Why is the Tournament Scene getting flak, and do they deserve it?

[Denzark]

With all the fuss and general kerfuffle surrounding the release of Stronghold and Escalation, one party of our hobby is drawing considerable flak from many quarters at the moment. This is the tournament scene and its players. The question occurs, why is this?

In another thread, it was pointed out by Darklink, that tournaments are often little more than organized events. It is an excuse for like-minded chaps to get together and fight a few games on the trot. That in itself is not bad, is it? Couple that with the fact that often (most in my experience, YMMV) tourney players are highly enthusiastic, their armies are largely built and painted, they know the rules, they know the fluff, they are there for the same thing as you. It takes a level of effort to specifically head out for a tournament - as opposed to knocking around your FLGS and agreeing at whim to a 'pick-up' game. The shared experience with this mutually heightened level of investment with tournament gaming can be awesome. After all, no-one begrudges playing the beginner at the club, but at some time the novelty of a half built, half painted 750pt ork army, half of which are proxied by Imperial Guard, pales somewhat.

So where have the Tourney gamers got this reputation from? I reckon there are several reasons:

1. Tourneys are the only places where you can be 'ambushed' by killer lists. 'Hang on' you say, 'it’s a tourney, anything goes'. OK I get that. But, put it in perspective. If you play in your basement/mancave wherever, against friends, you probably know what sort of list is being thrown down - it may be a trial of a cutthroat list, but normally people would agree beforehand. Likewise, you have a choice in pickup games - If someone in the FLGS invites you to play a 3 suit list against your fluffy list, you can respectfully opt out. But in a tournament you get no choice. You are there to play and at some point the draw or the rankings system, will see you against a killer list that you have little or no chance of beating.

2. The point above seems sort of obvious. But this links to my next point. The tournament is the only habitat of the WAAC power gamer. That person who takes his enjoyment in pressing the autowin button. He gets some point of self worth from the win, he cares nothing for sportsmanship, he doesn't banter during the game, his approach is almost autistic in disregard for social graces. You would not normally play this individual by choice, if you encounter him at a pick-up game, you would only play him that once as he is not fun. He gets a bad rep in-club and finds it near impossible to get games. But in a tourney this individual is forced upon you, hence my comment that this is the only environs in which they are found.

3. Tournament players can sometimes give the impression that the tournament scene is the most important aspect of the hobby. The level of irritation this causes can be similar to that expressed for the endless legions of Ebay sellers who claim they 'pro-paint'. Just because somebody won an event that had x-level of prize support, does not make them the final authority on all matters 40K. Now I do not claim all tourney players claim such things. However, I think the small numbers that do seem to imply this, can easily give the others a bad name (this also applies to the WAAC Jobs described above). This is further magnified by the high percentage of 'internet personalities' who co-incidentally are active in the tournament scene. Like Commodus in 'Gladiator' getting tetchy with Senators whispering 'Republic Republic Republic', some people grow tired of 'tournament tournament tournament'.

4. Now if the 3 points above are correct, the final point is the killer. Tourney players quite rightly would prefer a tight, balanced and unambiguous ruleset. 40K does not fit that. Escalation and Stronghold takes us even further away from that. Non-tourney players who couldn't give a toss about a tight ruleset and are having the time of their lives with mad fluff lists, massive death toys and all these expansions (see Mr Mystery's 'Golden Age' thread), take the tournament perspective to imply a criticism of the way they enjoy warts and all 40K. A non-tourney player may say: 'Hang on GW doesn't write tournament rules. How can you criticise them when they say the single most important rule is to have FUN?'. And because of the killer lists at point 1 and the WAACs at point 2 and the 'noisy tournament players' aspect at point 3, all of which do not make a FUN experience for a lot of people, the non-tourney players quite literally cannot empathise with the problems the tourney players raise. It is, a self-licking lollipop (or is that self-fulfilling prophecy?).

So who is right? With the debate in full swing and to be maintained as we find out online which tournaments are picking and choosing which rules/supplements to limit, I can see this ongoing. For myself, I recently had to check my perspective. I regularly play at Throne of Skulls, and found myself planning a new army to be WYSIWYG, no proxies and no third party parts. When I was debating how best to achieve this, my normal partner was quite aghast I was weighing these considerations up against the rule of cool - why should I limit myself merely to meet entry requirements for a tourney?

(TL:DR)

And so I came to the conclusion that both views are equally valid. Cutthroat at tourney, fluffy warts and all at home. Tourney players don't deserve flak just for being tourney players, but only if they try and claim some kudos just for being a tourney player when all that really means was they had the time and the cost of entry in their pocket. But on the flip side, if the non-tourney crowd are growing a little sick of the negative debate (actually increased codex/rules output was what the internetz were demanding from GW for the last 3 years of 5th Ed), they can always vote with their feet and not respond on those blogs where the self-perceived elite are being opinionated. After all, there but for the grace of the God Emperor goes I…

[Anggul]

There's nothing wrong with 'tourney players', they're usually no different from any other player. It's the ones in 'point 2' which are the bad image that so many people base their view of tourney players on. There's a difference. There are many people who bring lists to tourneys that are both fluffy and strong at the same time. There's this bizarre idea that 'fluffy' and 'strong' are mutually exclusive, when they aren't. 'Fluffy' doesn't mean purposely taking crappy, overpriced units, it means building your army to a theme. The players mentioned in point 2 screw this entirely and clearly care far more about, as you say, pressing a win button despite the fact that it only proves that they don't have any skill and are just making the tourney less fun for players who want to actually have a good, challenging game.

