Old Jervis Johnson Article and Age of Sigmar design philosophy

[Sception]

I've been trying to wrap my head around Age of Sigmar's design philosophy, even as I continue to play and enjoy games of it - as often despite its design as because of it. This morning, a new perspective on the game really fell into place for me when the following old article from the Citadel Journal rolled across my tumblr dash:

http://bewareofthephil.tumblr.com/post/124141948385/interesting-old-article-from-the-citadel-journal


I have to say, one thing I used to like about white dwarf that seems to have gone missing over the years were articles from developers that went into depth over the where and the why of rules changes when new editions or army books were released. You got to see what they were thinking, stated clearly right from the horse's mouth. As with all communication from GW, that has dried up, and nowadays the design studio is a black box, leaving the community to only speculate and argue about the often inexplicable choices made in their products and the jarring and unexpected changes in design direction and philosophy.

Too often this speculation takes the form of conspiracy theories, or reductionist rants against 'corporate suits' dictating design to the actual designers, tying their hands in the interest of milking as much cash out of the game as possible, and unsurprisingly that has been the going story about Age of Sigmar from day one. "Fantasy wasn't making money, so the suits killed it to push 'Ao$' instead, it's just a blatant cash grab to try and make us buy new models/bases/whatever all over again / appeal to the kiddies at the expense of 'real' gamers / etc".

-Even though the rules were made available for free.

-Even though free rules were made available for all their previous models.

-Even though the rules go out of their way to let you use your old models and bases (albeit with the most clumsy execution imaginable on the base front.

-Even though The game makes the entry point for new players significantly lower, and seems oriented to smaller - and thus cheaper - games.

-Even though the models are more elaborately detailed than ever, making painting them as daunting as ever for younger audiences.

Obviously GW and its designers hope AoS will be more successful than the game it's replacing, but try as I might, I just can't see the cheap soulless cash grab that so many are rushing to brand this as.

Often times in corporately held properties, you see the most creativity, the most creative control, in the flagging product lines, or in lines not expected to be major hits regardless. The suits are wary of messing with the 'cash cows', but the failing lines, those they're willing to let the creatives experiment with, try crazy ideas. The risk is lower - after all, if the product line is already unsuccessful, shaking it up can't really make things worse.

If I were to speculate about what AoS is, and the rest of this post is nothing but such baseless speculation, that is what I would put my money on. It has the feel of the auteur to it, the single-minded, inwardly focused (or, less generously, 'masturabatory') vision of a creator speaking primarily to themselves, rather than to an audience.

In the article linked above, Jervis Johnson bemoans the ubiquity of competitive games - not just tournament games, mind, but 'tournament style' games, by which he means equal points battles with plain scenarios played with the intent to win rather than just to push the models around the table and role-play with your buddies. He describes how he feels the best games of warhammer are played without points values, without victory conditions, without particular adherence to the rules. He is, in short, describing Age of Sigmar as the ideal incarnation of Warhammer Fantasy years before it was even a thing.


Now, the rest of this post is founded on the, at the moment, baseless speculation that Age of Sigmar had a singular creative vision driving it, and that either Jervis or someone who shares this basic philosophy is that principle creative mind at jwork in Age of Sigmar. Specifically the basic philosophy that tournament / pick up style games are the most boring, 'least common denominator' way to play, and that they should be sidelined in favor of purely narative, casual games focused on role play rather than 'roll play'.

To Jervis (or rather to my reductionist caricature of Jervis), the casual gamers who don't care about the rules and are just there to have a good time are the 'real gamers', and it's the serious competitive players who are the upstart kids ruining his hobby, in an ironic reversal of the most common characterizations of Age of Sigmar. He's not designing to 12 year olds, he's designing to 40 year olds (which includes designing games they can play with their 12 year old kids).

In the article he says he has nothing against competitive play, but he wishes it weren't ubiquitous, and he thinks he can change that by simply putting fewer competitive games in WD battle reports, and instead writing about narrative casual games.

But if he did that, it wasn't successful, was it? Tournament / pick up style games continued to be the way Warhammer was played. Later we saw the GW official tournament scene removed altogether, but that didn't change anything either, 'competitive' style 'play equal points games by the rules as written' game play continued to dominate the warhammer scene, even as fantasy declined in popularity, and it's easy to imagine (since, again, we have no actual insight into the black box) how old Jervis and his friends might have flailed about, looking for anything to blame that design on other than a quadrupling of the cost of playing the game in the middle of the worst global recession we've seen in the better part of a century.

How easy then for Jervis to blame it on players 'playing the game wrong'. How easy for him, once the ok was handed down from the suits to try something dramatic with fantasy, to decide to remove the competitive, rules and points obsessed scene from Fantasy altogether by releasing a version of the game that removes points values altogether, with rules so minimalist that the players are practically required to make up portions as they go?


So yeah, that's my theory of the thinking behind Age of Sigmar - not the product of a soulless corporate board of hucksters trying to weasel money out of rubes any way they could, but the brain child of a self centered (not in the sense of being selfish, but in the sense of caring about the "integrity" of their personal artistic vision rather than the interests or desires of their audience) games auteur, frustrated with people playing with their toys 'the wrong way', designing a rule set to try to force people to play the game 'the right way'.

Not that that's necessarily a much better a motivation for games design than soulless cash grabbing. I mean, it's a little better, but not much, since it still doesn't treat the eventual audience of the game as actual people worthy of respect, it merely disregards them rather than outright disrespecting them. And that's not to say the motivation behind the creation and design of a product is the most important aspect of judging its worth. I happen to like Age of Sigmar just fine as a thing in and of itself, even if I'm not exactly a fan of any of the artistic motivations that I could see leading to its creation.

As I said in the female models thread (now sadly, if understandably closed), when it branched into an 'intro to art theory' discussion,

when directors can't handle audiences reacting in unexpected ways, when they throw little public tantrums because audiences didn't 'get it', we rightfully mock them.

And mock them we do, though that doesn't necessarily mean we don't still go to their movies, and enjoy them in whatever way we please, subversively or otherwise, and I'm still going to play and enjoy Age of Sigmar. That enjoyment is just going to be tinged with a slight dose of irony.

 

[Pirate Robot Ninja of Death]

I think there's no question that the perspective shown in this article is exactly the driving force behind these Age of Sigmar changes, and exactly why I am so fucking done with Games Workshop, and get so (I'll admit...completely irrationally) angry about the community's attempt to forge something worthwhile out of the half-baked mess of Age of Sigmar.

I get that GW wants to cater more towards narrative gamers. And know what? That's absolutely fine. I understand that not everyone wants to play at a "competitive level," attend tournaments, or endlessly pour over the rules to find interesting and powerful combinations.

