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.

 FezzikDaBullgryn wrote:
I think it's been answered and explained. If you are 18" away, and your model has 5" movement, there is no possible way that your "unit" got within charge range, and that should be it. I don't care how many times you measured it. You were 18" away at the start of this turn.

This is why I almost always measure the distance to an enemy model before moving my guys if I intend to charge, so I can tell my opponent I'm moving X unit, he'll need a 7 to charge you, or something like that.

Matters a lot less if my movements are sloppy, if I'm measuring what I need for charge before I make the move.

I admit that with my orks I might be bit sloppy on movement(though movement trays help). However on flip side it goes BOTH way. I'm often not even trying to maximize models in combat prefering speedy game so I measure roughly who get and leave rest out even if with careful measures and willigness to break from movement trays would get not that insignificant amount of models to combat.

Seeing I lose more than win I doubt it's big issue for opponents. I might even win more if I was more careful with movements

Oh and for above kind of scenarios. With 5" move and 18" distance I obviously measure do I even have chance. Generally in those cases I measure first and declare intent. If distance is 17" but only barely measure before moving anything and declare things. Gets rid of measurement errors later, models bumping a bit mid turn etc.

Part of this sounds a bit like the playing to procedure or to intent, discussion that's about making sure your all playing with the same expectations.

Though even then I have to say I tend to expect chess style you can pick it up and place it anywhere within it's movement distance from where it was but once it's placed it's moved no magical follow the mini, follow the mini where will it be placed nonsence.

If where playing with intent and you say I moving my russ so he can shoot X unit sure I'll eyeball it and tell you little left, right forwards to a point I can see from my unit gives you Line of Sight and such to make the game go faster instead of you having to achieve advanced yoga posses to see if your model can see while not taking your hand off it

Never seen this tbh. I've seen a lot of cheats, including many instances of the "gamers inch" but never this one.

It sounds like an even sloppier case of "gamers inch".

Sloppy movement is sadly a thing. I find it's best to...
1. Speak up about it while it's happening because it can sour your entire game experience. Remember, it's OK to enforce the game rules.
2. Be polite about bringing it to your opponents attention. More often than not it's just bad habit.

Sometimes, if it's appropriate, I will openly, but in generalities as to not be accusatory, discuss the negative implications of sloppy movement. This can help them realize why it's important to keep it in check.

I've seen it all, I'm sure most have...
- The Floating Measuring Tape (e.g. moving the measuring tape forward while simultaneously moving the model)
- Front / Backing
- The Parallax Error (e.g. an extreme angle from which the view point makes the measurement look shorter than the actual distance traveled)
- The Stewie Shuffle (e.g. move the entire unit forward then move the entire unit back then move the entire unit forward again)
- The 'All My Friends Too' (e.g. measure to move one model and then pile everything else in behind it without measuring - this one is best used for Charge and Pile In moves)
- The 'Zero feths Given'; which happens to be my personal favorite / pet peeve (e.g. move your entire army then revisit each unit and adjust anything to ensure aura's, firing arches, max. cover, etc. are all in order)

I've definitely been guilty of sloppy play when I was younger, but I try to be precise now, and one technique that I find is very helpful when playing against "sloppy" opponents is to announce what I'm doing and why when I move, and ask them to double check my work.
For example, "I'm trying to keep all my units in aura range while staying 18" away from your Ork boyz, does this look good to you?"

It's not condescending or impolite, it gets the other player thinking about precise measurement, and once it's their turn there's no confusion.

Waaaghpower wrote:
I've definitely been guilty of sloppy play when I was younger, but I try to be precise now, and one technique that I find is very helpful when playing against "sloppy" opponents is to announce what I'm doing and why when I move, and ask them to double check my work.
For example, "I'm trying to keep all my units in aura range while staying 18" away from your Ork boyz, does this look good to you?"

It's not condescending or impolite, it gets the other player thinking about precise measurement, and once it's their turn there's no confusion.

That's a great tactic as well. I'll often say things like that in tournament play if I'm not 100% sure of what stratagems my opponent has... like if I move a Knight 18.1" away from a unit, I'll announce it's 18.1" away, so with his 6" move + a 12" charge he shouldn't have any way to charge it, then ask if he has any stratagems or abilities I've overlooked that will allow him to charge me, just so we're on the same page.

My personal favorite sloppy play rule that I see seems to be fairly common.

