The Old Rules

Unless you're one of those players who buys a new codex and army, plays it in tournaments, then sells everything on ebay as soon as the next codex/army comes out, you probably have multiple editions of GW rulebooks and codices on your shelf.  (If you're a person who plays mostly in hobby stores or in tournaments against strangers, then this post doesn't apply to you)

The Hated Fluff

Any time a new codex comes out, the Interwebs explode with everyone hating on the new fluff.  Beloved history and background are retconned out of existence, warped beyond recognition, or generally trampled upon.  Authors (I'm talking about you, Mat Ward) with no concept of how their new vision of the 40k Universe RUINS EVERYTHING.  I hate it as much as everyone else.

Force Protection

It's taken as a given that when you play a game of 40k, during a game you're going to lose a large portion of your army.  Maybe all of it if you lose.  Watching your opponent remove his models from the table is part of what makes the game fun!  The mental image you have of two armies of heroes (or evil bad guys) clashing in a desperate struggle in which only the few survive makes the game feel epic.  Gamers plan battle strategies around their suicide units.  They take it for granted that their elite unit will deep strike into the middle of the enemy lines, "pop a Land Raider", and then die.  I wonder how the troopers would feel if their commanders told them that it's his intention from the get-go that their purpose is to die.

One Shot, One Kill

In the real world, snipers have repeatedly been called "the deadliest weapon on the battlefield." Snipers have the element of surprise, can kill at very long ranges, are hard to deal with, and thus instill terror in the enemy. (As an aside I will ignore their other, arguably more important, employment as battlefield observers) If snipers are so deadly in the real world, why are they so ineffective in the game of 40k?

The War against Doctrine

The Codex Astartes is the holy tome written by Ultramarines Primarch Roboute Guilliman.  It defines the organization and tactical doctrine of the Adeptus Astartes and is followed by many, if not a majority, of Space Marine Chapters.

Guilliman is undisputedly one of the greatest military minds in history, rivaling if not surpassing all of the other Primarchs.  The Codex Astartes is considered one of Guilliman's most influential works. 

Yet there is a schizophrenia in the 40k universe...

Generalship

It seems like these days, the focus of gaming is more on making the army list rather than playing the game.  Army list posts on blogs and forums are extremely common.  You hear about "unbeatable" army lists with [insert awesome weapon of the day] spam.  Much (if not most) of the excitement generated by a new codex is determined by the rules/units available, and what units players can get to increase the power of their army list.  In order to succeed at a a tournament, it's a given that if you don't have a "competitive" army list, you needn't bother playing. 

Aerodynamics

In the design of any new model or miniature, one of the key things designers have to come to grips with is keeping the "theme" of the army intact with continuity of design. That is, each new miniature must fit, style-wise, with the rest of the army.

Codex Creep

A recent post on Bell of Lost Souls got me thinking about this.  Actually I've been thinking about it for long while, but the BoLS post inspired me to finally write about it.


Give people something they don't need, and they will be temporarily, mildly happy.  If you then take it away from them, the rage will erupt in a paroxysmal conflagration.  The fact that it was unnecessary to give it to them in the first place is irrelevant.  They had it, they owned it, it rightfully belongs to them, and may anyone who would dare take it away be damned to burn in a fiery hell for all eternity.

Generalship

I'm not a competitive player. That is to say, I don't play in tournaments and I don't pore obsessively over my army list and tweak it to get the most killing power out of it.

Whenever a new codex comes out, you hear the same complaints on the forums and some blogs, over and over again. Things like "codex creep", "OP" (over-powered), "nerfs", "buffs", etc. Whine whine whine. It's pathetic.

Some people may thrive on the whining. They live for it. Or perhaps I'm being too cynical and there are people who look at new challenges constructively and as an opportunity for growth. Yeah, right. The whiners are everywhere.

With such a wide diversity of 40k armies and their playstyles, it is a monumental, perhaps impossible task to make 40k into a truly balanced game. The only reason to even try to do this is to promote competitive play. Unbalanced armies/rules are probably the single most complained about facet of the game. This is a staple of the gaming industry in general, especially PC and console games. The most popular form of play (multiplayer or competitive play) is also the most complained about, for being unfair or unbalanced in some way.

Guess what? Life is unfair.

And that includes war.

History is replete with more wars and conflicts than bear mentioning. But one thing you'll never find is a war or a battle in which both sides were evenly matched. Always, always one side or the other will have an advantage in numbers, quality of troops, terrain, etc. But, notably, the side with the initial advantage is by no means the certain victor. In so many battles, a random event like the weather, hard fighting by the common soldier, or perhaps even good generalship can be the deciding factor.