Like you say, in a tourney setting that kind of person is forced upon you, you don't have a choice and it really isn't much fun. Sometimes it can be fun to see how well you can do against their boring spammy list, but it gets tedious. That's the thing that pushes people away from tournaments, and the problem is that there isn't much that can be done about it. Some people are just like that and aren't concerned about both sides having fun. You can place certain limitations like Feast of Blades has done, which I think is just fine, but there's a limit to what you can do. Really you just have to be patient and hope you don't have to face these kinds of people too often, and get to play other people who actually want to enjoy a challenging game, not someone who just wants to not have to think, roll dice and let their opponent pick their army back up without doing much.

Making the classification of a 'tourney player' I think is a mistake. The distinction people really see is 'person who wants a good fun, challenging game'/'person who just wants to win with no skill or challenge for some bizarre little ego kick (also known as WAAC). It's these kinds of people that drive people away from tournaments which are otherwise great fun and a great opportunity to play some good games against likeminded people who enjoy the game. There's 'refined' and then there's 'boring'.


As an aside, I think all players should be concerned with balance and whether units work. The point in playing is to replicate the fluff and to enjoy seeing your beloved units do what they do in backstory in an awesome fashion. Lack of balance means that doesn't happen, and you become disillusioned with the game, your suspense of disbelief broken because that unit that is so epic and/or glorious in the fluff is just getting trounced because of bad rules and points values. You want your army to perform as it should in the backstory, regardless of whether you're in a tournament or playing a narrative campaign. If anything, those of us who play narrative campaigns and such should be more concerned with it because the experience is based entirely upon faithfully representing the actions of the army. The issue, I think, is that people seem to be afraid to do what they want. They feel that they need explicit, written permission from GW to do something, when GW themselves actively promote the opposite. We can change things for the better ourselves. We can make those units that we love so much more balanced. You can't do it as easily with a random pick-up game, but at tournaments and regular gaming groups/your mate's house, you can set 'house' rule changes based upon what you think as a group and use them. Suddenly the game is a lot more fun because you can use the units you want to use without just having to pick them up off the board before they get to do their thing and you get to have fun replicating their endeavours.

Balance is important for all things, not just tourneys. It has an effect upon the game as a whole because the rules are representing the fluff. In some cases, people just don't seem to get how a unit is supposed to work, and so declare it 'underpowered'. There are genuine cases of underpowered units though, so we can fix them ourselves as long as the environment permits it and have fun using them.

[Defenestratus]

The reason why the tournament scene is getting flak is because they've totally forgotten the underlying social contract that exists between two people when playing a game of plastic dolls.

They've forgotten that each and every rule in the core rulebook requires as much permission to use as does anything else that GW puts out - and a lot of them are really having a hard time coming to grips with the fact that the world of make-believe, plastic toy soldier commanding isn't black and white.

Personally I find it pretty hilarious that this much uproar has been made over such a frivolous matter.

The idea that "anything goes" at a tournament is pretty silly to me. I have played only a handful of tournaments, but I have willingly ceded two games because I simply knew I wasn't going to have fun playing the person. One was because the person was using a broken Chaos list with the lord on disc of Tzeench, and the other was because the player was a douchenozzle who had previously made a 12 year old kid cry that same day.

Both time's I took a loss, and both times my opponent was pleased as punch at the "free" win. In my mind however that person lost. Why? Because in each case, that person didn't get to play a game of toy soldiers. Tournament players (I speak in generalities here) forget that they're in a tournament to *have fun* and not to *win*. Some people equate winning to having fun, but thats only because they actually don't really enjoy playing wargames. They just enjoy finding outlets that prove to themselves that they're better at *something* than someone else.

[Sly]

Anggul said it very well:

Most tournament players are not WAAC gamers.
Fluffy lists can be competitive, and the reverse.
Balance and solid rules are good for home players also, not just tournament players.

I'm going now to jump to a point to illustrate that a lot of players arguing from the point of view of a tournament are still arguing for the betterment of the game: D-class weapons.
A lot of tournaments are considering putting house rules for D-class, starting with making them S10/AP1 and adding some other benefits from there. Now, this is done for balance, right? However, I ask you... how many HOME gamers have some favorite unit, or a favorite HQ, or a tooled up Command Squad? Removing these from play with no save is NOT FUN for the guy looking forward to his Chapter Master having an epic battle with someone, win or lose. So this is one case of many where the balance that tournament players want to see would translate into protecting the fun of the home gamer.

[Mr Mystery]

Yet gamers talk to each other. Gamers have to arrange the game. Points are agreed. You're more likely to ask or be asked 'mind if I field my super heavy'.

For me, Tournaments are painted with the same brush because sadly the majority of whining comes from a minority of players who have tournament playing in common. As I'm not really noted for eloquence with words....this is not to say all tournament players are whiners, or even that all whiners are tournament players.

But it certainly seems a lot more common for an internet whine to be coming from a tournament player demanding the game be rebuilt from the ground up to satisfy their particular wishes. They also feel that people who don't exclusively play to win are a bit weird, or doing it wrong....

[Auticus]

I used to be a heavy hardcore tournament player. 95% of everyone I played with or met at a tournament were pretty good guys.

However the 5%...

The 5% are why tournament players get flak. We know the 5%. Everyone reading this probably can name off a couple names that fit in the 5%.

I've seen a table flipped at a tournament. I've seen dice flung at walls. I've seen models slammed to the ground and stomped on. I've been on the receiving end of a rant for fielding a "cheesy army". I've been on the receiving end of a rant blaming dice. I've seen grown men twist their faces up in RAGE. I've seen grown men curse other grown men out like they were playing in the NFL and their coaching career was on the line. I've seen grown men treat a game of warhammer like it was the NFL and that their entire self worth was based on their W/L record and winning the tournament.

