Article on Fanboys, Exclusivity, and Sonic the Hedgehog

[eldargal]

Excellent article, pretty much sums up my thoughts on the matter. I've no problem with people preferring Warmachine to GW and playing it instead, what I do have a problem with is people coming on a 40k/WFB forum and whinging about GW products and telling people to play WM instead. Ditto for the reverse, though I've not seen that happen in the WM sections of BoLS or Warseer as yet.

[DarkLink]

@ Darklink: no, not quite. 2 reasons - there are no dice in chess, and each piece does 1 thing (all melee) not shooting or spells.

Well, your complaint with Warmachine wasn't that dice were involved, it was that you didn't like the win condition of "kill the caster". Or at least, that's what I read. And since the win condition for chess is always "kill one specific model", it sounds like it really is the same thing. Warmachine introduces randomness and complexity through dice and buffs and similar wargaming mechanics, while chess introduces them via restricted and specific available moves that make thinking ahead of your opponent difficult and complex, especially in the long term.

Also, as befits a thousand year old game, chess players are more dignified than to try to convince me that it is the saviour of my soul from the evil that is 40K.

That's a problem with the players, not the game. I wouldn't say that I disliked a game because annoying people played it (so long as there were normal people to play it so I could ignore the annoying people).

[Denzark]

@ Mr DL - no, I clearly haven't explained fully. The 'kill the king' objective is not bad in itself. But combined with WM fanboyz saying 'the rules are tighter, updated every third pulse of the atomic clock, and only played by a combination of Alexander the Great, Sun Tzu and Cobra Commander due to their infinite complexities' it smacks of tosh.

And I don't think I actually have stated I dislike the warmachine game anywhere - it is mediocre to good (I can think of 3-4 games that I would rather play given a free 2-3 hours in my life) but if you look at warmachine as a whole, including rules, prices, minis, fluff, and importantly, players, the last factor is what is turning my ambivalence (from the first factors) for the WM hobby into a dislike. My loathing is, however, reserved for the 'preachers' as per my OP in this thread.

@ Ms EG - you are quite correct. My internet thug persona has maintained some maturity, in that I have resisted crayoning over WM threads in their forum in a wanton rollercoaster ride of kill bill-esque retribution for perceived ills.

[Mauglum.]

Hi all.
In my humble opinion the false dichoctemy spouted by the fanboys , THERE IS ONLY GW!
WARMAHORDES IS BETTER THAN GW!

Has sort of polorised writing of the OP.
I am aware the article was to point out the narrow view of people with a strong emotional tie to a manufacturers product line, rather than the HOBBY it self.

But I would rather think the actual difference is GW plc vs the rest of the companies in the table top minature games hobby.

As '...GW plc are in the buisness of selling toy soldiers to children.'And as such operate an insular marketing structure , and tend to use asthetic inspiration , for short term appeal.Instead of the long term interest companies that focus on gameplay seem to use.

I have no problem with people enjoying GW plc products.(You pay your money and make your chioce.)

However , I belive alot of people simply feel there is not any option to GWplc products. And as there is quite a lot of OBJECTIVE arguments about how poorly GW plc compare on value for money.

The only recource for the 'GW fan' is 'I like it because I like it, not because it good value for money!'
Which is absolutley fine and acceptable.(Denzark.)

But the 'GW FANBOYS' have such a strong emotional attachment they simply can not except that GW plc products do not compare favorably to other products.
And as they can not make any defense using facts, they are only left with emotional ties which often displays like 'religeous indignation.'

And the Warmahordes , fanboys are usualy ex GW players , who have found ONE of the many game available outside the GWplc branded 'GW hobby'.

And want to 'show' how great the TTMG hobby is with one limited example.Rather than use the massive variety availbale.

It is YOUR HOBBY . use what ever minatures you want , with the rule sets you like best!

[eldargal]

But your statement is subjective in its entirety. GW do compare favourably, they are the market leader for a reason, you know.

There is objective evidence in the sense that there are cheaper models than GW, but whether or not they are better value is subjective. Mantic are much cheaper, but in my subjective opinion they are utter trash. So they are certainly not better value for me because.

Warmachine models are quite nice, some of them, but they are more expensive per model than GW so that hardly speaks against GW.

Off the top of my head I can only think of the new Avatars of War plastic dorfs that I like as much as GW models and are cheaper. That is one kit though.

Your opinion may differ, hence the 'subjective' thing. But GW does not objectively compare disfavourably to the competition. Are they more expensive than some? Yes, does that objectively make them poor value? No. If you prefer the cheaper kit, then yes, but that is subjective.

I'm all for people preferring Mantic, WM or whatever to GW, what annoys me is when they come into GW forums and start spouting guff about their preferences being objectively better than other peoples when it is simply not true.

