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PenitentJake wrote:
But essentially, in order to further distinguish between play modes, GW needs both points and PL.

Why? The existence of PL (which is just a poorly balanced point system) adds literally nothing to any format that isn't already covered by the normal point system.

And why does GW even need multiple play modes? Open Play doesn't need to exist at all, and narrative play worked just fine when you had narrative scenarios and campaigns using the matched play rules.

Open and Narrative players, however, are not as likely to respond well to such regular change.

Why not? Crusade has a clear shelf life for a particular army and you're already regularly changing your forces to add reinforcements, retire units that take too many battle scars, etc. Why is it a big deal to have the point costs adjusted to improve balance? Are they afraid of losing access to a particular overpowered unit they rely on?

CadianSgtBob wrote:

PenitentJake wrote:
But essentially, in order to further distinguish between play modes, GW needs both points and PL.

Why? The existence of PL (which is just a poorly balanced point system) adds literally nothing to any format that isn't already covered by the normal point system.

It does though- especially in the context of crusade. Because of the tracking that Crusade entails, players don't need values for both troops and equipment and individual upgrades that change every 3 months IN ADDITION to tracking experience, battle honours and scars for every unit in the game, as well as crusade points and long term goal achievements. The improved balance that points provide in matched disintegrates the second one of my units that has achieved its first battle honour comes up against your first squad that hasn't.

In Crusade, the combat efficiency of every unit in your army can change from game to game, and the army as a whole can also grow in such a way as to impact balance. The buy in cost of a Crusade unit has almost nothing to do with how effective it is on the table from game 4 onward, so it is utterly pointless to waste the time costing out wargear.

CadianSgtBob wrote:

And why does GW even need multiple play modes? Open Play doesn't need to exist at all, and narrative play worked just fine when you had narrative scenarios and campaigns using the matched play rules.

Open serves some very important purposes: being the simplest, most accessible form of the game, it is absolutely the best learning tool available. If you're a parent and your kid is a nerd, open is probably the most amazing thing you could hope for. Ever notice how many WD letters to the ed are from parents? You can come for Open Play when you pry it from their cold, dead hands.

And look, I enjoyed all previous attempts at Narrative. At the time the original Kill Team and Combat Patrol Mini-games were included in the BRB? I loved that at the time. And it is still a ton of fun if you play it even today. There are even some elements, like equipment options, that I like better about those old prototype systems. But what is available now far exceeds the capacity provided by previous iterations of the game. There is far more product support for Crusade than there is for Matched- our Mission Packs outnumber Matched 2:1, and when you drop White Dwarf content into the equation? I think we've had a Flashpoint article every month since the Codex dropped, Torchbearer Fleets and Index Astartes chapter specific Crusade content on top of that.

I'm not saying Crusade could not be improved, nor

CadianSgtBob wrote:

Open and Narrative players, however, are not as likely to respond well to such regular change.

Why not... and you're already regularly changing your forces to add reinforcements, retire units that take too many battle scars, etc. Why is it a big deal to have the point costs adjusted to improve balance? Are they afraid of losing access to a particular overpowered unit they rely on?

As explained above, it' precisely because of all that constant change and tracking that points are impractical. And because the application if RP and XP have far more impact on balance than points, they're not just inconvenient, they're ineffective.

That being said, I have seen posts by quite a few players who prefer to use points in Crusade, and if that's what they prefer, that's fine too. To each their own... Which of course, is precisely why not only Points + PL as well as 3 ways to play and 4 game sizes provides far more capacity to suit a wider variety of players and therefore a broader audience (and a greater market share) than any laser balanced game that caters to exactly one demographic.

PenitentJake wrote:


Open serves some very important purposes: being the simplest, most accessible form of the game, it is absolutely the best learning tool available. If you're a parent and your kid is a nerd, open is probably the most amazing thing you could hope for. Ever notice how many WD letters to the ed are from parents? You can come for Open Play when you pry it from their cold, dead hands.

That's just swallowing GW's marketing BS. Open Play absolutely doesn't need to exist because it's only purpose is to codify a rule that says you don't have to follow the rules. That's pointless. Other wargames manage to introduce new players to the game just fine without using every single rule and also without an explicit acknowledgement by the designers that you can ignore any or all rules.

Can I ask, who here has seen "open" games being played in a brick and mortar? I've never seen anyone setup to play an open narrative game. People, maybe just in the US, feel they HAVE to play by the competitive standard, so they bring 1k or 2k lists. Never seen someone walk in and plop down 5 Stormsurges and be like, here's my list.

I feel like it's this way with all competitive "games". No one shows up to a basketball court and says, "I play by different rules. If you foul me it's 3 points for me." Everyone learns the rules of the "Game" first, and no one learns it's ok to change the rules for more fun, ala "Calvinball". Perhaps GW should be more open to promoting this style of play?

That being said, I have seen posts by quite a few players who prefer to use points in Crusade, and if that's what they prefer, that's fine too. To each their own...