I've seen grown men laughing mean-spiritedly at their opponent after defeating them, calling them "stupid" and condescending them. They are the same people that loudly boast about their grand warhammer skillz and how they are "good at the game" and you are not "good at the game".

Those 5% act the same no matter what environment you are in. However, in a gaming club you can choose to not play the 5%. At a tournament, you cannot choose this. You are hoping you don't draw the 5% but if you do draw them... your enjoyment of the event is likely going to plummet.

The 5% need policed by our community.

It only takes ONE game against one of these guys, and you will likely stereotype an entire tournament community from it, because the 5% primarily dwell in tournament halls where winning at all costs is the most important thing.

Its not fair, but that's why you get the reaction to tournament gamers most often than not.

[Mr Mystery]

Also, consider this.

My town has a gaming club. Comprised of predominantly good fellas, many of which I have gamed with in the past. But for a while the club became tournament obsessed. Every game was 'tournament practice'. Every game, because it was tournament practice, was subject to odd rulings and 'comp'. I'd be told 'you can't use that list. It's not comp' It went from a pretty decent group, to an elitist group quite quickly, and I haven't been back.

They couldn't get their heads out of Tournament mode for a single game each week. Their preference began to be foisted upon all and sundry. And that shouldn't ever happen. Nobody should be told at a paid for club they can't use a certain list, because the other person is prepping for a tournament, just as someone prepping for a tournament shouldn't be told they can't do it at a club they too have paid for. Got to compromise on all sides. But for me, it just stopped being fun.

[Eldar_Atog]

Mr Mystery's example is very similiar to what happened to my gaming group. About a third of the group became touranment obessed. You showed up for a friendly game and you ended up with 2 or 3 players wanting to test run their list (2 Cultist, 3 Hell Turkey, allied detachment with flying monstrous creature). That happened time after time. God help you if we had a friendly touranment. That's when the Necron flying circus guy would show up teamed with the flying monstrous creature guy.

Even after you would leave and get a bite to eat, they would keep talking about the latest power unit that they were going to exploit. It only took a few months of this to completely splinter the group.

There has been a lot of mention in this thread about this stereotype being caused by a small minority but my experience has been just the opposite. You'll have a small minority of touranment players that are there to have fun. The majority usually just wants to fondle themselves while talking about their leet 3 hell turkeys.

[SaveModifier]

Tournament players shouldn't be getting any flak, they should just be ignored, giving them the oxygen of publicity is confirming in their heads that the game revolves around them, its good to see the rest of the community finally hitting back at those people who complain and moan about everything.

[SON OF ROMULOUS]

will say from my own experiences is when it coms to tournaments you have some good guys and you have just as many if not more bad guys that come to these events. i know i can point to a few years back watching a tyranid player pull out models sit them on the table then have to switch them out for his actual list once his opponent had deployed.

another i can remmber was a group that called themselves hell fire setting up tournaments where their members won after their own guys as well as their seating caused only their guys to be in the top. so after a year or so everyone wised up and they got tossed from the local store never to be seen or heard from again.

hell i know at the last 2 tournaments ive seen a known cheater same tyranid player get away with murder.. apparently when you role for psychic powers you can roll 2 dice then determine which dice goes for which group. funny last time i checked you picked a disciplne then rolled 1 d6 and either took that or took the primaris then roll again and again until your done....


at anoher one i saw a group give out best painted to their own guy 2x now... beating a beautifully painted dark eldar force that was hand painted then beating a tau list this time that was stunning (apparently he had the wrong flock... funny i though silfor was flock and looks nicer then static grass...) oh and the first one lost out to imperial fists who were table top only... he had a display board while the De player did no it was shameful and left a bad taste in alot of peopl mouth.

I know i've met enough dbags in my career that i honestly avoid them unless somehow i get it into my head that i will go play games with cool dudes and then have fun... (oddly enough this only happens when your at the bottom of the tier...)

[silashand]

The 5% are why tournament players get flak. We know the 5%. Everyone reading this probably can name off a couple names that fit in the 5%.

IMO it's these same players that are the ones having such an issue online about implementing some actual restrictions for the tourney environment. People keep spouting about how all comp does is show the biases of the organizer, but in reality that's exactly what they are displaying. These few players apparently *like* the idea of playing d-bag lists so anything that restricts them from doing so is automatically bad in their eyes. They use the excuse that players aren't capable of balancing the system and that only GW can do so to justify their opinions. IMO they have this idea that it is more important to simply play with what is given them than to actually try and fix some of the un-fun options in the game because that's what appeals to *them* and their opponents' enjoyment be damned. I mean really, how many people actually *like* playing against Screamerstar, triple heldrake, etc.? Very few in my experience. So what if these lists can be beaten? If a list forces players to play in a manner that is unenjoyable for a majority of players then that list is inappropriate in the environment period if you ask me. Yet this 5% or so are by far the loudest complainers when it comes to opposing any sort of restrictions or "house rules" as they like to label them, as if doing so imposes their own viewpoint of illegitimacy against doing so.

Personally I hope the events that do choose to address these issues hold firm against these individuals. Most of us play this game to have fun. Unfortunately there is a small subset of players whose enjoyment apparently hinges on other people *not* having fun. And that is IMO a sad, pathetic state to be in that these people are the ones who have been allowed to dictate what happens in group events within this hobby.

JMO...

[daboarder]

You know, in my own experience its usually the non tourney games that are more open to abuse.

I'd rather have a game where both players comprehensively know the rules and the game runs smoothly, where the winner is determined by the better player.

In my experience when you sit down for a game with an opponent you've met for a pick up match its far more likely that key rules are not only forgotten, they're sometimes even actively "ignored(re:cheat)" in such situation I find that its usually the person with the more overbearing personallity that gets their way and as such a single person can change the course of the game solely by their attitude.

