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This is why I stressed, that it is a social problem, not ruleset problem. It takes just a small minority of players in a club with a cutthroat tournament mindset, to start the Arms Race and push out any casuals/narrative guys who don't want to participate in it out of the club.

Yea that makes sense to me.

This concept exists universally. Anyone trying to learn how to play DotA2 can attest how horribly toxic some of those people will be. Some people are frustrated, because playing DotA with a bad team is pretty miserable and absolutely amazing in a tight, well paired game. Others are just huuuuuge toxic dicks.

Yes, but the designers of games shouldn't design their games in such a way, that to avoid not having fun or being burdened with a bad army , which somehow doesn't cost less then a good one, you have to build "toxic" lists.

It is not the players fault that they see, a setting, see the way it works, solve it and the solution is playing w40k in a way which is very different from how other games are played. Even AoS isn't played the same way w40k is, and it is not because the rules are more balanced, less "toxic" or the players are different.

It is a bit like asking people playing basket ball or football to make the game fun for 165 65kg dudes, because they want to have fun too.

Karol wrote:


It is a bit like asking people playing basket ball or football to make the game fun for 165 65kg dudes, because they want to have fun too.

During my times of playing serious volleyball I had no troubles at all playing a less serious game with people 30cm smaller than me and with less power in their arms. It was also not a problem to play with softer ball, so less trained/skilled people would not end with broken fingers, and nobody expected barrel roll saves from casual players.

Games are not meant to be all serious, all cutthroat, all the time. Except 40k apparently.

nou wrote:

Karol wrote:


It is a bit like asking people playing basket ball or football to make the game fun for 165 65kg dudes, because they want to have fun too.

During my times of playing serious volleyball I had no troubles at all playing a less serious game with people 30cm smaller than me and with less power in their arms. It was also not a problem to play with softer ball, so less trained/skilled people would not end with broken fingers, and nobody expected barrel roll saves from casual players.

Games are not meant to be all serious, all cutthroat, all the time. Except 40k apparently.

You mean I’m not meant to just flatten kids if I see them playing Rugby??

 VladimirHerzog wrote:

EviscerationPlague wrote:

So let's say 1000 points of Marines handily beat 4000 points of Tyranids because the balance was thatboff, how many rounds are you having them respawn for your scenario?

read the whole post before replying ffs..

And it totally does not matter in most scenarios unless the balance is so off that one side is leafblowing the other with zero effort (which isnt a thing)

But it would be zero effort if the Marines were that overpowered in any scenario. The "whole" of the post doesn't apply because it doesn't stop to think about NORMAL circumstances.

 Eldarsif wrote:


Let's say you have a hero on a mount that boosts all mounted units. Then you add nothing but foot slogging units. So a list with that hero and mounted units will outperform any list with a hero and footslogging units.

It also does not account for the fact that as soon as you start introducing units that provide synergies to certain units this imbalance increases. I remember Blades of Khorne in 1.0 and 2.0 where there were over 15 heroes each providing different buffs to the army. That inherently reduces the ability of balancing "anything goes" kind of lists. As soon as you create a unit that boosts other units or skews a list into a current meta status the balance starts to go out the window. BoK was also super mono-build thanks to that.

Those are not synnergies, those are built-in combos. Synnergies go like this: "You shoot it with some incendiary ammunition, and when the crew comes out to not roast alive, you finish them off with small arms fire". Sadly, 40k does not support synnergies.

But of course you are right about the impossibility of balancing buff mechanics. If you remember any balance thread with me in it, you should have a very clear picture about my position on points as a balancing mechanism.

It's not impossible to point buffing mechanics. Assume the buffer is doing Centurions instead of Tactical Marines. It's real fething easy.

As noted by others, 40k is spectacularly ill-suited for any kind of tournament play. It's go a ton of dice-rolling, which can easily offset a skill advantage ("better lucky than good"). Add in army composition, terrain, mission and you've got huge (and divergent) skills sets being put to the test.

An interesting point of comparison is CCGs, where there are both open deck formats but also fixed-deck ones. It would be interesting to see how the tournament scene would function in a "fixed list" environment. By that I mean you (obviously) get to use the army of your choice, but your units are fixed with very limited options.

Would we still see the min-maxing for various unit types? Probably, though maybe a bit less of it. One advantage for GW is that they could add the latest units into the required lists, so yay profit!

I will add that the tournament thing has always struck me as odd because it basically shreds the fluff, mocks the setting and treats the game as an entirely abstract competition.