Too each their own, but... you just spent a lot of time waxing about how wrong and hard it was to do that. So it doesn't seem quite so accommodating

Which of course, is precisely why not only Points + PL as well as 3 ways to play and 4 game sizes provides far more capacity to suit a wider variety of players and therefore a broader audience (and a greater market share) than any laser balanced game that caters to exactly one demographic.

Since its neither 'laser balanced' nor has it ever catered to 'exactly one demographic' this seems like no reason at all. People were (and still are, despite attempts to infantilize them) capable of doing narrative or 'open' play without specific Forge Your Narrative scrawls in the margins of the rules.

One rules set (more polished, because they don't have to burn extra development time on the other ruleset or the non-rules ruleset) and a 'play your way' acknowledgement and NO set game sizes seems far more accepting of multiple demographics.

FezzikDaBullgryn wrote:
Can I ask, who here has seen "open" games being played in a brick and mortar?

Raises hand.
It depends upon who's actually playing the game in question, but there's been plenty of technically "Open" games played at the local shop(s). Because as soon as you add a house-rule? Or drop some fething stupid rule GW just shat out (like that new auto-destructing Dedicated Transports)? Guess what? You're not playing "Matched" any more. So is it Narrative or is it Open?
The most common examples?
*Almost every 9e game I've played against our CSM players that wasn't Crusade. At our tables, in general play, they've been enjoying their 2nd wound for about a month less than the Loyalists have. If they want it that is. (There's one guy who declines. Said he'd wait for errata/new Codex - he's had a long wait....)
*Or when we simply ignore the impractical placement restrictions concerning Fortifications.
*And if you look closely? You'd notice that we're pretty lax on larger squads keeping members within coherency of 2 other models.
*Anytime you see one of us old dogs playing with our Las/Plas Razorbacks - they aren't in the Codex, they aren't in the FW book, & they aren't even in Legends....
None of these things are done with any sort of story or scenario in mind, so I guess Open applies.
"Open" isn't just for throwing a mishmash of models on the table. (though I've seen a couple of players who were definitely doing that)

Now were you to pass by & see one of these games in progress? You may well mistake it for Matched. After all, it's "Open" - using about 98% of Matched as it's default....

No.. Coz every single unit would be tooled up to the max...

Voss wrote:

Too each their own, but... you just spent a lot of time waxing about how wrong and hard it was to do that. So it doesn't seem quite so accommodating

This is the problem with paraphrasing. Inconvenient =/= wrong. Ineffective =/= wrong.

Keep your words out of my mouth. I choose mine for a reason- they have meaning.

Voss wrote:

Which of course, is precisely why not only Points + PL as well as 3 ways to play and 4 game sizes provides far more capacity to suit a wider variety of players and therefore a broader audience (and a greater market share) than any laser balanced game that caters to exactly one demographic.

Since its neither 'laser balanced' nor has it ever catered to 'exactly one demographic' this seems like no reason at all. People were (and still are, despite attempts to infantilize them) capable of doing narrative or 'open' play without specific Forge Your Narrative scrawls in the margins of the rules.

One rules set (more polished, because they don't have to burn extra development time on the other ruleset or the non-rules ruleset) and a 'play your way' acknowledgement and NO set game sizes seems far more accepting of multiple demographics.

Did you ever try to invent Commorrite territories with in game effects to capture in 4th or 5th ed and then try to find a group to play them with?

Did you ever have a unit of sisters, who had previously accumulated a battle honour fail a break test and decide they should take a penitent oath and become repentia, except you couldn't convince the group you were playing with to let you replace them with a unit of repentia who had the same battle honour since they represented the same group of soldiers?

Did you ever smash a bunch of enemy vehicles with the admech and think to yourself: "Yay, spare parts- now I can build a cool piece of new tech" only to be told by your group that you couldn't just Invent a piece of war gear?

Did you ever convince an entire planet to join the Greater good only to be told that this doesn't or shouldn't confer a tangible benefit to your army thereafter?

These and other problems no longer exist, because the rules for them are printed in black and white, so you don't have to convince anyone that these are all things that make sense in a narrative context and then come up with rules and systems on your own to reflect these scenarios. This is a huge advantage for people who have been looking for a way to make this stuff happen in a game since 1989.

Why not just "polish" the rules as they are and keep the three ways to play and core support for other game sizes? I'm not saying there aren't core rules that couldn't be improved, which would impact all three modes- of course there are improvements that could be made. But eliminating support for Crusade or Open isn't going to make it any easier or harder for GW to make these changes, nor will it improve the likelihood of these changes occuring.

I just have zero idea why anyone wants a rule that neither they, nor anyone else they play with uses to be eliminated. If you and your opponents don't use the rule, I have a very difficult time understanding how your game experience is improved by the rule not being there. For you and your group, it effectively ISN'T there already, because you don't use it. Someone does. I guarantee you, someone somewhere uses all of the rules that you ignore because you feel like they're useless bloat... And while removing it wouldn't affect you at all since you're already not using it, it will affect the person who does.