Conversely in a tournament there is much less of this going on as not only are rules queries examined as a group that is able to usually reach consensus, if they cannot determine how a rules is supposed to work most judges in my experience will actually enforce the "4+ it" due to time constraints.

on a final note I find that the lists I face in tournament play are usually far more diverse than most (not all) pick up games. In pick up games you usually face players who are running the latest "net-list" because others have told them how good it is, whereas in the better tournaments you tend to face lists that have been tailored by each player to their own particular play style because regardlesss of what the internet says the list they take works for them.

So yeah I guess I do think the tourny scene is getting needless flak, particularly when it comes to escalation and the way that blatantly scews the balance of the game.

At the end of the day this game is designed for fun, and as a two player game that means that both players should be having fun, being brow beaten into facing a revenant titan every week because its "official" and because if I don't play it I'm just a "WAAC" Competitive gamer with no enjoyment or investment in the game is NOT my idea of fun.

[DarkLink]

That's my experience as well. It's not that I've never faced a crappy opponent at a tournament, it's happened one or two times, but most of those games were still salvageable, and overall, if I go to a tournament, I know I'm going to get in multiple pretty good games. When I just drop by the shop, though (which, for reference, is one of the largest gaming groups on the west coast), I can only hope to get a game in, and half the time it's with a less than choice opponent. There are a couple of guys I wouldn't normally play because they're known for being shifty with the rules, but every once and a while, I'll bite the bullet just to play a game.

Plus, tournaments are as much about meeting new people as anything else. They're a social event beyond just playing some games. You get to meet new people, see cool paint schemes and conversions, have dinner (and in the case of people who do drink, get drunk with) cool new people.

[daboarder]

That's my experience as well. It's not that I've never faced a crappy opponent at a tournament, it's happened one or two times, but most of those games were still salvageable, and overall, if I go to a tournament, I know I'm going to get in multiple pretty good games. When I just drop by the shop, though (which, for reference, is one of the largest gaming groups on the west coast), I can only hope to get a game in, and half the time it's with a less than choice opponent. There are a couple of guys I wouldn't normally play because they're known for being shifty with the rules, but every once and a while, I'll bite the bullet just to play a game.

Plus, tournaments are as much about meeting new people as anything else. They're a social event beyond just playing some games. You get to meet new people, see cool paint schemes and conversions, have dinner (and in the case of people who do drink, get drunk with) cool new people.

yeah I've had plenty of tournament games where I've lost badly, but only really one bad game, and that was a tau player when the new codex dropped. I spent the game killing his farshadow bomb by dancing my oblits between 36 and 30, he got really ****ty and started throwing his dice and models around when one died, then at the end ran a gun drone I'd forgotten to kill (silly me) onto an objective, I hadn't read the book yet so when he told me it was scoring in the scouring I believed him. Later discussion with the TO enlightened me to the fact that the apparently that shouldn't be the case as the codex specifies that drones are NEVER scoring....but thats just 1 game.

[Learn2Eel]

I like both kinds of games and don't really have a preference. As long as everyone is having fun, I say, who cares? Sorry if my post doesn't really fit the discussion, I'm tired now lol.

[The Sovereign]

I play fluffy lists and only fluffy lists, and naturally lose more than I win. That said, we pay an extreme for GW's products (models AND rules), so I won't be told I shouldn't expect somewhat tighter rules and balance than what we currently have. At the premium GW demands, there's no reason why their products shouldn't be all things to all people.

[DarkLink]

They could at least keep up with their FAQs. They were doing ok for a little while, then they went back to completely ignoring everything.

[Lord-Boofhead]

There are a couple of guys I wouldn't normally play because they're known for being shifty with the rules, but every once and a while, I'll bite the bullet just to play a game.

There is a guy locally who is known for being a little loose with the rules but I don't mind playing Friendlies against him because he's a nice guy and fun to play otherwice. I play 10 games against him rather than one game against an anal WAAC rules lawyer..,..


Plus, tournaments are as much about meeting new people as anything else. They're a social event beyond just playing some games. You get to meet new people, see cool paint schemes and conversions, have dinner (and in the case of people who do drink, get drunk with) cool new people.

Yeah this is how I treat Tournies too... In some of the bigger cities/events they have actually split the tournies in two. One Tourny for the WAAC to prove who has the biggest 'dice tower' and a fun one for the rest of us who just want to have fun and meet some new folks...

[silashand]

In some of the bigger cities/events they have actually split the tournies in two. One Tourny for the WAAC to prove who has the biggest 'dice tower' and a fun one for the rest of us who just want to have fun and meet some new folks...

The latter are the events I attend and are great fun.


They could at least keep up with their FAQs. They were doing ok for a little while, then they went back to completely ignoring everything.

I wish I knew why they did that. GW really are one of the worst hobby companies out there for supporting their product IMO. Any other company I'd think would WANT to keep their customers happy by reducing any confusion their rules cause.

[Brother Kendo]

I have been thinking of this quite a bit lately. I will make this shorter than the thoughts in my head.

1) Tournaments should be decided more by your performance on the table, and less by the models themselves. This is very simply called Balance. Most of the "tournament" guys are not the best players at all, they just know how to exploit "broken" combos in the game. This is bad for the game.

2) Warhammer Fantasy players have been dealing with army Comps for a long time now. Why not 40K? I am an avid Eldar player. I am fine if they put a 0-1 restriction on Wraithknights. Why, because I can admitt that GW in no way shape or form had tournaments in mind when rolling out the current models/rules. I do not think that units or items need to be banned though. Put restrictions when using said Items/units. For instance: you can take field 2 wraithknights but in exchange can take no wave serpents (remember only an example) Again, Warhammer Fantasy has tons of trade offs/unit restrictions and while some of the players still disagree with them, they get over it and make the best of it.