No real world general ever gets to pick the composition of his force. He has to make do with what he has. That is a challenge in generalship. It may sound unfair to take your green army into battle against a better equipped foe twice your size, but then, that's what makes a general a military commander and not a wimpy tabletop gamer.

What gamers see when they look in the mirror.

The games I find more interesting are the ones in which things are deliberately stacked against one player, and seeing how he deals with it. When the going gets tough, a player can either suck it up and stick it out, or whine and complain. The former are the men, the latter are the boys. (or alternatively, the women and the girls)

Also, real world generals never have the whole picture.  Real world generals don't get to peek at the contents of the enemy's army list. They get intelligence reports, and those reports are usually incomplete or even flat out wrong.

Here's a idea for a different way to play the game.

You pick your general, since that's represents you on the battlefield. Your opponent does the same.

Get a GM for your game (The GM doesn't have to be a referee, but rather someone to help you prepare the battle).  Pick someone you and your opponent can agree on, someone with a modicum of intelligence, knowledge of military history, and preferably an imagination.  The GM comes up with a narrative/scenario, and makes the two army lists. There's no restriction on the size or composition of either army--the GM should just pick something that fits the narrative. Force Org charts and points values should be guidelines, not rules.

If you get the "weaker" army, don't complain. The GM is giving you a chance to shine. Instead of whining, you can thank the Blood God for giving you this opportunity to give him more skulls for his throne. Maybe if you win he'll make you a daemon prince. One can always hope.

Depending on the scenario the GM has devised, he may provide you with an intelligence report about the opposing army. The information should be vague, incomplete, and perhaps even wrong in the details.

The GM gives each army an objective, and depending on the scenario devised, this does not necessarily have to be revealed to the opposition.  The objectives need not be mutually exclusive.  (e.g., one side might be attempting to get the secret plans off the table, while the other side merely wants to kill the opposing general)

Let the battle begin!

If you're on the weaker side, blame the impossible odds you have to face.  And if you win, the reason is obviously your generalship so give yourself all the credit.  That's what real generals do!

Thoughts on the State of Gaming, Part 3

I think GW has a workable business model with The Lord of the Rings line, provided they marketed it right.  The Lord of the Rings Strategy Battle Game is a perfectly workable skirmish game--easy enough for a new player to get into with a relative minimum of effort.  Once they become a veteran and want to play games with huge armies, then they can "graduate" into playing War of the Ring, and purchase the additional loads of miniatures.  If The Lord of the Rings Strategy Battle Game was marketed as the "entry-level" game, it might attract new players.  As it is now, it seems to be presented as a sub-game to War of the Ring.


It seems to me that there are three levels of games that could be tapped in a logical progression for each genre.  

1. A fast paced "board" game.  This could consist of interlocking board pieces like Space Hulk or Warhammer Quest, and a few miniatures that act as game pieces.  The game should have simple enough rules to appeal to players who are not gamers (the genre itself should keep the veterans interested).  The game should be something that you could play with your children or disinterested SO.  An example is the Settlers of Catan, which is arguably has some fantasy elements and yet is popular outside of traditional gaming circles.
2. An intermediate level "skirmish" wargame.  This should contain more miniatures than the previous level, while not being huge battles, either.
3. A wargame.  This is the level of the current games of Warhammer, Warhammer 40k, and War of the Ring.

The key to a marketing strategy like this is to ensure that the games should be as compatible as with each other as possible, at least in terms of the miniatures.  That ensures that a new player will "add on" to his army as he progresses up the chain, rather than feel like he has to "start over" each time.  

For each of the three main lines that GW has, I can envision the following tiers:

Warhammer:
    Tier One: Warhammer Quest.  A handful of characters doing a dungeon crawl to accomplish a quest.  
    Tier Two:  Mordheim, or something similar.  Basically warbands fighting each other for whatever reason.
    Tier Three:  Warhammer itself.

Warhammer 40k:
    Tier One:  A Warhammer Quest analogue, perhaps a Rogue Trader or Inquisitorial Retinue on a mission on board a space hulk to accomplish a quest, like retrieve an artifact and then escape.
    Tier Two:  A skirmish game, perhaps more like Necromunda, the original Rogue Trader version of the game, or something along the lines of the Kill Team rules from 6th edition 40k.  A disadvantage of Necromunda itself was that you couldn’t use the miniatures in Warhammer 40k, and, as far as I know, the vice versa.  Suffice it to say, it should a be a squad level game where each player has maybe a dozen miniatures.
    Tier Three:  Warhammer 40k.