EviscerationPlague wrote:
It's not impossible to point buffing mechanics. Assume the buffer is doing Centurions instead of Tactical Marines. It's real fething easy.

Bravo! You just made the buffer an overpriced, unusable crap when paired with anything less than the max potential of the buff and removed any practical choice. You might as well stick the buffer permanently with the squad of Centurions, because why bother otherwise? You have clearly achieved a better game for everyone thanks to your vast tournament expertise.

nou wrote:

 Daedalus81 wrote:


Something like that requires pre-planning to be fun. It just doesn't work for pickup.

Well, exactly what this is all about. When one reads a thing or two about wargames history and steps out of a 40k "wargaming" world, there is a whole universe of games, that are designed specifically not with the pick-up culture in mind. Some of them only have entirely fixed army lists and/or fixed scenarios, some only have army construction rules, that do not specify any fixed cost of units, etc. "Pick-up ready" is only a subset of all wargame rulesets out there, but amongst 40k players, mostly U.S. based 40k players, pick-up is the default mode of wargaming, to the point where everything else is treated as fairytales.

This is why I stressed, that it is a social problem, not ruleset problem. It takes just a small minority of players in a club with a cutthroat tournament mindset, to start the arms race and push out any casuals/narrative guys who don't want to participate in it out of the club. Seen it happened just too many times. You can also see this in pretty much every thread on Dakka, that there are people, like EviscerationPlague, who can't even fathom, that there are different approaches to wargaming even possible, and that blind pick-up culture is somehow the only way wargames are used. From the history point of view, pick-up is only a relatively recent concept in wargaming.

This distinction is usually dismissed with the broad "if only balance was good enough" statements, which miss the point entirely.

BTW, I think that some peoples' heads would explode if they knew what "validation" means in a historical wargaming context

absolutely this. The idea of "let me go up to the local game store and see if anyone is there for a game" is the outlier, not the norm. And seems to mainly be a US thing due to the undeserved dominance of "game store culture" here, wherein everything revolves around "your" local shop for games, including what is "allowed" to be played or sometimes even mentioned. I have legit seen both the staff of a game store and the patrons cuss someone out or get to the point where it may have ended in violence over nothing more than someone suggesting a new game that the store didn't stock. Said patrons saw it as insulting to the store, even as far as likening it to theft, to dare suggest that people play a game that wouldn't result in money for the shop by being able to immediately buy it there. I've actually seen two game stores almost engaged in what I would call gang warfare over turf because one store accuse the other one of trying to steal their customers by saying they also had things going on on a different night. In fact, with the blind loyalty I found so many people have in regard to their game store, I think the gang analogy is pretty apt. I rarely have ever found anyone who has multiple game stores they frequent, it's usually just one they've gone to and even daring to mention something going on at a different game store is liable to be met with hostility and considered trying to "steal" customers. Sounds crazy but I've actually seen it happen. I saw someone get bitched out by both the game store owner and two regulars to the point of almost being banned from the store just because he happened to say that another store was having a tournament in a few weeks if anyone wanted to attend that (and the store he said it in didn't even HAVE tournaments. It was literally "It's rude to talk about another store while you're in this one" with the sentiment being basically if people know about another store they may not come here)

I've also seen a fun, casual group be overtaken instantly, like cancer spreading, by one person even inadvertently bringing a "tournament" list to game night. No joke. I've seen where Bob and Jim have a game and Bob has decided to "git gud" and brings a tournament list, or more likely a heavier list (i.e. not even a netlist). He absolutely crushes Jim, almost to the point of Jim not having a fun experience, and soon after everyone starts playing catch-up with Bob as nobody wants to be steamrolled like Jim was (in some cases I've seen the person who gets crushed just stop showing up, it was so bad). Eventually, there are only tournament-type games going on, often because someone brings up the inevitable "If this is supposed to be balanced, that means NOT using it leads to unbalanced games", and as new players join they're basically told and see for themselves that this is the only way anyone plays so they are never exposed to anything else and more than likely see the lone guy trying to set up a campaign or more fun casual stuff get completely ignored or shut down to the point of giving up and playing tournament games with everyone else just to actually get to play, or just stopping showing up because nobody is interested in non-tournament games and being forgotten at worst. Even years later long after Bob has left, nobody still playing can remember the time before Bob started the domino effect to even consider going back, as their experience has been nobody is interested in anything else, and all the newbs are immediately exposed to just one way of doing things and pretty much indoctrinated that nothing else exists.