But what about those of us that do? What about those of us who enjoy warhammer primarily as a *GAME*, where playing tough games against tough players and getting better, expanding your knowledge, and honing your skills is the primary object and avenue for enjoyment. However Games Workshop clearly thinks that this sort of play is just "playing the game wrong," and Age of Sigmar is their clear and overwhelming statement that "we don't serve your kind here."


This is what pisses me off so much. GW has kicked us competitive players to the proverbial back of the bus. We're welcome to spend money in their stores, so long as we do not sully their product with any sort of "balancing" scheme in their official rules. No...we have to do that all ourselves. Seeing my fellow gamers bow to that, and keep playing to their fiddle despite such an insult fills me with insensate rage.

FUCK Games Workshop. Fuck them and everything they stand for. I've loved this hobby for two decades, and now I'm told that my enjoyment was somehow "wrong"? Somehow lesser than the guys just idly pushing models around in their basements?

I'll tell you right now, some of the best painters and hobbyists I know are tournament gamers. No...nearly ALL of them. The true "hobbyist" hobbyists are few and far between, and time and time again the most gorgeous armies I see on the tables are also pure unadulterated filth. Because tournaments give you an audience for that enormous amount of work. Because people who are passionate enough about the hobby to put in that amount of effort are often equally passionate about the game.



Thus why I'm so passionate about advocating for other game companies, producing games with an ear towards the community and an intent to make a balanced game that can be enjoyed by anyone. Because if the only style of play that's enjoyed is competitive play, it's probably because the company has completely shit the bed on creating a narrative game that is accessible enough for people to play. Not everyone has an army specifically tailored to their scenarios, which EXPLICITLY REQUIRE certain set models and armies to play. That don't even let you name your characters, let alone pick what units or armies you want to play with.

Games Workshop is just so far out to lunch that I no longer want to give them a fucking dime of my hobby dollars. I would rather go with a company that actually gives a shit about me as a player and hobbyist. A company like Mantic or Mierce who has provided their rules for free, to be rigorously playtested by the community...and who actually accepts feedback.

Not games workshop who dumps this half-baked abortion of a skirmish game on us, and expects us to do their fucking job for them. The more I read about Age of Sigmar, the angrier it all makes me.

Just...fuck Games Workshop. Fuck them for making me love their game so much. And then fuck them for telling me I'm not welcome in their Brave New World.

 

[Pirate Robot Ninja of Death]

Just to drive this point entirely home, here is a quote from the article that articulates their position without any shadow of a doubt as to where they stand.

So, something clearly needs to be done to teach players that tournament style play has its place, but it is a place well down in the pecking order of what constitutes a really good game.​

Fuck them. I'm done.



EDIT: And yes, I fully appreciate that my post seems irrational, disproportionate, and emotional to the extreme. But that's just how I'm feeling about this game right now. Warhammer is my hobby, and the activity that I engage in with many of my oldest and dearest friends. It's what I do when I'm looking for a weekend away. It's the only community that truly appreciates the immense amount of work and creativity I've poured into my army.

And now I get to see that community fracture and implode, because GW decided to rid themselves of the "problem players" rather than put the work into making a game that it could be enjoyed by all.

...I think that gives me every right to be irrationally angry and negative.

 

[Sception]

There's certainly something laughable about it. At least anecdotally, the Warhammer Fantasy community was never so strong or healthy, it was never so easy to get any kind of game - casual or competitive, narrative or gamist - as it was back when GW was actively supporting their own first party tournament scene.

And, looking back, it's easy to see a lot of moves from GW since then as reactions against the 'competitive' crowd - and again, that doesn't just mean tournament players, it means anybody with a 'play even games to particular points and follow the raw' mentality, ie most 'play at the store, bring and battle pick up games', in particular the closing of GW's forums when discussion focused on min-maxing and complaints about poor competitive balance, the cancellation of GW's tournaments altogether, the reduction in play testing of products. GW has repeatedly come across as not just indifferent but actively hostile towards the competitive crowd, even though by Jervis's own admission in that article they seemed to make up the majority of the warhammer player base.

And they did reduce the competitive player pool, but narrative players didn't rush in to fill the gap, the total player pool just shrank and shrank, and I think this is a fundamental flaw of trying to cater to narrative players at the expense of the competitive types.

- Narrative players will play their narrative games regardless of the actual rules. You do not need to cater to them specifically, and especially not at the expense of competitive players.

- Narrative players don't need your rules at all. If they get entrenched in an old system, they'll just stay there. Since they only ever play against their friends, there's no impetus to stay 'up to date' so they can play with strangers.

- Narrative players don't need your models, either. If they see a cool model from a rival company, then they buy it and add it to their armies. If they see a cool bit on a toy, they just incorporate it into their conversions. And when the suits try to bring the hammer down and ban non-GW models from GW stores, narrative players just stop going there to play, if they ever played outside of their basements anyway, which means they stop going there to shop. I am skeptical that GW's more casual / narrative oriented Age of Sigmar game and rules will be able to undo the damage that their anti-hobbyist, anti-conversion policies have done and continue to do with that crowd.

- The best advertisement for this game is seeing it played, and narrative players are less likely to come to the store to play in front of the windows than they are to play in their own basements.

- Expanding on the problem of evangelization, narrative players are less concerned with growing the hobby. They play primarily with their own handful of friends in their own basements, expanding the homebrew lore of their own epic rivalries. They don't benefit from new players in the same way that competitive / pick up gamers do because they're not looking for new opponents in the same way. Granted, overly competitive players can drive away new gamers, too, but I find casual types can be just as antisocial and off putting.


And, in general, it just just smacks of hubris for a creator to look out on a community enjoying their toys in an unexpected way and say 'You people are doing it wrong, so I'm just going to break my toys for everyone'.

Again, I happen to be a more casual/narrative gamer. Regardless of its origins or the attitudes behind it, I happen to like Age of Sigmar as a game into and of itself. So as long as enough people in my community are playing the game, so will I. But this attitude is very frustrating, it does feel like an abandonment of responsibility and just a really petty sort of move, and I would neither be shocked nor all that broken up about it if a year or so from now this game has dried up entirely. I'm not rooting for it to fail, mind, but neither do I feel invested in its success. I feel very ambivalent about it. Sort of like being told by a very bossy authority figure to do something I was already doing. It suddenly makes you not want to do it as much, you know?