I play Crusade exclusively, and so far, it's all been PL. If someone wanted to play matched with me, I'd find something else to do. If someone wanted me to use points to play a Crusade game, I could be talked into that. But you won't see me suggest eliminating matched play to make Crusade better, because I know that a) lots of people like matched, and they'd be choked to lose it B) eliminating matched would have no tangible impact on whether or not Crusade did end up being improved and C) the continuing existence of Matched will not affect me in anyway because I don't play it.

I suppose I should add D) I'm not an Edgelord/ Troll who has heard all of the above before and either understands it but chooses to shitpost for the Lulz anyway, or paraphrase into an argument that was never being made in order to justify a negative response, or prefers not to engage with this perspective because that would mean admitting that the discussion is more nuanced than they want it to be.

And before anyone goes making another one of those assumptions that I'm implying something I didn't explicitly write: I'm not saying YOU are the edgelord/ troll... Nor am I even saying anyone is an edgelord/ troll all of the time. Even the trolliest troll will occasionally engage and meaningfully contribute constructive feedback that indicates they have taken the points of view of other players seriously.

PenitentJake wrote:
Did you ever try to invent Commorrite territories with in game effects to capture in 4th or 5th ed and then try to find a group to play them with?

Did you ever have a unit of sisters, who had previously accumulated a battle honour fail a break test and decide they should take a penitent oath and become repentia, except you couldn't convince the group you were playing with to let you replace them with a unit of repentia who had the same battle honour since they represented the same group of soldiers?

Did you ever smash a bunch of enemy vehicles with the admech and think to yourself: "Yay, spare parts- now I can build a cool piece of new tech" only to be told by your group that you couldn't just Invent a piece of war gear?

Did you ever convince an entire planet to join the Greater good only to be told that this doesn't or shouldn't confer a tangible benefit to your army thereafter?

The existence of Open and Narrative sections in the rules doesn't allow you to do any of these things. You're praising Crusade, which could still be around even if the game dispensed with the 'three ways to play' that amounts to 'here are the rules, also you're allowed to ignore them if you want'.

PenitentJake wrote:

Voss wrote:

Too each their own, but... you just spent a lot of time waxing about how wrong and hard it was to do that. So it doesn't seem quite so accommodating

This is the problem with paraphrasing. Inconvenient =/= wrong. Ineffective =/= wrong.

Keep your words out of my mouth. I choose mine for a reason- they have meaning.

Not to me, but then I feel meaning has to be conveyed to the reader. Intent is nebulous.
And given that this whole post reads as 'How dare you not agree!' I'm sticking with the meaning I got out of your words, because you just reinforced it.

Voss wrote:

Which of course, is precisely why not only Points + PL as well as 3 ways to play and 4 game sizes provides far more capacity to suit a wider variety of players and therefore a broader audience (and a greater market share) than any laser balanced game that caters to exactly one demographic.

Since its neither 'laser balanced' nor has it ever catered to 'exactly one demographic' this seems like no reason at all. People were (and still are, despite attempts to infantilize them) capable of doing narrative or 'open' play without specific Forge Your Narrative scrawls in the margins of the rules.

One rules set (more polished, because they don't have to burn extra development time on the other ruleset or the non-rules ruleset) and a 'play your way' acknowledgement and NO set game sizes seems far more accepting of multiple demographics.

Why not just "polish" the rules as they are and keep the three ways to play and core support for other game sizes? I'm not saying there aren't core rules that couldn't be improved, which would impact all three modes- of course there are improvements that could be made. But eliminating support for Crusade or Open isn't going to make it any easier or harder for GW to make these changes, nor will it improve the likelihood of these changes occuring.

Because three sets is more work. If it doesn't make it easier or harder, or improve the likelihood of changes (your words), its completely wasted time and effort that could be put to something that matters.

For me, rules quality took a noticeable dip when they randomly started the 'Forge Your Narrative' meme. The time they waste not fixing obvious problems is getting absurd. The extra workload isn't necessary, and even disrupts the layout and usability of the rulebooks.

I just have zero idea why anyone wants a rule that neither they, nor anyone else they play with uses to be eliminated. If you and your opponents don't use the rule, I have a very difficult time understanding how your game experience is improved by the rule not being there. For you and your group, it effectively ISN'T there already, because you don't use it.

No, it is there. Its taking up book space, rules space and development time. If it isn't used, its a negative effect.

I play Crusade exclusively, and so far, it's all been PL. If someone wanted to play matched with me, I'd find something else to do. If someone wanted me to use points to play a Crusade game, I could be talked into that. But you won't see me suggest eliminating matched play to make Crusade better, because I know that a) lots of people like matched, and they'd be choked to lose it B) eliminating matched would have no tangible impact on whether or not Crusade did end up being improved and C) the continuing existence of Matched will not affect me in anyway because I don't play it.

The stuff that spills over does effect you, whether you want to admit it or not.
Got any chaos players in your crusade group? Want to ask them how 'unaffected' they are by the stuff that's just vanishing?

