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Southern Heel posted:Does anyone have a link to that WD snippet where the guy talks about the exact opposite of netlisting? I don't think it was even in the internet era so maybe just referring to min-max army lists of that era - he talks (possibly tongue in cheek) about supergluing and gloss varnishing his miniatures, having them as parts of a whole but not varying the size of the regiment or what banners/etc. it was equipped with. The idea being that over time you just know what to do with them; good or bad. Was that Nigel Stillman? Bit of internet sleuthing found this (on an old Warseer post so may not be 100% accurate but I seem to remember most of this being right): quote:Dave Cain - White Dwarf UK #221, Spirit of the Game, pg 61
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Jul 11, 2017 22:23
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I remember the article. It bothered the hell out of me at the time because why WOULDN'T I bring specialized forces to a battle. The paint jobs were atrocious too.
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Jul 11, 2017 22:46
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Southern Heel posted:Does anyone have a link to that WD snippet where the guy talks about the exact opposite of netlisting? I don't think it was even in the internet era so maybe just referring to min-max army lists of that era - he talks (possibly tongue in cheek) about supergluing and gloss varnishing his miniatures, having them as parts of a whole but not varying the size of the regiment or what banners/etc. it was equipped with. The idea being that over time you just know what to do with them; good or bad. I think it was a column by Jervis Johnson, but I can't find it. E: d'oh, it was Stillman. lilljonas fucked around with this message at 23:07 on Jul 11, 2017 |
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Jul 11, 2017 22:51
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Zark the Damned posted:Was that Nigel Stillman? Bit of internet sleuthing found this (on an old Warseer post so may not be 100% accurate but I seem to remember most of this being right): That's the ticket! Thank you! EDIT: I like the sentiment, if only GW games were robust enough that deployment/usage would be enough
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Jul 11, 2017 22:59
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I feel like it's a bit hostile, or is it  ?
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Jul 12, 2017 05:41
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Jul 12, 2017 08:34
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JcDent posted:I feel like it's a bit hostile, or is it Reads to me as parody.
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Jul 12, 2017 09:35
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It is not Parody at all. it's very, very Nigel Stillman / Jervis Johnson. Jervis is AFAIK the main driver behind GWs "just talk to your opponent, who cares, points are bad" schtick.
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Jul 12, 2017 11:38
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TTerrible posted:It is not Parody at all. it's very, very Nigel Stillman / Jervis Johnson. Yes, and JJ was quite outspoken in WD that he found tournament gaming, and especially a RAW approach, to be unimaginable to him.
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Jul 12, 2017 11:50
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The thing that GW and its fanbase seems to miss by a mile is if you make a tight, strict ruleset that actually works you can still talk to your opponent and houserule / ommit parts of it for your narrative games. That is a lot easier than trying to hang together some giant houserule document to make the game work in the first place like the ITC do. Oh well.
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Jul 12, 2017 11:57
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lilljonas posted:Yes, and JJ was quite outspoken in WD that he found tournament gaming, and especially a RAW approach, to be unimaginable to him. TTerrible posted:It is not Parody at all. it's very, very Nigel Stillman / Jervis Johnson. This is my poo poo right here, but then again I only play against one dude.
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Jul 12, 2017 15:05
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They must come from a historical background, because those are easier to balance - or you know the problematic places because you're into the period. You hardly ever get immortal characters or, barring a Tiger fetish, indestructable tanks in historical games. For me, it would be hard to balance or at least make a scenario without points as guidelines.
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Jul 12, 2017 15:10
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It's just as much the origin through RPGs that informed that sensibility. Early warhammer was more a large scale RPG, and not very conductive to competative playing.
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Jul 12, 2017 15:17
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Yes, but I think the concept of 'competitive' gaming in the context of a hobby based around a combination of art, narration and chance is just a bit misplaced (personally!). If you play as the Romans at Cannae it's hardly a fair proposition and you will probably lose - but that's not the important point, is it?