 

[Pirate Robot Ninja of Death]

Absolutely, it is 100% the hubris of a creator wanting to dictate the terms of how his art is enjoyed, to keep it in line with his original vision. Warhammer is an battlefield RPG to them, and that's really what Age of Sigmar is. It's Dungeons & Dragons, how certain feats aren't even remotely balanced but were never really meant to be, because it's all about the experience of roleplaying and "min-maxers" are playing the game "wrong."

I also agree that so-called "casual" or "hobby" gamers are often some of the most unpleasant and obnoxious of the bunch. The tournament gamers in our scene are wonderful opponents as a rule, with very few exceptions. We've played so many games, and both won and lost them, to the point that the actual outcome matters far less than our individual performance. However "hobby" gamers are frequently (though not always) far more bent out of shape by a loss than a competitive player ever is...and tend to construct an elaborate system around what is a "true" or "fair" win, and what wins are the result of "cheesy lists" or "cheesy strategies" or - absolute worst of all - "the dice going against them." Beat a competitive gamer and he will shake your hand with a smile and congratulate you on a well-fought victory. Beat a hobby gamer and he will find every excuse for why your victory doesn't, or shouldn't, matter.

The part that frustrates me the most is this notion that "competitive" and "narrative" play are mutually exclusive, and that there is no crossover between the players. I've both run and participated in narrative campaigns with my friends. They're great. GW's offerings on that front are also largely shit, and frequently constrict you to replaying historical battles with fixed lists of models. I'd say it's a very specific type of gamer who is into that sort of gaming, or who even has the models for it. You can't just "play through all of the End Times" scenarios with a buddy, because doing so would mean having some 30,000 points spread across every bloody faction in the game.

Not to mention the spurious notion that competitive players don't paint their armies. Some don't, just like all the casual players I know haven't touched their models with a paintbrush in a decade. But look at the most gorgeous armies on the internet and chances are they're in the hands of a tournament player.



At this point, I *AM* actively rooting for GW to fail. Call me petty. Call me vindictive. I don't care. At this point my worst case scenario is that Age of Sigmar is a roaring success, Jervis' perspective on this hobby is validated, and I'm never allowed back in that tent again. I would much rather see that company crash and burn hard, then have their IP bought out by a company who knows how to run a fucking gaming community. Someone like Hasbro, who could put the folks from Wizards at the helm and rebuild something worthwhile out of the flaming heap of ruin that GW turned this beloved hobby into.

 

[Sception]

I really wouldn't call you petty or vindictive. I absolutely understand, and even agree with to an extent, the bitterness of players who feel actively betrayed by GW's designers, and I feel criticism of their actions and decisions in scrapping warhammer fantasy in favor of this game are absolutely justified. I understood Holy Death's burning of his dark elf army, and don't feel it showed any moral failing on his part to stage such an act of protest with his own property.

I mean, I would prefer you to keep such criticisms out of Age of Sigmar threads on the tactics subforum - those are for internal discussions of the game rather than external discussions, if you catch my meaning. 'How best to play Connect Four', not 'is Connect Four worth playing to begin with' or 'does Milton Bradley deserve your money'. Maybe if GW's actions had been actively immoral instead of just obnoxious and disrespectful of their audience. Like, if Age of Sigmar models were built in totalitarian nation by child or slave labor in unsafe factories that killed workers. That's the kind of immoral that would warrant active disruption of any discussion of the game. But as it is, while I think criticism is completely warranted (heck I just started this thread with a giant post doing so), I also think it is reasonable to ask that it be reserved for specifically critical threads on general discussion subforums, rather than invading the space of people who are just trying to enjoy the game. While it's disrespectful of GW to tell players how they 'should' or 'shouldn't' play the game, it's disrespectful for use to try and impose such feelings on each other as well. Posting a new thread discussing your displeasure with GW's actions feels like a critique of GW, but interrupting a discussion of Age of Sigmar between players feels like you're attacking them, not GW.

Otherwise, I'm mostly objecting to those who have been calling Age of Sigmar a money-grab, or using derisive abbreviations that imply that accusation ('Ao$'), because I think that fails to capture the what and the why of the designers' actions, which, regardless of whether I personally enjoy the game or not, I certainly feel are not above a considerable degree of criticism, here.


EDIT: also keep in mind that while Wizards have done a bang up job with MtG over the years, the general feeling is that they've made a mess of D&D, and if they got their hands on Warhammer they'd be far more likely to turn it into a heroclix-esque pre-painted collectable minis game sold in random booster packs.

 

[Pirate Robot Ninja of Death]

No, I fully understand. I've been looking all over for avenues to vent about how much this pisses me off, and have not been paying attention to whether the venues I choose are appropriate or are detrimental to others' discussion. I'll watch myself in the future.

It just...makes me so fucking mad. As mad to see people tacitly accepting this garbage as the release of the garbage itself.

Is Age of Sigmar fun? Sure. I don't doubt that. I thought it looked fun myself. But it's also an incomplete product. You can't play a GAME with it, like it is meant to. You can tell a story, or play glorified GI Joes with it. But it's not a head-to-head wargame like it implies on the tin. Certainly not like the WHFB it's purporting to replace.

People are putting all this effort into trying to salvage something out of this game, and honestly I don't think that GW deserves this level of devotion anymore. There are other games that could serve as a base for these efforts, from companies who might actually respect and appreciate those efforts. All we will ever get from GW is sneers and derision that we're "playing their game wrong," even as they take our money for their ever-increasingly-expensive models.

As I said elsewhere, it's like watching a parent give in and buy their child that toy or sweet they're having a tantrum in the store about. Or watching your friends go back to their abusive ex. Or reading about some company dumping garbage into a river half the world away. Yeah it doesn't affect me *direct*, but it's like "GOD DAMNIT DON'T ENCOURAGE THIS BEHAVIOUR." The rest of us will have to deal with the consequences of this! If Age of Sigmar is a roaring success, don't think they wont give 40K the same treatment.

 

[najo]

First off, Pirate, I'm not going to tell you your wrong to feel the way you do and I understand why you feel the way you do. I just want to add my own two cents to the conversation in hopes of helping things be better for all of us.

1) In my 25 years, the philosophy of GW towards tournaments has always been sportsmanship and fun first. For whatever reason, they feel that the tournament scene brings out the worst in players. I think they problems they see are legit, but the cause isn't the tournament scene and they think it is.

2) the problems they see, set point values, stagnate armies, new player intimidation and shut out, only playing the game one way. Those problems all seem like they are part of the tournaments, but the problem isn't the hardcore players. It's the game design. Removing points like they have addresses some of these problems and leads to out of the box thinking on how to set up games. GW wanted to try making the game from the narrative, new player direction and are leaving comp and balance to the hardcores. Look at all the tournaments and rules like ETC, if anything, hardcore players have thrown out GWs points and army comp and replaced it with their own anyways.

