
Self-isolation is feeding my Warhammer addiction - robinhouston
https://unherd.com/2020/03/self-isolation-is-feeding-my-warhammer-addiction/
======
Symbiote
I haven't played the game since about 2001, when my friends decided it wasn't
cool any more. They (we) moved on to Magic: the Gathering instead, which was a
problem as I was the teenager with by far the least money in our group. My
parents had just about accepted that Warhammer was expensive but intricate and
time-consuming (equivalent to my dad's train set in the 1950s), but _15 cards_
for _£$€_? No way. I more-or-less agreed with them.

So anyway, in anticipation of having plenty of spare evenings and weekends in
the coming months, I went to the Warhammer shop yesterday, and picked out one
of the fantasy races. I bought the "Starter Pack", a 10cm high hero I liked
the look of, and the biggest and most expensive monster-heroine-sorceress-
something for that race. Plus some paints.

It was probably a life goal of mine, age 14 or so, to be able to afford to do
this.

~~~
Fnoord
Magic, yawn. I played it back in the 90s. The pinnacle of P2W, no matter the
format. If you play Type I you face the very expensive power nine cards. If
you play Type II every time a new expansion comes out, all your old cards are
a goner. If you play something in between, its a hybrid between these two.
Hearthstone successfully copied it.

Total War: Warhammer II is a great game which you can play solo and coop. Same
for Borderlands 3, a steampunkish FPS (on sale for 50% on Steam until the
20th).

~~~
ddevault
I don't play Magic much anymore, but the Commander format is a good balance.
The decks stay competitive longer, and the format is mostly casual anyway so
most players are there to have fun rather than to win. The format encourages a
lot of jank and fun play styles that aren't possible in competitive games, and
the cards needed are therefore a lot cheaper.

Even outside of Commander, most players keep a few "casual" decks around which
aren't especially competitive, but are designed to play with interesting
ideas. If you ask someone to pull out a casual deck, they'll usually agree.

~~~
Fnoord
Sounds like a fun format. Yes, formats can (somewhat) work around the P2W
issue. I've played various experimental formats (back then these were
suggested in mags such as Inquest).

There's also a format where you pay for packs. You open a pack, grab one card,
and then pass it on to the player left of you. Repeat. Sealed deck or
something it is called, but sealed deck itself involves too much around RNG.

I had very expensive Type I decks, and could not be bothered with the hypes
around Type II because I disliked how I suddenly wasn't allowed to use certain
cards. Which sucks if you got them not right away but later in the game (hence
the hype to "buy a box" in start).

The most fun for me, with MtG, was trying to build decks, and _win_ with them
(or polish them, and _then win_ with them). Unfortunately, we later found out
that the competition was skewed: we had to pay 1 guilder (~half an EUR) to
enroll, but the guy who ran it always opened the packs _and replaced expensive
rares with cheap ones_ something he previously denied doing.

I had a faerie deck back in the days, with only one expensive card:
Pendelhaven. It was a quick weenie deck, and I could add some more expensive
cards if my opponent had these as well, such as Nevinyrral's Disk.

~~~
bart_spoon
> There's also a format where you pay for packs. You open a pack, grab one
> card, and then pass it on to the player left of you. Repeat. Sealed deck or
> something it is called, but sealed deck itself involves too much around RNG.

Close. Sealed is when you get 6 packs yourelf, and construct the best deck you
can out of the cards therein. You are thinking of limited, in which everyone
gets 3 packs, and takes one card, and passes the rest along, until every
person has 45 cards they use to construct a deck.

These are both fun, but as you said, it adds additional RNG to the RNG already
present in the gameplay. There are strategies that come with that additional
RNG, but there are certainly players who simply find it a turn off. More
importantly to me is that it requires buying 3/6 packs per person (~$12/$24)
every time to play.

Cube formats are becoming a popular alternative. Instead of opening a set of
brand new packs to play, players construct their own card pools and simulate a
limited or sealed event from it. This eliminates the need to rebuy new (and
potentially already owned) cards, and also allows for players to create
interesting card pools that aren't available from packs. But it requires
significant upfront investment in terms of planning.

Probably the best format these days for those not interested in the steep
costs is Pauper. Its traditional Magic in that you construct your own deck
from the pool of all existing cards, but it's unique in that only Common
rarity cards are legal. This eliminates a lot of the flashier cards out there,
but Magic has been around long enough that there is still lots of creative
space in terms of designing unique strategies. There can still be expensive
cards, as some are quite old, but because they are all common rarity, really
expensive decks tend to cost in the tens of dollars rather than the hundreds.

------
jesperht
Anyone interested in getting into the hobby and would like something a bit
different, then you may want to give Infinity a look. I often describe it as
X-Com meets 40K. Infinity is similar to 40K in the sense that it’s in the
future and sci-fi with aliens, but a few key differences:

* Rules are free and available on the official website for download.

* Gameplay is much more dynamic with the non active player getting to react to moves made by the active player during their turn. (Much less waiting/doing nothing)

* More near future with current nations represented at places

* Fewer religious overtones

* Bladerunner/Manga aesthetics

* Smaller company, but much more community driven

* Played with fewer figures. A typical full length game will have between 10-20 minis per side.

