Losing Gracefully... Help

[Wolfshade]

One of the things that you could do is consider what your army is doing. So, when you play a game consider what went well and what didn't. What units were worth it and what wasn't or was the issue how a unit was used. Then make small tweaks to the list to address these small areas. But that is possibly more how to improve rather than how to lose gracefully.

It is an old axiom but it isn't all about the winning, it is the playing that counts. Sounds a little cheesey sorry about that.

[Ian Mulcahy]

One of the things I enjoy doing sometimes is just getting a fun narrative for the battle going. Cheesy battle cries, laughing at the sheer ridiculousness that the dice can bring, and bringing in my own little bit of fun. Enjoy the story that unfolds as the game progresses. I find that leads to some memorable moments that last long past the battle. Here's some of my favorites from games I've been in:

Having a 10 man squad of battle sisters reduced to a single model by my opponents terminator squad. She made her leadership roll and fired her bolter-- hitting and killing one of the termies. He decided he needed to stop chasing my command squad and focus on that one poor sister--splattering her horribly.

Starting a three-way battle and realizing we were all playing Imperium forces (Guard, Marines, Sisters). So we put a shack in the middle and decided we were fighting for control of the outhouse. Chaos ensued.

Having my orbital strike scatter into my own seraphim squad just before it engaged my opponents front line. Ouch.

Teasing my opponent because his farseer kept bouncing his Singing Spear off the front of my rhinos-- "Silly eldar, spears can't hurt tanks!"

Having my entire sisters army gunned down by guardsmen as I tried to close in to engage them. My army was butchered to a man because I placed a single squad in the wrong position during deployment

The point is, for all of those battles (except the last one) I don't even remember who won the battle. Focus on the fun-- then loosing isn't so nasty. (Losing still sucks though. If you can, try to avoid it. )

[ElectricPaladin]

I think you need to distinguish your problems.

Is your problem that you're losing too much and it's frustrating you to the point of distraction? Do an army switch, proxy your army as another army (maybe you picked the wrong faction...), and play with experienced opponents and ask them what you're doing wrong. Something else you might enjoy is trying on some 40k variants that play more to your strengths, or are at the very least just a change of pace (sometimes if you can't win at least you can lose in a new way). Supplements like Cities of Death, Spearhead, and Kill Team are all pretty easy to adapt to the 6th Edition rules, and can be a lot of fun if you're suffering from frustration and/or burnout.

If your problem is that you're taking losing too seriously... I don't know what to say. It's a game. I get that frustrated feeling that comes with an NGE (Negative Game Experience), but taking it out on your opponents... that's just childish. To be perfectly honest, I'd recommend looking at the rest of your life to see if you can discern a pattern of that sort of behavior. Maybe what you really need is to talk to a counselor of some kind: a shrink, priest/rabbi, buddy, prostitute... anyone who can help you get to the real reason why your maturity levels are taking a hit.

Full disclosure: I've seen several shrinks over the course of my life, and I'm married to a shrink. I don't see it as a sign of anything other than living in a crazy world, and I'm not trying to insult you.

[Lost Vyper]

Been there brother, been there...our whole FLGC is competitive, although we try to keep games fun & fluffy --> that don´t always happen... I played CSM for about 1-2 years, always against seasoned players (BA, Orks, Nids mainly) and my record (fe. in ten games) was like Win 1 Draw 1 Defeat 8 and i still kept banging my head against the tree...then i got bored and bought few new codexes and started the Eldar trickery path. First it was an uphill climb, but now i win some, lose some, but it´s MORE FUN, i´ve found MY army.

My 2 cents...

- Last game i mentally prepared myself losing against the Necrons (which i didn´t! My toughest enemy ATM), just to keep myself calm after the beating --> i too get heated sometimes and i recommend you to see the possibility of losing too, so you can see that´s it´s not the end of the world
- Beer was recommended, so true
- Switch you army or get fe. Eldar allies. Or go over your list and check what you are missing (more firepower, Riptide spam etc., fortification)
- Any downtime i have from playing 40K, i check almost every BATREP available for Eldar from Youtube. I suggest you find yourself a channel/channels to view, cos you´ll get loads of ideas and strategies from those. For Tau, Miniwargaming´s Owen has a nasty Tau-list and cool batreps, --> miniwargaming.com
- And last, it´s just a game (this is what i have to tell myself OVER and OVER after a bad beat, but you´ll always bounce back), re-tweak your list and NEVER bring the same list two times in a row

- Lost Vyper

[Denzark]

Actually Soton put a key one out there. Play the mission. If in doubt, start killing scoring units. Or units that you get a cheap VP for.

