Competitive players to warhammer 40k are toxic to the overall game...

[Stone Edwards]

This is the point I disagree on. For one the proclaimed "casual fun gamer" doesnt exist. Yes there are players that play for fun tossing their dice having a good time. Yes there are players that do that casually. Yes there are players that do both.
But they still play to win the game. And thus act competitive. They are not jerking around rules or write any hardcore list, but in the end they try to secure the mission objectives, they try to kill enemy units and try to keep their army alive. They dont do that out of coincidence, they try to win the game. Not at all costs. Maybe they allow you to reconsider a move or let you do your shooting again after you where eager to charge a unit and forgot about shooting (I know people who actually forget quite often)... but they still try to win.
If they throw a game on purpose and let you win it wont be fun. And it usually leaves bad feelings.
Also a thight ruleset does not mean a casual player must obey all rules at any cost. Ther could be basic rules, advanced rules and specialist rules covering more and more stuff. Also casual players tend to ignore rules anyways. Not because they agree on doing so, but because they forget about them. Its not bad to have a tight ruleset. You pick the ones you like and agree to ignore the ones you dont like (think about agreeing to ban SC, Allies, escalation, stronghold, forge world,...) thats catering to both "groups".
The reason we have sloppy rules is not because they want to cater to casual fun gamers (as even friendly built armies can be so horrendous unbalanced to eachother that the game ends on turn 2 and is no fun at all) but because they want to crank out as much stuff as possible at low development costs. Playtesting takes a termendous amount of time. Finetuning is a horrid never ending task.
Look at the patchnotes to any multifaction pc game which can be played competitive such as LoL, SC2, Dota,... they never stop to balance stuff.
Some companies also do that for tabletop. GW doesnt. It generates no additional profit and you actually have to invest money. Thats the sad truth.

Ok, when I say competitive players I'm mostly talking about players who do things like take spammy net lists or won't let you shoot after you forgot, obviously I don't think that casual players don't care about winning (and I think hardly anyone else would either). Arguing about semantics like this doesn't really advance the debate at all.

As you said earlier in the thread having the rule there already makes it easier. Sure casual players could just ignore rules that ruin what they want to do or come up with new ones, but the exact same thing can be said of competitive players. As has been made clear GW doesn't want to deal with writing for real competitive players so it makes perfect sense that the rules reflect that.

As far as comparing this to games like LoL and SC2. Not only is there MUCH less to balance in those games compared to 40k (just think of all the different factions, units, and variations on those units), but 40k is also a physical game. Think of how mad some people get when a new codex every couple years can make their favorite models "useless", think about how awful that would be if it happened monthly. Sure other miniature games be this as well but they typically have smaller buy ins and/or smaller model counts. Having to replace one warjack is much easier to take than replacing 10 man units.

[Charon]

Ok, when I say competitive players I'm mostly talking about players who do things like take spammy net lists or won't let you shoot after you forgot, obviously I don't think that casual players don't care about winning (and I think hardly anyone else would either). Arguing about semantics like this doesn't really advance the debate at all.

There is already an issue because for you "competitive" is synonym with "jerk" they way you describe it.

As you said earlier in the thread having the rule there already makes it easier. Sure casual players could just ignore rules that ruin what they want to do or come up with new ones, but the exact same thing can be said of competitive players. As has been made clear GW doesn't want to deal with writing for real competitive players so it makes perfect sense that the rules reflect that.

No, there is a difference. I never said create new ones (this option ALWAYS exists if your gaming group agrees - much more difficult to negotiate that with a stranger). I said feel free to ignore rules. I cant ignore what is not there. Sloppy rules mean that if I ignore the little rest which is presented, I can quit the game and make one up myself. I dont need a rulebook for that and GW loses another customer.
Many rules allow you to ignore some. Few rules dont allow you to ignore some to make the game better, it just gets worse.