The Lord of the Rings
    Tier One:  A game called something like “Escape from Moria”, where the Fellowship (or a small band of other heros), has to escape the mines of Moria before they are captured or killed by its evil denizens.  This is a different concept from the boxed set The Mines of Moria, which is the starter set to The Lord of the Rings Strategy Battle Game.  Rather, this game would have the interlocking game pieces like Warhammer Quest or Space Hulk, which creates Moria as the players explore it, searching for an exit.  
    Tier Two:  The Lord of the Rings Strategy Battle Game, albeit marketed at the skirmish level like it was originally envisioned.
    Tier Three:  War of the Ring.  

Having a tiered structure like this I think would attract more gamers.  As it is, many new players jump in and get hooked for life, while others start to get involved, build an army, get frustrated at the escalating costs or codex creep or whatever, and then and sell everything on ebay and leave permanently.  Those that are lost are going to tell others about their experiences, and potentially drive others away.  However, with more gaming options available, someone who gets frustrated might instead take a break from the Tier Three game and slide back down to Tier Two or One, and still have fun.  Even if their never go back up to Tier Three, they’re still playing games within the company, and even if they spend way less money than they used to, less is better than none at all.

Thoughts on the State of Gaming, Part 2

Another point of the Specialist Game Rant the I mentioned in Part 1 is that the purpose of the "side games" was to draw in new blood with the side games, in the hopes of hooking them into playing the more expensive flagship games.  What GW supposedly found was that the veteran players were being pulled away by the specialist games rather than new players being hooked into the hobby by them.


On the other hand, I know several people who are gamers but not miniatures gamers, who stay away from GW stuff simply because they don't want to invest the time and money required to buy and paint an army (this is also a primary reason I don't play MMORPGs).  In such a situation, a smaller game like Battlefleet Gothic would be much more palatable to them, as spending less than $100 can get you a decent fleet that won't even take very long to paint--even though many of the miniatures are still expensive metal. 


But it's a maxim of the business industry that it costs ten times more to attract a new customer than to keep a current one.  Every veteran of Warhammer or Warhammer 40k is going to get burned out eventually, and want to play something else, if only for a while.  If the specialist games exist, the veteran will likely go to those.  Even if the veteran never comes back--they're still playing within the company.  If the specialist games aren't available, then the veteran might just leave the company and play another company's game, like Warmachine.  And then they might like that game better...and never come back.


I find myself in that position right now--after not playing Warhammer 40k for a while, I'm looking at Warhammer a little bit, but it'll be a long time before I can build up a workable army, so my motivation is low.  In such a situation, I'd be interested in checking out some of the other games, for example Warhammer Quest, Man O'War, Mordheim, Necromunda, who knows?  But none of them are readily available. 


The main one that is right now, Battlefleet Gothic, is great, and in fact that's the last game I played.  Many of the people who have read my battle reports have said that they've enjoyed that I've incorporated Battlefleet Gothic games into my 40k mini-campaigns.  With GW support of other games, I could potentially do the same thing with them... (for example, a Mordheim or Man O’ War game incorporated with Warhammer.  How can that not be cool?).  GW would do well to have more cross over campaigns and battle reports.  The intermingling of fans of both games can only serve to increase the popularity of both.

Thoughts on the State of Gaming, Part 1

It's been almost three months since I bought anything GW-related. The reasons are many--but boil down to distractions and discipline, pretty much in that order. As can happen with many hobbies, it's become a situation where I want to get back into it, and even feel a little guilty about not being more into it, but I'm not motivated enough to dive in it yet. Possibly this is related to the fact that I haven't even played a game since early June.



My White Dwarf subscription is nearing expiration, and for a while I was seriously considering not renewing (eventually I think I'll crack).  The battle reports in White Dwarf were the original reason I got into doing up my own battle reports, and were by far the most interesting articles to me. Nowadays, even though their battle reports are little more than showcases for their army of the month, I still find them interesting reads, if only to read about the new armies and what has changed.  Sure, I can probably get more news and battle reports than I know what to do with on the internet, but there's still something about having the magazine in hand that is appealing (much in the same way that holding an actual miniature can in ways be more appealing than just looking at a video game character).


Despite the fact that I haven’t played the games all that much recently, nor have a I painted very diligently recently, I’ve spent plenty of time thinking about it, both the games and the hobby.  What I like about it, what I don’t like, and what I think is missing.  The benefit of being out of the loop is...perspective.