I suppose I should add D) I'm not an Edgelord/ Troll who has heard all of the above before and either understands it but chooses to shitpost for the Lulz anyway, or paraphrase into an argument that was never being made in order to justify a negative response, or prefers not to engage with this perspective because that would mean admitting that the discussion is more nuanced than they want it to be.

And before anyone goes making another one of those assumptions that I'm implying something I didn't explicitly write: I'm not saying YOU are the edgelord/ troll... Nor am I even saying anyone is an edgelord/ troll all of the time. Even the trolliest troll will occasionally engage and meaningfully contribute constructive feedback that indicates they have taken the points of view of other players seriously.

Yep. That's definitely convincing.
You'd have been better of leaving that out.

Edit: and catbarf is correct. You're hyperfocused on Crusade rules, but having wasted space on Open and Narrative doesn't matter to that. Crusade is more rules bloat than even matched (which you yourself seem to recognize given that you reject points on the basis its too much work on top of all the accounting for Crusade).

 catbarf wrote:


The existence of Open and Narrative sections in the rules doesn't allow you to do any of these things. You're praising Crusade, which could still be around even if the game dispensed with the 'three ways to play' that amounts to 'here are the rules, also you're allowed to ignore them if you want'.

You're certainly correct about Open. It's a bit squishier when we talk about Narrative: I certainly agree with you and Unit and others that not all "Narrative" games have to be, or even should be crusade games. But GW doesn't distinguish between Narrative and Crusade. From their perspective, the three modes of play are Open, Crusade and Matched.

Still, solid and debatable point.

But the selection you quote comes within the context of:

CadianSgtBob wrote:

And why does GW even need multiple play modes? Open Play doesn't need to exist at all, and narrative play worked just fine when you had narrative scenarios and campaigns using the matched play rules.

And:

Voss wrote:

One rules set (more polished, because they don't have to burn extra development time on the other ruleset or the non-rules ruleset) and a 'play your way' acknowledgement and NO set game sizes seems far more accepting of multiple demographics.

These two comments, which are the things I've been responding to, clearly do not represent a vision of the game which continues to make Crusade rules available.

If GW dropped the "three ways to play" but kept all of the Crusade content, I don't think that they would actually be dropping three ways to play. It seems like this would imply dropping ONE of the ways to play, and keeping the other two. It's theoretically possible to frame all the Crusade content in the same way as the prototype Kill Team/ Combat Patrol rules in previous editions, where it's included as an appendix rather than being acknowledged as alternative mode of play...

But given the fact that there have been more resources printed this edition that include Crusade content than resources that don't, I think it's fair to say that calling Crusade an appendix would be a tad disingenuous, unless a lot of the content was dropped.

One of the approaches Unit and I had discussed AGES ago involved releasing a Big Book of Crusade- which included not only the existing bespoke codex content for every faction, but also guidelines for creating campaigns of various types. This could have been a better way to go because it would have allowed EVERYONE to start Crusading right away... But even that's not so simple, because bespoke Crusade content does reference Codex rules that aren't Crusade specific.... So for example, the Master Archon/ Haemonculus/ Succubus rules aren't Crusade rules per se... but there are Requisitions in Crusade that allow you to grow into a Master, and it would have been problematic to print the requisitions that allow you to become a Master before the rules for BEING a Master had been printed.

In any case, thank you for envisioning a version of the game that continues to include Crusade and the players who prefer it. Your post strikes me as very reasonable in both tone and content because it suggests ways of improving the game that don't exclude folks with a preference for a particular mode of play that is fully supported by the current rules.

So yo reference my reply to you that you just jumped past:

It's all well and good to like Crusade if it serves your needs, but you need to recognize that Crusade doesn't serve everyone's needs (even if they are a narrative player. It doesn't serve mine for example).

Saying 40k is the best ever right now and could never change for the better does nothing for the folks for whom Crusade (or the whole ruleset) does nothing. So instead of a "feth you, got mine" approach where you vociferously protest any proposed change, take an approach where you say "Yes, GW is wrong and probably should change that" unless you have a VERY GOOD REASON why they shouldn't change it.

So, for example, Eldar Crusade rules. They should include tanks and tankers, and GW is wrong and Crusade is less fun for some people when it doesn't. Yes?

People say "it'd mean everyone would just take the best options" as if that isn't what is already happening. How much actual variation goes on in 40k. Very little in my opinion. You're either playing netlisters with just last week repainted minis to whatever the stock standard hotness is that week, or you have completely new players who just bought their first set of Ork Nobs, and wants to play a "fun" game to try out their investment.

You all act like there are droves of people using Reivers and Land Raiders, or Custodes Wardens. Or Company Commanders with Laspistols instead of command rods. No one is playing this game or investing in it to lose constantly. Everyone in some fashion is trying to win at least. No one is purposefully being a Low Tier God and maining the weakest units for pride. Everyone is using their best units, because they want to win.

When did it become bad to want to win?

FezzikDaBullgryn wrote:

When did it become bad to want to win?