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Jul 12, 2017 15:19
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Southern Heel posted:Yes, but I think the concept of 'competitive' gaming in the context of a hobby based around a combination of art, narration and chance is just a bit misplaced (personally!). If you play as the Romans at Cannae it's hardly a fair proposition and you will probably lose - but that's not the important point, is it? This is part of why I'm kinda bummed about gaming in general. You can't put "tournament" anywhere on an event or some dickhead comes in with a skewed list and a waac attitude and thinks it's justified. It's usually the same person who complains about how some models are broken or overpowered, too. I miss playing 4th edition DnD because it was the kind of experience that I imagined miniature gaming would be before I actually got into it.
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Jul 12, 2017 16:40
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jodai posted:You can't put "tournament" anywhere on an event or some dickhead comes in with a skewed list and a waac attitude and thinks it's justified. In a competitive environment, that's totally justified. People are playing to win, and as long as you're not trying to cheat or being an rear end in a top hat outside of the game itself, it's all fair. Your opponent has just as much opportunity to compose a strong list and you should expect that they're trying to win too. jodai posted:It's usually the same person who complains about how some models are broken or overpowered, too. That's not really surprising; if they're trying to play the game competitively, they've probably looked into a lot of the in-game interactions to find the strongest elements/combinations. If there are some broken/OP parts, they'll probably find those too (and use them because, again, this is in a competitive environment). A person who put the effort in to figure all this out is probably going to want to play at least a few competitive games with their army. (Unfortunately, people also netlist their way to victory, but this isn't really something you can stop.) Ultimately, the solution to this problem is to play good games made by designers with a commitment to game balance. Failing that, just don't play in a competitive environment unless you're the sort of person who likes to exploit a game's rules to their maximum potential. There's nothing actually wrong with playing a friendly, non-competitive game, but competitive play is totally valid too. Not only that, but designing a game to work in a competitive environment generally doesn't break it for friendly games (in fact, it often helps friendly games), so it's a good goal for designers to shoot for.
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Jul 12, 2017 17:51
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The difficulty of forging the narrative is in forging the drat narrative. In regular matchpetativve 40k, you roll for mission, deployment, objectives... whatever, only the army building is fun, nothing exciting happens on the table. On the narrative, however... You have to come up with a scenario that would feel markedly different than competitive play, make up a story and build the forces in a way that doesn'tI really railroad the process... I feel hella intimidated by Force on Force's scifi cousin Tomorrow's War, since it abhors points and is all about scenario play. And I'm going to play 40K on it. While we're on the subject, what would be good, setting agnostic games to hammer 40K on? I know FUBAR has a 40K module, and I am thinking about Clash on the Fringe and Stargrunt II.
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Jul 12, 2017 20:32
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jodai posted:This is part of why I'm kinda bummed about gaming in general. You can't put "tournament" anywhere on an event or some dickhead comes in with a skewed list and a waac attitude and thinks it's justified. It's usually the same person who complains about how some models are broken or overpowered, too. I miss playing 4th edition DnD because it was the kind of experience that I imagined miniature gaming would be before I actually got into it. This to me is the baffling perspective. I think Avenging Dentist covered everything I wanted to say well enough, but it basically comes down to whether or not you personally want to engage with the hobby competitively or not. If you don't, then why are you getting upset that other people are taking every advantage that they can? Why are you signing up for events that have clear winners and losers? If your goal is to hang out with friends and tell emergent stories, then do that. But don't get mad when people show up for a tournament with the intention to win. And if you do want to play competitively but don't want to be at a disadvantage because you didn't google the most optimized list and wanted to play with the models that you have or like, then play a different game, one that emphasizes balance and doesn't punish you in the list building phase for choosing wrong. Basically, there are two types of balance in any game. There's composition balance and there's gameplay balance. Some games have janky rules that reward randomness over player agency. Some games have wide disparities in power levels between lists and tons of trap choices. Some games have both. Ultimately it's on you as a player and a consumer to buy and play games that you are satisfied with.
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Jul 13, 2017 02:06
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JcDent posted:While we're on the subject, what would be good, setting agnostic games to hammer 40K on? I know FUBAR has a 40K module, and I am thinking about Clash on the Fringe and Stargrunt II. Alternative Armies Firefight is a neat, small scale system. It has a setting, but it's kinda 40k with the serial numbers filed off so it should convert. For a squad with attachments per side it should do the trick nicely.
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Jul 13, 2017 02:55
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So... anyone heard anything about Maelstrom's Edge? Is it DOA?
