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.

^That's still pretty much every edition though. I just started meeting people to try 9th ed again and they all asked "how hard do you want to go?" More or less.

The answer is "Try to wipe me from the board." Btw.

 Insectum7 wrote:
^That's still pretty much every edition though. I just started meeting people to try 9th ed again and they all asked "how hard do you want to go?" More or less.

The answer is "Try to wipe me from the board." Btw.

Which is a completely legit answer. But it’s an important conversation to have. And always has been.

40k is a great game when people come to the table with the same expectations. But the balance is so scattershot, you can’t make assumptions.

 Strg Alt wrote:
The culprit in 2nd in regards to lethality were not the wonderful weapon profiles but rather min-maxing players intent to cram in as many heavy weapons into the list as possible. This made an enjoyable game often hard, if not even impossible. So have a talk with your opponent to tone it down next time you play it.

If you need ro talk to your opponent what what they're allowed to bring, the game was a failure in design to begin with.

EviscerationPlague wrote:

 Strg Alt wrote:
The culprit in 2nd in regards to lethality were not the wonderful weapon profiles but rather min-maxing players intent to cram in as many heavy weapons into the list as possible. This made an enjoyable game often hard, if not even impossible. So have a talk with your opponent to tone it down next time you play it.

If you need ro talk to your opponent what what they're allowed to bring, the game was a failure in design to begin with.

100% disagree.

It all depends on the purpose of the game to begin with.

For a competitive wargame… I think that’s generally a failure.

 Insectum7 wrote:

EviscerationPlague wrote:

 Strg Alt wrote:
The culprit in 2nd in regards to lethality were not the wonderful weapon profiles but rather min-maxing players intent to cram in as many heavy weapons into the list as possible. This made an enjoyable game often hard, if not even impossible. So have a talk with your opponent to tone it down next time you play it.

If you need ro talk to your opponent what what they're allowed to bring, the game was a failure in design to begin with.

100% disagree.

It all depends on the purpose of the game to begin with.

The purpose of the game is to beat your opponent...

 JNAProductions wrote:
For a competitive wargame… I think that’s generally a failure.

The question is are RogueTrader and 2nd edition actually a competitive wargames?

 JNAProductions wrote:
For a competitive wargame… I think that’s generally a failure.

But has the intent of 40k always been a competetive wargame? I'd argue not.

RT was more of a RPG than a wargame. 2nd was getting more codified into a structured wargame, with 3rd being definitively there.

 Insectum7 wrote:

 JNAProductions wrote:
For a competitive wargame… I think that’s generally a failure.

But has the intent of 40k always been a competetive wargame? I'd argue not.

RT? Probably not.
2nd? Maybe not.
3rd onwards? Yes.

 JNAProductions wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:

 JNAProductions wrote:
For a competitive wargame… I think that’s generally a failure.

But has the intent of 40k always been a competetive wargame? I'd argue not.

RT? Probably not.
2nd? Maybe not.
3rd onwards? Yes.

Sorta. The big rule books also provided many scenario missions and rules for assymetric affairs. GW provided lots of options for alternate lists like R&H, Tank Companies, all-Kroot armies and Vehicle Design Rules, with varying levels of 'competetiveness'. 40k is a game which CAN be played competetively, but also narratively. Yes you 'play to win', but not always in the sense that two rough-equivalent armies are facing off over a "tourney standard" table/mission. I'd argue 40k at its best is NOT designed for 100% tourney-style balance.

EviscerationPlague wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:

EviscerationPlague wrote:

 Strg Alt wrote:
The culprit in 2nd in regards to lethality were not the wonderful weapon profiles but rather min-maxing players intent to cram in as many heavy weapons into the list as possible. This made an enjoyable game often hard, if not even impossible. So have a talk with your opponent to tone it down next time you play it.

If you need ro talk to your opponent what what they're allowed to bring, the game was a failure in design to begin with.

100% disagree.

It all depends on the purpose of the game to begin with.

The purpose of the game is to beat your opponent...

Lets switch to HH 2.0 for just a second. Player A brings a TAC list and Player B brings a "March of the Ancients" list. We all know that Player A won´t have a good time.
This "beating your opponent mindset" is feasible for a tournament but not a game among friends. Although who knows maybe you have so many friends that losing a few won´t make such a difference.

That’s a sign that balance is bad.
That’s not a sign that playing to the best of your ability is bad.

 JNAProductions wrote:
That’s a sign that balance is bad.
That’s not a sign that playing to the best of your ability is bad.