3) Age of Sigmar has done two critical things that all previous wargames failed to do. It removed the barrier to entry entirely and it built in deep tactical play in simple rules anyone can learn. Anyone of any age can pick out a model they like, throw it on the table and play it with rules they can learn in minutes. Then, once your games get larger, the tactical play gets more complex. Rules like the 3" zone, fighting over models, retreating from combat, pile-in towards closest enemy.. That's the difficult to master part. There is a complex movement and engagement system right there. That shows GW is thinking about long term retention and veteran players.

Then of course there is the starting true to the mythology and course the world was on. AoS fluff is the logical direction of the Warhammer story. But that is a whole other topic.

Any rate, that is what those of us who are intrigued by AoS see. GW is offering a well-crafted, new approach to wargames that hopeful give us new blood and greater tactics. Something that scales better. To us, it's too early to write off as our initial findings are discovering something solid under the simple appearances.

You don't have to like it, and you are free to continue playing 8th or go play KoW. But wishing it all would fail and burn down... That only hurts all of us that are enjoying b it and want to see AoS grow and improve.

And as malisteen mentioned, this is a game for 40 year old vets and their 12 year olds too. Well, that is exactly who I am and my 13 year old daughter is finely playing Warhammer with me after trying to get her into it for years. She loves Age of Sigmar. As do my other 40 yr old veteran buddies who only want the most tactical game possible. To me, the fact that wargame vets and teenagers are clamoring for more and playing together means they did something right.

Anyways, please take that into consideration. Personally, I say we keep 8th alive and continuing to master that system as that is where we all have common ground. Otherwise, KoW vs AoS just divides the community even further. Warhammer is why we're all together.

Peace.

 

[Sception]

I'm also an older, more casual gamer, but it's just frustrating that it feels like 20 and 30 year olds, and anyone who likes to go to the shop for pick up games and doesn't have a cadre of basement buddies or a captive child audience to play with has been thrown under the bus by this move, and unnecessarily so, imo. Especially since my basement bud group no longer plays GW, and hasn't in a while due to other GW actions and policies, as aluded to in my initial post.

So far the local scene is picking the game up against all odds, so I'll deal, but it is considerably more frustrating putting those pick up games together than it used to be. Points, imperfect as they might have been, were a tool that made arranging games with strangers easy and fast, and they made list-building into a thing all its own, as much a part of the hobby as playing or painting, and something a lot of us sunk even more time into than the rest, and that portion of the warhammer hobby just feels like its dead now.

 

[Oppenheimer]

I've never played in a tournament and don't really have much interest in it. I just want to play with my friends. I actually think that the change in rules will allow more of my friends to join me in a game. They were just too intimidated by it before even if I let them borrow one of my armies so there's no buy in. I've shown them that the rules are not a giant book but just a few pages and they are now genuinely interested in trying it out.


I like the lore and the models and enjoy putting them together and then playing with them. The games I've had the most fun in were scenarios I cooked up that are actually lopsided on purpose. My favourite one was where Alarielle is kidnapped and held prisoner and being transported off and so we created a city landscape and put the black coach in the middle to represent the prison wagon and I set up my forces in a line like they were moving through the village. Then we had the elves hiding out in the buildings. Made rules that the black coach kept moving each turn but couldn't charge and if destroyed my opponent would get the Alarielle mini put in the closest unit at no cost. I feel like Age of Sigmar has more flexibility for creative scenarios like that. I just want to be able to play with my miniatures and delve into the lore. If this makes more of my friends interested in playing it then I'm happy about that.

 

[Sception]

I also like the four page rule set, I'm just frustrated by the lack of points values due to the unnecessary difficulties it adds to bring & battle gaming. Heck, even if they were called out as an optional scenario rule, and only incorporated into one or two scenarios, that would be fine for me. It would be there for the people who find it useful, but the focus of the game would still be clear, imo.

I like the minimalist, four page ruleset. I like the emphasis on tailored special rules on each unit card, quick and easy for opponents to look over, but allowing for considerable flavor for the different units and factions (I like, for instance, that banners and musicians do different things for different factions). I like the new lore and setting, I like the look of the new models, I like everything except the more obnoxious joke rules, the apparent lack of testing, the dumb way bases are handled, and especially the lack of list construction rules & points values that would make pick up games easier and keep that 'tinkering with army lists' aspect of the hobby in place.

Oh, and the lack of communication. Especially the lack of communication. If Age of Sigmar were advertised as trial rules of the new warhammer, inviting public commentary, maybe even with official checkbox and comment forms in the starter box for players to mail in their thoughts or brief battle reports - even if nobody on the other side ever actually read them - I would be a lot more forgiving to it.

 

[najo]

Two quick points.

1) my friends and I are devising a fairly robust no points system for army comp I plan to share shortly.

2) AoS has been playtested and developed in house for about two years. Everything you see is intentional and methodical with the intention of rebooting fantasy and having it thrive. Doesn't mean it's perfect, but it's more balanced and less thrown together than people think. And the main issue is army comp and scenarios right now. Which as I said, I have an idea that isn't out there yet and I plan to share really soon.

 

[Tawg]

Jervis... what a cool guy.

This whole topic and thread is quite amazing, it was a thoroughly enjoyable read. Although I got the feeling that @Pirate Robot Ninja of Death was accepting most of this as fact, rather than the conjecture you properly announced it as @Malisteen . Either way it is a very interesting theory, albeit nearly as conspiracy theory as the Ao$ lot. It certainly offers a different course of events to see the game as; I always wondered why GW thought it was a good idea to promote the No-non-GW-Conversions rule, and then simply bowed out of up keeping their in house events and stores. Speaking to @Banat, he told me about how it is still a fairly big thing in their home of the UK, which surprised me. I figured they stopped having that sort of thing anywhere, not just in the US.