That sounds insane but I've literally seen it happen in various forms, several times. And it always ends up the same: anything that's not "tournament standard" might as well not exist, to where people are actively pushed AWAY from it, and worse anyone bringing up other ways is looked at like a leper and told, often politely but sometimes not, that nobody cares about the casual stuff and stop trying to change things. I can understand, even respect, the group that wants to play more seriously to improve (because I want this too, and IMHO everyone should want to improve their own game). What I can't is the idea that must be the one and only way, now and forever, and nothing else can even be considered as valid or even considered as a valid option, to the point of "let's just ignore him and he'll go away" to anyone who dares to deviate from the holy tournament pack. And that latter part is what I've seen far too often, at many stores (many now long gone) over 20 years. I refuse to believe it's just the Tampa area. Plenty of people I've spoken to online, even here have experienced the same or similar. But the one constant as it's always the tournament crowd that influences everything to switch to it rather than adapt to what already exists or have an alternative for occasional use but not all the time. It's almost like the mindset there is it must be all or nothing and there can be no compromise, only domination. I have never seen the narrative/casual group try to make that the only style of play, just an option with events or atmosphere; sometimes you may get some more vehement people that try to STOP tournament play, but they're just as bad IMHO. But it always seems to be the tournament players who show up, and feel they have to TAKE OVER, not just be another option. It can't be a subgroup of the players, so that someone more interested in tournament play can be pointed towards the "competitive crowd" for advice, and someone who doesn't want tournaments at all can be pointed to the other group who likes to play more casual/wacky/narrative play. It has to be that the tournament players "conquer" the way games are played.

nou wrote:

EviscerationPlague wrote:
It's not impossible to point buffing mechanics. Assume the buffer is doing Centurions instead of Tactical Marines. It's real fething easy.

Bravo! You just made the buffer an overpriced, unusable crap when paired with anything less than the max potential of the buff and removed any practical choice. You might as well stick the buffer permanently with the squad of Centurions, because why bother otherwise? You have clearly achieved a better game for everyone thanks to your vast tournament expertise.

Why is it impractical?

During 7th, would you have cast Invisibility on a squad of Tactical Marines or a variant of Centurion squad?

EviscerationPlague wrote:

nou wrote:

EviscerationPlague wrote:
It's not impossible to point buffing mechanics. Assume the buffer is doing Centurions instead of Tactical Marines. It's real fething easy.

Bravo! You just made the buffer an overpriced, unusable crap when paired with anything less than the max potential of the buff and removed any practical choice. You might as well stick the buffer permanently with the squad of Centurions, because why bother otherwise? You have clearly achieved a better game for everyone thanks to your vast tournament expertise.

Why is it impractical?

During 7th, would you have cast Invisibility on a squad of Tactical Marines or a variant of Centurion squad?

Depends entirely on what I’m trying to do in a given turn.

If the Tactical Marines are holding a viral objective, and I need them to still be there at the end of my opponents turn? Yes. Absolutely

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:

EviscerationPlague wrote:

nou wrote:

EviscerationPlague wrote:
It's not impossible to point buffing mechanics. Assume the buffer is doing Centurions instead of Tactical Marines. It's real fething easy.

Bravo! You just made the buffer an overpriced, unusable crap when paired with anything less than the max potential of the buff and removed any practical choice. You might as well stick the buffer permanently with the squad of Centurions, because why bother otherwise? You have clearly achieved a better game for everyone thanks to your vast tournament expertise.

Why is it impractical?

During 7th, would you have cast Invisibility on a squad of Tactical Marines or a variant of Centurion squad?

Depends entirely on what I’m trying to do in a given turn.

If the Tactical Marines are holding a viral objective, and I need them to still be there at the end of my opponents turn? Yes. Absolutely

Considering that holding only applied at the end of the game as it stands i doubt that to be the most common aswer.
Sure in the last turn? But before that 9/10 times the centurions will get the invis, or what is more likely some form of deathstar.

Not Online!!! wrote:

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:

EviscerationPlague wrote:

nou wrote:

EviscerationPlague wrote:
It's not impossible to point buffing mechanics. Assume the buffer is doing Centurions instead of Tactical Marines. It's real fething easy.

Bravo! You just made the buffer an overpriced, unusable crap when paired with anything less than the max potential of the buff and removed any practical choice. You might as well stick the buffer permanently with the squad of Centurions, because why bother otherwise? You have clearly achieved a better game for everyone thanks to your vast tournament expertise.