3) Going along with #2: It is the job of the TO's to balance the tournament game out, and it is the job of the players to strive for a balanced WITH them. This is not an "Us vs Them". As players we should work with our local TO's to apply Comps to the game that even the playing field for everyone. GW is in the business to sell MODELS, and there is nothing...NOTHING wrong with that. Why else would they let me put a Super Heavy on the table in regular 40K...because they sell more Baneblades!!!! The flip side to this coin is this. We are all gamers that strive to build most effective lists possible. If we are going to a tournament that has restrictions, WE WILL find the best list to run. Either through the net, or hours of looking at numbers on a sheet of paper. The game will always be evolving, and we need to evolve with it.

Lastly. Earlier someone talked about the 5% of players that we all know. They are ones that will HATE these kind of changes. They are ones that are a Cancer to the game, and we should impose new tournament rules and just get them out. Let those of us that want a balanaced and fun game have out fun. I want to go to a tournament and meet new players, and after finishing out game work with them on how to improve their game. Not listen to some guy laugh at his opponent because its his first tournament and got tabled by his Turkey Spam

[Orange]

Most of the tournament scene in my area are former Games Workshop employees or guys who come into the stores regularly and play. Tournaments are not so much about meeting new players and power gaming as a day that is organized and you know you are getting three - five big games in against nicely painted models with people who know the rules.

The only reason half of tournament guys get flak is because of these imaginary armies that people have like Flying Circus, Leafblower, etc. that won a tournament and continued to place well and people think they are auto-win armies and most people on here are guys who get off to Space Marine battle porn and just want to shoot bolters all game.

[DarkLink]

Well, really, tournament players are getting flak because of trolls like this:


Tournament players shouldn't be getting any flak, they should just be ignored, giving them the oxygen of publicity is confirming in their heads that the game revolves around them, its good to see the rest of the community finally hitting back at those people who complain and moan about everything.

But, yes,the perception of tournament players as waac is overblown. And you will never see as many awesome converted and painted armies in one place as you will at a major tournament.

[Eldar_Atog]

But, yes,the perception of tournament players as waac is overblown. And you will never see as many awesome converted and painted armies in one place as you will at a major tournament.

Everyone's experiences are different. For you, playing with tournament players has been a positive experience: Well painted armies, good sportmanship, and creative lists.

For me, playing with tournament players has been a negative experience: Min-maxed lists, childish tantrums, cheating, bad winners/sore losers.

I say the perception of tournament players as WAAC is an accurate one.

[DarkLink]

I'm not saying they aren't out there. I'm saying I've been to a lot of tournaments, and they're pretty rare. In fact, more common are anti-competitive players who will rant about how cheese your army is compared to their fluffy necron flyer spam, but those are still a lot less common than in pickup games in my experience.

Point is, when you jump to conclusions about large groups of people based on limited personal experience, you're going to be wrong on some level.

Plus, playing a tough list doesn't make you a bad person. In my experience, most of the complaining about waac has nothing to do with the actual winning list, and everything to do with the fact that the looser lost and that makes the other guy's army cheesy.

[Auticus]

There is no way to quantify what is or is not Waac. There is no way to quantify what most people are complaining about. Waac takes many forms to many people. To some it is that they lost yes. To others it is that the guy across the table is treating the game like a professional sport. To others it is that the guy across the table has an army list that is min/maxed. To another it is the guy across the table was just caught cheating.

To say that the majority of people complaining about WAAC is mostly due to them losing is as (in)valid as saying that the majority of people that go to tournaments are WAAC. There is no way to quantify or justify either statement with anything other than personal opinion and personal anecdote.

[Eldar_Atog]

Point is, when you jump to conclusions about large groups of people based on limited personal experience, you're going to be wrong on some level.

Another point: when you make assumptions that someone that disagrees with you must have limited personal experience, you come off as short sighted.

Perhaps I have not played as much as you but that does not lessen my experiences. I've been to several small and medium tournaments and everyone of them has been a negative experience. Winning and losing is meaningless to me. I just wanted to have a few good games and get some ideas for painting. My take away from each of those events was that the tournament scene draws in every bad personality type under the sun.




Plus, playing a tough list doesn't make you a bad person. In my experience, most of the complaining about waac has nothing to do with the actual winning list, and everything to do with the fact that the looser lost and that makes the other guy's army cheesy.

And my experience is that people complaining about WAAC have valid complaints. It's about the bullying behavior that some tournament seem to revel in. I've watched grown *** men taking such glee in completely destroying a young kid's love for minituare gaming. I'll never understand the need in some people to destroy someone else just to give meaning to their own miserable existance.

I'm sure all Catholic priests are not pedophiles but they will always have the reputation. They failed to police themselves and look where they are now. If tournament players are so worried about their reputations, then they are going to be the ones that fix the problem. This is not the fault of the more casual gamers.

[DarkLink]

I meant that in the sense that just because you've had a problem with tournaments doesn't mean everyone has. So if you don't want to go to the, that's fine. I wouldn't go if I had a bad tournament scene, either. It happens that I do, though, so it bugs me when people paint a picture with such a broad, judgemental brush.

[gcsmith]

I don't know why people complain about tourney lists. As far as I'm concerned, bring fluffy fun lists if you want, but never complain when someone brings the best they can.

[SaveModifier]

Its not a competitive game, its a friendly game meant to be played civilly between people that can act like decent human beings. The aim of any game of 40K is spelled out very clearly in the rule book that WAAC players obviously haven't bothered to read, its for everyone involved to have fun. Its on page 8 of the rule book, look it up, read that and if you can honestly, hand on heart tell me that your 3 Hell Drake list, or whatever the current flavour of the month is, fits in with the spirit of the game, then you're either a liar or an idiot.