"Look what I found" - I move my unit into a building, capture objective. Confirm with opponent he has no models in the area, so I get OBJ Confirmed.

Oh, wait, I had this one guy behind the wall, sorry, I missed him. Well, my turn is now over and I never get the point. This is my fault, because I'm not getting a 360, but still. I asked you, and you either lied or at best omitted the truth.

 FezzikDaBullgryn wrote:
My personal favorite sloppy play rule that I see seems to be fairly common.

"Look what I found" - I move my unit into a building, capture objective. Confirm with opponent he has no models in the area, so I get OBJ Confirmed.

Oh, wait, I had this one guy behind the wall, sorry, I missed him. Well, my turn is now over and I never get the point. This is my fault, because I'm not getting a 360, but still. I asked you, and you either lied or at best omitted the truth.

At that point I'd call a judge if tournament play, or if not tell my opponent that's his problem, and the guy was sleeping or something, so I still get the point. I've never had a situation like that happen before, but man that would seriously piss me off.

I'm nowhere near a tournament player, but I like to pretend I am.

 FezzikDaBullgryn wrote:
I'm nowhere near a tournament player, but I like to pretend I am.

That is really common here. Unfortunately.

A.T. wrote:
Locally we used to use drinks straws cut to 6" less the width of a base, though mainly because it was the quickest way to move models.

But we didn't have any of the pre-movement movement, if you'd picked up and put your model that's where it was ending its phase for the most part.

This^^

Touch a model twice and lose the model.
Touch another one twice, and lose a finger.

This thread reminds me...

Years ago, I was on the top tables of the Baltimore GT in game 4 and had an Ork-playing opponent *shove with both hands in one move* the entire front of his unit forward into base contact with one of my units without measuring (this was when assault moves were set at 6" and premeasuring wasn't allowed). And it wasn't a slam dunk at all that the unit was within 6". It was close by my estimation, but without question something that should have been measured.

Because it was so audacious, it was a pretty good cheat. What recourse did I have? The entire front of his unit had moved, and that's what made the cheat obvious and the distance unproveable. Had it been a single model, maybe we could have estimated its previous position. But as it stood, it was my word against his (obviously he was going to claim that the unit was well within 6"). I knew things were going to go nowhere with a GW judge, so I played on. That assault ended up being a big turning point in the game, and I lost.

I own some responsibility for leaving my unit anywhere near 12" (6+6) away. But that was the first time I had something so bush league pulled on me at a big event. I expect lots of little gamesmanship moves on the top tables, but that was really something. Thank god premeasuring is now a thing. It's such an improvement.

 FezzikDaBullgryn wrote:
I'm nowhere near a tournament player, but I like to pretend I am.

I play competitively, but only locally. I don't really have the capability or budget to travel long distances to attend major tournaments.

I consider myself fairly good at this game, though, and feel generally validated in that self-assessment based on the assessment of the people I play with normally.

 bullyboy wrote:
See it all the time, and to be honest, unless it feels blatant, I don't care (unless it specifically has an effect that wasn't possible with an exact move).

Funniest thing i witnessed was a guy playing Space Wolves (back in 3rd) who moved his models Turn 1 and got a charge off vs enemy player. Player said he moved too far, other protested, etc. Then defending calmly pointed out deployment requirements and how it was mathematically impossible to have made that charge Turn 1. Other guy just went silent.

I've seen this exact situation (and been on the receiving end) several times. Mathematically impossible turn one/two charges, usually from assault heavy armies. As a Tau player, it's pretty important that I make sure my opponent's movement is legitimate. When I was playing Death Guard, it wasn't nearly so important.

I'll do a sloppy pile in, but I always ask first. 99% of people will just say "yeah sure", because who wants to sit there and watch their opponent move their horde army piece by piece for 30 minutes?

I’m a close-enough mover of models, unless I foresee a range being critical, in which case I’ll premeasure or confirm with my opponent...

“Before I move, I’m 11 7/8” away, so “xyz” is happening.

Ohh yeah... Pet peve of mine.

The worse is when every time it wasn't obvious about my ranges (I.E. +-0.5") my guys would always be out of range- tough luck not In range to charge/fire etc.

But then, miraculously every time any measurements were being done against me, (that same +-0.5) he would always be in range. It was a casual game so apart from highlighting every instance by and slowly cranking up the sarcasm every time "Ohh your guys are in range are they? We had the same case over here and your guys were in range remember?" but ultimately I just let it go but make mental note of the players FB profile so I don't arrange another game in the future.