Hi all.
However , I belive alot of people simply feel there is not any option to GWplc products. And as there is quite a lot of OBJECTIVE arguments about how poorly GW plc compare on value for money.

The only recource for the 'GW fan' is 'I like it because I like it, not because it good value for money!'
Which is absolutley fine and acceptable.(Denzark.)

But the 'GW FANBOYS' have such a strong emotional attachment they simply can not except that GW plc products do not compare favorably to other products.
And as they can not make any defense using facts, they are only left with emotional ties which often displays like 'religeous indignation.'

[SotonShades]

I'm a little too hung over to really get in to this right now, but I did want to say that it was a nice article, I mostly agreed with the points made and I enjoyed reading it

I also have to say that I agree with eldargirl's stance; by all means play other games, enjoy them and do feel free to introduce me to them. However please do not go to a forum or any other environment that is solely for the discussion of 40k and tell me your system is better. Equally, 40k fanboys shouldn't do the reverse, or attempt to shout down the rest just because they play the market leading game etc.

Around here, there doesn't seem to be much interest in other games systems (at least, not amongst my gaming group) so I'm fairly happy to stick with GW. I don't feel that their models or policy or prices are particularly bad , neither do I feel they are perfect. I am very aware though that that is how I feel. Fanboys, on either side, don't seem to get that their opinions are often how they feel.

[scadugenga]

Oh, there's anti-PP trolling on the WM/H forums, it's just nowhere near the level that you see happening in the 40k forums.

I chalk that up to 40k (and WFB) being the "entry point" for the majority of new(er) gamers. 40k is all they know, so when they get disillusioned, some end up getting all "born again grass-is-greener-esque" and start trying to regurgitate their opinion on everyone else's plate.

You don't see many gamers' entry-point being PP. It's something people discover having already been in the community after awhile, so there's less "BAGiG" going on the reverse direction.

Maybe the trolling tends to stem from some partially-hidden self-esteem problem. Like the troll's image of self-worth is somehow tied in to the perception of their favorite game or something.

[laestli]

I remember this whole fanboi thing with WoW and WaR, even a very similar article. The born again MMO nutjob Warhammer fanboi's were ridiculously annoying in any thread where people were trying to compare and contrast the two games on official and unofficial forums. I'm sure we'll see this whole thing play out again and again as time goes on, emotional investment will pretty much guarantee it. At least the fanboi vs. fanboi cripple fights are amusing from certain point of view.

[Verilance]

from my perspective this is nothing new, I started wargaming with boardgames primarily those produced by Avalon Hill in the seventies. but as with most of my peers this new games Dungeons and Dragons was starting up and lots of people went to role-play. There was some difficulty between the boardgamers and the role-players as well.

Then folks (and I was one) became disenchanted with D&D because of its limitations and moved on to other systems which were better (for them) because they heightened the gaming experience (for them) arguments were long and heated on this topic.

the more things change the more they stay the same

[Mauglum.]

Hi eldargal
I was refering to the GW plc products that CAN be compared objectivley, NOT the ashetic preference for a particular style of minature.
All products that have a function , (hobby supplies and rule books.)
Can be compared objectivley.

And as such GW plc products in this catagory often do not compare well to the competitors products.
Sorry if I did not make this clear.

A persons personal taste for individual minatures only goes so far as to cover 'collectors ' portion of the customers.And if you like it enough you can justify paying the asking price, to your own personal sense of value.
(We all do this...)

(However , as the customer base is shrinking with every price rise,the price rises get higher and higher to cover the ever decreasing sales volumes...this will evenualy result in GW plc pricing them selves out of the market.)

For people that play games , the 'value for money' covers the cost of the entire experiance.And this is where the 'fanboys' start spouting 'GW plc spin' in defence of what they love,(on 'blind faith' as the op calls it.)Rather than acept the objective critisism of the functional elements of the GW plc product range.

The reason GW plc is the market leader, in thier own self proclaimed niche of the market.
Has far more to do with what GW did ,(1985 to 1997) rather than what they are doing now.
(Factual fiscal study underway of the performance year on year of GW plc 2001 to 2011.When complete this will give actual evidence of how much sales volume has been lost recently!)

'GW plc make the best toy soldiers in the world*'.
(*For GW plc games.Apart from AoW, and other manufacturers that you may like, that are sometimes cheaper...)

If you enjoy GW plc products, fine by me!

I Just want EVERYONE to be aware of the alternatives available, that GW FANBOYS AND PP FANBOYS pretend do not exist...

Enjoy your hobby , it belongs to YOU.
(Not GW,PP,AoW,Battlefront Mantic Games ,Reaper,PeterPig,Perry Minatures, Warlord games,TTG, Heresy Minatures etc .....I think you get where I am coming from .)

happy gaming
Lanrak.