I found an interesting link while surfing recently: It's some generic rants about the state of GW games and the company's marketing practices, and even though they are 5-6 years old, much of it still rings true.


One of the rants in particular talks about the demise of the Specialist Games, which I think is a real tragedy. The short of the story is this: Back in the old days GW had its two flagship games, Warhammer Fantasy Battle and Warhammer 40,000, but also released rules and miniatures for many other games. These other games, while popular with dedicated fanbases, didn't attract quite the same audience as the two main ones. As such, GW has essentially discontinued the specialist games in favor of their "primary" games.


This seems antithetical to the original purpose of Games Workshop. I don't purport to know what GW's original "mission statement" was, if it even had one, but a company that has a name like "Games Workshop" seems to have an implied purpose. Namely, creating games. Creating two games and then sticking with them (albeit with new editions) doesn't fit that title very well. Back in the 90s when there were a dozen games running around, many with their own dedicated miniatures lines, with new games being developed all the time...that when was Games Workshop actually lived up to its name. Even though I'm not interested in playing all of the games available then, I still wish some of them were still around.


One of the major problems I think is maintaining the multiple miniatures lines. With the move to mostly plastic miniatures, I would think that separate miniatures lines would be easier to maintain. I think the market still exists for Epic 40k and Battlefleet Gothic, and probably a smaller market exists on the fantasy side (Warmaster and Man O'War (the latter despite being discontinued)).  The online communities that remain for these games are a testament to this.


The example set by Gorkamorka was a bad move in my opinion.  while the miniatures themselves were cool and usable in 40k, why the switch to different bases? The only reason I can think of to do it is to provide some distance from 40k and emphasize the game’s differences.  But why would you want to do that?  Perhaps the fear was that people would think the game was essentially the same as 40k, and so there was no reason to get it.  But it’s well known that many players buy the various boxed games because they just want the miniatures.  By having a different basing style, it’s an immediate turn off.


The current method of revitalizing The Lord of the Rings line by making The War of the Ring game is a better approach. Yes, The War of the Ring uses additional bases, but you don't have to re-base the existing models you have--you just plop them into the new, large bases. 



Space Hulk is an anomaly--which makes me think it was an experiment to test the waters.  From the beginning GW said it was a one-shot deal-- (although this has generated no end of skepticism by the cynical, who assumed that it was just a marketing ploy, and that it would remain in production indefinitely).  As a one-shot, the fact that most of the miniatures can’t be used in 40k without modification to their bases isn’t as much of a problem.  But still...I’m hoping that Space Hulk was just a “one shot” in that it they won’t support it beyond the initial release, and not that it was the only “old school” game that they ever intend to re-release.

Chess, StarCraft, and 40k

It's the background that gets you to play the game...but once the game starts, the background goes out the window.

To a degree, even Chess is like this. Chess has a hint of a politico-strategic element to it in the names of its pieces: King, Queen, Bishop, Knight, Rook, Pawn, but the names of the pieces are only incidental to gameplay. They could be called Dog, Top Hat, Wheel Barrow, Race Car, Boot, and Iron, and it would still be the same game. But naming the game pieces after personalities (or fortifications), instills in the player the politico-strategic element to the game, and the players can better imagine it to be a battle of political heavyweights as the maneuverings of the pieces are analogues to maneuverings in a political environment.

At least until they start playing. When the game actually begins, the last thing a player is thinking about is "political machinations." They're thinking of things like the "English Opening", or the "Sicilian Defense", which describe certain opening moves. (I'm far from a chess expert--I just looked up some openings and picked two at random).

If a motivator to play the game is because it's an analogue to political maneuverings, it has been lost. The game has become divorced from its abstract background, and has fallen into a set pattern of opening moves, some of them so common that they've practically become scripted. These moves have been analyzed by expert players to death.

This perspective of the game is certainly not limited to Chess. I'm also a casual Real-Time Strategy game player, and a fan of StarCraft. Soon StarCraft II will be released, but in the meantime the beta is out. I recently got into the beta and have been playing a few games (and losing--clearly I need to get rid of the rust after ten years since I last played the original StarCraft). The StarCraft universe has a rich background, involving three races (Terran, Zerg, and Protoss), each striving for dominance. The game has a single-player mode that consists of multiple missions/games/scenarios in a story-driven campaign where you learn about the conflicting motivations of the three races and how they relate to each other (usually through violence).

But then, fully drawn in by the rich story, it then comes to an end, and the player, wanting a fresh experience, is left with one major outlet to play the game--the multiplayer mode. Nowadays StarCraft is all about the multiplayer mode. What was once an add-on for many games has now become their reason for being. But the multiplayer takes the rich background that hooked the players and tosses it out the window.