Balance?! LOL! We are taking about 40K. Players are advised to have self-restraint when playing this game. The moment you behave like an immature Mr. WAAC you will run out of opponents pretty quickly.

 JNAProductions wrote:
That’s a sign that balance is bad.

I think you need to define balance. Are we doing the "any 2k list should be competetive with any other 2k list" thing? Because I would argue AGAINST aiming for that ideal of balance.

 Insectum7 wrote:

 JNAProductions wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:

 JNAProductions wrote:
For a competitive wargame… I think that’s generally a failure.

But has the intent of 40k always been a competetive wargame? I'd argue not.

RT? Probably not.
2nd? Maybe not.
3rd onwards? Yes.

Sorta. The big rule books also provided many scenario missions and rules for assymetric affairs. GW provided lots of options for alternate lists like R&H, Tank Companies, all-Kroot armies and Vehicle Design Rules, with varying levels of 'competetiveness'. 40k is a game which CAN be played competetively, but also narratively. Yes you 'play to win', but not always in the sense that two rough-equivalent armies are facing off over a "tourney standard" table/mission. I'd argue 40k at its best is NOT designed for 100% tourney-style balance.

I forgot that 3rd had asymmetrical force org charts for some battles. Like the attacker would have more FA picks, and the defender more HS. Been a while since I looked at them. We were not at the “2 players bring fixed lists” point of pure bilateral balance yet. Was there any of that left in 4th? I think most people would agree that by 5th at the very least we’d tightened up into a wargame from the loose “we recommend having an impartial Game Master” days of RT.

Assymetrical scenarios were still in 4th ed BRB.

Feels off topic but whatever. The entire concept of a user regulated game is critical for many hobbies such as D&D, Airsoft, and of course Warhammer. People play these game for many different reasons and not everyone is trying to go full throttle, min max to the extreme, no holds barred, hit me as hard as you can, levels of play. In all three of these examples, the imagery of what is happening and the interactions that take place are just as important if not more than being the winner. In the case of Warhammer, a good chunk of players don't like just seal clubbing somebody and also generally dislike being on the receiving end the seal clubber 9000. A fairly even matchup is vastly more enjoyable to play and allows you to express the creativity of your army on the table top.

I loved picking a theme and then min maxing an army that can do the things that I wanted to experience on the table room. My Blitz-a-waaagh list for example was basically everything in an AV14 hull + having dakkajets + some Flash Gitz in the mix so I tuned it to get the most out of that list idea to make it as viable as I could without sacrificing what I wanted to have on the table. Was this able to take on the top tier armies in tournaments? Absolutely not but was it a fair match up for little Timmy's first army or somebody playing a fluffy Space Marine list? Not even close. But finding somebody running something at a roughly similar power level (not referring to GW's system) made for great games.

 Insectum7 wrote:

 JNAProductions wrote:
That’s a sign that balance is bad.

I think you need to define balance. Are we doing the "any 2k list should be competetive with any other 2k list" thing? Because I would argue AGAINST aiming for that ideal of balance.

Any competently built list, where competence is defined as someone who’s at a minimum thoroughly read and understands the rules, should have equal odds of beating another competently built list.
A well-optimized list can have an advantage, but it shouldn’t be more than 20% in favor of a cutthroat list compared to a basic one.
Every option should be worth taking, though not in all contexts.

 JNAProductions wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:

 JNAProductions wrote:
That’s a sign that balance is bad.

I think you need to define balance. Are we doing the "any 2k list should be competetive with any other 2k list" thing? Because I would argue AGAINST aiming for that ideal of balance.

Any competently built list, where competence is defined as someone who’s at a minimum thoroughly read and understands the rules, should have equal odds of beating another competently built list.
A well-optimized list can have an advantage, but it shouldn’t be more than 20% in favor of a cutthroat list compared to a basic one.
Every option should be worth taking, though not in all contexts.

That's pretty good, although 'contexts' is a doozy. Because terrain should matter a heck of a lot, and that in turn should have a huge impact on the percieved viabilities of any given unit.

Yeah, I don’t expect 40k to ever achieve… well, any of that.

But GW can do a LOT better than it is now.

 JNAProductions wrote:
Yeah, I don’t expect 40k to ever achieve… well, any of that.

But GW can do a LOT better than it is now.

I can agree with that.

But I'd also leave the space open for 40k to not aim to be a strictly competetive endeavor too. I'm very happy to have less-than-competetively-viable units, and even lists, for the sake of world building.