As far as comparing this to games like LoL and SC2. Not only is there MUCH less to balance in those games compared to 40k (just think of all the different factions, units, and variations on those units), but 40k is also a physical game. Think of how mad some people get when a new codex every couple years can make their favorite models "useless", think about how awful that would be if it happened monthly. Sure other miniature games be this as well but they typically have smaller buy ins and/or smaller model counts. Having to replace one warjack is much easier to take than replacing 10 man units.

Nobody expects chess balance. But some things are just broken to a point that the game tends to get boring if you even think about taking them in your list. No spamming needed. Some armies are just bland unfun to play against. Imperial guard is my prime example of this. I had not a single fun game vs imperial guard since 5th edition. Thats not because all IG players are jerks but the way the faction is designed.
You dont even need to completely change rules each month. But to actually crank out FAQs every 2 months and take care of broken mechanics like rerollable 2++ or summon spamming. I dont think thats too much to ask for.

[chicop76]

I'll just go into this without read the first 4 pages and give my opinion about this matter.

The actual toxicity I've seen comes from the Elitist mind set. Here is a few examples I've seen with this.

1. Player A brings a solid list of shooty nids, not awesome, but by it being unusual throws off most players. Player B brings a list that is his opinion what he got from reading a book. Player A just wants to play a game. While player B is using an anti nid army that is similar to what was used in the battle of Maccagre.

Now the problem comes from player A don't really care if he win or lose, just that he wants to play a good game. Player B have the mind set he should win, because that is what happens in the books. When player B losses he gets upset and no longer wants to play player A and label them a power gamer.

This is a problem I see happen a lot. People assume x army should win over y army. Not saying all fluffy players tailor list according to narrative to beat competitive players, heck competitive players do the same thing. The problem is I see fluffy players get upset at losing more than a competitive player does.

2. Think 40k as a sport. You have Tiger Woods who is really good at golf and the casual golfer. There problem is instead of having an elite place for the pro golfer and a casual place for the casual golfer. You wind up playing tiger woods when you want to just play a casual game. No one likes to be curbed stomped. Do we ask Tiger Woods to play worst or do the casual player step up his game? Their is no real answer for that since people have their opinions. The problem with Tiger Woods in playing down his game he actually gets worst and have a harder time winning against people at his level. While the casual player simply gets frustrated that he have to log in the same hours.

I have so called switched armies with people the following game and still curb stomp the guy just to show it's not the list that sucks. However a gamer you have logged lots of gaming hours and played since 3rd is going to be better than a person who have played months and just started in 6th. The only problem older players really have is adjusting to the new rule set. Once they do than look out.

3. I seen people trying to learn the game, out of towners, etc. Have a hard time playing a game simply either the other Ayer want an easy victory, mainly due to that, or the other players do not have a fluffy army.

4. The biggest thing is stereotype as well. For example I'll take Grey knights. They wasn't the most open army, but they did get a lot of deals and low costing gear, and army wide force weapons, and higher strength assault cannons that anyone in the army can use, while some can take up to 4 assault cannons, and the list goes on. Where they unbeatable, no. Was it a pain to deal with, yes. Was it cheesy, that's up for debate. It's not rerollable 2+ invulnerable saves with it will not die, invisibility, and +4 feel no pain, which in my opinion is cheesy and not fun to play against.

The problem with 7th is people are scared of really silly things like an army of nurgle chaos marine bikes on the board for example with invisibility galore casted upon them. However lack of troops will hurt in this edition more since you simply can't contest anymore. You will need a good amount of troops to win games. What good are the nurgle bikes if they can't get rid of 30 men guard squads sitting on objectives causing the guard player to score while those bikes get crap. If anything I think you'll see more balanced list in the long run when people start losing games due to lack of troops that are durable and can move.

Besides daemons, more specifically certain psychic powers I think 7th is more balancing than people realize. The more I read and find out the more I realized I have more flexibility, but I need the troop basics to win games.

Also another note. I want to address accepted power gamers which blows my mind. What I call accepted is when you see crazy looking armies that are fluffy. If said power gamer have a fluffy list it's excepted. When said gamer have said list and it's not fluffy than it's a power gamer.

