What's up with the 40K community?

[xbenblasterx]

So how come we guy's are so much louder than anyone else?

Undoubtedly, 40K and Warhammer Fantasy are the two ring leaders within the tabletop wargaming market and as a result no doubt boast the largest communities and player bases.

Yet many people argue that other systems such as Warmachine and Hordes are growing to 40k scale rapidly and have recently become extremely popular, the same could even be said for Infinity. All of these systems can especially Warmachine since they've been around for over ten years now could possibly say that their respective communities are becoming comparable to that of GW's systems and yets why is it news on either 40k or Fantasy that always dominates our headlines? Why is there not as much fan service for other systems.

Is it simply because Privateer Press run such a smooth ship there isn't really a whole lot to discuss and GW is always finding ways to rile us up. I dunno I just think that 40k and fantasy communities seem so much more active that there counterparts. Especially on this forum in particular.

Do you guys feel the same? Or am I completely misguided and need to look harder!

[Deadlift]

I dont really know about other areas, but in my area nobody plays anything but 40k. I think it's also the "gateway" to wargaming for many who play other games, so whilst people who play Infinity, x-wing and Warmahordes etc they may also play GWs games too (except LOTR /Hobbit )

[Popsical]

I think youll find the flames of war community is huge also.
FOW has its own dedicated forum which caters solely for the system, there is quite often a hard core of gamers that have stopped buying GW for many reasons (especially in historical wargaming) who prefer to use forums free of GW news and gossip.
To be honest if i could find a local group of FOW players i would move away from 40k more.
My group however staunchly refuse to do anything but GW.

[chicop76]

I tried Warmachine and what I complained about in 40k was even more so in Warmachine. In 40k you can still win with a sucky list. In Warmachine that is not the case.

That being said if 40k was like warmachine except rules wise I would like 40k much better. I think warmachine is stil trying to please it's customer base, while 40k aka walmart games know they have their customers and could care less.

The fact I can bit order and I get decent boxed packs with warmachine makes them more attractive. However I thought 40k was complicated. The most op army in Warmachine and hordes makes necrons and grey knights look balanced.

I do notice the last two edition s 40k have been trying to be more like warmachine in the rules. Honestly I wish they try to stay original and don't copy off warmachine at all. If they are too much like warmachine than I can play warmachine.

[YorkNecromancer]

Like Deadlift says, I think it's just popularity.

The more popular something gets, the more vocal people get about the problems. The more niche, the fewer complaints, because seriously - who's going to care?

"What, you're complaining about how broken the Viktorias are? Well... wait, are we talking about Warmachine? Malifaux? What's that?"

Complaining about GW has always been the unspoken "fourth leg" of the hobby (after gaming, modelling and painting). You'll know Warmachine has truly made it when people start to complain more than they talk about how much they love it.

[chicop76]

I think youll find the flames of war community is huge also.
FOW has its own dedicated forum which caters solely for the system, there is quite often a hard core of gamers that have stopped buying GW for many reasons (especially in historical wargaming) who prefer to use forums free of GW news and gossip.
To be honest if i could find a local group of FOW players i would move away from 40k more.
My group however staunchly refuse to do anything but GW.

I seen fow pop up at a lot of stores. It is much cheaper than 40k and looks fun. The only draw back is getting in a game at some places.

[Popsical]

Weird isnt it, that folk moan endlessly about granny and her total disregard for the players/consumers, but they often wont try anything new.
Even when GW are far more expensive and folk whine about that too. Odd.

[Brakkart]

I think part of it has to do with variety. We are so much more vocal about discussing 40k because there is so much more of it to discuss. I don't play Warmahordes so I apologise if my numbers aren't precise, but from what I have read of it there are something like 6 factions for Warmachine and about the same number of factions for Hordes for a grand total of 12ish factions. Now we can double that on just the most popular Space Marine armies alone, without counting in the various Craftworlds, Hive Fleets, Traitor forces, Qabals and Imperial Guard regiments and that's before we get onto forces that have barely featured in models or not featured at all like a huge number of the Xenos races that we know are in the 40k universe as well as forces like the AdMech (only just starting to really be covered).

Part of the way that PP have built their game is to introduce a unit and have a model for it right away. GW on the other hand have mentioned literally dozens of units, vehicles and characters that do not have models or rules for them in their various books (both game and Black Library publications) which leaves a lot of room for discussion, interpretation, wishlisting and such all of which generates threads on these and other forums.

[Mr Mystery]

GW suffers from 'hobby hipsters'.

They can be found in vast numbers over on Dakka.

They can be spotted by a vociferous dislike for GW, and treat those who have the temerity to actually enjoy the hobby they've sunk countless of hours and thousands of their local currency into like frothing lunatics with some kind of infectious mental disorder.

Nothing GW does is ever good enough, and they compare those who disagree as battered spouses defending their abuser (real comparison!), whilst failing to admit that the second GW do something they've been demanding (such as digital books), it's instantly some kind of carefully calculated and entirely personal kick in the 'nads.

Nobody has ever worked out why, as their complaints are so fluid, it's hard to keep track of precisely what the whinge of the month actually is.

[Popsical]

40ks fluff is far better and available in pretty much every book store in the world now often as best sellers.
Warmahordes just cant match that, and probably never will.
Historical games are the only ones to match or beat that, WW2 being the most popular game, ACW being the most written about.

MM, losing games is the main reason for the hate. To many losses and the moaners must find fault in the game.