Why is it impractical?

During 7th, would you have cast Invisibility on a squad of Tactical Marines or a variant of Centurion squad?

Depends entirely on what I’m trying to do in a given turn.

If the Tactical Marines are holding a viral objective, and I need them to still be there at the end of my opponents turn? Yes. Absolutely

Considering that holding only applied at the end of the game as it stands i doubt that to be the most common aswer.
Sure in the last turn? But before that 9/10 times the centurions will get the invis, or what is more likely some form of deathstar.

Not if you played Maelstrom.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Now, on entirely different note, there is actually a way to remove balance issues from the equation entirely, even today. Moreover, anybody can try this for themselves outright. Instead of simply award the win to the player who scores the most VPs, grant it to the player who better predicts the exact VP score of both players at the end of the game. Right after establishing who has the first turn, players secretly write down their predictions. Now list disparity doesn’t matter and being „better at the game” isn’t simply about bringing the most broken list. You have to have both the true knowledge about the game, and skill to outsmart the opponent. Arms race is removed from the game entirely, as steamrolling is too easy to predict for both players alike, and problems like the buffer conundrum above become entirely irrelevant. Ideally, you want to bring back 3rd-7th ed CC rules or remove voluntary fall back, so players can be forced to score by charging them, but otherwise the game can remain unchanged.

nou wrote:

 Eldarsif wrote:


Let's say you have a hero on a mount that boosts all mounted units. Then you add nothing but foot slogging units. So a list with that hero and mounted units will outperform any list with a hero and footslogging units.

It also does not account for the fact that as soon as you start introducing units that provide synergies to certain units this imbalance increases. I remember Blades of Khorne in 1.0 and 2.0 where there were over 15 heroes each providing different buffs to the army. That inherently reduces the ability of balancing "anything goes" kind of lists. As soon as you create a unit that boosts other units or skews a list into a current meta status the balance starts to go out the window. BoK was also super mono-build thanks to that.

Those are not synnergies, those are built-in combos. Synnergies go like this: "You shoot it with some incendiary ammunition, and when the crew comes out to not roast alive, you finish them off with small arms fire". Sadly, 40k does not support synnergies.

But of course you are right about the impossibility of balancing buff mechanics. If you remember any balance thread with me in it, you should have a very clear picture about my position on points as a balancing mechanism.

You should get yourself an avatar. I rarely look at user names, but people with specific avatars I can more easily remember.

Regarding victory conditions I always like BMG's approach to it. Winning wasn't simply more points, but having over a certain threshold of more points. If your point differences were only 6 points it meant you and your opponent had a draw and neither player won. Personally I wouldn't mind seeing something similar in 40k mainly because the highest tables are often with such low point differences that if balance issue are taken into account it would count as a draw.

 Eldarsif wrote:

nou wrote:

 Eldarsif wrote:


Let's say you have a hero on a mount that boosts all mounted units. Then you add nothing but foot slogging units. So a list with that hero and mounted units will outperform any list with a hero and footslogging units.

It also does not account for the fact that as soon as you start introducing units that provide synergies to certain units this imbalance increases. I remember Blades of Khorne in 1.0 and 2.0 where there were over 15 heroes each providing different buffs to the army. That inherently reduces the ability of balancing "anything goes" kind of lists. As soon as you create a unit that boosts other units or skews a list into a current meta status the balance starts to go out the window. BoK was also super mono-build thanks to that.

Those are not synnergies, those are built-in combos. Synnergies go like this: "You shoot it with some incendiary ammunition, and when the crew comes out to not roast alive, you finish them off with small arms fire". Sadly, 40k does not support synnergies.

But of course you are right about the impossibility of balancing buff mechanics. If you remember any balance thread with me in it, you should have a very clear picture about my position on points as a balancing mechanism.

You should get yourself an avatar. I rarely look at user names, but people with specific avatars I can more easily remember.

Regarding victory conditions I always like BMG's approach to it. Winning wasn't simply more points, but having over a certain threshold of more points. If your point differences were only 6 points it meant you and your opponent had a draw and neither player won. Personally I wouldn't mind seeing something similar in 40k mainly because the highest tables are often with such low point differences that if balance issue are taken into account it would count as a draw.

I’m usually writing from mobile, where nobody has an avatar. But I’ll consider your advice.