The rich background of the game allows the players to imagine Terran marines using their Gauss Rifles to fend off leaping Zerglings and Hydralisks while Siege Tanks support them with deadly artillery fire, and Protoss Zealots wielding their Psionic Blades and raging over the loss of their homeplanet of Aiur to plunge into close combat for revenge.

At least until they start playing. When the game actually begins, the last thing a player is thinking about is Gauss Rifles and Psionic Blades. They're thinking of things like "Marauder Builds", "Muta-ling Builds", "Reaper Rush", splash damage, micro and macro. (the terms micromanagement and macromanagement taking too long to say for such a fast-paced game as StarCraft.) The gamer terminology has overtaken the background to such a degree that players even refer to units with special powers and/or abilities as "casting spells," despite spells usually being associated with science fantasy rather than science fiction. Races in the background story who are the most vicious of enemies, e.g. Protoss and Zerg, are now allies as often as not in the multiplayer environment.

The background as a motivator to draw interest into the game has served its purpose, which can now be ignored. The game has become divorced from its background and has fallen into a pattern of strategies, based not on the background of the game, but rather the damage models used by the game, and the tactics players use to get the most out of the various units. These tactics have been analyzed by expert players to death.

Does any of this sound familiar?

Warhammer 40k is a game with an extremely rich background. Background text is all over the rulebooks, codices, etc. The art in the rulebooks inspires us to imagine the 40k Universe. Black Library publishes novel after novel of what could be argued is just "fluff" for the game (but just as arguably it exists in its own right these days).

But all of this just serves to get us to play the game. (I'd argue that the whole hobby aspect of painting miniatures is an offshoot of the origin of 40k as a game rather than the other way around, as the company is Games Workshop, not Hobbies Workshop, but that's a discussion for another day) Once the game actually starts, who among us bothers to truly think in terms of what is happening from a "background" perspective? We don't really imagine the Space Marines plowing into melee and beating on orks with their chainswords. We think about getting the +1 attack on the charge, re-rolls to wound, winning the combat resolution. We make "Leafblower" army lists, focus on our ability to kill MEQ, and are desperate about getting on troops choices the on objective markers in Turn 5. At tournaments the majority of games are marines vs. marines.

The amazing background of the 40k universe has served its purpose--to get us to play the game. It's rich enough that when we're not playing the game, we still manage to obsess about it, and so much of it would live on even if 40k the game ceased to exist. But while we are playing the game...where does it all go?

Take no Prisoners!

The 40k Universe is a dangerous place.

In the real world, last stands happen in wars, but are generally uncommon (at least in modern times). Far more common is that once a side realizes it's been beaten, it surrenders. The hope of a prisoner is that they'll get to sit out the rest of the conflict and be able to return home (if it still exists) and live a semi-peaceful existence. Frequently that doesn't happen, but it's the hope. That hope, even if possible, is usually chosen because it is perceived as being better than the alternative at the time--which is usually death. 

Not so in the universe of 40k. There, nearly all wars are wars of extermination. "In the grim darkness of the far future, there is only war." Well, not really. More like genocide.

Let's examine the various races in the 40k Universe and the viability of surrendering to them:

Imperial: Humans are so xenophobic they won't tolerate aliens to survive. Individual humans might be able to live alongside aliens, but the official stance is that the only good alien is a dead alien. On the other hand, Imperials surrendering to Imperials (in the case of rebellions or civil wars) is possible, but not usually wise, as the rebels are almost invariably executed anyway.  But there's the slim chance of performing hard labor in a prison for 20 years, tortured, and then killed.  So there's somehing, I guess.

Eldar: Eldar, if they don't exterminate an alien completely, are more likely to just drive an enemy away. If they won't leave, they the Eldar will kill them. What possible use do prisoners have? I can see that if anyone surrendered to Eldar, if they did not kill them outright, they'd disarm them and maroon them on some out of the way death world where they wouldn't be a threat. But only if they were feeling very generous.

Orks: Orks could conceivably take prisoners to use as slaves, but they'd have to restrain themselves from just stomping you. But why bother, when there's already plenty of Gretchin to serve the purpose? But I suppose its possible.  I can see a Mekboy using slaves to help him build some nefarious device and incorporate your race's technology into it.  He might even keep you alive for a while if you do a good job.  But then when you succeed he'll pat you on the back so hard it'll break your spine.  Then he'll send you to the Painboy, who'll chop off your head and sew it back onto another's body.  And that's likely to be the end of the road.