Trying to destroy your opponent isn't part of the game and using net lists that someone much smarter than you wrote, usually as nothing more than an intellectual exercise, is you trying to remove that element of fun for your opponent for no other reason than your own inferiority. If you aren't capable of writing a list thats as fun to play against as it is to play with, one where you aren't going to win all the time, then thats not GWs fault, they've given you the tools to write those fun lists to play the game with while respecting your opponent and tell the story of your battle, they're abusable but the social contract thats expected between two adults playing a game means that it shouldn't be an issue.

Tournament players, as a whole, as seen on the internet forums and this very thread, are whining, entitled children, trying to change the game into a boring thing that no one would actually want to play because they either lack the social grace or intelligence to be able to spend and other people's leisure time correctly.

[gcsmith]

Its not a competitive game, its a friendly game meant to be played civilly between people that can act like decent human beings. The aim of any game of 40K is spelled out very clearly in the rule book that WAAC players obviously haven't bothered to read, its for everyone involved to have fun. Its on page 8 of the rule book, look it up, read that and if you can honestly, hand on heart tell me that your 3 Hell Drake list, or whatever the current flavour of the month is, fits in with the spirit of the game, then you're either a liar or an idiot.

Trying to destroy your opponent isn't part of the game and using net lists that someone much smarter than you wrote, usually as nothing more than an intellectual exercise, is you trying to remove that element of fun for your opponent for no other reason than your own inferiority. If you aren't capable of writing a list thats as fun to play against as it is to play with, one where you aren't going to win all the time, then thats not GWs fault, they've given you the tools to write those fun lists to play the game with while respecting your opponent and tell the story of your battle, they're abusable but the social contract thats expected between two adults playing a game means that it shouldn't be an issue.

Tournament players, as a whole, as seen on the internet forums and this very thread, are whining, entitled children, trying to change the game into a boring thing that no one would actually want to play because they either lack the social grace or intelligence to be able to spend and other people's leisure time correctly.

The aim of a game is to be competative, as long as winners and losers exist, it will be competative. The only reason it's so bad at being competative is lazy writing on behalf of GW. And also, the irony of you saying people are being entitled when you say "IT IS NOT COMPETATIVE" and saying the spirit of the game doesn't fit winning lists....

[Rogue428]

I'll chime in here very quickly to relate my own experience. I find that I usually only get "fair" games in Tournaments. For a while, I only played exclusively in tournaments. Did I run into abusive lists and some jerks, once in a while. In my experience, I ran into abuse far more frequently at my FLGS to the point that I don't bother trying to get a pick up game in down there except against a chosen few. I found I got bogged down in rules arguments because people just flat out didn't know the rules. (A lot of them don't even own the rulebook or the codices except in pirated pdf form which they didn't even bother to read. They are playing some kind of game involving miniatures, but it isn't Warhammer 40K). I found that the people with their egos most tied to winning the game were much more likely to be local pick-up gamers than the average tourney goer.

Secondly, I like the modelling aspect of the hobby a lot. I love seeing other people's armies and well-painted models. On our 40K night at the FLGS, there might be 2 or 3 well painted armies out of about 40 people hanging out there. There are folks playing for years with stuff that isn't even primered. That's fine for them I suppose, that doesn't take away from their enjoyment. But it takes away from mine, when I try to get a game in, and someone is tailoring their list on the spot after seeing mine. "Oh you have terminators? I'm proxying stuff, all these flamers are really plasma guns, and these empty bases are blah blah blah". That gets annoying. I don't have to worry about that at a tourney. Everyone's stuff is painted. Most of them look good. Opponents can't tailor their lists before the game.

Third. I'm very busy now. It isn't easy for me to get games of 40K in. Most of my time is spent on the hobby aspect of the game. But I can take a weekend off and get 3 games in, in one day against some solid opponents. If I travel to a big event, that's even better since it means 5 or more games, plus some pick up games, plus I get to hang out with friends that I usually only see at the tourneys.

Now here's the trick most non-tourney folks don't know, because they're too committed to their stereotypical idea of the WAAC tourney player to bother finding out. Tourneys cost $$, national level events cost a lot of $$. If a person's only goal in going to the tourney is to win, they are going to be severely disappointed. There are so many things that go into the winning of a tournament that even the world's greatest 40K player ever can't bank on it. It is a dice game after all. If all a person was going for was to win prize support, for most tournaments, they'd be better off just buying the stuff outright, rather than spending money on traveling to the tournament. Most tourney players don't go there to win. Because we know better. We go to place well (hopefully), play a bunch of games a short amount of time, and hang out with like-minded people. (Wow, that sounds a lot like why people play pick up games at the FLGS, doesn't it?)

The game is about what one of my friends calls "Cooperative Competition". There definitely is a social contract when I step up to the table. Problems arise when people ignore that contract.

What I find a little sad is that so many people take pleasure in vilifying the tournament scene almost to the point you'd think we were enemies somehow. (just look at some of the responses in this very thread). We're all part of the same hobby and the same game. I happen to adore all the new releases and codices and dataslates etc. But I also don't want to spend a lot of money traveling to Vegas, or Adepticon or whatever, pull out my models that I spent a long time on, and then put them immediately away because someone just dropped a 15" Apocalypse Mega-blast on them.

It's all about expectation management. When Adepticon runs the Gladiator (which is a tourney that allows Apocalypse units), people don't complain about facing D weapons. If I'm playing at the FLGS, and someone wants to run a transcendant C'tan for fun. Sure why not?

Problems arise when expectations are violated and the social contract ignored.