Point threshold doesn’t remove the steamrolling problem, but is indeed a way to account for random swings. Dice based game not having this kind of margin is quite dumb.

I liked the way 3rd edition Flames of War worked out victory, firstly

there are now draws, if the attacker doesn't complete their mission and nor does the defender both plays score a defeat

secondly if you do win it doesn't matter how much of the enemy died, what matters is how much of your force died to win that victory.

leopard wrote:
I liked the way 3rd edition Flames of War worked out victory, firstly

there are now draws, if the attacker doesn't complete their mission and nor does the defender both plays score a defeat

secondly if you do win it doesn't matter how much of the enemy died, what matters is how much of your force died to win that victory.

In the context of a wargame, that actually makes sense since you're simulating war, or supposed to be. It's not about just winning, its about the cost of victory. Shame they got rid of that in 4th to be basically 40k-lite.

Commissar von Toussaint wrote:
As noted by others, 40k is spectacularly ill-suited for any kind of tournament play. It's go a ton of dice-rolling, which can easily offset a skill advantage ("better lucky than good"). Add in army composition, terrain, mission and you've got huge (and divergent) skills sets being put to the test.

You are right that this does get said a lot despite being an incredibly wrong statement.

EightFoldPath wrote:

Commissar von Toussaint wrote:
As noted by others, 40k is spectacularly ill-suited for any kind of tournament play. It's go a ton of dice-rolling, which can easily offset a skill advantage ("better lucky than good"). Add in army composition, terrain, mission and you've got huge (and divergent) skills sets being put to the test.

You are right that this does get said a lot despite being an incredibly wrong statement.

What makes it wrong? The fact 40k has tournaments doesn't mean it's well-suited for it. Just like the fact McDonalds sells billions in gakky hamburgers doesn't mean it's good food. 40k is probably the worst set of tournament rules, or rules in general, that I've seen in 25+ years.

The incredibly wrong statement is that there isn't a massive skill advantage available in 9th edition 40k.

I'm less emphatic regarding how well/ill suited to tournaments 9th ed 40k is. It would depend what you are comparing it to.

Other editions of 40k? Best tournament edition - yes.

Other wargames? People seem to be voting with their weekends and wallets for 40k.
I see you've gone with McDonalds as your GW analogy, I didn't realise GW were the cheap mass produced wargame option competing with more expensive products, do you play a superior game with solid gold miniatures? So best tournament wargame - probably also yes.

Other games? No idea and does it matter? I don't mind the MTG comparisons because they are probably one of the closest comparative hobbies, but what other games are you thinking of?

But can 10th ed 40k potentially be a better tournament wargame? Very much yes as there is plenty of room for improvement.

EightFoldPath, you read 'random dice can sometimes offset skill' and interpreted it as 'skill doesn't exist', then read an analogy that amounts to 'selling a lot doesn't mean it's great' and interpreted it as '40K is cheap and mass produced'.

Maybe slow your roll and respond to what people are actually saying.

 catbarf wrote:
EightFoldPath, you read 'random dice can sometimes offset skill' and interpreted it as 'skill doesn't exist', then read an analogy that amounts to 'selling a lot doesn't mean it's great' and interpreted it as '40K is cheap and mass produced'.

Maybe slow your roll and respond to what people are actually saying.

In his defense, I get it, I really do. Disagree, but I get the sentiment.

Wayniac wrote: absolutely this. The idea of "let me go up to the local game store and see if anyone is there for a game" is the outlier, not the norm. And seems to mainly be a US thing due to the undeserved dominance of "game store culture" here, wherein everything revolves around "your" local shop for games, including what is "allowed" to be played or sometimes even mentioned. I have legit seen both the staff of a game store and the patrons cuss someone out or get to the point where it may have ended in violence over nothing more than someone suggesting a new game that the store didn't stock. Said patrons saw it as insulting to the store, even as far as likening it to theft, to dare suggest that people play a game that wouldn't result in money for the shop by being able to immediately buy it there. I've actually seen two game stores almost engaged in what I would call gang warfare over turf because one store accuse the other one of trying to steal their customers by saying they also had things going on on a different night. In fact, with the blind loyalty I found so many people have in regard to their game store, I think the gang analogy is pretty apt. I rarely have ever found anyone who has multiple game stores they frequent, it's usually just one they've gone to and even daring to mention something going on at a different game store is liable to be met with hostility and considered trying to "steal" customers. Sounds crazy but I've actually seen it happen. I saw someone get bitched out by both the game store owner and two regulars to the point of almost being banned from the store just because he happened to say that another store was having a tournament in a few weeks if anyone wanted to attend that (and the store he said it in didn't even HAVE tournaments. It was literally "It's rude to talk about another store while you're in this one" with the sentiment being basically if people know about another store they may not come here)