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Jul 13, 2017 03:22
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LordAba posted:So... anyone heard anything about Maelstrom's Edge? Is it DOA? This post is literally the first I have heard in ages,so that isn't the best sign.
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Jul 13, 2017 03:27
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I have the box set, just never gave it a shot. I'm interested too.
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Jul 13, 2017 03:31
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I am a scrub Allow me to introduce myself. I have a hard time finding a decent line between "playing to win" and having a good time and have assumed they are mutually exclusive. I have literally thrown games because of this weird mental block. If I ever win, I replay every move, sure that I must have gotten a rule wrong or somehow messed up somewhere because me winning means someone else lost and didn't have fun so they're probably not going to play anymore. It's kookydooks. Also, I've been to too many "new player friendly" or casual tournaments and events to think that it's possible to enjoy something and completely avoid competitive players. It's frustrating because some people think competitive means free rein to be a jack rear end and also only play tournament lists. Unfortunately, I have moved around a lot and so it's hard to establish a set of people i want to play with. Every new place, I have to take time to feel out what's the general goal of gaming in the area. It's hard to find a place I like.
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Jul 13, 2017 03:48
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jodai posted:I am a scrub Allow me to introduce myself. I have a hard time finding a decent line between "playing to win" and having a good time and have assumed they are mutually exclusive. I have literally thrown games because of this weird mental block. If I ever win, I replay every move, sure that I must have gotten a rule wrong or somehow messed up somewhere because me winning means someone else lost and didn't have fun so they're probably not going to play anymore. It's kookydooks. I've lost plenty of games that were fun. I've also lost games and been miserable the whole time. The trick is playing a game where defeat isn't a certainty. Too many popular games are decided before the first die is rolled or are determined based on who gets the first turn. It loving sucks to play a 2 hour game where it's just you prolonging the inevitable and defeat has been certain since the opening move. quote:Also, I've been to too many "new player friendly" or casual tournaments and events to think that it's possible to enjoy something and completely avoid competitive players. It's frustrating because some people think competitive means free rein to be a jack rear end and also only play tournament lists. Unfortunately, I have moved around a lot and so it's hard to establish a set of people i want to play with. Every new place, I have to take time to feel out what's the general goal of gaming in the area. It's hard to find a place I like. This is a separate set of problems. Grog.txt is a thing for a reason. If an event is "new player friendly" or a tournament is intended to be "casual" then it's on the event organizers to enforce that. I've heard horror stories of Warmahordes events where newbies are squashed by esoteric combos on the first turn and that's their first real exposure to the game. If events are going to be "casual", the organizers need to vet lists, enforce guidelines, or not enforce standard tournament rules. For instance, they might outright ban certain unit combinations, require lists to conform to fluff, or in the case of something like X-Wing, not require players to have the physical item card but instead allow computer printouts.
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Jul 13, 2017 04:28
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Atlas Hugged posted:I've lost plenty of games that were fun. I've also lost games and been miserable the whole time. The trick is playing a game where defeat isn't a certainty. Too many popular games are decided before the first die is rolled or are determined based on who gets the first turn. It loving sucks to play a 2 hour game where it's just you prolonging the inevitable and defeat has been certain since the opening move. Yeah, the problem is list building (and deck building!) being at such a distance from the gameplay in time that it's difficult to react to people's lists. jodai posted:I am a scrub Allow me to introduce myself. I have a hard time finding a decent line between "playing to win" and having a good time and have assumed they are mutually exclusive. I have literally thrown games because of this weird mental block. If I ever win, I replay every move, sure that I must have gotten a rule wrong or somehow messed up somewhere because me winning means someone else lost and didn't have fun so they're probably not going to play anymore. It's kookydooks. Sirlin's model is not good/transferable to miniatures games I suspect. I like that Sirlin article when it's something like a fighting game. Gameplay is, what, 3-5 minutes? If the match is totally lopsided you can take your licks and then do anything else. Plus, you can iterate pretty quickly. If you beat me with character X, I can dial up character X and do what you did. Then when you beat that tactic, I've learnt even more stuff, and can iterate again. I can go back to the first character and then see what you try to counter him with this time. Tabletop minis don't have any of this. The Sirlin model assumes that you have every model/weapon combo available for whatever numbers you need for every army, which is just not realistic for most miniatures based games. You table my Cryx with your Menoth dudes. It's not like I can say 'oh poo poo that army is real good' pick Menoth at the army select screen and then we have a rematch 5 minutes later. I'll take months and 100s of dollarydoos to replicate your Menoth dudes. Nor can I learn anything from what you did with your Menoth to bring back to my Cryx experience. Additionally, if you beat me at the army selection screen it takes forever to resolve it and it's a grinder not like, 5 minutes. It doesn't have the low bar of accessibility to different options and the ability to play over and over again that are critical to making the scrub/expert dichotomy work. Cthulhu Dreams fucked around with this message at 06:27 on Jul 13, 2017 |
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Jul 13, 2017 06:24
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Some grogs are proponents of the hard knocks school where you beat up a newbie, then discuss the match with him. It's not a lot of fun.