One other thing before I leave you guys. I don't run into seasoned tourney players that are jerks. When I do run into a jerk at a tourney, it is often a person's 1st or 2nd tourney, and they are behaving that way because they think that's the way people are supposed to behave in a tourney. When I discovered this a couple of years ago, I found I could just step in and chat with the player for a few minutes and explain to them that playing a tourney game was no different than playing a friendly game. There was no need for arguments and being a jerk. Something to think about.

[DarkLink]

Yes. Several of the big gaming groups like the BOLS guys or Team Zero Comp are awesome people. Part of the reason I get fairly adamant about this is because trolls like savemodifier pop up occasionally with their 'anyone who has ever even thought about going to a tournament is inherently a bad person' crap, and I'm pretty good friends with a lot of these guys, so it gets kind of personal. Not that I really get worked up over what people on the internet say, but I'll throw in a rebuttal at least.


The aim of a game is to be competative, as long as winners and losers exist, it will be competative. The only reason it's so bad at being competative is lazy writing on behalf of GW. And also, the irony of you saying people are being entitled when you say "IT IS NOT COMPETATIVE" and saying the spirit of the game doesn't fit winning lists....

Yes.

Also, if everyone plays lists someone else wrote for them, as savemodifier claims, then who writes the list. Is there one random smart guy who secretly writes all the lists for everyone? Is he like 40k Santa or something?

But seriously, the idea of netlists is massively blown out of proportion. Sure, you'll see lots of wave serpents, because Phil Kelly sucks, but actual "netlists" with minmaxed 6x 5 dire avengers with wave serpents? Pretty rare. Enough to skew the reaults at the top tables, but the idea that tournament players just copy the latest list off the internet word for word is laughable.

[Eldar_Atog]

I meant that in the sense that just because you've had a problem with tournaments doesn't mean everyone has. So if you don't want to go to the, that's fine. I wouldn't go if I had a bad tournament scene, either. It happens that I do, though, so it bugs me when people paint a picture with such a broad, judgemental brush.

I'm sure there are plenty of great tournament groups. If there weren't, then no one would want to fool with it.

It also bugs me when people try to paint a picture with a broad, dismissive brush.



In my experience, most of the complaining about waac has nothing to do with the actual winning list, and everything to do with the fact that the looser lost and that makes the other guy's army cheesy.

Dismissing other people's concerns like this does nothing to help the conversation. It only makes it worse. You dismiss their arguements and concerns while insulting them in the same breath. There might be a couple of trolls lurking in this conversation but most of us are being honest about our experiences.

[DarkLink]

Chill out, dude.

I was referring more to people like savemodifier with the painting with a broad brush. I offered my experience as a contrast to yours, not as some sort of universal truth. I know there are bad players out there. I've personally found them to be few and far between, and my experience with a lot of the anti competitive sort has been that they lose to a better player, and then ***** about his army. Just trust me on that, I can give you plenty of examples.

My point is, just have fun playing the game, and if other people like to play it differently than you, then, well, don't be like savemodifier.

[Lord-Boofhead]

2) Warhammer Fantasy players have been dealing with army Comps for a long time now. Why not 40K? I am an avid Eldar player. I am fine if they put a 0-1 restriction on Wraithknights. Why, because I can admitt that GW in no way shape or form had tournaments in mind when rolling out the current models/rules. I do not think that units or items need to be banned though. Put restrictions when using said Items/units. For instance: you can take field 2 wraithknights but in exchange can take no wave serpents (remember only an example) Again, Warhammer Fantasy has tons of trade offs/unit restrictions and while some of the players still disagree with them, they get over it and make the best of it.



Sounds like you are describing 'Swedish Comp' which is from what I have heard is bearable.

The problem with Comp is it also gets in the way of Fluffy lists and badly thought out comp can actually screw some armies over for being them. Locally we have just gone back to comp in WFB doe to this problem. Comp was a dirty word. It was used and abused by army jumping WAAC guys. In the first big Statewide tourney 'magic was op' so it to a hit from the Nerf bat.no army was allowed to have more than 4 levels in total of magic. Lots of fun if you were High Elves or Tzeentch Chaos, you weren't allowed to use one of you main strengths. Empire and Dwarves however could feild their standard 4 cannons ect. Funny
thing was that the guy who wrote the comp rules was an empire player...

[DarkLink]

I've seen a Swedish comp list floating around, and it was idiotic. The list of what took comp hits or not was utterly nonsensical. Dunno if there are other versions out there that have done it better. But I can say that virtually any remotely competitive GK list (which is a mid tier codex now) would take massive comp hits, but my much, much more competitive Eldar barely takes any. Par for the course with comp.

Comp wasn't really made by waac players, but when a tournament impliments comp, it pretty much inevitably fails to actually comp anything meaningful, and then the waac players just shrug and write up a new cheesy list that fits in perfectly and continue on their way. I've seen it happen many times, especially considering that the big local tournaments in my area often have a significant amount of comp.

[Mr Mystery]

Comp wasn't really made by waac players, but when a tournament impliments comp, it pretty much inevitably fails to actually comp anything meaningful, and then the waac players just shrug and write up a new cheesy list that fits in perfectly and continue on their way. I've seen it happen many times, especially considering that the big local tournaments in my area often have a significant amount of comp.

This +1.

'Comp' achieves nothing. It doesn't eliminate dodgy armies, it just means the definition shifts.

The game is meant to be fun, and open to each gamer's own interpretations. Comp is to my eyes a bit of a hobby abomination, as the TO is essentially stating they know better, their way is best.