Ever since we had people virtue signaling with "only toy soldiers" and "beer and pretzels"

EviscerationPlague wrote:

FezzikDaBullgryn wrote:

When did it become bad to want to win?

Ever since we had people virtue signaling with "only toy soldiers" and "beer and pretzels"

So before you were a twinkle in your fathers eye then.

Btw anyone who complains about virtue sigalling is nearly always, in that act, virtue signalling themselves. Stop being such an abrasive poster.

Dai wrote:

EviscerationPlague wrote:

FezzikDaBullgryn wrote:

When did it become bad to want to win?

Ever since we had people virtue signaling with "only toy soldiers" and "beer and pretzels"

So before you were a twinkle in your fathers eye then.

Btw anyone who complains about virtue sigalling is nearly always, in that act, virtue signalling themselves. Stop being such an abrasive poster.

Well feel free to point out where I did that then. Also just because it's been going on a long time doesn't make it any less of virtue signaling, and it's quite a laughable attitude to be honest.

FezzikDaBullgryn wrote:


When did it become bad to want to win?

When 'wanting to win' becomes 'competitive-at-all-cost' or even worse, win-at-all-cost,and when this attitude creates and fosters toxic communities and toxic players that skews the game and ruins peoples enjoyments of a hobby that is supposed to be fun. Players 'wanting to win' drove me out of 40k for years.

Lets be clear - Saying 'I want to win' is fine in principle. Even as a narrative player I don't set out to lose.
A lot of things get sacrificed on that altar of 'trying to win' for you and for everyone else and frankly, lets not pretend that there isnt a point where that price paid for 'trying to win' starts to negatively affect aspects of the hobby, and the greater community, including other people's enjoyment. Or yours.

PenitentJake wrote:
It does though- especially in the context of crusade. Because of the tracking that Crusade entails, players don't need values for both troops and equipment and individual upgrades that change every 3 months IN ADDITION to tracking experience, battle honours and scars for every unit in the game, as well as crusade points and long term goal achievements. The improved balance that points provide in matched disintegrates the second one of my units that has achieved its first battle honour comes up against your first squad that hasn't.

Why does it matter if your unit costs 5 points out of 25 or 110 points out of 500? It's not like you're changing equipment in Crusade. Once a unit's point cost is set, whether by the fixed point value on the datasheet or by adding up the point costs from the latest matched play table, that's it and you play the game exactly the same way from there. You're talking about a few minutes of work, max. So yeah, you can argue that the extra balance factor of normal points is not necessary in Crusade but it's absolutely ridiculous to claim that PL is somehow necessary for Crusade to function. Crusade would work just fine if PL had never been invented.

As for changing mid-Crusade, it's not like there isn't precedent already in competitive leagues having rules that new codices and rule changes that are released during a season do not apply until the end of the season. Waiting until the end of the current season of Crusade would be perfectly in line with that.

Open serves some very important purposes: being the simplest, most accessible form of the game, it is absolutely the best learning tool available. If you're a parent and your kid is a nerd, open is probably the most amazing thing you could hope for. Ever notice how many WD letters to the ed are from parents? You can come for Open Play when you pry it from their cold, dead hands.

But why does that require explicitly naming Open Play as an official Way™ To™ Play™ The™ Game™? You don't need to create an entire game mode that consists of "all rules are optional" or tell a parent they're playing Official™ Warhammer™ 40k™ Rules™ when they set up a game with a single infantry squad on each side to teach their kid the basic rules. People were doing all that stuff long before GW made Open Play a thing.

The real reason Open Play exists is that it's a relic of a failed attempt to get people to buy stuff for other armies. GW tried promoting Open Play as a valid game type so they'd have a reason to tell Tyranid players to buy the latest space marine release, since you can take that cool primaris tank in your Tyranid army in Open Play. Nobody wanted that nonsense and GW quietly dropped their promotion of it but they haven't yet admitted defeat and taken it out of the book yet.

And look, I enjoyed all previous attempts at Narrative. At the time the original Kill Team and Combat Patrol Mini-games were included in the BRB? I loved that at the time. And it is still a ton of fun if you play it even today. There are even some elements, like equipment options, that I like better about those old prototype systems. But what is available now far exceeds the capacity provided by previous iterations of the game. There is far more product support for Crusade than there is for Matched- our Mission Packs outnumber Matched 2:1, and when you drop White Dwarf content into the equation? I think we've had a Flashpoint article every month since the Codex dropped, Torchbearer Fleets and Index Astartes chapter specific Crusade content on top of that.

Yes, there is support. But that doesn't change the fact that Crusade is just matched play with points-based list construction and generic scenarios that would be right at home in a matched play mission pack. It doesn't need PL as a separate point system to function. It doesn't need to ignore the matched play rules like AoC, rule of three, etc.

Where Crusade diverges from competitive play and previous narrative efforts is only in the between games stuff. Crusade had the excellent design decision to decouple the between games stuff from any particular player group. So instead of having your campaign die every time it encounters scheduling issues or people drop you have a between-games path that is attached entirely to your own army. And that made Crusade far more resilient to the kind of campaign-ending disruptions that made every other narrative system a "great in theory, bad in practice" failure. But none of it has anything to do with the on-table gameplay of Crusade.