While I do agree that a lot of the behaviors that you mention here are pretty ridiculous and extreme, such as suggesting to play a game that is not stocked by the store, as well as all of the cussing and threats to ban people, I do believe that going into a store and mentioning stuff going on at another store is rude and could be considered as insulting, even if it wasn't meant as such. Doing so could end up with the store that they went into in fact actually losing some customers, whether or not they ran tournaments, and businesses do need to protect their bottom line.

 ArcaneHorror wrote:

Wayniac wrote: absolutely this. The idea of "let me go up to the local game store and see if anyone is there for a game" is the outlier, not the norm. And seems to mainly be a US thing due to the undeserved dominance of "game store culture" here, wherein everything revolves around "your" local shop for games, including what is "allowed" to be played or sometimes even mentioned. I have legit seen both the staff of a game store and the patrons cuss someone out or get to the point where it may have ended in violence over nothing more than someone suggesting a new game that the store didn't stock. Said patrons saw it as insulting to the store, even as far as likening it to theft, to dare suggest that people play a game that wouldn't result in money for the shop by being able to immediately buy it there. I've actually seen two game stores almost engaged in what I would call gang warfare over turf because one store accuse the other one of trying to steal their customers by saying they also had things going on on a different night. In fact, with the blind loyalty I found so many people have in regard to their game store, I think the gang analogy is pretty apt. I rarely have ever found anyone who has multiple game stores they frequent, it's usually just one they've gone to and even daring to mention something going on at a different game store is liable to be met with hostility and considered trying to "steal" customers. Sounds crazy but I've actually seen it happen. I saw someone get bitched out by both the game store owner and two regulars to the point of almost being banned from the store just because he happened to say that another store was having a tournament in a few weeks if anyone wanted to attend that (and the store he said it in didn't even HAVE tournaments. It was literally "It's rude to talk about another store while you're in this one" with the sentiment being basically if people know about another store they may not come here)

While I do agree that a lot of the behaviors that you mention here are pretty ridiculous and extreme, such as suggesting to play a game that is not stocked by the store, as well as all of the cussing and threats to ban people, I do believe that going into a store and mentioning stuff going on at another store is rude and could be considered as insulting, even if it wasn't meant as such. Doing so could end up with the store that they went into in fact actually losing some customers, whether or not they ran tournaments, and businesses do need to protect their bottom line.

If those tournaments/nights are not happening at the same day, I don't see how that is rude/innapropriate/insulting, since it is nurturing the broader community. This is straight up toxic behaviour by both the shop owner and regulars, and I would not come back to this store ever again. The problem of the "game not stocked" can always been solved by taking a fee for a table if you want to play something outside of the carried range. I was even asked a few times to bring such game to the store for a demo game, because a) the shop owner himself was interested, and b) his mindset was that the more crowd, the better publicity for the store.

I think such "turf wars" might be a very U.S. thing, as I have never experienced anything like this down here.

nou wrote:

This is why I stressed, that it is a social problem, not ruleset problem. It takes just a small minority of players in a club with a cutthroat tournament mindset, to start the arms race and push out any casuals/narrative guys who don't want to participate in it out of the club. Seen it happened just too many times. You can also see this in pretty much every thread on Dakka, that there are people, like EviscerationPlague, who can't even fathom, that there are different approaches to wargaming even possible, and that blind pick-up culture is somehow the only way wargames are used. From the history point of view, pick-up is only a relatively recent concept in wargaming.

It isn't a social problem, it is a social reality.

You aren't changing the fact that some people like to win when playing games. There are several ways to mitigate it, but you aren't changing that.

Same with pick-up culture, it may be a relatively recent concept in wargaming, but the sheer success of 40k means it is the new reality.

 Tyran wrote:

nou wrote:

This is why I stressed, that it is a social problem, not ruleset problem. It takes just a small minority of players in a club with a cutthroat tournament mindset, to start the arms race and push out any casuals/narrative guys who don't want to participate in it out of the club. Seen it happened just too many times. You can also see this in pretty much every thread on Dakka, that there are people, like EviscerationPlague, who can't even fathom, that there are different approaches to wargaming even possible, and that blind pick-up culture is somehow the only way wargames are used. From the history point of view, pick-up is only a relatively recent concept in wargaming.