It is an interesting topic, I've had plenty of games as I'm sure others have that victory or defeat hanged on a single 1/2" of not making the charge or just being out of critical target with some guns. I personally try to be as accurate as possible with movements and use a die as a measuring token. It does slightly annoy me when an opponent just gets extra inch or two for their pox walkers etc.

If I need to do this to check LOS. i place a die/dice at the position of the model. I've never had a issue keeping things consistent at least.

Hi. My name is Fhanados and I have a problem... I am sloppy with movement.

My general method is to move the front mini of a unit, then move the rest of the front line in roughly the same formation as previously. Once the front line is done I do the same process for the back line, then move the middle to fill the gap between.

Is it perfect? Lord no. I use around 60 infantry in a 2000pt game. It's not Green-tide or Infantry Squad Spam levels, but they all need to move very frequently to be useful at all. I'll tend to err on the side of caution so I'm not ripping off my opponents, but it's VERY rare that I'll meticulously measure every inch of movement for every model in a squad.

Consequently, I'm very interested in getting a bunch of Apocalypse movement trays for my squads.

 gorgon wrote:
This thread reminds me...

Years ago, I was on the top tables of the Baltimore GT in game 4 and had an Ork-playing opponent *shove with both hands in one move* the entire front of his unit forward into base contact with one of my units without measuring (this was when assault moves were set at 6" and premeasuring wasn't allowed). And it wasn't a slam dunk at all that the unit was within 6". It was close by my estimation, but without question something that should have been measured.

Because it was so audacious, it was a pretty good cheat. What recourse did I have? The entire front of his unit had moved, and that's what made the cheat obvious and the distance unproveable. Had it been a single model, maybe we could have estimated its previous position. But as it stood, it was my word against his (obviously he was going to claim that the unit was well within 6"). I knew things were going to go nowhere with a GW judge, so I played on. That assault ended up being a big turning point in the game, and I lost.

I own some responsibility for leaving my unit anywhere near 12" (6+6) away. But that was the first time I had something so bush league pulled on me at a big event. I expect lots of little gamesmanship moves on the top tables, but that was really something. Thank god premeasuring is now a thing. It's such an improvement.

Oh I know that one. It is rather famous around here, called the arturius move, from some really ancient dude who moved his whole bretonian army in one move doing a first turn charge and when the opponent called a judge he just messured X" to be withing charge range and said "see they were in range, Arturius never lies". Story is ancient though happened way back before I was even born.

the premeasuring can still be went around, you move 1-2 dudes, then move another in a semic circle real fast, then move the first 2 a little bit back, then move nother dudes forward, and then you go "oh they have to be in cohorency" and mover the first 2 dudes behind the second group you moved, and then you abort the whole movment, move them back to their "original" position which you marked with a dice, and when you do so you can easily gain 0,5-1" , and then do the real charge. If you are really trained and fast doing it, an opponent who isn't used to it, won't able to do a thing unless the whole thing is streamed.

I think the main problem with movment, are because play with intent is so big in US/UK. Here if you pick up a model and put it down, and it isn't visibly out of range, and you always make people measure, in a way you can see and not with their hand covering the entire tape, it stays where you put it down. You don't like where you put the model, you shouldn't have picked it up. Like in chess you touched a figure, you moved it.

 Kap'n Krump wrote:
I'm guilty of this, especially with my ork army, though I do my damnedest to move the first rank of orks accurately but don't worry about the rest.

But yeah, I've moved units, thought better, and tried to move them back or fudge where I move them to a bit.

I wouldn't mind being called out, corrected, or asked to use a proxy if playing someone though.

Pretty much this, front rank or two ranks of my horde infantry gets painstackingly checked. Everything else is a mad dash.

I ask my opponent if he's okay with things BEFORE I do them, sometimes maybe demonstrating (after marking where a unit may be before hand) and I have never had a complaint. I also am fine with my opponent doing things like this barring certain exceptions, No I'm sorry friend but you WILL need to measure your knight army 100% since you have 5 models and its hyper important on their exact positioning

Horst wrote:

 FezzikDaBullgryn wrote:
I think it's been answered and explained. If you are 18" away, and your model has 5" movement, there is no possible way that your "unit" got within charge range, and that should be it. I don't care how many times you measured it. You were 18" away at the start of this turn.