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Jul 13, 2017 09:36
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JcDent posted:Some grogs are proponents of the hard knocks school where you beat up a newbie, then discuss the match with him. I swear these guys only play against newbies and then brag about their win/loss record.
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Jul 13, 2017 09:44
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Atlas Hugged posted:I swear these guys only play against newbies and then brag about their win/loss record. I'm the warseer poster with his W-L-D records written in my signature. For each army. For every game. Look at my posts and weep, ye mortal.
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Jul 13, 2017 10:29
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The biggest problem with miniatures games from a competitive perspective is that nobody has infinite models like they would for an RTS, which's why listbuilding is the shittiest aspect of wargames balance. Turns out tyranids suck? Man that's too bad, hope you have £300 for a space marine army instead.
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Jul 13, 2017 15:56
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Another solution is to play a game where entire factions aren't dumpster-tier, or a game with a smaller buy-in cost. I don't think it makes sense to malign all miniatures games just because the biggest one is unwilling or unable to provide a properly balanced experience.
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Jul 13, 2017 17:12
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I think the Sirlin article is relevant in that a lot of wargamers will hold themselves back through selfenforced rules about using only models that make sense in the background of the game or never using a model that someone else has deemed a "crutch". Strategies and counter strategies can be developed over time but, like it's been said, war games take a lot longer than fighting games and there is a much bigger investment in terms of buying a new model, assembling and painting it and then actually getting a game in. I'm from an area where two games of anything besides 40k a week is a busy week.
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Jul 13, 2017 17:12
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jodai posted:I think the Sirlin article is relevant in that a lot of wargamers will hold themselves back through selfenforced rules about using only models that make sense in the background of the game or never using a model that someone else has deemed a "crutch". Lol no that never happens
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Jul 13, 2017 18:13
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Avenging Dentist posted:Another solution is to play a game where entire factions aren't dumpster-tier, or a game with a smaller buy-in cost. I don't think it makes sense to malign all miniatures games just because the biggest one is unwilling or unable to provide a properly balanced experience. In fairness this is still true of any miniatures game. The only ones who don't really suffer from it are ones where you need like one £10 model, but even then it's not as trivial as it is in an RTS. You could just as easily say "You went in on Soviet armour, but turns out the meta favours infantry?", or "You went for a buff-specialist mage, but the meta favours damage dealers?". Unless you're going to play with pogs and cardboard squares, there's always going to be an issue with adjusting strategies in war games video games (or complete-in-box board games) don't have, since changing a list isn't cost-neutral.
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Jul 13, 2017 18:25
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It's not that you're spending any money, it's the ridiculous amount that games (and really we're mostly talking warhammer here) expect you to spend on a list that's large enough to have any kind of understanding of how the game actually functions. If you're playing a minis game you've already kind of come to the decision that you're spending some cash.
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Jul 13, 2017 22:58
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At my local game store, we were starting to get into Deadzone when we ran up against the wall of the Reb Terraton. This is a giant, teleporting rhino that will mess anything up in melee and has enough hit points and abilities to shrug off a lot of damage. The Reb player stopped taking it for a bit because he didn't want to be seen as having to use that unit to win, but during that time we just learned how to play the game better. When the Terraton came back, it was usually killed in the first turn or two so now the challenge has become him trying to keep the drat thing alive long enough to get it into melee. So the crutch thing does happen, but I've never seen it in a competitive environment. This is just a handful of guys on a Sunday afternoon.