You're putting words in my mouth. I think you phrased it better, "don't set out to lose..." Yes, WAAC is a gross over reach of Trying to Win, just as it's a gross characterization of simply not wanting to lose. This is a competition. You CAN breed enjoyment through success, but even that is an amorphous term. Success can be measured in victory or in just plain being able to compete with a friend.

All I am trying to say is automatically demonizing the PL+ crowd as permission to WAAC is obtuse and silly.

PenitentJake wrote:
Did you ever convince an entire planet to join the Greater good only to be told that this doesn't or shouldn't confer a tangible benefit to your army thereafter?

Did you ever enjoy the narrative purely for the sake of the story, not because it gives you a direct on-table buff to your units? I thought the goal of narrative play is roleplaying, not roll playing?

CadianSgtBob wrote:

But why does that require explicitly naming Open Play as an official Way™ To™ Play™ The™ Game™? You don't need to create an entire game mode that consists of "all rules are optional" or tell a parent they're playing Official™ Warhammer™ 40k™ Rules™ when they set up a game with a single infantry squad on each side to teach their kid the basic rules. People were doing all that stuff long before GW made Open Play a thing.

Probably because 'Official-at-all-cost' dogma is a thing.

Youre right on the money bob, but for the wrong reasons.

People have always been doing this - for sure, and a large element of the community has always been hostile and vitriolic towards anyone that steps out of the bounds of 'the default game' and 'the official rules' aka the right and proper (and only!) way the game should be played (and you are a badwrongperson if you don't conform).

Open play gives a legitimacy towards playing that way. Honestly it's never a thing I'll do but I understand the need to allow it and to say this in writing.

FezzikDaBullgryn wrote:
You're putting words in my mouth. I think you phrased it better, "don't set out to lose..." Yes, WAAC is a gross over reach of Trying to Win, just as it's a gross characterization of simply not wanting to lose. This is a competition. You CAN breed enjoyment through success, but even that is an amorphous term. Success can be measured in victory or in just plain being able to compete with a friend.

All I am trying to say is automatically demonizing the PL+ crowd as permission to WAAC is obtuse and silly.

No.

You asked a precise question.

FezzikDaBullgryn wrote:


When did it become bad to want to win?

I answered it.

There is a point 'wanting to win' becomes bad.

Simples.

Success can breed enjoyment. Sure! Success at the expense of someone else's enjoyment? Different story. You dont have to be a bad person to be the villain in someone elses atoey. That can put you on the road to toxicity and being a bully.

Deadnight wrote:
People have always been doing this - for sure, and a large element of the community has always been hostile and vitriolic towards anyone that steps out of the bounds of 'the default game' and 'the official rules' aka the right and proper (and only!) way the game should be played (and you are a badwrongperson if you don't conform).

But the example given didn't involve any kind of community, it was a parent teaching their kids the game. And have never seen anyone raging about HOW DARE YOU NOT PLAY A FULL OFFICIAL GAME OF WARHAMMER 40K when a parent puts a couple of basic infantry squads on the table and ignores stratagems/chapter rules/etc. Maybe it happened but there's no way it was anything more than an occasional idiot that nobody likes.

Success can breed enjoyment. Sure! Success at the expense of someone else's enjoyment? Different story. That can put you on the road to toxicity and being a bully.

So, just to clarify here: are we talking about WAAC as in "making good choices in the list-building part of the game with the intent to win" or WAAC as in "rules lawyering, moving an extra inch because you can get away with it, etc"?

EviscerationPlague wrote:

Dai wrote:

EviscerationPlague wrote:

FezzikDaBullgryn wrote:

When did it become bad to want to win?

Ever since we had people virtue signaling with "only toy soldiers" and "beer and pretzels"

So before you were a twinkle in your fathers eye then.

Btw anyone who complains about virtue sigalling is nearly always, in that act, virtue signalling themselves. Stop being such an abrasive poster.

Well feel free to point out where I did that then. Also just because it's been going on a long time doesn't make it any less of virtue signaling, and it's quite a laughable attitude to be honest.

You have a point: 40k has a decent contingent of players that have a virulent 'anti-competitive' mindset where, should you attempt to try and win the game or be good at it in any way that doesn't match some invisible standard of 'real wargaming', they get quite angry.

But that phrasing is incredibly obnoxious. This isn't 4chan and you don't get reddit Klan Karma for using buzzwords like 'virtue signaling'.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

CadianSgtBob wrote:

Deadnight wrote:
People have always been doing this - for sure, and a large element of the community has always been hostile and vitriolic towards anyone that steps out of the bounds of 'the default game' and 'the official rules' aka the right and proper (and only!) way the game should be played (and you are a badwrongperson if you don't conform).

