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You know, it’s possible to care about fluff AND the rules too.

They’re not mutually exclusive.

Lets say a WS or DA player wants to play with a list full of Land Speeders. Would the game really be worse if they used UM or IH rules rather than their own so they can move and shoot without that stupid penalty etc. Not only would that player feel like he is playing a worse version of his list he would probably also feel bad for asking you to turn down your list so he doesnt get stomped.

Im gonna play my BA ad Ravenguard but Im only gonna do things I wish I could do effective with BA but cant for my rules are outdated. Im not gonna do a vehicle castle like IH and I bet most players who have painted their armies like a certain chapter wants to play it like they envision them to play. No matter which chapter name is on the actual book the rules come from. Or sometimes try out something different and not only play Jump Packs with BA even if that is what I like the most. Kinda insane that most chapters rules only allow a few playstyles to work really well instead of the main rules supporting most of them and then chapters just adding a tiny bit of flavour. Like 5-15% improvement so you dont need to "chapter hop" . Not 50-100+% like what IH does for vehicles.

 Ishagu wrote:
If it's purely to get better rules then it bothers me.

You can't be a meta chaser and lazy at the same time. Let's see some proper Iron Hands.

It's when you say stuff like this that I am almost sure you work for GW. LOL.

Ultra Iron Blood Wolves?

Bring it!

 Ishagu wrote:
If it's purely to get better rules then it bothers me

What other reason can be?

I'm 100% fine with and have done it regularly. Sometimes it's because X is more powerful than Y and other's its because I want to try something different. I'm not bothered by it in the absolute least. If someone takes issue with it though that's fine to. They can enjoy their hobby the way they want to and play with who they want to and I 100% respect that. If the hobby was a ton cheaper and painting not so time consuming it might be a different story, but that's not the story we're in.

 Ishagu wrote:

Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Inquisitor Lord Katherine wrote:

 puma713 wrote:
I'm curious what people out there think, especially with all of the new Chapter hotness coming out. How do you feel about someone who shows up with a bright green army and says they're Iron Hands, but then turns up the next weekend with the same army and says they're Raven Guard? Does it bother you?

I'm actually beyond indifferent about the color they chose. I believe that the personal expression in how one paints her/his army is important and should not influence the rules.

My army is beautifully painted, as are the armies of many in my local scene.

Colour matters, 100%

So are mine, and many of the people I play with. That's why it's imperative that the scheme you selected for your army doesn't affect the rules you have to use for them.

I'm going to use the rules that represent how I want my army to play [aggressive and stabby], and paint my army how I want my army to look [silver and red].

People forget that the box provides a nifty little guide for first-time players and painters to get their army started. The default scheme of Ultras or Saim-Hann have nice strong opague colors that work easily out of the box for beginners.

Once someone breaks out of the casual phase, they may find they like other rules or other army traits better. I think it's just a lot of snobbery to expect people to stay nailed to a faction that GW probably pushed them towards.

I do not know enough of the space marine chapters well enough to care.
GW are just getting annoying with this.

If it's really really well done, I'm good with it. If they bought the Bobby G model and have him painted tie-die, I'm gone with the psychedelic Marines being Ultramarines.

That goes for any of the special characters.

Considering that

A) I couldn't tell you what color any of the Necron or Tyranid sub-factions are supposed to be to save my life,

B) GW has a bad habit of giving sub-factions rules that don't remotely match their fluff,

and

C) Marines are still in a state of flux with at least two books yet to be released,

Yeah, not worrying very much about it.

I don't care what color you paint your stuff.

It bothers me more that this is such a hot topic on here. Everyone always preaches "they're you're models paint them how you like! " but then they dead stare the same guy "But if you play those blood angles as Ultramarines I will never play you again"

Example 1: Player likes Dawn of War and paints their Marines as Blood Ravens. In one list he uses White Scars rules and in another list uses Iron Hands. Problem with this?

Example 2: Player likes Space Marine and paints their Marines as Ultramarines. In one list he uses Ultramarine tactics because (hey there are rules for this chapter). In another list he uses Imperial Fists because those rules fit that playstyle better, he prefers that chapter tactic over the ones written for Ultras, or he power games. Problem with this?

