
It seems for me the least bad trade off since the least amount of casual players are hurt wile at the same time addressing the most problematic lists.
Is this an ideal solution probably not but its the best one I have seen so far (outside just solving it with unwritten rules). Feel free to suggest a better one, I will switch sides in an instant if it does a better job at killing off all the dull top tier builds while at the same time sparing most of the casual builds.

**Spetulhu**

nareik wrote:
De-emphasise the importance of winning, perhaps add 'narrative achievements' for players to unlock during the league to help remove that focus on winning?

One of our guys (a really good player) sometimes takes a "narrative challenge" on himself just to make the game more interesting. He can win or has a good chance against almost anything so a little something makes it more challenging for him. Like the time he played a borrowed list with an Inquisitor as HQ at one of our small tournaments and decided the legendary Inquisitor Weasel must survive every game. He even sacrificed units to give the inky time to evacuate and still won.

**Polonius**

NInjatactiks wrote:
On the topic of comps, could anyone point me in the right direction for a good system to follow?

I don't think one has been developed that is both effective (meaning it doesn't just lead to a different form of broken) and user friendly. Most aren't either.

I think if you try to create comp rules, you end up either down a rabbit hole of complexity, or instead you trade rigid rules for more of a code of conduct. Here are some examples:
- the goal of the game is for both players to have fun, so make sure your army presents both a challenge, but also a realistic match up to your opponent.
- Diversity, especially of elites, Fast, and Heavy, is almost always more interesting than spam.
- When in doubt, units of generalist infantry are a good thing to add for casual play.
- You're army should look like an army, not a random collection of models.
- Allies are for narrative games and tournaments. Stand on your own when you can.
- Avoid army skew. Don't just include 2+ saves, or AV13+, or hordes. Include a wide variety of targets for your opponent.
- Be honest about what units are most efficient, points wise, and use them in moderation.

These are vague, at times, and none are 100% applicable (Deathwing can, and should, overwhelm your oppoenent with 2+ saves; while some generalist infantry is super good (Grey Hunters)

**Traditio**

Peregrine wrote:This has nothing to do with fluff or "what is cool". A marine army with mixed weapons is not "fluffy" or "cool", it's just poorly optimized. You're never going to have a working system if you insist on treating "casual" and "weak lists with poor strategic choices" as synonyms.

This is what GW markets, and I think that this is one reason why GW is doing so poorly as a company relative, say, to how it was doing in 5th edition.

If I want to play the game competitive with a marine army, I need all of the models required for a battle company, a ton of white paint, and I need somewhere in the ballpark of at least...no fewer than 10 grav cannons. Probably more, but no fewer.

But GW doesn't sell and market grav cannon devastator squads. They market and sell mixed weapon devastator squads.

So to win, you need optimized, specialized squads. But that's not what they sell, and what they do sell, they sell at a ridiculous premium.

There's a huge disparity between game play and marketing, and I think that this is really hurting GW.

**Talizvar**

"Casual play", I tend to side with more competitive play BUT my definition of casual is to get a bit more into the narrative "fluff".
The only way I can see that working is design scenarios.
It plays into my hands anyway because ideally I want a close game.
So the "balance" can be built into the parameters of the scenario.
Heck, a scenario can give a complete excuse to be unfair and try to delay and survive to a given point (make sure if you designed it you are the disadvantaged one).
This is why many people play historical games: to see if they can "do better" not necessarily win.
Plus it would be nice to select some objectives that make sense to the scenario but still can be a random selection.

Something with a bit of a plot I think would make the "casual play" more engaging.
40k these days is seems like a glorified version of Pachinko works for some and others, like watching paint dry.

**Happyjew**

Let me ask this how would you rank an Eldar list, consisting of Farseers, Warlocks, guardians, vauls wrath support batteries, jetbikes, war walkers, Vypers and maybe an Avatar?

**Sgt_Smudge**

Traditio wrote:
Peregrine wrote:This has nothing to do with fluff or "what is cool". A marine army with mixed weapons is not "fluffy" or "cool", it's just poorly optimized. You're never going to have a working system if you insist on treating "casual" and "weak lists with poor strategic choices" as synonyms.

This is what GW markets, and I think that this is one reason why GW is doing so poorly as a company relative, say, to how it was doing in 5th edition.

If I want to play the game competitive with a marine army, I need all of the models required for a battle company, a ton of white paint, and I need somewhere in the ballpark of at least...no fewer than 10 grav cannons. Probably more, but no fewer.

But GW doesn't sell and market grav cannon devastator squads. They market and sell mixed weapon devastator squads.

So to win, you need optimized, specialized squads. But that's not what they sell, and what they do sell, they sell at a ridiculous premium.