[DarkLink]

Every time I see a comp system, I think back to early 5th edition when I played demon hunters. Like I said, my local tournaments tended to be very comp heavy, which meant that I didn't go to to them. Demonhunters basically relied on you taking maximum Land Raiders as anti tank and transport. The comp system both banned duplicate units outside of troops and put a 25 percent cap on heavy support slots. It made it impossible to make a remotely decent list with demon hunters. But for those remember, demon hunters was pretty easily the weakest codex in the game. All the newer books were flexible enough that they could just tweaked their list so little and get perfect comp. So if weakest books get hurt most, and the strongest just ignore it, how is that a good system? I've never seen a comp system that didn't suffer those problems.

[Mr Mystery]

Necrons trump you on that one :p

Small points game? Enjoy your 460 points just to field a legal army!

And how would I field Necrons without multiple units of Immortals? They were, you know, kind of mission critical as units go.

And back to the opening topic. Is it really the scene that's catching the flak, or is it the players?

I feel it's the players. And there are those that deserve. Sadly, as with human nature, we tend to notice the lowest social denominator. GW in general suffers from this, as we're all considered by the wider world to be spotty little 'Erberts, because spotty little 'Erberts stand out, and are seen indulging in our hobby. What people won't notice are the well heeled people in their 20-30's nipping in to procure plastic crack on their lunch break.

[DarkLink]

Necrons were tied for worst with Daemonhunters.

[Auticus]

Necrons trump you on that one :p

Small points game? Enjoy your 460 points just to field a legal army!

And how would I field Necrons without multiple units of Immortals? They were, you know, kind of mission critical as units go.

And back to the opening topic. Is it really the scene that's catching the flak, or is it the players?

I feel it's the players. And there are those that deserve. Sadly, as with human nature, we tend to notice the lowest social denominator. GW in general suffers from this, as we're all considered by the wider world to be spotty little 'Erberts, because spotty little 'Erberts stand out, and are seen indulging in our hobby. What people won't notice are the well heeled people in their 20-30's nipping in to procure plastic crack on their lunch break.

Yep because it only takes one or two of those types of players to make a bad name for everyone.

[Lord-Boofhead]

Necrons trump you on that one :p

Small points game? Enjoy your 460 points just to field a legal army!

You do realise that 300 - 600 point games have a different FOC?

[Mr Mystery]

Was referring to the old Necron book, and general 40k games.

[Pure Legend]

Tournament players are the sort of people who ruin Xmas day games of Monopoly with their over competitiveness and who take great enjoyment out of beating their 93 year old Nan at a game of Twister. Sad but true!

Like a previous poster pointed out that he had conceded a game and the bloke virtually wet himself with feelings of great excitement and self worth. Tournaments for Chess where there is a clear and concise rule-set = Yes! 40k where there is no clear and concise rule-set = No!

Obviously I'm no tournament player and I hate it when these so called power gamers turn up to my club and ruin it with their atrocious attitudes and pointless existence.

[Popsical]

You just cant tar groups of people with the same brush.
Ive been to a few tournies and met a variety of folk.
From the top of my head ive met several lovely blokes who chat before, during and after the games.
Organisers who really try to get banter going between players. These people ive kept in touch with if i can.

Yes of course there are the "other" ones, such as:
The king of nerdness, whom knows ALL the rules and still dresses like his mother dressed him when he was 6 and going to a family doo.
A guy with hugely overactive sweat glans who slowed every game down by moving one ork at a time measuring each one.
The smarmy guy who pretends to lose with grace, only to slag you off to the other gamers (foolishly not realising that you are related to one and mateswith some others lol).

Those are a few examples of the folk who either make or break your tournie.
They are roughly split evenly in my experience. It is sad that the second group stick in the mind most.
Yes we all love going back to see the good ones, but the bad ones seem to repel us more.
Ive personally come close to chinning a couple of the frequent offenders. It can be that bad.

[DarkLink]

Tournament players are the sort of people who ruin Xmas day games of Monopoly with their over competitiveness and who take great enjoyment out of beating their 93 year old Nan at a game of Twister. Sad but true!

You haven't met many tournament players, have you.

[Mr Mystery]

You haven't met many tournament players, have you.

Sadly as already established, it only takes meeting to wrong sort a couple of times to skew things.

For me? It was a group encountered via Dakkadakka that called themselves The Wrecking Crew. So far up themselves it wasn't funny. And they didn't have what you night call a positive reputation online.

Representative? Hardly. But a negative enough impression to our me off Tournaments entirely, knowing there are goons like that about.

[Pure Legend]

I confess not met many as don't frequent tournaments but been along to enough as a guest to know that you'll always meet some of the pigeon holed win at any costs types. It's like going up town on Sat night you'll always bump into some drunk drugged up fool and see people rolling around the road. hence like tournaments and nights up town, I just don't bother.

[Chronowraith]

Overall I'd say most tournament players aren't any different from anyone else. I'd also argue against tournament players being people in clubs that no one wants to play. The more successful tournament players play all the time. Now, they might be in clubs with like-minded people but that isn't always the case.

My small step into tournaments has largely been a fun experience. I get to play against lists I don't see on the local scene, armies that are incredibly assembled/painted, and otherwise have a good weekend of gaming.

I'd add to Mr Mystery... I've met the Wrecking Crew, I've played against their members, and I agree with you wholeheartedly. However, I wouldn't let them spoil tournament scenes as they can be very fun and interesting events. I'd also add most players over here in the states (that I've met and talked to) have a very low opinion of the Wrecking Crew. Most tournaments I've played in are pretty fun (even national ones). Out of 5 games I can usually count on at least 3 being great games, 1 being mediocre, and 1 being bad. Only one year broke this and that was because 4/5 opponents were tyranids (by complete chance, tyranids weren't over represented that year).

[DarkLink]

One member of the wrecking crew was caught using loaded dice at beakycon a couple years ago. But that's other side of the country from me, I don't think I've met them.