Example 3: Player paints their Tau army teal with red accents because he likes that color scheme. Later on they find out that "red markings are Vior'la Sept colors" and they are the ones seen on the boxes typically using white armor (as Tau only identifies Septs by small markings instead of armor color like Space Marines do). He doesn't care because up until 8th the sept colors didn't mean anything and didn't even knew what Vior'la is. He uses the Tau Sept rules because (insert reason here). Problem with this?

Example 4: Person buys Grey Knights and paints them blue. Problem with this?

The answer should be no to all of these because its paint on a plastic model that the person took the time and effort to put on there themselves. Just because GW wants to assign rule sets to certain sub factions that have certain paint schemes shouldn't mean you have to use that scheme to use those rules. It also shouldn't mean you have to use a certain rule set because your models are painted a certain way.

I don't care what subfaction your army is painted as nor fielded as. Heck outside of Space marines and one or two Tyranid armies I can't tell you the subfactions for ANY other faction in the game by their paint schemes. And that's for those which have schemes with are easily told apart from each other (Jump over to AoS and the Daughters of Khaine paint schemes are quite literally just different shades of red).

GW chose to give different subforces variations in statistics for the game and I've no problem if you field a close combat army and choose to use the marine/eldar/chaos/whatever subforce that gives you the best close combat bonus. Indeed I expect it of the opponent.



NOW with marines I personally would prefer it though if you were fielding a Spacewolves unique models that they would be what they are not proxies. So if you go putting those Thunderwolf Riders down then that is what they are. I don't care if they are red, blue, pink, purple or grey plastic - they are marines riding oversized wolves.

This is a bit of a unique thing for Marines mostly because their subfactions do have totally unique models. I'm not as fussed about marines with shoulderpads (its a small enough detail a bit like if they've got seals or grenades on them); but I dislike heavily proxied armies*

Also if you've got 2 or 3 different chapters please at least have markers on the models os that different squads can easily be told apart even if they are all painted in the same scheme.

*And in a sane world if you're just testing out a new army before buying; or its just all for fun; or you're just mucking around etc.... Ergo whilst I dislike them there ARE legitimate, fun and good times to allow it where it won't diminish the fun.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Vankraken wrote:
Example 1: Player likes Dawn of War and paints their Marines as Blood Ravens. In one list he uses White Scars rules and in another list uses Iron Hands. Problem with this?

Example 2: Player likes Space Marine and paints their Marines as Ultramarines. In one list he uses Ultramarine tactics because (hey there are rules for this chapter). In another list he uses Imperial Fists because those rules fit that playstyle better, he prefers that chapter tactic over the ones written for Ultras, or he power games. Problem with this?

Example 3: Player paints their Tau army teal with red accents because he likes that color scheme. Later on they find out that "red markings are Vior'la Sept colors" and they are the ones seen on the boxes typically using white armor (as Tau only identifies Septs by small markings instead of armor color like Space Marines do). He doesn't care because up until 8th the sept colors didn't mean anything and didn't even knew what Vior'la is. He uses the Tau Sept rules because (insert reason here). Problem with this?

Example 4: Person buys Grey Knights and paints them blue. Problem with this?

The answer should be no to all of these because its paint on a plastic model that the person took the time and effort to put on there themselves. Just because GW wants to assign rule sets to certain sub factions that have certain paint schemes shouldn't mean you have to use that scheme to use those rules. It also shouldn't mean you have to use a certain rule set because your models are painted a certain way.

Nice examples and fully agreed. Heck paint affecting rules is just daft when you consider how many subfactions come and go for armies that aren't marines. Furthermore many beginners are going to likely follow studio schemes and since GW often only shows a limited number of schemes (heck most armies barring marines only have one, perhaps two studio schemes on show); then there's a high chance that they'd all get locked into the same paint scheme. They shouldn't be punished for that.

Doesn't bother me in the slightest because motive doesn't really matter here as long as they aren't trying to deceive their opponent. Let's go through a few scenarios with different motives.


tldr; The real issue isn't mismatched colors once you remove "Iron Hands are bonkers strong" from the equation. Even for things like narrative you can simply call them what they look like after telling your opponent you will be using different rules. You can dance around it all you want, but if Iron Hands/New:SM were Grey Knight levels of weak this thread wouldn't exist. You turn into a jerk when you do it on purpose to stomp people which is an entirely different issue that happens regardless of paintjob. As long as it is an even matchup it should be fine.

