Very clever, Mr. Internets. Or can I call you Danny?

By the way you frame the debate, you have demonstrated through logic that fun vs. “competitive” is not a real dispute since competitive players also play for fun. Unfortunately for us all this does not neatly wrap up the issue.

Let’s put aside the cheating, aggressive asshats that partially populate any competitive arena. We can call them WAAC players, or tool factories, or douchenozzles, whatever. They do not represent a faction or philosophy; they represent their own insecurities and moral failings. Bad sportsmanship is not really the issue here.

It is clear that competitive players are out there. They build lists to win, they play to win, and they attempt to exploit any weakness in the opponent’s strategy and deployment. They will not try to win at all costs… because they won’t cheat, bully their opponent, stall the clock, etc. This is a war game, and there are rules established to hopefully ensure a fair and balanced experience. There is nothing intrinsically wrong with this style of play. It is a matter of taste.

The so-called “fun players” should not be called “fun players” because as you pointed out everyone in the hobby is looking to have fun in their own way. We don’t really need to label everyone, we can call them hobby players or whatever but in reality everyone is on a continuum. Someone could conceivably win both best painted and best general because playing and collecting are separate realms. In any case, some players want to incorporate a story or theme within what they play. This will limit their selections, and therefore limit the potential effectiveness of their army list. This could be as lowkey as taking a couple useless pieces of wargear because it fits the fluff, or your whole army could be made up of subpar units because it matches models you like or a story you want to help tell.

For example, I refuse to take Vendettas in my traitor guard because I feel it doesn’t match the theme of the army, even though Vendettas are perhaps the best unit in the Imperial Guard Codex. However, since I still want to win games I made the decision to mech up and leave the infantry hordes and cavalry at home. This was a personal compromise, and each player has their own balance between effectiveness, models, and theme. Players with different priorities should not be mocked for bringing a sub optimal unit and still trying their best to win, not everyone in the hobby should be expected to bring only the best cutthroat killer units.

One could argue that any army could have a story that justifies their composition, but this is working backwards. You can come up with a rationale for why four land raiders with assault terminators showed up to fight some Orks, but this is not the same as honestly trying to balance story and effectiveness. In rare cases there are units that are so broken I would consider them an exploit (such as 4th edition holofield falcons) but fortunately the worst cheese is slowly being written out of the game. If you want to play with broken combos play Magic the Gathering or online games.

Composition scores are counterproductive since they are almost purely subjective, and weak lists should not be rewarded. Roll up awards for representative or themed lists into the appearance awards, or just leave them out of scoring altogether.

Someone with a killer but soulless list shouldn’t brag about how awesome they are, since there is more to the hobby then winning games. If you see a player with three units of converted Ogryns it is an interesting change of pace, and I don’t want to see 40k devolve into a handful of cookie cutter lists. Conversely, those with a real theme or better painting should not bash the purely competitive players. It’s obvious the player with lots of land raiders or vendettas wants to win, but so what, so does every other player at the tournament. Ideally we can all learn from each other, this is supposed to be a hobby community and not a pissing contest.

I’m going to edit this for use on my blog, http://chaosgerbil.wordpress.com/ , and http://littleplasticmen.net/ . Dueling manifestos!

Cheers,
Your friendly neighborhood Chaosgerbil

It’s clever. I saw where you were going with it and suspect I know where you’ll end up, though no doubt you’ll have a surprise or two. Don’t get me wrong – I’m only saying that ’cause it’s obvious when you pointed at a street sign and said, “Turn here.”

I’m always more interested in ‘why.’ We lack ritual; we create it. We marshal our warriors and do battle with the neighboring tribe – you know, without actually having to bleed. If we manage to suspend disbelief our body will reward us with an endorphin dump in the ol’ bloodstream.

Then we can posture and strut and tell the other guy he’s doing it wrong and you could totally kick his ass and steal his horse or something.

God, but I love this hobby.

(Crap, I’m talking to myself again.)

Love the style and the argument … I think its Plato (10 years since pols theory) who points out the definition of the self through definition of the other. We cannot ’see’ ourselves, but only in what we are, and what we are not. Hence the encampments.

Being Geeks, and internet Geeks at that … we build the walls – but your definitive analysis of ‘fun’ and ‘competition’ is compelling. The difference I would postulate is that the ‘fun’ is being identified on a purely selfish spectrum.

I’m a highly competitive player who likes to ‘make fun’ more than ‘take fun’ … the latter involves a sort of inhuman bullying I abhor. It’s a better game when you get beat and still have a ‘fun’ outlook.

However, this isn’t a set outline, but actually a condition we have to learn … how to compete without being arsey … and then how to compete without being a bullying arse full stop.

A tricky conundrum.

I’ve added you in and will be keeping tabs. Nice site design BTW.