It isn't a social problem, it is a social reality.

You aren't changing the fact that some people like to win when playing games. There are several ways to mitigate it, but you aren't changing that.

Same with pick-up culture, it may be a relatively recent concept in wargaming, but the sheer success of 40k means it is the new reality.

No, not really. It is only "social reality" if you stick to 40k and the type of club 40k reigns in. There are other, greener pastures out there, but you have to do some legwork to either find them, or nurture them yourself. However, I get that this is rare or nigh impossible in the U.S. and I can only be glad, that I don't live there.

nou wrote:

 Tyran wrote:

nou wrote:

This is why I stressed, that it is a social problem, not ruleset problem. It takes just a small minority of players in a club with a cutthroat tournament mindset, to start the arms race and push out any casuals/narrative guys who don't want to participate in it out of the club. Seen it happened just too many times. You can also see this in pretty much every thread on Dakka, that there are people, like EviscerationPlague, who can't even fathom, that there are different approaches to wargaming even possible, and that blind pick-up culture is somehow the only way wargames are used. From the history point of view, pick-up is only a relatively recent concept in wargaming.

It isn't a social problem, it is a social reality.

You aren't changing the fact that some people like to win when playing games. There are several ways to mitigate it, but you aren't changing that.

Same with pick-up culture, it may be a relatively recent concept in wargaming, but the sheer success of 40k means it is the new reality.

No, not really. It is only "social reality" if you stick to 40k and the type of club 40k reigns in. There are other, greener pastures out there, but you have to do some legwork to either find them, or nurture them yourself. However, I get that this is rare or nigh impossible in the U.S. and I can only be glad, that I don't live there.

I agree with Tyran. It's not a game thing, it very much is a social human thing.

You can have totally casual 40K groups and you can have totally die-hard competitive 40K groups.

Same as you can for MTG, Infinity, chess, etc...

Now what can happen is local areas might only have one group so if you get a single local group that has an extreme focus and that's not your interest then its going to be a problem. But its, again, purely a social element not something built into the rules of the game. Heck even Warmachine with its Page 5 does NOT define the group style. It simply provides a platform and game - what groups are kept active and the social leaders and organises within those groups are what helps define how the game is played and how things are interpreted and soforth.


So yeah its not a 40K thing that its always hyper competitive. It's a social construct and that means you can change it if you're prepared and skilled to do the legwork in either broadening the horizons and offerings of your local club*; or branching out and starting your own.




*Note how this is NOT the same as trying to go against the current popular style/theme. If you attack what people are enjoying then it stops being hobby and becomes a contest of egos and bullying. Instead if you promote, play, advertise and generally create an interesting alternative then you enhance the local group by broadening what they engage with

 Overread wrote:

nou wrote:

 Tyran wrote:

nou wrote:

This is why I stressed, that it is a social problem, not ruleset problem. It takes just a small minority of players in a club with a cutthroat tournament mindset, to start the arms race and push out any casuals/narrative guys who don't want to participate in it out of the club. Seen it happened just too many times. You can also see this in pretty much every thread on Dakka, that there are people, like EviscerationPlague, who can't even fathom, that there are different approaches to wargaming even possible, and that blind pick-up culture is somehow the only way wargames are used. From the history point of view, pick-up is only a relatively recent concept in wargaming.

It isn't a social problem, it is a social reality.

You aren't changing the fact that some people like to win when playing games. There are several ways to mitigate it, but you aren't changing that.

Same with pick-up culture, it may be a relatively recent concept in wargaming, but the sheer success of 40k means it is the new reality.

No, not really. It is only "social reality" if you stick to 40k and the type of club 40k reigns in. There are other, greener pastures out there, but you have to do some legwork to either find them, or nurture them yourself. However, I get that this is rare or nigh impossible in the U.S. and I can only be glad, that I don't live there.

I agree with Tyran. It's not a game thing, it very much is a social human thing.

You can have totally casual 40K groups and you can have totally die-hard competitive 40K groups.

Same as you can for MTG, Infinity, chess, etc...

Now what can happen is local areas might only have one group so if you get a single local group that has an extreme focus and that's not your interest then its going to be a problem. But its, again, purely a social element not something built into the rules of the game. Heck even Warmachine with its Page 5 does NOT define the group style. It simply provides a platform and game - what groups are kept active and the social leaders and organises within those groups are what helps define how the game is played and how things are interpreted and soforth.