And back to the original point: If you leave design space for these alternate builds and units to exist in the game because it enriches the universe and promotes engagement in a less-than-strictly-competetive way, then the paradigm begins to require that players coordinate ahead of time about what sort of game they want to play. Do they want to try their wierd and fluffy build in a casual game? Or do they want to go cut-throat?

 Strg Alt wrote:

EviscerationPlague wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:

EviscerationPlague wrote:

 Strg Alt wrote:
The culprit in 2nd in regards to lethality were not the wonderful weapon profiles but rather min-maxing players intent to cram in as many heavy weapons into the list as possible. This made an enjoyable game often hard, if not even impossible. So have a talk with your opponent to tone it down next time you play it.

If you need ro talk to your opponent what what they're allowed to bring, the game was a failure in design to begin with.

100% disagree.

It all depends on the purpose of the game to begin with.

The purpose of the game is to beat your opponent...

Lets switch to HH 2.0 for just a second. Player A brings a TAC list and Player B brings a "March of the Ancients" list. We all know that Player A won´t have a good time.
This "beating your opponent mindset" is feasible for a tournament but not a game among friends. Although who knows maybe you have so many friends that losing a few won´t make such a difference.

1. Why shouldn't someone be allowed to do March of the Ancients? Dreads are cool.
2. If Dreads are a problem, why shouldn't the rules writers tone them down?

 JNAProductions wrote:
But GW can do a LOT better than it is now.

I'm starting to believe they can't. This much failure after this length of time tells me not only that they can't improve, but that they don't want to.

I dont think 2nd edition was supposed to be balanced. Certainly not to the level Gamers on the internet demand nowadays anyway.

It had so much optional bolt on stuff and permission to do your own thing im not sure how theyd even start doing so to be honest.

Of course players who did want a balanced competitive type game it could be houseruled but that is really not what the company was going for so i dont think one can attack them for not achieving it

EviscerationPlague wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:

EviscerationPlague wrote:

 Strg Alt wrote:
The culprit in 2nd in regards to lethality were not the wonderful weapon profiles but rather min-maxing players intent to cram in as many heavy weapons into the list as possible. This made an enjoyable game often hard, if not even impossible. So have a talk with your opponent to tone it down next time you play it.

If you need ro talk to your opponent what what they're allowed to bring, the game was a failure in design to begin with.

100% disagree.

It all depends on the purpose of the game to begin with.

The purpose of the game is to beat your opponent...

No, not at all.

The purpose of the game is to provide a framework for two (or more) players to have fun. I appreciate that this can be forgotten by the more cutthroat tournament types.

The objective for an individual playing a specific game may be to win, but even then, that may not be as simple as "get the most victory points" or "kill the most models" - as have been pointed out, asymmetric missions have existed in a number of editions, where a "win" may be as simple as "survive until turn 5" because you're the defender in a holding action.

 Dysartes wrote:

EviscerationPlague wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:

EviscerationPlague wrote:

 Strg Alt wrote:
The culprit in 2nd in regards to lethality were not the wonderful weapon profiles but rather min-maxing players intent to cram in as many heavy weapons into the list as possible. This made an enjoyable game often hard, if not even impossible. So have a talk with your opponent to tone it down next time you play it.

If you need ro talk to your opponent what what they're allowed to bring, the game was a failure in design to begin with.

100% disagree.

It all depends on the purpose of the game to begin with.

The purpose of the game is to beat your opponent...

No, not at all.

The purpose of the game is to provide a framework for two (or more) players to have fun. I appreciate that this can be forgotten by the more cutthroat tournament types.

"Have fun" is literally why any game is made to begin with. Your answer is weak and quite frankly I stopped reading after this.

Dai wrote:
Of course players who did want a balanced competitive type game it could be houseruled but that is really not what the company was going for so i dont think one can attack them for not achieving it

They've been doing this for over 30 years. They absolutely can be attacked for consistently screwing it up.

 H.B.M.C. wrote:

Dai wrote:
Of course players who did want a balanced competitive type game it could be houseruled but that is really not what the company was going for so i dont think one can attack them for not achieving it

They've been doing this for over 30 years. They absolutely can be attacked for consistently screwing it up.

To be fair to Dai, they were referring specifically to 2nd edition, which was 30 years ago...

You snipped that context out of the quote though.

EviscerationPlague wrote:
"Have fun" is literally why any game is made to begin with.

That's not true either, wargames are serious business, intended to explore and solve strategic and tactical possibilities.

Seems like some video games these days are made entirely for money, not fun.