This is why I almost always measure the distance to an enemy model before moving my guys if I intend to charge, so I can tell my opponent I'm moving X unit, he'll need a 7 to charge you, or something like that.

Matters a lot less if my movements are sloppy, if I'm measuring what I need for charge before I make the move.

I'll almost always measure my movement/charge first(before any movement) then move the closest model. I'll follow that up with measuring again before I move any other models. More just to double check myself than anything else tho.

There is one dude @ our flgs whom you have to watch like a hawk and make sure you measure distances of his models. I would count this out as just being inattentive/lackadaisical (on his part) the first game it happened, but when it happened exactly like before, a trend appeared. After talking with 4 or 5 others they've played, everyone had the exact same experience. A pattern emerges.

So last game we played, I made very specific measures of distance during deployment and made sure to specifically mess with him during my movement phase(even putting units just 1/2" out of range). after being called out by a spectator, he kept saying sorry....every...freakin...time. More than once he thought he was in range of something juicy (my relic contemptor) but all that was in range was an Intercessor squad in cover (cities of death). by turn 2 he was visibly frustrated, turn 3 it was straight up agitation.

It's like their entire plan/strategy was to fudge enuff to win and when called out on it acting like a little kid who just got told "NO ICE CREAM"!

Let's just say " I'm not gonna play him again but if I do, I prefer Dos XX "(i.e. drunk so I dont care).

Extra movement is a pretty common method of cheating or sloppy play but one thing that really annoys me is endless shuffling of models back and forth. You can premeasure, so that's all the info you should need. When players pick a model up, put it down in a new location, change their mind, put it "back where it was" and try again the margin of error goes way up. 40k is already pretty generous with the amount of info a player has over their movement and range options and I get a bit annoyed when people try to game the system this way. Adhering to a strict chess-like rule is probably the best way to prevent this kind of sloppy play.

On a related note I saw a game of 9th Age, I believe from last year's ETC, and one of the things that really put me off that apparently highly competitive system was watching top players move units 3, 4, sometimes more times. Models got moved, then shuffled back a bit, then rearranged, then returned to their original position, then moved somewhere else. Angled LoS tools were deployed at every moment to make sure everything was right where it should be, which was kind of comical given the amount of inaccuracy they were introducing by how they moved the models.

Slipspace wrote:
Extra movement is a pretty common method of cheating or sloppy play but one thing that really annoys me is endless shuffling of models back and forth. You can premeasure, so that's all the info you should need. When players pick a model up, put it down in a new location, change their mind, put it "back where it was" and try again the margin of error goes way up. 40k is already pretty generous with the amount of info a player has over their movement and range options and I get a bit annoyed when people try to game the system this way. Adhering to a strict chess-like rule is probably the best way to prevent this kind of sloppy play.

On a related note I saw a game of 9th Age, I believe from last year's ETC, and one of the things that really put me off that apparently highly competitive system was watching top players move units 3, 4, sometimes more times. Models got moved, then shuffled back a bit, then rearranged, then returned to their original position, then moved somewhere else. Angled LoS tools were deployed at every moment to make sure everything was right where it should be, which was kind of comical given the amount of inaccuracy they were introducing by how they moved the models.

Usually the benefit of the doubt goes to player whose turn it is. You have to keep in mind via premeasuring how far each unit is from the closest enemy model by the end of your turn, especially those who are doing this to gain benefit.

 Ouze wrote:

 flandarz wrote:
90% of my games are "beer and pretzel" games, so generally me and my buddies just measure for the closest model and then pile everyone else in behind it. Competitively, I'll measure for each one, or (to save time) just deliberately short-change myself on distance (4.5" instead of 5", for example).

That is pretty much how we did it, when I still actively played. Measure one model, move the rest no further up. The biggest thing we tried to remember was not to move a model from the front of the base starting to the end of the base new position, because that's basically an extra inch. We did approximate center to center.

It helped that I played with close friends who would not cheat, and so pointing out someone was moving sloppy wouldn't be taken badly, as we all had a strong presumption of good faith.

That's me too. The bolded part is something one guy I played with was very prone to, however he wasn't doing it intentionally, he's just a bit of a goof in general.

I've noticed many players do very casual movements, I won't do it myself and if it's a casual movement I'll be sure to short change myself to save time but it's usually close and I make sure the base fits through where they move, which is a personal issue people seem to like to leap frog models and ignore the bases.

You aren't wrong for bringing it up just try and be chill at the same time. Distance is important in the game though and warhammer is a game of inches.