I also have something of note. Like @Malisteen mentioned, how "narrative" players will disregard what they want to or any such, I am dumbfounded by the reaction of players like @Pirate Robot Ninja of Death. Not because I believe you are unjustified to feel betrayed or that AoS does not appeal to you in the least, but rather I am shocked that people believe that extending the community to "fixing" the game is an extreme effort on our part, or a lack of effort on GW's part. I've stated before that I don't believe GW has ever put out a product that was something I could consider beyond the reproach of house ruling, or tweaking. In fact, sometimes part of the enjoyment for myself (In many games, not just GW), is trying to get a system that works for my friends and myself. It's also so odd because I don't understand the concept when it is almost always the case that the games supported by point costs often have such "min-max" builds based on the fact that they are simply not balanced. Everyone knows it is not truly balanced. But they can't live without guide lines? The guidelines are always there. It's the performance of the units, and the abilities ascribed to them. The point costs that get tagged onto them is simply a way for a player cry "But Mom SAID it was OK!" when other people question them; And sometimes it is to the point that the community agrees on such things being cheese, or in the case that @Pirate Robot Ninja of Death seemed to support, it is the case that individuals bend their definition of cheese to what ever is beating them. But that will happen no matter what the game system supports. If a poor sport is going to cry about an imbalanced game, giving them no points means they'll cry about anything that isn't clearly in their favor, but with points they just make up excuses? Likewise for "tournament" players, the guidelines are certainly more clear cut (Although not always balanced to a point everyone agrees on), and AoS is definitely a hurdle for them to get over.

Don't get me wrong, I understand the value of point costs (Ba-dum-tish :ghost: ), but to cry bloody murder when they are not there is as silly as those players who are "grasping at straws to make this half-baked PoS-AoS functional". It's a mater of perspective. I enjoy making up rules anyways, and while I agree that the balance is something new and very strange, making it quite a bit harder to set up games, it isn't something that is wholly needed. Many players are upset by this, and @Malisteen is right, perhaps they will produce a magical list of "official" point costs for units, but just the same a tournament (Or even just community) scene will make the changes they deem fit to the game to make it work for them. And something like that will probably spread due to the desire of many players to have something unified to relate to, but it doesn't mean those people who put that effort into the game are mind-numbed slaves to GW.

Honestly other games don't appeal to me very much at all. Although I would not say I owe GW any loyalty, rather much I buy which ever models I like, as any "narrative" player might (Or any player with an eye for their own aesthetic values). But other games often have points that are rather much not in agreement with my enjoyment.

Also, @Malisteen, I am curious. Everyone speaks about Pick-up-Games, but rather much, if you're interested in the hobby/game, could you not put up a bulletin of information to gather players of like mind? Like, present an idea for a campaign or such, to try and get a set of games going and have people agree on things going into it, rather than strictly P-u-Gs? Maybe I'm a bit off, but at my FLGS they have community bulletins, and I think those are useful tools to find like-minded players. Or kind of scouting to find players you think might be worth trying to play with. I understand that not everyone has an active gaming group (Mine is basically scattered around the States at this point), but I feel like it might be worth trying to find persons, rather than calling it a lost hope.

Even if you just put together a scenario idea and offer to play people, or put yourself out there as a person looking to game and inviting players who aren't put off by the AoS's lack of points or such.


And to completely 180° my opinion, I will add that it takes a bit of actual gaming experience to really understand the design of the game well enough to set up good matches. I'm no genius myself, although I've been playing for quite some time, and I find that right now with AoS matches, they are often rather poorly matched. Just tonight I played some 60+ skaven models + a few guns and Rat Ogres, against an army of only 14 Ogres +2x Mournfang and 1x Frosthorn. The FLGS attendant walked by the table my friend and I were playing at, and questioned if the match was fair near the second turn. By the third turn my friend's Ogre's had hit my battle line (Or I hit his, we both were advancing), and he killed two units of mine in nearly one round of combat each between casualties and the new Bravery System. Within 2 combat phases my army had been reduced to just the guns, 10 Rats and the Hero while I had killed only about 6 Ogres. Balance is certainly a work in progress.

 

[Draykorinee]

Anyways, please take that into consideration. Personally, I say we keep 8th alive and continuing to master that system as that is where we all have common ground. Otherwise, KoW vs AoS just divides the community even further. Warhammer is why we're all together.

Peace.

KoW vs AoS doesn't even exist, why should it, its different games.
People are also moving on from warhammer whether the moderators like it or not, that isn't to say its the majority/minority, we don't know, but clearly there is a drive for some people to move to KoW, it only divides the community if the creators community doesn't let those who want to go to KoW have their place to discuss it, right now we're (rightly) wedged in between different discussions about whatever, leading it to once again invade this discussion. There is zero reason why people playing KoW can't play warhammer 8th or AoS and zero reason why it should divide the community or discussion between all parties can't be like it was pre-AoS if it is properly supported.

As to the motivation, its pretty clear its a business move, they are targeting new audiences and hoping those who played WFB go along for the ride. I doubt there is a shred of malice in it, or a conspiracy to remove tournament players or whatever. To me its a total dick move, they had this in the works for 2 years, they never involved the community, I foolishly spent £170 on WoC armies this year including books, which whilst not redundant, I can assure you I wouldn't have spent a penny had I known what was in store. Its a mess of a game, yes I have played it, it doesn't balance even when trying but the thing that frustrates me more is the complete death of support for warhammer 8th and how it has ripped apart communities and I doubt GW gives a monkeys.

Personally I don't get why the hell people are so desperate to support GW when other companies are out there developing games and quite clearly getting involved in the community. Not one person would go the lengths they are to get this game going if it was done by anyone else GW is quite frankly the EA of the miniature world to me.

 

[Emicrania]

I really dont understand why everywhere in this forum there is a war of opinion where one side is trying to convince the other. If one feel and think and that the new system sucks ,I don't understand why you are trying to put em on the spot and clarify all the angles on how awesome gw is and how good the new products are.
Same goes in the other way of course,but the holy crusade to convert the anti-aos is oblivious, just count how many 3d have been opened to promote AoS and how many to complain.

I just wanna add to clarify all the doomsayers and conspiracy mockery one thing: GW YouTube channel is the only contact with the real world for free we can get,and have disabled comment( one way communication).
KoW and all the other games out there have official forums and you can actually talk by the people that makes the rules and the fluff.
GW may be bigger,but not for long.
Or maybe it is,they never release any data,so the whole "fantasy was selling bad" might be just another trick of smoke and mirrors.

 

[Draykorinee]

Same goes in the other way of course,but the holy crusade to convert the anti-aos is oblivious, just count how many 3d have been opened to promote AoS and how many to complain.

I don't think people are trying to convert, but I think its clear that there are certain games people are hoping we don't switch to, its pretty much been said in here, don't go to KoW stick with 8th. I don't get why that is, one company is offering a game for the next 10/15/20 years, the other is dead, why encourage people to stick with it and try to turn people off of KoW?

On topic ^ this is why GW motivation baffles me, they could have released these rules in Beta, got everyone excited, playtest it, give people a heads up to whats coming, but they did the usual pigheaded, heres our game, go play it. (oh and fix it while you're at it)

I'll give everything a go, but you can't seriously be telling me its divisive if I chose another game to play as well as the ones I already own and want to discuss it. There is scope for everyone to enjoy the games they want.