For me it's very simple. I don't play in tournaments, nor do I have any interest in mega-competitive games. It's rather easy to tell if a person is chasing rules/power, or if they have a genuine interest in the "theme" that an army presents.

If you're the type of person swapping chapters every month or two chasing the strongest/most competitive/meta-driven rules...then we're likely not even going to have a game, which is fine. Our interests in the game don't align, so no worries.

If you profess to love a chapter you've painted...then play that chapter, simple.

 Elbows wrote:
For me it's very simple. I don't play in tournaments, nor do I have any interest in mega-competitive games. It's rather easy to tell if a person is chasing rules/power, or if they have a genuine interest in the "theme" that an army presents.

If you're the type of person swapping chapters every month or two chasing the strongest/most competitive/meta-driven rules...then we're likely not even going to have a game, which is fine. Our interests in the game don't align, so no worries.

If you profess to love a chapter you've painted...then play that chapter, simple.

For marines its a bit different, but what about all the other armies. Most armies that aren't marines the different subforces have very specific focuses. They might have close combat or ranged bonuses only. So the army composition changing would suggest that the player would change the subfaction as well just to get the rules. Because why should paint and a random subfaction name lock them out of bonuses that the army is clearly balanced and designed to work with.

Personally I don't see it as "power chasing" and rather just good army building. The whole power chasing element only comes into play when there's heavy imbalance in the system and that's GW's issue to deal with the balance (or house rules of course) rather than someone being "bad" and chasing power.

It would ruin immersion somewhat. I keep saying that chapter tactics and the like should have been left to narrative play (which I love). They're bound to be unbalanced and lead to this sort of weirdness.


That said, it wouldn't ruin the game or anything, I might give you some cheeky winding up over it though. All good fun, things are rarely as serious in real life as the internet.

This is a really biased poll. 2 yes, 1 maybe, and 0 no? I wonder what answer you're looking for...

What paint on what models is irrelevant in this game.

But, it really is power chasing. Now you can blame GW 's always-mediocre rules writing for allowing gulfs to exist. The easy answer is: paint your own faction. I think the "well, we're fighting in a different fashion this battle..." is just an excuse for precisely that: power chasing. If you have 5,000 points of lovingly painted Ultramarines and you're an Ultramarine fanboy and you show up and decide you're playing as Space Wolves...yeah we're not on the same page. You are chasing rules to benefit you, regardless of how you try to mask it.

I'm not saying chasing rules to benefit you is wrong, but it's a sign that you and I have very different goals for a game/enjoyment...so it's best we don't play. That's also, completely fine. I'm an adult, you're an adult - we know what we enjoy and what we don't. There isn't one big 40K community, that's just nonsense. If you're desperate enough to win a tabletop wargame that you're chasing rules, then yeah we're not interested in the same stuff.

Your poll SUCKS, where is the hard NO!

Playing and Painting are 2 different hobbies and painting takes an immense amount of time. Rules change all the time, playing is meant to be fun, if you are not having fun with Blue boys and what White, or Red boys, why do i care if your Red boys are painted blue?

No one questions Necrons, Tau, DE colors, they only question SM b.c its "easy to know the colors".

 Elbows wrote:
But, it really is power chasing. Now you can blame GW 's always-mediocre rules writing for allowing gulfs to exist. The easy answer is: paint your own faction. I think the "well, we're fighting in a different fashion this battle..." is just an excuse for precisely that: power chasing. If you have 5,000 points of lovingly painted Ultramarines and you're an Ultramarine fanboy and you show up and decide you're playing as Space Wolves...yeah we're not on the same page. You are chasing rules to benefit you, regardless of how you try to mask it.

At the same time if the army is all generic models which are not unique to Ultramarines and you put High Marshal Helbrecht and several other unique Black Templar models down then I've no problem with the whole army being Black Templars. Heck GW even shows ALL the Primaris models in Ultramarines colours even when they appear in the different chapters right on the store page. If the GW art and marketing department doesn't even bother to make an entire new force of generic space marine models to use a handful of chapter specific ones then why should gamers.

I agree if you put down Helbrecht then he should be Helbrecht and not another hero (barring a proxy game where you might be trying out another army for fun or before commiting to buy etc..).