Necrons: Rend the living. Not so bad, considering that's all they'll do to you.  Except maybe wear your skin after they kill you.  But I guess that's better than wearing your skin before you die, which is what the Dark Eldar will do. 

Chaos: Surrendering to Chaos is hardly an option, unless it is done so by trickery (think Slaanesh or Tzeentch), in which case it's not really surrender as it is capture. An eternity of being tortured isn't as good as it sounds.

Dark Eldar: Like with Chaos, death is preferable to capture by these guys, so surrenders generally won't happen. They do take prisoners, however, and you really don't want that to happen.

Tyranids:  Nom nom nom.

Tau: Here we go...a race you can surrender to and they won't kill you out of hand.  But the Tau are still a minor player in the grand scheme of things.  They're not like to survive much longer.  But hopefully you can get captured by them and live in peace.  That is, before they get wiped out by an coalition of all the other races who band together solely to eliminate this upstart race that violates the galactic take no prisoners rule.

With so few options, it's no wonder that most 40k battles have horrendous casualties and most of the time combatants die where they stand.  Considering the alternatives, one would think that heroic last stands are so common in the 41st millenium that they've become passe.

Two kinds of Imperial Guard Players

It seems to me that there are two main kinds of Imperial Guard Players:  The Gamer and the Hobbyist. 

The Gamer plays games often.  He wants to win games, and enjoys the competitive aspects of the game.   He has a lot of experience tweaking his army list in order to get the most out of it.  The Gamer posts his army lists to the forums to get feedback and advice from other players.  He reads tactics articles religiously.  

The Hobbyist designs armies, not army lists.  He plays games when he can, but usually this is far less frequently than the Gamer.  The Hobbyist enjoys the game, but spends far less time playing than he does just thinking about his army.  The Hobbyist is more interested in creating an army that fits the background or "makes sense" from a real world perspective.  He's interested in fielding a force according to a real world organization, and be damned to its effectiveness on the 40k gaming scene.  This "real world perspective" can be simulating a modern force (e.g., my army is theoretically based on a US Army Combined Arms Battalion) or something historical, like a WWII formation, or the Praetorians, simulating the British during the Anglo-Zulu War (q.v. Col. Gravis' fantastic Praetorian Army).


Warhammer 40k is designed as a company-sized game (although you could almost say platoon sized for the more elite armies).  For a game of this size, the Gamer might field several armored fist squads, a Leman Russ or two, a Basilisk/Medusa, and a Vendetta.  (Or perhaps they'd field the Leafblower list.)  There's a little bit of everything, designed to handle many tactical situations. This may be tactically effective within the game, but an organizational nightmare (at least to the more bureaucratic Hobbyist).  The Hobbyist is more likely to field something like an infantry company of three platoons of three squads and a weapons section each, with an armor platoon for support.  If the Hobbyist were to consider using Vendettas or Valkyries, he would more likely consider using entire platoons of them rather than a singleton--platoons fit better into the TO&E.

The Gamer arms his Command HQ squad with an eye to getting the most damage from it.  A typical Gamer Command HQ squad might be armed with an officer with power weapon and plasma pistol, four meltaguns, plasma guns or flamers (4 of each, no mixing), riding in a Chimera.

The Hobbyist may not even consider arming his Colonel with anything more powerful than a laspistol, except maybe a ceremonial power sword.  (If he gives his Colonel a power fist, it's probably because his model has one and he wants his army to be WYSIWYG).  After all, a Colonel should be commanding his troops.  The fighting strength of a regiment is in the arms of the soldiers that make it up, not the commanding officer.  His job is to employ the fighting strength of his men, not embody it.  His squad would therefore consist of his command staff and liaisons such as a Master-Vox, Master of Ordnance, Officer of the Fleet, bodyguard(s) (aides, rather) and possibly standard bearer, depending on the army style.

The Gamer prowls the forums, reading about other gamers' battles, reading tactics and strategies, and discussing army lists.  He will also check out the blogosphere--basically anywhere he can get information on how to improve his game.  The purview of the Hobbyist is primarily just the blogosphere--he frequently has his own blog, and discusses painting, modelling, and army organization (as opposed to army lists)

When a new Codex Arrives, the Gamer asks "What new tricks do I have available now?  Which units are worth fielding and which aren't?"  The Hobbyist asks, "How can I fit the vision of my army into a legal force?"