 

[najo]

I need to clear the air here as I am tired of the undertones in all these threads.

1) I never said don't play KoW. Only once did I state in reply to someone that it wasn't my cup of tea. I have never once attacked it or replied in its threads in any negative way. Go search my posts on my profile.

2) I personally am in the give KoW a sub-section in the board camp. I think its a legitimate game and I would rather keep our family together than make anyone feel alienated.

3) I have stated AoS has depth and it has personally intrigued me. Some other members here agree and have had similar findings. When we discuss it and start threads on it, its been pro-KoW members who lash out and declare AoS as worthless. When I've attempted to point out my findings I get argued with by people who aren't even giving AoS any real chance.

4) There has been virtually no pro-AoS going into KoW threads and becoming hostile. There has been pro-KoW posts that become hostile and attack AoS however. This is likely because of the betrayal and passion fueling the migration by angry WFB players to KoW. This needs to stop though.

Because I am direct, honest and vocal I am getting targeted and painted up as pro-AoS and anti-KoW and actively working against KoW and KoW members. This couldn't be further from the truth. I am pro-AoS not because I am a GW fan-boi but because of the validity I've seen in it so far. It's less with more appeals to me and I love how fast it can be picked up by new players. Its doing things outside of the box and I want to see that journey unfold. Age of Sigmar isn't a watered down skirmish game. Its potentially the game industry equivalent of GO.

KoW is not my cup of tea because I already have played and own that game. To me that's Warhammer 6th - 8th edition. I don't want to put energy into learning two new games and I don't want to miss out on the new ground that Age of Sigmar is exploring in game design.

Totally transparency, Alessio is one of my favorite designers of all time. I loved most of the work he did on 6th and 7th edition Warhammer and the other games he designed for GW. He is a great minimalist and I think overall he was GW's best designer when it came to streamlining and balance. But I think he was better on a team and working with the established fluff of Warhammer. With Kings of War, I find his design is too cut down and barebones. Its boring and anything interesting is copied from Warhammer. I do plan on buying Kings of war 2nd Edition to check it out, but I can tell from what I've seen so far its not going to get my creative juices going. Mantic's business model of essentially copying GW and then wooing their customers away is a turn off to me.

To be 100% honest and vulnerable, I personally have game design aspirations and love studying and taking game systems apart. I really follow the work of all these guys closely and I don't speak of game systems lightly. The reason Age of Sigmar is calling to me is because it keeps surprising and challenging me as a designer. GW did something fairly brilliant there, and whether you agree or not really doesn't matter, but I'm not saying that out of stubbornly trying to get you to play it, its coming from my understanding as a designer because its true.

For the record, 4th edition Dungeons and Dragons was out of the box and brilliant design in certain ways too. It made DMing easier than any previous edition and has been the easiest edition for new players to pick up. The adventures were really customizible and the DM guide advice spot on. Game mechanics simple but complex. Unfortunately they messed up character design and progression, this gave characters a MMO/ gamist feel, which ended up alienating the players while attracting DMs who wanted an easy game to manage.

Is Age of Sigmar GW's D&D 4th edition? Possibly. Its causing a revolt in some players like 4e did. The difference is when your playing Age of Sigmar, its plays very much like Warhammer and the more people play it the easier they are finding it to plug in units and the deeper the tactics seem to go. Just played a game tonight where we discovered a couple more layers, though I hit my first major concern in how quickly damage is dished out. Units can be deleted very quickly, often in a single turn. Not sure if this is a good or bad thing yet. It might be the balance to the summoning/reinforcement aspect of the game. I don't know yet. What I did discover though, is movement, cautious tactics and well-timed charges that give you advantage in combat when you choose which unit to activate only supported that AoS is Chess or GO. Dice don't seem to matter so much as does movement, position and activation order. That is all math and timing, which means tactics. Its more prevalent than any previous edition too.

Any rate, I hope that might give you some better insight into myself, my position and what my intention is with Age of Sigmar. Stop feeling like I am anti-KoW, because I am not. I would love for you guys to play AoS because I want you guys to put it through its paces and break or balance it. I want to hear more findings and respect you guys as hardcore players. But if AoS is just garlic and holywater to your vampire selves, I will understand.

Just know that we are on the same side.

 

[Blutsauger]

On the one hand, I shed no tears for the competitive gamers. I largely agree with Jervis's old article and the general 'vibe' from GW that taking the competitive side of the game too seriously is 'doing it wrong'.

I still don't like Age of Sigmar though.

There are hundreds, maybe thousands of different wargames out there. They cover all sorts of periods and themes, from gladiators to space combat to WWII and literally everything in between. Age of Sigmar is just another one in the pile. It's not Warhammer, it's not set in the same world as Warhammer was, and while you can still use the Warhammer models, I can use Warhammer models in lots of different games so that's a moot point.

Age of Sigmar doesn't do it for me. I'm not going to be militant about it, it's just that as far as I'm concerned it's just another game on the pile. I'd pick up Wargods of Olympus before I started AoS, and there's plenty of other games that are ahead of it in the queue. And frankly, I'm still mad they blew up the old world.

 

[owain_b]

Hey Najo, I think its a shame you felt the need to post that. I have read a lot of your posts and I have never once thought you were anti KOW, or overly promoting AOS. You have just been sharing your experiences so far with a new game, keep it up people dont have to read them if they done want to, and this is coming from someone that probably wont play AOS, more to do with lack of opponents but also partly because I'm happy with 8th at the mo.
But who knows, i'd happily give it a try if I can talk one of my group into trying it

 

[owain_b]

On the one hand, I shed no tears for the competitive gamers. I largely agree with Jervis's old article and the general 'vibe' from GW that taking the competitive side of the game too seriously is 'doing it wrong'.

I still don't like Age of Sigmar though.

There are hundreds, maybe thousands of different wargames out there. They cover all sorts of periods and themes, from gladiators to space combat to WWII and literally everything in between. Age of Sigmar is just another one in the pile. It's not Warhammer, it's not set in the same world as Warhammer was, and while you can still use the Warhammer models, I can use Warhammer models in lots of different games so that's a moot point.

Age of Sigmar doesn't do it for me. I'm not going to be militant about it, it's just that as far as I'm concerned it's just another game on the pile. I'd pick up Wargods of Olympus before I started AoS, and there's plenty of other games that are ahead of it in the queue. And frankly, I'm still mad they blew up the old world.