But the example given didn't involve any kind of community, it was a parent teaching their kids the game. And have never seen anyone raging about HOW DARE YOU NOT PLAY A FULL OFFICIAL GAME OF WARHAMMER 40K when a parent puts a couple of basic infantry squads on the table and ignores stratagems/chapter rules/etc. Maybe it happened but there's no way it was anything more than an occasional idiot that nobody likes.

Success can breed enjoyment. Sure! Success at the expense of someone else's enjoyment? Different story. That can put you on the road to toxicity and being a bully.

So, just to clarify here: are we talking about WAAC as in "making good choices in the list-building part of the game with the intent to win" or WAAC as in "rules lawyering, moving an extra inch because you can get away with it, etc"?

A certain subset of players considers any genuine attempt to win the game, ANY at all, WAAC.

 Unit1126PLL wrote:
So yo reference my reply to you that you just jumped past:

It's all well and good to like Crusade if it serves your needs, but you need to recognize that Crusade doesn't serve everyone's needs (even if they are a narrative player. It doesn't serve mine for example).

When you make good points, and you frequently do, I do tend to back them up. I supported your idea of having suggested sub-faction traits rather than mandated ones. I continue to support the idea of a Big Book of Crusade, even as I point out that there are some nuances and difficulties with doing so. I support HBMC's AWESOME idea of gathering all of the Crusade content in a campaign season into a single book and all the Matched content for a campaign season. Thank you for recognizing that I absolutely do understand that Crusade doesn't fit everyone's needs, including folks like you who identify as narrative players. There absolutely IS room for improvement to Crusade.

There probably have been specific ideas proposed for the improvement of Crusade that I have objected to for specific reasons, but I have never believed or advocated that Crusade couldn't or shouldn't be improved. I fully acknowledge that there have likely been posts where I could have ben more clear about that- especially since I rely on people to respond to my posts in context... Like the fact that today, I am responding to CadianSgtBob and Voss who are both advocating not for improvements to Crusade, but for it's complete removal.

I have had to respond to both Cartbarf and you, precisely because you responded to comments I made to CadianSgt and Voss WITHOUT acknowledging the context that they don't want to improve Crusade, they want it gone. And to be fair to both of them, they didn't explicitly say they wanted Crusade gone, so I am paraphrasing them, and many apologies to both of them if they weren't in fact suggesting that Crusade should be cancelled.

 Unit1126PLL wrote:

Saying 40k is the best ever right now and could never change for the better

I may have said something some time ago that you interpreted as this, but I don't think I've ever said this.

I tend to say things like "The game feels better for my particular play style and preferences than it ever has before" or "The decoupling of Agendas from victory points allows for wider variety of Narrative choices to be made during the game." I almost never use vague terms like "better" or "best" preferring instead to speak about the specific elements of the game that support the type of gameplay I prefer.

I've listed two examples above were YOU proposed suggestions to improve both Crusade and 40k in general where I have enthusiastically and consistently agreed with you, and we're about to discuss a third suggestion for an improvement to Crusade which I support...

 Unit1126PLL wrote:

So instead of a "feth you, got mine" approach where you vociferously protest any proposed change,

Again, the changes I vociferously protest tend to be the ones that suggest the full scale removal of Crusade. Suggestions to improve it are addressed case by case- some of them are definite improvements, and I support those. Others may have unintended side effects that the person proposing the rule may not have considered. In those cases, I usually attempt to ask clarifying questions.

I think the posts that have given you the idea I have a "feth you, I got mine" attitude are posts that are responses to someone suggesting an improvement intended to deal with a Matched play issue when the suggestion is worded in such a way that it would also impact Crusade. I do also point out that some super unpopular rules decisions don't affect Crusade- this is my attempt to help the folks who hate the rule soooo much that it makes them want to rage quit, because they might actually not know that a given rule doesn't apply to Crusade.

 Unit1126PLL wrote:

take an approach where you say "Yes, GW is wrong and probably should change that" unless you have a VERY GOOD REASON why they shouldn't change it.

So, for example, Eldar Crusade rules. They should include tanks and tankers, and GW is wrong and Crusade is less fun for some people when it doesn't. Yes?

Yes.

I went back and reread my responses- I thought I had explicitly said that I thought adding a "Way of the Pilot" was a good idea, but apparently I did not. I should have, because it IS a good idea and I would support it. I'm not sure why I didn't say that in response.

Instead, I pointed out a bunch of ways that the current rules might help you create the desired effect, and I can see how that might have come across as resistance to your suggestion... Perhaps the context of the discussion at the time somehow lead me to believe that you were implying that Crusade shouldn't exist because it doesn't have Path rules for Eldar tanks... Probably an unsubstantiated belief in hindsight, but when you using a single response to reply to multiple posts and posters, some of which include "End Crusade!" others which include legitimate constructive suggestion for the improvement of either Crusade specifically or the game as a whole and still others that came across as outright personal attacks, errors are likely to occur.

So for the record, YES, a path of the Pilot IS a decent suggestion for improving Crusade. The creation of additional Drukhari Territories that exist outside of Commorragh and better support the idea of Drukhari pirates would also be a welcome addition to Crusade that would probably move the ruleset closer to supporting another of your narrative concepts.