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Jul 14, 2017 01:49
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It's partly my meta from Malifaux. There were two waac players that constantly talked behind each other's backs about how cheap or cheesy their lists were and so most of the stuff they used was pretty much on a do not use list. Also, I've run into the idea that if another person is using this faction or leader, no one else should as some kind of courtesy. That was on the verge of changing right about the time when I moved but now from what I hear, everyone is pretty much burnt out on the game. Just as a slight aside, has anyone used the Fear and Faith rules? I'm always surprised when o go back and read stuff based on SoBH because it sounds very fun but I just can't find any players. If F&F didn't work, is there a decent set of horror skirmish rules that anyone can recommend?
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Jul 14, 2017 04:28
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Honestly I think the use and promulgation of the term "WAAC" is more toxic to the hobby than any of the supposed associated behaviors. The problem is that it associates outright cheating and bullying with taking advantage of the rules and somehow blaming the players for exploiting things that the developers left in and didn't bother balancing. It exonerates lazy developers when the reality is that we the customers should be holding them accountable. If players can so easily abuse a system, switch systems. If people are just unpleasant to play against, play against different people. No gaming is better than bad gaming.
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Jul 14, 2017 05:22
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True, but what you're saying exonerates bad players. And those aren't a myth. Plus, switch systems is a God drat lovely copout outside of historicals. I mean, if you want to play hams because of undying love for Space Marines or you got into Malifaux because you always wanted to run a posse of undead whores, what other systems can you play? WAACs will netlist and argue for RAW all day long. Me, I don't understand the appeal of plating the system rather the setting. Sure, I started Infinity because I liked the system, but I haven't played a game in months and I have spent a lot of time time painting Hams and assembling Bolt Action because I care about the fantasy of being a Space Marine or running a brit platoon a lot more than about AROs
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Jul 14, 2017 06:06
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JcDent posted:WAACs will netlist and argue for RAW all day long. This has absolutely no bearing whatsoever on a player's attitude or the manner in which they compose themselves towards their opponents. Any correlation between the two is entirely in your head. Nothing in Atlas' post exonerates lovely behavior, but you're connecting lovely behavior with someone's desire to play the game a certain way or with certain kinds of objectives in mind. For instance, there's no intrinsic reason why someone who wants to play by the rules (RAW) is a bad player. What's bad is pretending that someone is able to divine the intent of the author (despite their apparently and obviously lovely and obtuse and unhelpful writing) and then putting it on their opponent that they ought to come to the same conclusion regarding that intent - then calling their opponent the bad actor in the situation if the opponent doesn't see things the same way. This is the classic 'my opponent was perfectly nice and gracious during the whole game, but I tanked their composition and sportsmanship scores because their list was cheesy, and I think that makes them an rear end in a top hat' kind of bullshit that is all over warhammer events. Notably, their opponents army list doesn't even have to have been good for this to happen. S.J. fucked around with this message at 06:25 on Jul 14, 2017 |
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Jul 14, 2017 06:19
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As far as I can tell the people who use "WAAC" and consider it to be a serious problem are the people who are less good at exploiting rules or abusing composition. Maybe they bought models before they realized what was good and are bitter that they got stuck with trap choices. Maybe the meta passed them by and they don't have the resources to retool their army or buy a new one. Maybe they've been using "one dumb trick" to win all of their games at the local game club and at an official tournament got schooled when someone pointed out they had been playing the game wrong. Either way, the problem is almost always everyone else and not them or the game. "Everyone else is playing wrong. I'm playing in the spirit of the game." Nonsense. I think there are enough systems out right now that you can find something you and your friends like that has the flexibility to use whatever models you have or want to use. Obviously nothing is going to be perfect and there might be some proxying, but you'll be able to play how you want to play. If you're set on playing a particular game because of brand loyalty or because you like the setting or because it's the only game in town, then you're either going to have to suck it up and deal with "all of those WAACers" or you can demand better events using the suggestions I posted above. Complaining about all the other players who are ruining your fun just makes you a whiner.
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Jul 14, 2017 06:55
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