Thats exactly it, I think you've hit the nail on the head there! AOS is a new game, and if people arent interested in starting a new game they wont. And one new game is as good as any other to try, and unless you have tried, you cant know for sure if its any good. I think a lot of people that just play for fun with friends will just continue with 8th, as playing a game of 8th tomorrow is no different to playing it 6 months ago.
I will definately try AOS at some point, but I dont feel the urge to try it immediately, I'm still enjoying 8th, but I'm sure there will be a time that I will. And I think as a game that I can still use all my existing models and down load the rules for free, it is the most likely one I will be trying. Also KOW doesnt have lizardmen as far as I can see, so it is more limited to certain armies and as Lizardmen is my second army that really would put me off trying KOW.

 

[Draykorinee]

I'm not and didn't say anyone was anti kow, I said it seems people hope we don't switch to kinds of war, which when you say we should stick with 8th and KoW vs AoS is divisive, that's the picture it paints. WHB VS AoS is just as divisive (as in it's not)
I never thought you were anti kow the way some people are anti aos and I agree that stuff needs to stop.
There was no undertones, I was being pretty obvious and honest. I value your opinion on AoS but having actually played it and not seeing any value in it I've decided I won't enter any AoS related threads. Which is why I'm hoping kow gets one, but even then I've played more aos than I have kow so I might hate that
We're definitely on the same side if we just want to talk about our miniature hobby!
Things seem to be getting lost in translation across the internet and I think everyone including me are seeing attacks everywhere which aren't there :S

Also lizardmen are in beta as far as army lists go. There will be lists for every single army.

 

[Emicrania]

There are hundreds, maybe thousands of different wargames out there. They cover all sorts of periods and themes, from gladiators to space combat to WWII and literally everything in between. Age of Sigmar is just another one in the pile. It's not Warhammer, it's not set in the same world as Warhammer was, and while you can still use the Warhammer models, I can use Warhammer models in lots of different games so that's a moot point.

Age of Sigmar doesn't do it for me. I'm not going to be militant about it, it's just that as far as I'm concerned it's just another game on the pile. I'd pick up Wargods of Olympus before I started AoS, and there's plenty of other games that are ahead of it in the queue. And frankly, I'm still mad they blew up the old world.

Bingo!

 

[najo]

I'm not and didn't say anyone was anti kow, I said it seems people hope we don't switch to kinds of war, which when you say we should stick with 8th and KoW vs AoS is divisive, that's the picture it paints. WHB VS AoS is just as divisive (as in it's not)
I never thought you were anti kow the way some people are anti aos and I agree that stuff needs to stop.
There was no undertones, I was being pretty obvious and honest. I value your opinion on AoS but having actually played it and not seeing any value in it I've decided I won't enter any AoS related threads. Which is why I'm hoping kow gets one, but even then I've played more aos than I have kow so I might hate that
We're definitely on the same side if we just want to talk about our miniature hobby!
Things seem to be getting lost in translation across the internet and I think everyone including me are seeing attacks everywhere which aren't there :S

Also lizardmen are in beta as far as army lists go. There will be lists for every single army.

I appreciate getting things cleared up. I didn't so much feel it was you specifically just key KoW people together feeling like i was painting up KoW vs AoS. I miss-communicated what I meant too. When I stated KoW vs AoS and everyone playing 8th. I wasn't meaning play 8th instead of KoW, I meant we can all still play 8th together instead of dividing into KoW and AoS camps. Some players play KoW and 8th, while the others play AoS and 8th and we meet at the middle with 8th, holding our community together. What's fairly awesome too is the hobby work done on those 8th armies can then be taken into KoW games or AoS games as well as played in games of 8th. That in itself is pretty awesome.

On a side note, when you state you will avoid AoS threads, there are some threads like this one I would hope you wouldn't avoid because I'd really like to hear your input on them: https://www.vampirecounts.net/threads/balancing-games-without-using-point-values.29457/

In my opinion, some of the Age of Sigmar development is going to transcend the game and apply to wargaming as a whole. So, the more of our community that chimes in the better.

 

[Sception]

Re: points values, my opinion on the matter is best summed up by this passage from a reaction to Age of Sigmar from Evan S. on Facing the Grey Tide. Much of their article falls into the kind of thinking I reject in the OP here, that design was somehow handed down from the suits rather than originating with the designers - again, if corporate were mandating this, they wouldn't have mandated a game that cuts off a major chunk of the community this way. But his discussion of points costs does capture why I feel they're important and why I feel the lack of them or any official replacement for them, is a bad move:

There are plenty of other omissions or gloss-overs that beg an FAQ, but probably the most controversial "innovation" is the lack of a points system. This concept smacks of Jervis Johnson's crusade to remind people to "just have fun" with the game. I'm a filthy-casual, narrative gamer. I subscribe to Jervis' philosophy, when I have the luxury to play a game with a like-minded friend. But this strategy disenfranchises the majority of gamers.

Most gamers:

• Expect and want points systems. For them, the strategic, between-game list-building is as much a part of the enjoyment of the game as actually playing the game. Like deck-building for Magic.
• Are accustomed to points systems and find anything else foreign and unsettling, i.e. they'll look for something else that's in their comfort-zone instead.
• Use the points system to quickly and easily establish the social contract for a pick-up game, either with a friend or with a stranger.

GW is doing two things here. One thing is to impose their philosophy of casual gaming onto their player base. The other thing is to recuse themselves of balancing the game. Let's look at each of these Things in turn.

Thing 1. Casual/narrative gaming versus competitive/tournament gaming. I belong to the former camp, but I learned something important from Mike Brandt, founder of the NOVA Open convention. Mike strives to offer multiple formats for his convention in order to satisfy all gamer types. He states that designing a game to satisfy the tournament gamer will satisfy both the tournament gamer and the casual gamer. But it doesn't work in reverse. I'm convinced his statement is accurate.

A points system brings two players into the same ballpark towards having a fair game. Within that ballpark, there's enough slop for the extremes of the two player-types to diverge, but on-average, two players can expect a decent match-up. The points system supports organized play, and it likewise enables casual players to show up at a game store and find pick-up games with strangers.

However, if the rules are open-ended and geared towards the casual gamer, the players must spend time up-front establishing their social contract. Organized play, tournament or otherwise, can't afford the time to accomplish this arrangement. The tournament organizers must augment the base rules with rules of their own in order to pre-arrange the social contract.

A points system is a yardstick on which both player-types can rely to engage in fair play. A loosey-goosey system of Calvin-ball serves neither player-type. Except those few, rare players who want a game of Calvin-ball with one another. However, most players aren't entering a 3- to 4-hour game, having invested hours of prep time, just to "wing it".