[Digitarii]

First, remember it's just a game. Of all the reasons to get upset, this isn't one of them. Frustrated, yes, but not upset. Second, mix up your playlist a bit. Change something around and maybe that change will work in your favor. Third, 6th edition is all about synergies and narrative. Units that you wouldn't look twice at in 5th edition take on a whole new life when you pair them with the correct synergistic unit in 6th. Fourth and final, if it's that bad, take a break from 40K and play some Video Games and read some books.

I've had some opponents consistently loose to me because I'm better at the abstract of the rules. You're not just playing against the opponent, you're also playing against the rules for that scenario. Back in the days when Necrons were first introduced, my primary opponent and I had a game of his Necrons versus my Blood Angels. He literally took out everything except my librarian in Termie armor and he had nothing that could take out the Libby. The scenario rules were that he had to kill off every model to claim a victory, I had to have at lest one intact unit survive to the end of the final turn. By the RAW, I won the game, but since he wiped out my force, I felt that the victory was truly his. To his credit, he never gave up trying even though he knew he had nothing that could hurt the libby. Me, I always got stuck in and fought his units instead of moving and hiding the libby like I could have done. The important thing is that we didn't get frustrated and had a good time playing the game.

[Auticus]

Do battle reports. Record your games. Post them. Get critiqued. Learn.

Most of the time people blaming losses on the dice have made other mistakes in the game that made those dice rolls so important that failing them costs them the game. I'm not saying that dice aren't a factor.... they obviously are.... but 9 times out of 10 when i hear someone blame their losses on dice and i watch them play I can pick out a half dozen or so major mistakes that they make, but they only see that the dice are rolling poorly for them.

[Wildeybeast]

Play nids. I used to find taking handfuls of my models off the board to be so disheartening as a Tau player. Nids let me get into the mindset of not caring about my troops; hell, there are plenty more of them and their purpose is just to jam up the enemy guns. I now have a far more relaxed attitude to defeat with all my armies. Remember, you may have lost one battle but you can still win the war.

[Orange]

You're going to have to just keep on losing and suck it up. Try and see what you are doing wrong in games in terms of your deployment, what you are bringing to the table that is consistently not performing as you see described/how you envision them to work. Also, making sure that your army is in sync is very important. Each unit should have a purpose and you should usually have a fall back in case of that bad die roll. If you cannot fulfill what you expect to most commonly come across when playing locally then you should tweak your list to allocate for these deficiencies. As someone who also plays Tau, trial and error in terms of placement is important as well as learning in what order to do things as often times you are looking at using units to strengthen other units to get results instead of simple point and shoot like people like to pretend that is how Tau is played.

Also, my suggestion would be to try and check your dice from time to time. Even though I know all dice are created equal in terms of probability, I have packages of dice I won't use because I consistently roll poorly with these dice as people all roll very differently.

[CenturyChild533]

Everyone, thank you very much for all your feedback and help. I really appreciate your advice and, most importantly, your candor.

I have a short term course of action now. Since I finally have a weekend free to devote to it, I'm going to brainstorm some new lists and see if I can find the flaws in my army composition, and try to play a couple of games over the weekend. In all honesty though, if those couple of games go poorly I'm going to take another hiatus from everything but model building. I have too much stress going on right now as is; 40K was supposed to be a break from all of that, and it's just making things worse at the moment. Thankfully there's still the hobby end of things to keep me occupied.

I made a bonehead snap judgement though and ordered the Eldar Ghost Warriors box set to build an Iyanden army with. I may live to regret that, but at the very least I can have fun building it, customizing the figures, and making it look awesome. Then maybe I can sell it if I don't end up enjoying playing it.