There's a huge disparity between game play and marketing, and I think that this is really hurting GW.

GW do not appear to realise the imbalances they create, or actively encourage power creep (case in point - the Riptide, which they deliberately made an MC because they knew the Walker rules were toilet paper).

They test the game using combos to have a friendly game - not actively trying to test the limits and work out what actually is broken. As a result, you end up with horribly OP units and combinations because the tester didn't actually test the OP units.

For example, tester Bob brings Space Marines and took Raven Guard Centurions with lascannons and a Libarian (to represent his own company of the RG - not testing the stronger Chapter Tactics and fitting his aspect of the Centurions as snipers - not using the grav weapons to test them) and rolling on Pyromancy for the Libby (because he felt like using fire instead of actually trialling the broken combos such as Gate of Infinity Grav Centurions).

According to them, you should take mixed weapon Devastator Squads, because they need to have a flexible battlefield role, despite them all having to shoot the same target.

**Lord Damocles**

Desubot wrote:
Talk. actually talk to people about what you want to do.

This. So much this.

Systems which involve trying to rate armies [players] based on what their opponents judge they were thinking; or systems which try to fix wonky points costs by adding a whole extra layer of wonky points costs; or hard restrictions which invalidate entire factions don't work.

If you don't want Mr Tau Player to field triple Riptides every game, how about just saying 'yo Mr Tau dude. How about not taking triple Riptides every game, because the rest of us can't handle it. Please'?

(on the other side of the coin, if everyone says 'yo Mr organiser dude, we all want to take triple Ripdides and Wraithknights, and invisible Centurian deathstars every game', well, you might have to shift).

**Nazrak**

Lord Damocles wrote:
Desubot wrote:
Talk. actually talk to people about what you want to do.

This. So much this.

Systems which involve trying to rate armies [players] based on what their opponents judge they were thinking; or systems which try to fix wonky points costs by adding a whole extra layer of wonky points costs; or hard restrictions which invalidate entire factions don't work.

If you don't want Mr Tau Player to field triple Riptides every game, how about just saying 'yo Mr Tau dude. How about not taking triple Riptides every game, because the rest of us can't handle it. Please'?

(on the other side of the coin, if everyone says 'yo Mr organiser dude, we all want to take triple Ripdides and Wraithknights, and invisible Centurian deathstars every game', well, you might have to shift).

Yepppppp, this. If people spent as much time talking to the people they play with about how they want to play, rather than grumbling about it on the internet, I imagine there'd be a lot less bother.

**necrontyrOG**

No Formations, no Super Heavies, no Battle Brothers. Nearly any codex can compete with the other with these guidelines.

**Traditio**

necrontyrOG wrote:
No Formations, no Super Heavies, no Battle Brothers. Nearly any codex can compete with the other with these guidelines.

That still leaves scatter bikes, warp spiders, grav spam...

**necrontyrOG**

Traditio wrote:
necrontyrOG wrote:
No Formations, no Super Heavies, no Battle Brothers. Nearly any codex can compete with the other with these guidelines.

That still leaves scatter bikes, warp spiders, grav spam...

It does, but they're much more manageable when limited by the force org chart and no special rules from Formations. Except for scat bikes, those things are dumb. Maybe limit them to one heavy per 3 models like they used to be?

**dracpanzer**

Rule #1- At each get together, the player who is deemed to have brought the beardiest list has to buy the drinks.
/thread

**NInjatactiks**

dracpanzer wrote:
Rule #1- At each get together, the player who is deemed to have brought the beardiest list has to buy the drinks.
/thread

WE HAVE A WINNER!

**Traditio**

NInjatactiks wrote:
dracpanzer wrote:
Rule #1- At each get together, the player who is deemed to have brought the beardiest list has to buy the drinks.
/thread

WE HAVE A WINNER!

I actually have a decent idea:

1. Forbid formations and GMCs and SHVs

2. Ban codex specific options on a case by case basis. (Example: no grav, no bikes as troops, etc.)

3. After you've done those two things:

Allow each player a certain maximum number of vetos. At the end of the tournament, each player may "veto" up to x number of players in the tournament (whether or not he's played against him). Any player who receives more than x number of vetos is disqualified from the tournament and all of his wins go to his opponents instead. Specify in advance that "vetos" should only be used on players who brought perceived cheesy or OP lists.

**Peregrine**

Traditio wrote:
Specify in advance that "vetos" should only be used on players who brought perceived cheesy or OP lists.

"Here's this perfect opportunity to be a TFG and ruin someone's day, but please don't use it on anyone who isn't a TFG." Sounds like a great idea to me...