The Gamer speaks in gamer jargon.  He talks about army "builds", refers to other armies by terms such as "Nidzilla, Smurfs, Clown Cars, Lash Armies, Daemon Bombs, and discusses tactics such as "Melta-spam".  The names of the armies builds frequently are the same as the primary tactic they use.  The Hobbyist speaks in military jargon, and he usually doesn't talk too much about other armies at all.  He refers to things like "sections", "detachments", "combined arms", "order of battle", and knows how to spell "ordnance".

After each game,  the Hobbyist considers painting on honor badges to the models in his army that performed well.  The Gamer considers how to tweak his army list to improve game performance.


The Gamer is more likely to be younger than the Hobbyist.  There are plenty of older Gamers, but many players who used to be Gamers got older, got married and started families, and suddenly had much less time to play.  When they did have free time, they might only have time to work a little bit on their armies, and suddenly found themselves morphing into Hobbyists.

All in all, there's nothing wrong with either type of player; they are both equally valid ways of being involved in the hobby.  I find myself firmly in the category of the "Hobbyist".  I consider myself lucky if I get a game in once a month, and when I do, half the time I make my army list the night before, and don't even start thinking about my strategy until game time.  Most of the rest of the time I spend painting/converting my guardmen and thinking about their regimental organization.  Would I like to play more often?  Absolutely...but that'll probably have to wait until my daughter's in college and/or I retire...or win the lottery.

I keep saying to myself that GW would be far better served if they just paid me to play their games.  I could then quit my job and do this stuff full time.

Chaos Daemon Bloodbath

Seeing this post by Ron over at From the Warp got me thinking about this again.

When I saw the Apocalypse Bloodthirster Bloodbath formation, I thought:  That would be an awesome formation to field.  Just imagining the spectacle of 8 Bloodthirsters suddenly appearing on the battlefield, led by Forgeworld's Bloodthirster Ann'ggrath is just fantastic.  While Ann'ggrath is both huge and expensive, I can almost justify getting him...as the centerpiece to my Bloodthirster Bloodbath.  The problem is, I hate the current GW Bloodthirster.

The current one is dated,  expensive...and limited.  I really wish GW came out with a new Bloodthirster model, preferably a plastic one.   If GW made a new model, that looks better than the current one and in plastic with options to provide some variety, I'd have a very hard time resisting picking some up.  The temptation to field a Bloodbath would just be too great.

I dislike the current model enough that I got a fantasy model instead to represent a Bloodthirster, Bel'Akor the Dark Master: 

In the meantime, the closest substitutes for Bloodthirsters are:

• Soul Grinder - This is something of a stretch, with its Defiler lower half, but the upper half has possibilities.
• GW Daemon Prince - Also a stretch--the model has a great head & claws, the but the rest of the model is too obviously a Chaos Space Marine to really work as a Bloodthirster in its own right.
• Forgeworld's Daemon Prince -Great model, and would serve just fine as a Bloodthirster.  Only downside is that it's somewhat expensive, about ~$100.  If he was $50, this would be a no brainer.

All three would need conversion work to give them wings.  But I do like the idea of each Bloodthirster being unique and having its own "personality."  But it looks like I'll have to wait...sigh.

The Inverse Law of Arguments Mattering

A certain situation has happened again and again in my gaming experience. One player interprets a rule one way ("He gets a 5+ save!"), while the other player interprets it another way ("No, he gets a 2+ save!"). The more these two players argue and make an issue over it, the more likely the eventual die roll will make both interpretations irrelevant. (the actual die roll in the example above will almost certainly be a 1 or a 6. As the discussion gets longer and more heated, the probability of this occurring approaches 1)

More succinctly, the more you argue over a particular rules interpretation or how to handle a given situation, the less it will matter because the point will end up being moot.

This is known as "The Inverse Law of Arguments Mattering", or the "Law of Your Pants".

It is described by the equation:

U R = 1/(pants)

where
U = Importance of the point of contention to the game as a whole
R = Relevance of the point of contention to the game as a whole
p = number of players involved in argument
a = anger level generated
n = number of rulebooks consulted
t = length of time the point is argued
s = stupidity of the whole situation

A corollary to this is that the more effort you exert in winning the argument, the less of an impact your little victory will have on the game. (For example: You argue vociferously that your character gets a cover save against that meltagun, only to have him killed 2 seconds later by a laspistol shot from the same attacking unit)

Game or Simulation?

Over the past decade, within my gaming group, we've had many pick up games, the forces and scenario being determined by a rule of "Who hasn't played each other in a while? What scenario haven't we tried in a while?" Those have been lots of fun. But with time I've been increasingly drawn to narrative scenarios/campaigns rather than unstructured "pick up games." I find that thinking about these story based scenarios is more fun than thinking about isolated games that have no larger context.