ERJAK wrote:
You have a point: 40k has a decent contingent of players that have a virulent 'anti-competitive' mindset where, should you attempt to try and win the game or be good at it in any way that doesn't match some invisible standard of 'real wargaming', they get quite angry.

And the hilarious irony of it is that the only reason they're upset is because they lost. If winning genuinely wasn't important they'd have no reason to care if their opponent brought a stronger list.

ERJAK wrote:

EviscerationPlague wrote:

Dai wrote:

EviscerationPlague wrote:

FezzikDaBullgryn wrote:

When did it become bad to want to win?

Ever since we had people virtue signaling with "only toy soldiers" and "beer and pretzels"

So before you were a twinkle in your fathers eye then.

Btw anyone who complains about virtue sigalling is nearly always, in that act, virtue signalling themselves. Stop being such an abrasive poster.

Well feel free to point out where I did that then. Also just because it's been going on a long time doesn't make it any less of virtue signaling, and it's quite a laughable attitude to be honest.

You have a point: 40k has a decent contingent of players that have a virulent 'anti-competitive' mindset where, should you attempt to try and win the game or be good at it in any way that doesn't match some invisible standard of 'real wargaming', they get quite angry.

But that phrasing is incredibly obnoxious. This isn't 4chan and you don't get reddit Klan Karma for using buzzwords like 'virtue signaling'.

Unfortunately CAAC hasn't caught on as a term, so if you have something catchy or more memorable I'm all ears.

PenitentJake wrote:
I have had to respond to both Cartbarf and you, precisely because you responded to comments I made to CadianSgt and Voss WITHOUT acknowledging the context that they don't want to improve Crusade, they want it gone. And to be fair to both of them, they didn't explicitly say they wanted Crusade gone, so I am paraphrasing them, and many apologies to both of them if they weren't in fact suggesting that Crusade should be cancelled.

You aren't paraphrasing anything, you're lying and building a straw man argument. Crusade with the normal point system and normal matched play rules is still Crusade. It does not need a separate point system to function and removing PL is in no way the same as removing Crusade.

CadianSgtBob wrote:

ERJAK wrote:
You have a point: 40k has a decent contingent of players that have a virulent 'anti-competitive' mindset where, should you attempt to try and win the game or be good at it in any way that doesn't match some invisible standard of 'real wargaming', they get quite angry.

And the hilarious irony of it is that the only reason they're upset is because they lost. If winning genuinely wasn't important they'd have no reason to care if their opponent brought a stronger list.

You're not following fluff if your Devastators match any weapons after all LOL

Wow, you are doing a great deal of conflating bob. I'm not nearly the E-Jock you are, what with your quote mining but I'll just respond in a boring block of text.

Wanting to win is not WAAC. There are lines you cross to get to that point. You cannot conflate desire for success with desire to ruin another person's experience. Your argument is pressuming that everyone at the table is a child with zero coping skills or the ability to rationally react to negatives. Just because I lose a game doesn't make me a butt hurt grouch, I learn what I did wrong, and try to do better the next time. It makes me a better player. We learn from our failures, how to build successes.

To say that I can only find success "at the expense of someone else's enjoyment" shows me that you are incapable of understanding the finer point of this, and are clearly unwilling to listen to other viewpoints.

Again:
There are two nay arguments to making PL the dominant system;

1. I like the crafting of lists with points. FINE, No ISSUES HERE.
2. It will make everyone ONLY pick the best options to win, and we'll never see anything but the best models. - And to this I ask again, when was the last time you took non-standard BiS wargear on you lists? When did you take Launchers instead of Plasma? When did you choose Chainswords and Laspistols over Powerswords and Plasma Pistols?

There are two answers:

1. You never took suboptimal options, because toy wanted to win

or

2. You took them to free up the points to take a more optimal model/unit later in the list, in which case the point was still to win.

Ergo - You cannot say PL is WAAC, because all systems built around paying a cost for options is about optimizing your lists. The only way it wouldn't be is to remove options entirely, or force everyone to take the same models (Chess), which would be the same thing.

PL isn't WAAC, it's the evolution of a broken an unbalanced system brought about in the olden days of 40k, which like all things from back then, is broken, and no longer worth the effort of fixing every 3 months, to appease the WAAC Chuds.

CadianSgtBob wrote:

PenitentJake wrote:
I have had to respond to both Cartbarf and you, precisely because you responded to comments I made to CadianSgt and Voss WITHOUT acknowledging the context that they don't want to improve Crusade, they want it gone. And to be fair to both of them, they didn't explicitly say they wanted Crusade gone, so I am paraphrasing them, and many apologies to both of them if they weren't in fact suggesting that Crusade should be cancelled.

You aren't paraphrasing anything, you're lying and building a straw man argument. Crusade with the normal point system and normal matched play rules is still Crusade. It does not need a separate point system to function and removing PL is in no way the same as removing Crusade.

I would just like to say I'd be all for doing a Crusade campaign if it weren't for the fact it's based on PL