**Traditio**

Peregrine wrote:
Traditio wrote:
Specify in advance that "vetos" should only be used on players who brought perceived cheesy or OP lists.

"Here's this perfect opportunity to be a TFG and ruin someone's day, but please don't use it on anyone who isn't a TFG." Sounds like a great idea to me...

I don't think that you're fully thinking this one out. Presumably, a TFG is going to use his vetos on his own opponents. But if the TO is sufficiently shrewd about this, what will end up happening, if EVERYONE is a TFG, is that nobody will accumulate enough vetos to be disqualified.

The second most likely occurrence is that people are going to use their veto on the player with the strongest army. But this is the intended effect.

The other possible thing that could happen is that people will veto whoever it is that is winning towards the end. But this is a matter of timing.

So, I have a revised proposal:

All lists must be submitted and posted without the name of the person who brought the list. Each player, before the tournament begins, may "veto" up to x number of those lists. Those vetos are cast secretively and the results of the vetos are not revealed until the end of the tournament.

**Peregrine**

Traditio wrote:
Presumably, a TFG is going to use his vetos on his own opponents.

Only if the TFG is concerned primarily about winning, rather than being a

and ruining someone's day. What you are more likely to get is TFGs who vote to kick out people they don't like, cliques who vote to kick out anyone who doesn't regularly play at "their" store, etc. It makes the tournament a popularity contest, not a game.

All lists must be submitted and posted without the name of the person who brought the list. Each player, before the tournament begins, may "veto" up to x number of those lists. Those vetos are cast secretively and the results of the vetos are not revealed until the end of the tournament.

Which, assuming a big enough community that you can't identify a person simply by what army they have, fixes the problem of TFG voting to ruin the day of someone they don't like. But it doesn't at all fix the problem of ruining someone's day with "well, you fought hard and thought you win, but surprise, you lose because we don't like your list".

**Backspacehacker**

Best way, honestly call people on their cheese.

If your objective is to avoid conflict you wont be able to do it forever. Eventually someone is going to show up with an all warp spider army and say its totally not OP.

The best way to go about it, is if you have a TFG come in with waithknights, get him to at least admit its OP then play him.

Being honest an confrontational about cheese is not a bad or taboo thing.

Also, push for people to run fluffy armies, run what they think is cool and fun.

For example, i run DW RW, the RW side is OP but its balanced because the DW side is gimmped, and honestly i wont change it no matter if the rules make it better or worse for me because its my fluff army.

Also run narrative campaigns.

**Peregrine**

Backspacehacker wrote:
Also, push for people to run fluffy armies, run what they think is cool and fun.

The problem is that many things which are "fluffy" or "cool and fun" are also very powerful. A list of nothing but knights is 100% fluffy, but also a list that can be very difficult to fight against for many "casual" armies. Riptides/Wraithknights/etc are blatantly overpowered, but many people think they're really cool models. And of course people have widely diverging ideas about what "fluffy" or "cool" are, making them rather useless concepts in general. Appealing to such hopelessly vague terms with an implicit threat of shunning from the community almost guarantees awkward conflicts.

**Traditio**

Peregrine wrote:Only if the TFG is concerned primarily about winning, rather than being a and ruining someone's day.

Is that actually a thing?

If I were the kind of person who plays in tournaments, and I were playing according to the rules I've proposed, I wouldn't vote against Joe the Outsider (who brought an army of only chaos cultists). I don't care how "outside" of my clique he is. I'm voting against the dude who brought scatter bikes. I'm voting against the dude who brought white scars bike spam and grav spam.

What you are more likely to get is TFGs who vote to kick out people they don't like, cliques who vote to kick out anyone who doesn't regularly play at "their" store, etc. It makes the tournament a popularity contest, not a game.

I feel like making it a secret ballot at least partly would mitigate against this. If the rest of your clique didn't know who you voted against, then you're less likely to side with your clique, no?

In addition, this may or may not even be a concern at the OP's venue.

Which, assuming a big enough community that you can't identify a person simply by what army they have, fixes the problem of TFG voting to ruin the day of someone they don't like. But it doesn't at all fix the problem of ruining someone's day with "well, you fought hard and thought you win, but surprise, you lose because we don't like your list".

That's not a problem. That's the intended result. And you can't claim that it's unfair, because if the OP were to impose that rule, then that's what his players will have signed up for. Don't want to be disqualified? Then don't bring a list that will [censored] people off.

And note, I'm not saying that people shouldn't be allowed to play. You brought white scars biker spam? Fine. I'll play you. You can play your games. You just can't win the tournament if enough people agree with me.

**Backspacehacker**

Peregrine wrote:
Backspacehacker wrote:
Also, push for people to run fluffy armies, run what they think is cool and fun.