My biggest and arguably best Battle Report, The Assault on Morkandy Beach is the classic example. And yet, the victor of that battle was entirely predetermined. In designing the scenario, we decided from the beginning that the Imperial Guard were going to win the battle--the "drama", as it were, would be just how long and how many casualties it took for them to finally succeed. In many ways it was one of the most fun battles I participated in, and when I posted it, it got the most feedback of any Battle Report I ever posted (originally I had posted it on various message boards).

40k is clearly a "game" and most players view it as such, but in generating the Morkandy Beach scenario, I turned it into a "simulation." The primary difference between a war "game" and a "simulation" is that simulations frequently ignore any attempt at balance between the forces involved and/or their objectives. They address "what if" scenarios.

As I am a big history fan, this is the kind of game that interests me the most. In the real world, armies are never evenly matched, and generals have to make do with what they have. Increasingly, I find myself thinking less about trying to fit armies into specific points value (i.e., what can I make with 2000pts?) and thinking more about giving myself deliberate limitations on my army choice to fit the scenario. The game becomes less about winning, and more about what can I manage to pull off with the forces at my disposal.

Also, in the real world, opposing armies often have wildly varying objectives--beyond just "kill the other guy." 40k tries to deal with this aspect by assigning physical "objectives" to players, such that they have to take and hold specific points on the battlefield. This is a good start, but in making the game a "simulation", I like to go farther than that. Many of the more scenario based games in 40k and its supplements address than the 3 types in the main rulebook. But in general, even these scenarios are created with a view to maintain game balance--for each disadvantage one side has, it is given an advantage in another aspect to keep it fair. This is fine for the intended purpose, but think it can also be interesting to let the balance fall out the window completely if it makes sense for the scenario.

I know some players might view this perspective as madness--why on earth would you deliberately handicap yourself (or your opponent), either in terms of army selection or scenario? Isn't this the very definition of cheese (or stupidity, depending who has the advantage)? Well, for me it's not about winning, and it's not about handicapping myself with the goal of improving my skills as a player so I can kick butt in a regular, balanced game. It's about putting myself in the shoes of a "real world" commander, in order to get an understanding of the problems that one would face when dealing with a "real world" battlefield that isn't always fair.

But then, 40k is science-fiction. There ARE no "real world" commanders, dealing with "real world" problems on a "real world" 40k battlefield. But so what? I think many players would agree that games (of all kinds) are more fun if they have greater immersion. For me, I find it more fun playing a more "simulation" version of the game where I think more about achieving my objectives as an Imperial Commander (or Ork, Eldar, Tau, whatever), rather than defeating my human opponent in an abstract dice-rolling "game."

One of the beauties of 40k is that you can play it any way you want and have fun.

Are you Population 1 or Population 2?

Over on that great 40k blog, Bell of Lost Souls, Brass Scorpion recently put up an excellent editorial piece: "A Funny Thing Happened On The Way To The Forum". I won't reproduce it here (click on the link above, it's worth the read), but the gist was that on gaming forums, there seems to be two basic populations. Population 1 consists of gamers/hobbyists who post to forums to "support" the hobby, they discuss rules, playing the game, painting their miniatures. They even criticize all aspects of the hobby (including GW itself), but they do so constructively and with decorum. Population 2 consists of gamers/hobbyists who post to forums, as he puts it, "to entertain themselves at the expense of others." They criticize (non-constructively), flame, and appear to have a chip on their shoulders against GW.

Brass Scorpions advocates the position of the Population 1. Personally, I can't see why anyone would disagree with him on this.

I was surprised at the number of comments (186 at last count). Clearly this issue is important to people to have engendered such a vocal response. The responses start out positively, but then, to my dismay, I saw that it devolved into flaming (primarily a small minority). It is irony at its best--Brass Scorpion comes out against flaming, and then is flamed for it. He was called everything from a GW shill for saying he likes their products to a fascist for daring to advocate that we be polite to each other while discussing the hobby we all supposedly love. What is wrong with these people?

It is good to see so many blogs in the blogosphere where the attitude is more positive, the FTW Blogger Group being a good example of this. Blogs can so easily become nothing more than a vehicle for ranting (does this post constitute a rant?), so it is nice to see that a community exists where people talk about the hobby they enjoy in a positive way. I have nothing against constructive criticism, but I just don't see what purpose destructive criticism serves.

Anyway, I didn't read all of the flames--instead, I just skimmed over them (once I identified it as a flame, I moved on). Eventually I got up from the computer and did something more worth my time--I painted some miniatures.