Thing 2. In a perverse sense, eliminating a points system actually "solves" the problem of game balance. For the designers. Eliminating the points system shifts the responsibility of balance onto the players. Now, I actually support this concept in part. I contend that it is impossible to balance a miniatures game. Therefore, the design must accommodate imbalance, not by attempting the impossible task of balancing the factions, but through other means.

Malifaux solves this conundrum by shifting the responsibility of game-balance partially to the players. But Malifaux shifts the responsibility responsibly. The game designers for Malifaux still share responsibility for balancing the factions as best they can. And Wyrd crowdsources play-testing to the community. Wyrd designers are doing their part, and Wyrd achieves massive play-testing. From that point on, the rules force the players to do their part.

Players select their own missions from a pool of options. Once each player knows their mission (and possibly their opponent's), each player selects his or her skirmish crew. Malifaux is one of very few games that define this sequence for game setup. This sequence enables a player to define his or her own win conditions, with some knowledge of the competition.

If a player is pounded into the dirt, a player must look to their own decisions to evaluate why that curb-stomp happened. The player can't blame the game design or blame overpowered units or blame a win-at-all-costs opponent. At least not entirely. No one in Malifaux complains about game balance. Even a filthy-casual like me asks instead, "What can I do differently next time?".

AoS, on the other hand, places all of the responsibility for game balance in the players hands. The players must decide what determines a fair matchup. The players have no guidelines to use except intuition and what is likely a flimsy social contract. Gamers rely on rules to establish the social contract. Sure, imaginative players with time on their hands can define their own rules and social contract, but commercial games solve that problem for them. It's part of what the players are paying for, as consumers. It's an expected, modern efficiency, like using money instead of barter.

GW abandons their responsibility to provide these rules as a part of their product. Many, if not most players, will reject this game out-of-hand, simply because the rules and thus the game are incomplete and inconvenient.

GW believes the majority of their player-base consists of casual garage-gamers, not tournament players. Hard to say, even for GW, who pride themselves for not doing market research (according to the preamble to one of the recent financial reports). But either way, abandoning the points system disenfranchises most types of gamers, except for the type that prefers blatant narrative, asymmetrical games. I'm comfortable in that zone personally, and many of my friends are as well. But I believe we're the minority. As a business course-of-action, GW needs to appeal the majority. And if they serve the majority, they just so happen to serve the minority as well. Besides, we narrative gamers will craft our asymmetrical, Calvin-ball games regardless.

 

[Tawg]

I appreciate getting things cleared up. I didn't so much feel it was you specifically just key KoW people together feeling like i was painting up KoW vs AoS. I miss-communicated what I meant too. When I stated KoW vs AoS and everyone playing 8th. I wasn't meaning play 8th instead of KoW, I meant we can all still play 8th together instead of dividing into KoW and AoS camps. Some players play KoW and 8th, while the others play AoS and 8th and we meet at the middle with 8th, holding our community together. What's fairly awesome too is the hobby work done on those 8th armies can then be taken into KoW games or AoS games as well as played in games of 8th. That in itself is pretty awesome.

I don't play 8th, I feel attacked :ghost:

[/joking]

@Malisteen I don't know. I still think that GW doing no points is better for the game than them agreeing on a points system. I mean, it's less so that a competitive player will "Play competitive games" if you take away their point costs than the narrative player will simply "Wing it" when they want to do what they want to do. True. And certainly it may be much harder for them, since even if they come up with an elaborate system to govern the game, when they go to play another player they have to convince them of it as well rather than simply sitting down to play (Or standing). But I disagree that no points is entirely debilitating to the game. Perhaps a lot of players might be pushed away, but I feel almost like it's a opportunity for growth to understand that points are not the be all end all. And there will groups of people (Probably the ones that organized tournaments previously) that set up "new" comp systems for AoS to "balance" the game as they see fit, and eventually one of them will ring so true that it will be heard by everyone, and perhaps even will become a standard of "pick up games" so everyone has a similar page to jump off of.

But I don't think that they are shooting themselves in the foot nearly as much as people are suggesting. Granted I don't know the scene of players that well, and maybe those existing long-term players that once loved the game will be jilted and never come back. However I don't think the lack of points is the problem for them, they usually take far more issue with the game in general. I mean, it would be nice to see a few "balanced" games, but the ability to think of them on our own is not a detriment, and I am more glad than anything that GW isn't trying to force a balance with points. Because I've never been satisfied by the points ascribed by GW in their games, and often I wonder why things can't be slightly different, or why I can't use the models I think are cool without being a total fail-bucket.

Granted, I'm not saying one side of the tournament/narrative players won or lost with the no points. What I'm saying is simply that I hope people who actually want to play a game and enjoy it, don't cling to false sense of balance presented by point costs. And for those who can not get past that "failure" on GW's part perhaps should take a look at why they see points the way they do. Because no one would ever dare say that points make a game perfect, and if you can grasp that concept, than you're already halfway to understanding they never mattered in the first place. It's more oppressive to me to say you can't play the cool things you want to play, ever (Because they are "points inefficient"), than to let people try to figure out what would be ok to play against each other. Everyone wants to play fairly, they are just looking for guidelines to adhere (And often to abuse, see Min-Max) to. But is it more fair for a player to be gimped by their choice of "cool" and another player to Min-Max and crush them? I mean we already had to navigate social situations when we wanted to play anything beyond what is considered acceptably "powered" in games, often even in PuGs. So to say this is a new situation where we have to face a strife of social conflict between agreements is fairly inaccurate. The difference is that the people who strictly adhered to point costs as the only guidance for fair don't have a "parent" to run and hide behind when someone questions if they are being cooperative with their opponents and making a game that is fun for everyone.

And previously I would have been on the side who was forced to walk away from tables if I didn't want to play games with obvious imbalance, in the name of point costs, or I'd have to go into games knowing I was taking sub-par choices on purpose (And more than likely going to lose). And the people who actively support those imbalances saying you "need to build a better list" were never going to yield. Players have always had to find their like-souls to stage matches that suit their interest. And that is totally fine. But it's silly to suggest that one group is more egregiously injured by GW with this new system and suggest that the other way around, which basically just turns the table, makes it a less harmful. In the end, you are either catering to players who accept and understand the differences between their game styles and wants to progress together, or you're catering to that "lowest common denominator", who can't accept that the way they play isn't the ONLY way to play, and that they could take a step back to see the game in it's full spectrum of glory. Rather than focusing on only one wavelength.

Now, how we do balance units for play might be a slight hurdle, but we're not going to jump it by complaining it away; And if people are so disenchanted with the notion of constructing one, you really only need to wait because surely someone will.