The problem is that many things which are "fluffy" or "cool and fun" are also very powerful. A list of nothing but knights is 100% fluffy, but also a list that can be very difficult to fight against for many "casual" armies. Riptides/Wraithknights/etc are blatantly overpowered, but many people think they're really cool models. And of course people have widely diverging ideas about what "fluffy" or "cool" are, making them rather useless concepts in general. Appealing to such hopelessly vague terms with an implicit threat of shunning from the community almost guarantees awkward conflicts.

Ill give you that one my friend.

My stance on any army, even if it was all knights, is ill fight it, as long as said player does not try and pretend their army is not fluffy, ill play it.

Another good way is to push cad maybe.

**Peregrine**

Traditio wrote:
Is that actually a thing?

If I were the kind of person who plays in tournaments, and I were playing according to the rules I've proposed, I wouldn't vote against Joe the Outsider (who brought an army of only chaos cultists). I don't care how "outside" of my clique he is. I'm voting against the dude who brought scatter bikes. I'm voting against the dude who brought white scars bike spam and grav spam.

Of course it's a thing. Have you honestly never seen cliquish behavior, trolls who just want to get other people angry, etc? I would have thought from the number of times you've blamed "trolls" for voting the wrong way in your polls that you would understand very well how people might vote for the "make this person angry" option rather than the self-interested one.

I feel like making it a secret ballot at least partly would mitigate against this. If the rest of your clique didn't know who you voted against, then you're less likely to side with your clique, no?

No, because a clique doesn't rely on explicit agreements to vote a particular way. It's more like Bob is from out of town, but Alice is one of my friends. I'm not going to vote against my friend, so Bob gets the vote. And I probably don't like Bob all that much since he hasn't made an effort to be part of my group, so that vote is really easy.

(And of course if your clique does arrange a vote explicitly it's not like you have any incentive to break the agreement, since it's targeting someone you don't care about. The secret ballot doesn't change anything.)

That's not a problem. That's the intended result. And you can't claim that it's unfair, because if the OP were to impose that rule, then that's what his players will have signed up for. Don't want to be disqualified? Then don't bring a list that will [censored] people off.

I didn't say that it's unfair, I said that it ruins someone's day. It's perfectly fair because it's announced up front and you can always decline to participate. But that doesn't mean it's not going to suck to find out that you lost all of your games because people didn't approve of your list. It's a terrible idea that almost guarantees that people will be unhappy, regardless of how "fair" it is.

And note, I'm not saying that people shouldn't be allowed to play. You brought white scars biker spam? Fine. I'll play you. You can play your games. You just can't win the tournament if enough people agree with me.

Which is why your proposal, like most comp systems, is a terrible idea. If White Scars biker spam creates a bad enough experience that people are justified in voting to disqualify it then it shouldn't be allowed in the first place! Voting to disqualify the player after the tournament is over doesn't change the fact that people had that bad experience playing against it. It's just an opportunity for a smug "I'm so casual and you're a TFG" lecture after the game is over, except with the added punishment of taking away any prize the player earned.

**Traditio**

Peregrine wrote:Which is why your proposal, like most comp systems, is a terrible idea. If White Scars biker spam creates a bad enough experience that people are justified in voting to disqualify it then it shouldn't be allowed in the first place! Voting to disqualify the player after the tournament is over doesn't change the fact that people had that bad experience playing against it. It's just an opportunity for a smug "I'm so casual and you're a TFG" lecture after the game is over, except with the added punishment of taking away any prize the player earned.

Your previous points are duly noted. It's this particular point that I want to address.

Here's my problem with what you are saying:

Power gamers are going to power game regardless of the restrictions. If you just say "You can't do x," then power gamers are going to bring the next most OP thing that they can come up with. Unless the TO carefully goes through each and every single codex and writes an exhaustive list of the units, combinations, etc. that can't be taken, he's not going to come up with anything like a list which can be deemed as "sufficient" to stop people from power gaming. And even then, power gamers will still probably find a work around and succeed in [censored] people off.

Presumably, what the OP is going for is a mindset. My system encourages a mindset. "Don't power game. Period. If you power game, you stand a good chance of being disqualified."

Of course, this will make power gamers very unhappy. But then, if the OP wants to create a casual-friendly environment, then OF COURSE he's going to have to make the power gamers unhappy. That's part of the trade off.

You tell me that this just encourages the "I'm so casual and you're a TFG."

Well if you just set up a list of rules without what I've proposed, then you've just encouraged power gamers to try to break the game within the context of your limitations.

My recommendation sends a clear message: "No breaking the game. Don't even try. Or else."

**Martel732**

Recost the miscosted units. Most problems go away.