Gaming in fluff-mode

[Count Darvaleth]

Hello fellow inhabitants of the dark beyond. Today I wanted to discuss playing a game of warhammer (for me, in this instance, 40K) and playing dead to fluff, sometimes not to your own advantage. What I mean is...

I am thinking of playing Imperial Guard. I would have an incompetent general (Artillery Battalion of some jungle death-world) who makes bad decisions on purpose, such as "into the meat grinder" and being stubborn. Would this be stupid?

Have you ever seen this tried? Playing dead to fluff? Is it at all feasible? Why shouldn't we? I would love the idea of my stubborn, battle-axe of an old man ordering the young wipper-snappers to take the hill from some enemy Orks instead of bombarding them with their significant firepower.

Sounds dumb, I know. or maybe it doesn't. Any opinion would be greatly appreciated, and thank you for your time.

 

[Count Lasombra]

The whole point of the game is to have a good time...sometimes I enjoy my losses more than my victories.I routinely play sub optimal armies b/c it's more enjoyable to me.Who doesn't want to lead a ragtag bunch of misfits to some dubious glory

 

[Count Darvaleth]

I generally lose when I try anyway, so I wouldn't mind losing. But perhaps, say, if the opponent is another SPAASSS MAHREEEN player, it would seem weird.... here's you, with your carefully converted and painted artillery battalion, then there's some try-hard 14-year-old with a load of grey terminators and land raiders.

I will anyway, to be honest, even if only in my head.


EDIT: I know! For all those SPASS MAHREENS, I'll bring along my Necrons as well, for some horrid dream-crushing destruction, but preferably bring out the old IG. I'll create some fluff for them soon....

 

[TMS]

Being a strongly competitive guy, I really can't find any sense or point in (myself) choosing an alternative that I know isn't in my best interest for achieving victory. However, this only applies in-game - I am definately a proponent for building fluffy and themed lists for any occasion. Learning how to correctly use your own chosen tools that have been picked to taste is far more satisfying than anything else.

 

[Bishop]

Playing something that's fluffy and has an interesting background is one thing ... playing something so horribly wrong that you'll likely lose 90% (or more) of the time, is another thing all together. :devil2:

You need to find a nice balance between the two

 

[Danceman]

I have been known to make "fluffy decisions"(like making a heroic last stand with my dwarfs despite known 2 turns in advance I've lost, holding where it might have been better to flee... I mean, a dwarf fleeing from elves?! I don't think so!) in my time but generally the most fun of the game is, much like MS, is to make the most of what I've got. I dislike using proven tactics and much prefer using unconventional unit and item choices in order to achieve funky synnergy between my choices within a list. Sometimes, ok quite frequently, this comes back and bites me in the arse but warhammer is very much a learn by doing-type of game.
In essence, I am not making things easy for my opponent(hell, sometimes an unconvential list probably is much harder than a normal list) due the metagame being flipped upside down. However, I need to make things interesting for myself, so that's that.

I think it is important that you're both on the same page though. It might be highly frustrating for your opponent if you intentionally make bad decisions.

 

[Santawraith]

I think one of the reasons I play some of the armies I do is the fluff and I try to make my army represent the fluff created for them.

Such as the discples of khorne , Kharne fed up with the rest of the chaos marines has set out to slay anything and everything in the name of khorne. So a fallowing of Beserker's and Khrone worshiping chaos marines falllowed. my best game with him was the Famos charge into terminators he did. A suicidal attack which at the time seemed stupid but they presented themselves. Kharne killed 3 of them and his troops killed the other two. In my right mind outside of fluff I would of shot them to death with my dreadnaught with the melta. (I field 2-3 dreads armed like that)

Kharne has slaughtered his troops time and again and made many sucidal charges. Some good some bad.

In battles where there is objective counters I don't ussualy win as my beserkers have too much on there hands killing the enemy to worry about it. (victory by being the last one standing right)


I agree some games are great playing this way then again some are quite horrible both for me and my enemy. (thinks of the battle vs nids and cringes at the slaughter)

 

[Pietr Von Carstein]

When I rarely play LotR if someone has a Balrog I cant help but charge it with Gandalf and shout "YOU SHALL NOT PASS!!" .
The fluffiest thing my woodies ever do is flee except the wildriders who I like to charge scary things with and watch them die , the wildriders being the dieing ones of course .
In 40k I don't play fluffy at all because I use red corsairs who are , pirate space marine , and I don't like tanks . So you end up with an army which is supposed to be all fast and whatnot just walking across the board .

 

[Chunky Von Waffles]

With my 40k Daemons I always run Skulltaker on a Juggernaut with his meat shield of 15 Bloodletters :devil2:

I always throw Skulltaker as close as possible to the enemy commander(s). My main goal, no matter the mission at hand, is to get Skulltaker in base-to-base with my opponents HQ and claim their head(s).
So far in my short beginning of Chaos Daemons I have the following skulls in my collection..
Tau Commander x1
Chaos Lord x1
Necron Lord x1
Archon x1

Haven't lost a game yet

P.S.: NEVER throw grotesques against Skulltaker :swear:

 

[Matthewop]

i cannot play this game. any fast way to get in??

