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Why I will never attend a 40k tournament

It all started with a very nice evening. I was enjoying catching up on some Facebook things. Brother-in-law actually painted the kegs he is using for brewing some beer a very distinct way that conjured images of the Bad Moons in my brains. Was chatting with a friend about a nerdcore show in Charlotte coming up at the end of the month. I felt for a brief moment everything was right in the world. But I got a little excited when I saw Goatboy just did an article about Space Marine scouts.

See I love the idea of highly trained inexpensive troops. My guardian based army has always been one of my favorite things. I like pulling in other troops and mixing up the builds when I run Eldar, but Defenders with Shuriken Catapults are only 9pts each. They were probably not designed with horde-army in mind, but wow a hundred of them is only 900pts. Someone had told me a long time ago that space marine scouts were awesome with terminators. You have inexpensive troops and really expensive troops on the board. A good way to balance things.

The article Goatboy wrote wasn't along these lines. His piece is more about using the special rules in the formations. Let's see if I field this new combined arms detachment with these guys, and add in the special formation - then pow! Admittedly the same concept does apply. Inexpensive troops fielded with an array heavy weapons. Who doesn't like the fact the special formations give you better rules for your models.

But it is like down the rabbit hole sometimes. I don't collect every army in GW. I don't have all of the books and dataslates for everyone across the board. It is this little pick and choose type of thing that made us hate D&D 3.5ed. Every book would have one or two little feats or spells that overpowered the last manual. By the time we had played a campaign to 12th or 13th level, we were such a devastingly powergamer group it was clear things had gotten unbalanced. I am trying my best to sit in a Pathfinder game right now and it is the same thing. Utterly overwhelming in terms of the builds.

But one thing was bugging me. I was wondering what was so good about the graviton guns. I am very familiar with the melta special rule, but I haven't ever lined up against the grav guns. So I did a little internet search and found this article - link. It is well written, rather lengthy, and the comments just make it so much better. I am not going to derail against the original poster in terms of his logic or his idea. He makes a lengthy and very poignant argument as to why he believes the rules work the way he chooses to play them.

Instead it is his attitude. It is his idea that RAW or technically Rules as Interpreted should be correct. Damn the game, damn painting/converting, damn your opponent - it is nearly a guide on how to argue the points. He admits it should be FAQ'd at some point, but until then here are the rules and reference points you can use to win battles. I can just imagine rolling into a game with Goatboy and him taking a shot with his scout sergeant. He paid ten points for a combi-grav gun making it a 21pt model. He scores three hits because the model hits on a 3+. It is when he rolls two six's to damage my tank or tells me I can't take a cover save with it we run into problems. See because the people playing this weapon just assume it works exactly like this because someone said so. First hit immobilizes the vehicle and the second hit causes two. It doesn't cause a glancing or penetrating hit, so you aren't allowed cover saves. And I should know better because it was clearly laid out in an article somewhere and that is how people are playing it.

See what I mean. It is the same as the Soul Blaze or whatever that daemon rule is. I've gone on and on about Rules as Interpreted. I just don't want an argument. I mean it is game. And in all honesty. Goatboy is really super cool. I doubt I'd even have a gripe playing him. It wasn't his article on 40k Global. The original poster on there went into some detail about discussing things with your opponent before hand on these interpretations rather than this is canon. I think the biggest issue for me is packing up my models to get ready for a fight. It is almost like you know before you leave the house someone is going to be lining up their arguments about how the rules work in advance. Maybe one day I'll get another game in with my brother or some friends. At least we always got along.

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