I think if you get rid of the Elitist attitudes, and people just play the game than it will help the game a lot. For example people refusing to play non painted armies for example. It's just a game people. Although heavy proxies do have it's limits. For the most part it's not that the so call player don't want his army painted. It's the Elitist that don't help the player figure out how to paint his army. I seen unpainted armies simply due to people tried to paint them, but given a hard time on how bad they painted. To be honest competitive players can care less if he plays against an unpainted army or not.

I think that's it. I wouldn't say it's the competitive players mucking up the game solely. If you lose learn from it and try to figure out how to counter what was done. If you lost cause you suck than practice, practice, practice. If you lost due to model choice. Than look within fluff to swap out units. If you lost due to poor army matches. Like nid zilla vs dark eldar it's an uphill battle with little you can do against it, unless you don't nid zilla, balance your list, or simply play something else.

Another thing is list balancing. Fluff players have a hard time doing that to competitive players. Competitive players typically have the most balanced list since they can pretty much face anything. Flying Circus for example is a pain, but against Tau for example it can get shut down, especially if the Tau player is familiar with Daemons. Flying Circus is a one trick pony that works well against low unit count armies with lack of anti air. If faced against a lot of units and lots of anti air and lots of high strength ap 3 shooting than it have a hard time. The difference is you kill those 5 units it's game over for the daemon player, vs if you have to kill 20 units on the other side that are problem units.

Anyway I would say it's both sides. I mean is it realistic to ask Tiger Woods to stop playing the way he does. Get a different job and just play goof casual for fun. If someone wrote that a person should beat him than Tiger Woods should let them win due to the article that was written.

[-Tom-]

1. Player A brings a solid list of shooty nids, not awesome, but by it being unusual throws off most players. Player B brings a list that is his opinion what he got from reading a book. Player A just wants to play a game. While player B is using an anti nid army that is similar to what was used in the battle of Maccagre.

Now the problem comes from player A don't really care if he win or lose, just that he wants to play a good game. Player B have the mind set he should win, because that is what happens in the books. When player B losses he gets upset and no longer wants to play player A and label them a power gamer.

This is a problem I see happen a lot. People assume x army should win over y army. Not saying all fluffy players tailor list according to narrative to beat competitive players, heck competitive players do the same thing. The problem is I see fluffy players get upset at losing more than a competitive player does.

This got me thinking... extending this argument out to Eldar, basing our army choices on fluff from the literature we should expect to lose anyway Most likely we should have our own mission cards released so that, in fact, we still get to think of it as a 'sort of win'. We should rock up to the table and get curb stomped by making some stupid heroic sacrifices. We reach across the table and congratulate you on your win, and then reveal our mission card that says something like "Throw away thousands of lives pointlessly as a cover for some sneaky other secret mission. Roll a D6, on a 4+ you have rescued a lost phoenix lord or something and you may count it is a win".

[chicop76]

This got me thinking... extending this argument out to Eldar, basing our army choices on fluff from the literature we should expect to lose anyway Most likely we should have our own mission cards released so that, in fact, we still get to think of it as a 'sort of win'. We should rock up to the table and get curb stomped by making some stupid heroic sacrifices. We reach across the table and congratulate you on your win, and then reveal our mission card that says something like "Throw away thousands of lives pointlessly as a cover for some sneaky other secret mission. Roll a D6, on a 4+ you have rescued a lost phoenix lord or something and you may count it is a win".

Lol. Personally I liked the game more in 3rd and 4th. Mainly due to how terrain and los worked out. Now hiding behind trees my whole unit gets wiped out. The problem with terrain it is hard to really have a proper battle field. Also lack of terrain sucks. Than throw in tlos., sigh. Anyway hoping in 8th they abandon tlos. Personally I think GW likes tlos since it forces you to actually buy terrain, heaven forbid the terrain is 2 dimensional. Also it messes up vassal games since tlos is really impossible. However I enjoy vassal games more since it brings the game back to 3rd and 4th edition since it is 2 dimensional terrain.