 

[Count Lasombra]

The are no shortcuts just pick up a sword and sheild and get in there!
Or a laser gun...if that's what you're into.
As far as playing to fluff is concerned,I still play to win.I just try and do so within the limitations I set for myself.It's not enough to win at all costs,I want to do it a certain way.Unless I'm in a tournement,I don't want to massacre my opponent,chump bashing is not my cup of tea.I like to barely win,after 6 rounds of heavy conflict.

 

[Count Darvaleth]

Perhaps you're right. Being too stupid would possibly upset the opponent, who thinks you're somehow patronising him with your silly orders. (Such as Take Cover! on a combined squad of 60 guardsmen, who are all in rapid fire range of his terminators, or something)

But a themed list can bring this out without being silly. Now, how the hell am I going to make a themed Necron army....

 

[Count Lasombra]

@Darv- There's always Hello Kitty :slapface:

 

[Onikaigo]

Hello Kitty Necrons? OH MY LORD!

Do it! Please, for the love of Kitty, do it!

 

[Count Darvaleth]

My ignorance leaves me "out of the joke" as they say.

I thought Hello Kitty was some funny... kitty, a TV show.

How this relates to Necrons I will never know.

 

[Sanai]

Prepare for hello kitty indoctrination....

scared yet? you should be.


Edit: My IG army is pure infantry in my lists at the moment so it is pretty fluffy, as you cant be too tactical when you can only just squeeze your army into your deployment zone. Once tried to deploy each squad in a long line, creating row upon row of lined up squads. A few templates and half my army was out of coherency.

 

[Count Lasombra]

Thanks Sanai!!
I would have nominated you for court jester if there was one...ah vell.
The spicy asian is a lovely touch btw.

 

[Count Darvaleth]

The asian wearing the glasses is the one I'm worried about....

And, in answer, NO HELLO KITTY NECRONS EVER!

/shouty mini-rant

EDIT: Now, I mean a real theme for Necrons. I doubt there are many.

 

[Count Lasombra]

OH...A Real Theme? that's harder.
I guess I'm a fantasy bigot b/c 40k armies all seem rather mono-thematic to me.
You can paint'em different or give them them funny heads.
Paint them ethereal and make them the harbingers of Nursing home dimension.
P.S: I meant the one w/ the glasses

 

[RoguePanda]

Some possible themes for Necrons... hmmm, let me think

i) Terracotta Army - Move away from the sleek metal of the normal tomb soldiers, and make them more ornamental. Have a look at some of the Terracota warriors for examples here, I mean greenstuffing on ornate "armour" even though they don't need it. Maybe these Nacrons have less decayed memory engrams and remember something of their original martial pride? Lots of Warriors and Immortals, and some heavily converted Pariah's as another form of elite warrior cadre rather than fresh pawns of the C'Tan?

ii) Deceitful Hate - minions of the deciever that use holograms, camo fields, and other stuff to make themselves harder to deal with. Almost a sort of Necron-Harlequins? Use the Flayed One and Wraith entries, but model them to be hybrid models - eg kitbash Cadians with a flayed one arm and a paint scheme with the "Cadian" colours fading into "Necron Metal" as you reach the necron arm? Or a wraith that is just transitioning from a Marine to a Wraith in appearance, so as an example the Helmet is sliced away in places to reveal a Necron head, paint it to look like the camo field is pulling back from it. Literally they masquerade as their enemies until they are up close and personal.

iii) The Harvest Wardens - model up lots of Pariahs and Immortals, and instead of Scarab swarms use Flagellants on swarm bases. If you have the necron codex handy there is that fluff piece that reads how the future vision shows some people dragged into the machines, and others sucumbing to the illusions and blissfully marching to their deaths. Perhaps cover them in small bits of necron tech, or even latch the scarabs on to them directly? The idea is that this tomb world has managed to start the harvest so well that they have the world under control already! And are now using the cattle as meat sheilds. Maybe use human slaves again in groups with Necron style servitor arms as counts as Tomb Spiders... maybe need Ogryn for that kind of size model?

iv) Mythological Necrons - perhaps this tomb world had a particular religious bent and their forms reflect their old myths and legends? Since we don't know too much about it you can go wild - i.e. headswap all Necron Warriors with Beastmen heads and paint them as ornate masks, instead of Tomb Spiders have floating crystals of some kind surrounded by Necron Runes (you can carve crystals using that tutorial in the codex, just make them mobile and bigger), and other ornate bling.

Sorry, that's all I have got right now. You'll come up with a theme Darvy, best of luck!... Ummm, sorry for the long post, it didn't look so long as it typed it!

 

[Count Darvaleth]

Cheers for those, Pandy. Don't worry about the post size, the more the merrier.

Although you did manage to trick the thread into thinking there were 2 pages, even though there weren't. Sneaky Pandy.