So yeah its not a 40K thing that its always hyper competitive. It's a social construct and that means you can change it if you're prepared and skilled to do the legwork in either broadening the horizons and offerings of your local club*; or branching out and starting your own.




*Note how this is NOT the same as trying to go against the current popular style/theme. If you attack what people are enjoying then it stops being hobby and becomes a contest of egos and bullying. Instead if you promote, play, advertise and generally create an interesting alternative then you enhance the local group by broadening what they engage with

You basically wrote an extended version of my post, so I think you might have misread something above. And I did what you describe here years ago, and enjoy a very happy narrative wargaming life ever since.

nou wrote:

 ArcaneHorror wrote:


While I do agree that a lot of the behaviors that you mention here are pretty ridiculous and extreme, such as suggesting to play a game that is not stocked by the store, as well as all of the cussing and threats to ban people, I do believe that going into a store and mentioning stuff going on at another store is rude and could be considered as insulting, even if it wasn't meant as such. Doing so could end up with the store that they went into in fact actually losing some customers, whether or not they ran tournaments, and businesses do need to protect their bottom line.

If those tournaments/nights are not happening at the same day, I don't see how that is rude/innapropriate/insulting, since it is nurturing the broader community. This is straight up toxic behaviour by both the shop owner and regulars, and I would not come back to this store ever again. The problem of the "game not stocked" can always been solved by taking a fee for a table if you want to play something outside of the carried range. I was even asked a few times to bring such game to the store for a demo game, because a) the shop owner himself was interested, and b) his mindset was that the more crowd, the better publicity for the store.

I think such "turf wars" might be a very U.S. thing, as I have never experienced anything like this down here.

The fact of the matter is "the broader community" is the main outlier in the US, since the majority of people, at least that I've seen over the 20 odd years, don't care about a broader community, they care about "their" local store's community and that's it. It isn't the same mentality as where you have a "wargames club" that meets regularly, because in that case you want to expand the community as a whole, whether people are 10 minutes away or make a 3 hour drive for the monthly club meeting. Those do exist, but they are few and far between in the US that I've seen. The "community" in most cases begins and ends with the game store everyone goes to, and it becomes just as much a focus on making sure the store stays profitable than having a community of gamers. For example, there are about 5 or so stores within a 30 mile radius of me, something like that. Not one of these stores does cross collaboration or anything with the other, they are in effect individual fiefdoms with their own regulars, who only care about what goes on in their "kingdom" and aren't concerned with "outsiders".

Tyran wrote:

nou wrote:

This is why I stressed, that it is a social problem, not ruleset problem. It takes just a small minority of players in a club with a cutthroat tournament mindset, to start the arms race and push out any casuals/narrative guys who don't want to participate in it out of the club. Seen it happened just too many times. You can also see this in pretty much every thread on Dakka, that there are people, like EviscerationPlague, who can't even fathom, that there are different approaches to wargaming even possible, and that blind pick-up culture is somehow the only way wargames are used. From the history point of view, pick-up is only a relatively recent concept in wargaming.

It isn't a social problem, it is a social reality.

You aren't changing the fact that some people like to win when playing games. There are several ways to mitigate it, but you aren't changing that.

Same with pick-up culture, it may be a relatively recent concept in wargaming, but the sheer success of 40k means it is the new reality.

The problem, I think, is that the pickup game mentality is bad for the community but good for a store. It only benefits the store you go to if you just randomly show up, or at best use the store's social media to set up games. You're completely ignoring the wider groups in your own area, acting as though they don't exist at best (because it's another store, therefore a "competitor" to your store of choice) or treating them as rivals/enemies at worst. That whole mindset is the opposite of the club mentality where you want as many people in the area, even outside the local area, as possible to come to have the most variety in games and opponents. You just don't see that when pickup games are the rule of the day, but for what reason I don't get as nothing precludes that. In fact, if anything its the game store-centric mindset, not pickup game culture, that's to blame; the idea that you need to pick a store, and then only focus on that store to ensure its success, which leads to feudalism and turf wars against others. It's seeing the "FLGS" as the center of the universe that's problematic, since obviously even in a club setting you wouldn't expect to always have set-piece events and stuff going on, you would still have pickup games (perhaps even easier as you could reasonably assume a bunch of people showing up to club nights) but you wouldn't be basing everything around "our" store.