Sgt. Cortez wrote:
When my DG lost access to Obliterators, Raptors and Bikes in 8th edition It was clear these could only be played as Nurgle Renegades and they couldn't be anything else because that's what they're modelled and painted as. With Codex 2.0 I can now play them as either generic renegades or the Purge. I'd never think about playing them as a different legion or even a different Chaos god, because that would be proxying in my view. I don't hold the same standard for my opponent's though and I admit I don't know every Necron dynasty color and Tau fluffwize don't really have a set sept color and are always a mixture of septs, as are many Orkklans.
If you've built a green Space Marine army with lizards and scales all over, melters and/or flamers in every squad - why would you not play these as Salamanders, though? At least give me a well thought out fluff justification why these now count as Iron Hands or Imperial fists. And don't question my Vindicator with Plague spitter side sponsoons that's used as Plagueburst Crawler.

Which is why consolidation for the Legions is necessary, just like for the other 9 Chapters. Space Wolves...much trickier though.

 Elbows wrote:
You are chasing rules to benefit you, regardless of how you try to mask it

This is an incredibly unfair statement. Traits are basically play styles

The problem is that colour based subfactions with such different (and plainly poorly balanced) rules exist in the first place. Marines should just be marines.

Nobody even knows the Necron color schemes, not even a lot of Necron players. Try accusing THEM of trying to chase good rules in their poor codex!

 Overread wrote:

 Elbows wrote:
But, it really is power chasing. Now you can blame GW 's always-mediocre rules writing for allowing gulfs to exist. The easy answer is: paint your own faction. I think the "well, we're fighting in a different fashion this battle..." is just an excuse for precisely that: power chasing. If you have 5,000 points of lovingly painted Ultramarines and you're an Ultramarine fanboy and you show up and decide you're playing as Space Wolves...yeah we're not on the same page. You are chasing rules to benefit you, regardless of how you try to mask it.

At the same time if the army is all generic models which are not unique to Ultramarines and you put High Marshal Helbrecht and several other unique Black Templar models down then I've no problem with the whole army being Black Templars. Heck GW even shows ALL the Primaris models in Ultramarines colours even when they appear in the different chapters right on the store page. If the GW art and marketing department doesn't even bother to make an entire new force of generic space marine models to use a handful of chapter specific ones then why should gamers.

I agree if you put down Helbrecht then he should be Helbrecht and not another hero (barring a proxy game where you might be trying out another army for fun or before commiting to buy etc..).

Those are some hefty goalposts you keep moving there...

Why does it need to be constantly explained Ultramarines (complete with all the livery and iconography) =/= Blue space marines?

If I saw an UM army, with all of the signifiers that imply it is an UM army then I expect to play an UM army. If I see generic blue SMs then they can be whatever they want to be.

 fraser1191 wrote:

 Elbows wrote:
You are chasing rules to benefit you, regardless of how you try to mask it

This is an incredibly unfair statement. Traits are basically play styles

Exactly.

I fell in love with the BA playstyle first and since red is one of my favorite colors the faction grew on me despite thinking BA were a bit over the top in some regards when it comes to looks. At first I had a homebrewn chapter that I just changed the special character of depending on what rules I used. In the end I only used BA characters since they were the most fun. Now I'm repainting my whole force as Blood Angels since I really enjoy that playstyle. I want to play aggressive with jump infantry, hero characters and dreads. Problem is that right now the best chapter for that is Ravenguard. And not just by a little bit. It's like going from playing every matchup as the underdog to having a fair chance in every matchup. I dont do it just for win% but for a more enjoyable experience. If it were only to win I would consider IH or UM too but that isnt an option.

I dont like the look on Ravenguard but the rules allow me to play my BA army better in the way I want to play them. My affection for red has never wavered nor the playstyle I like but the rules has as well as the meta. It is usually a combination of fluff, looks and playstyle that influences what chapter people like and even if the look and fluff stays the same the rules for the playstyle can shift around a lot. And on the table its the rules that matter in the end how well they will function according to their own actual fluff.

 fraser1191 wrote:

 Elbows wrote:
You are chasing rules to benefit you, regardless of how you try to mask it

This is an incredibly unfair statement. Traits are basically play styles

Did you stop reading my post at that point in a rush to respond? I'll assume so. It's also an incredibly fair statement, by the way.