After reading the first four pages it really didn't change what I wrote. However I was surprised about the support that competitive players recievd than anything else.

On of my favorite games is chess and especially Axis and Allies. Personally I think the units shoukd be more customizable, make hem more unique. My hope for 7th is that it will bring more uniqueness to armies out there. If anything 7th brings a lot of ambiguity to competitive players since it's harder to counter with all the different crap out there, not to mention the potential endless combos out there. It's akin to magic forcing players to play white only, or one color decks and than coming out and saying you can mix colors and give out mana with the ability to do so. Now it will be hard to counter armies.

For example if it's mono Tau you pretty know what you have to deal with. When you throw in tAu, guard. Marines, daemons in the mix it kinda mess up your strategy to deal with that player.

[DarkLink]

Yeah, I call bull**** on the idea that the game can't be good both casually and competitively. And if you're dismissing some of the stuff sirlin says as just waac nonsense, you missed some pretty fundamental concepts in his articles. He might not address it in that particular article, but he does discuss that sort of thing elsewhere.

[Lord Asterion]

This is the point I disagree on. For one the proclaimed "casual fun gamer" doesnt exist. Yes there are players that play for fun tossing their dice having a good time. Yes there are players that do that casually. Yes there are players that do both.
But they still play to win the game. And thus act competitive. They are not jerking around rules or write any hardcore list, but in the end they try to secure the mission objectives, they try to kill enemy units and try to keep their army alive. They dont do that out of coincidence, they try to win the game. Not at all costs. Maybe they allow you to reconsider a move or let you do your shooting again after you where eager to charge a unit and forgot about shooting (I know people who actually forget quite often)... but they still try to win.
If they throw a game on purpose and let you win it wont be fun. And it usually leaves bad feelings.
Also a thight ruleset does not mean a casual player must obey all rules at any cost. Ther could be basic rules, advanced rules and specialist rules covering more and more stuff. Also casual players tend to ignore rules anyways. Not because they agree on doing so, but because they forget about them. Its not bad to have a tight ruleset. You pick the ones you like and agree to ignore the ones you dont like (think about agreeing to ban SC, Allies, escalation, stronghold, forge world,...) thats catering to both "groups".
The reason we have sloppy rules is not because they want to cater to casual fun gamers (as even friendly built armies can be so horrendous unbalanced to eachother that the game ends on turn 2 and is no fun at all) but because they want to crank out as much stuff as possible at low development costs. Playtesting takes a termendous amount of time. Finetuning is a horrid never ending task.
Look at the patchnotes to any multifaction pc game which can be played competitive such as LoL, SC2, Dota,... they never stop to balance stuff.
Some companies also do that for tabletop. GW doesnt. It generates no additional profit and you actually have to invest money. Thats the sad truth.

I think reading this gave me an insight into your life, I'm very very sorry, but "casual fun gamers" most certainly go exist, they play, they don't play to win, they play because the joy of being with friends and playing games with their models gives them pleasure, winning isn't even a consideration. I really do feel bad for you if you can't accept this as a reality, because it means you're missing something I and my friends find fundemental to the hobby.

[chicop76]

I think reading this gave me an insight into your life, I'm very very sorry, but "casual fun gamers" most certainly go exist, they play, they don't play to win, they play because the joy of being with friends and playing games with their models gives them pleasure, winning isn't even a consideration. I really do feel bad for you if you can't accept this as a reality, because it means you're missing something I and my friends find fundemental to the hobby.

Basically he's a casual basketball player who gets upset when Michael Jordan owns him.

[ElectricPaladin]

Basically he's a casual basketball player who gets upset when Michael Jordan owns him.

No. He's a casual basketball player who gets upset when Michael Jordan comes into his local gym, insists on playing by NBA rules, owns everyone, and then tells them that they're playing the game wrong.

[40kGamer]

I'm glad competitive gamers exist. I love a fun fluffy game with friends where who wins isn't really a big deal but I also enjoy going toe to toe with someone desperately trying to win. Our hobby takes all kinds. Put an end to gamer discrimination.