* Well organised digital competitive play tracking with online leaderboards and tournament organising tools. (This makes tournament matchups much more fair as newbies will be matched against other newbies right away etc)

* Rules are quite a bit more complex than that of 40K. Great for people who like that, but certainly a bit of a learning curve for newbies. (Code One mitigates this, see below)

There’s also a new version coming out called Code One that was just announced
for pre-orders and is shipping next month. Seems like a good starting point as
it’s a slightly simplified and quicker version that can serve as a jumping off
point to the full game.

[https://www.infinitythegame.com/](https://www.infinitythegame.com/)

~~~
Xelbair
One of reasons i bought Necromunda Dark Uprising - the terrain there is
awesome and can be used for infinity too... and for Kill Team.

I have few friends that are into wh40k, but i want to stealthly convert them
to infinity :>

~~~
jesperht
Definitely going to give Necromunda Dark Uprising a look then, especially
considering the "compatible" terrain. Havent touched Necromunda in a very very
very long time, so love the idea of giving it a shot again. Thank you for the
tip, and goood luck with your stealth mission ;-)

~~~
Xelbair
I have to wait for all the magnets to arrive before i assemble it though. The
terrain is very modular and it has pre-made spots to fit in magnets.

I am still drilling spots for few other pieces to make is as modular as
possible.

It might be a bit hard to get some of them with all the pandemic going on. At
least my paints arrived already.

------
beedyg
"A friend who plays more tabletop games than I do tells me that — in terms of
the mechanics — as tabletop games go, it’s middling" absolutely, just played
my first few games of Infinity recently (yes plural each game took around an
hour) and was blown away by how much more fun it was to play. The next day we
were trying to organise the next session. That never happened with 40K because
the games were exhausting and more something you 'got through'.

However as the author says Games Workshop have created an incredibly
engrossing setting which pulls you in and enhances all the other aspects of
the hobby.

~~~
thebouv
My whole group was in on Infinity for a long time.

But eventually the intricacies of Infinity rules gets to you. It is a dense
DENSE ruleset that requires constant referral to the rulebook.

It is fun. It is a great setting. But I know it wears on some people due to
its complexity.

After a week of work where I'm heavy on the brain-stuff, I've decided I want
my games dumber than Infinity.

~~~
beedyg
Since we were only playing the most basic rules (it was our first time) I did
wonder if it would be as much fun playing with more of the rulebook. There is
a new simplified version coming out so I'm hoping that maintains the
fun/complexity balance we found.

------
thickbill
I'm curious how video game sales will be affected by COVID-19. Anecdotally,
I've noticed all my friends who were never previously interested are now
messaging me about setting up group matches in Age of Empire, Fortnite,
Civilization.

~~~
raister
What about the implications on bandwidth as well? Internet will be pushed to
its limits in streaming and teleconferencing, among other things.

~~~
jacobwilliamroy
I think this already happened back in february during the chinese lockdown. I
remember the google forms we were using suddenly started changing every time
someone submitted a form, the data they entered would replace the field
labels.

------
bitcurious
I rediscovered yesterday around 2AM why I stopped playing Civilization...

~~~
gaogao
"Just one more turn..."

------
tibbydudeza
The Emperor protects.

But it is simply amazing to see the amount of work being output by The Gaming
Workshop in this Universe.

The amount of audio books and novels and depth of world building is simply
mind boggling and here I thought Lord of the Rings/Wheel Of Time was huge.

~~~
russellbeattie
I actually started reading some of these novels for this exact reason. I
figured that if I liked them, I'll have plenty to keep me occupied for the
next several years.

Didn't like the Inquisitor novels, so I stopped that series. The Horus Heresy
got a little bogged down in the second book, so I read a summary online and
decided to skip the other 50 books (LITERALLY). But the first book in the
Gaunt's Ghost series has me intrigued so far, so we'll see how that goes.

I totally agree: The sheer quantity of lore that Games Workshop produces is
truly mind boggling. It's more than Star Wars and Star Trek combined I'd bet.
Truly insane.

~~~
tibbydudeza
Well they finally got to Horus and his legions attacking Terra in circa 2019
... the first book in the series was published in 2006.

I normally just check out the author (Dan Abnett) or the particular storyline
of the plotl (Emperor/Custodes/Alpha Legion/Mechanicus/Titans) before
committing myself to listen to the audiobook as they are very well done.

------
tartoran
The zenlike state relates quite well to painting and why so many people still
choose to paint/draw in this digital age. And all comes down to doing manual
work I think. Some of us are more wired for it, others for different tasks. To
me, when I paint it feels I was made for doing this and feels i could do it
24/7 without getting bored. My rational self tempers this urge though.

~~~
test1235
I agree - I get this too. I've often wondered if the John Carmacks of the
world have the same thing for coding, in which case, I envy them for being
addicted to something so lucrative (as opposed to taking up an activity which
is worth next to nil, financially, and is frowned upon, pricewise and
socially)

~~~
tartoran
Most likely for John Carmacks of the world. One ingredient of the equarion is
doing what one wants and is attracted to. I too enter a zen like state when
coding sometimes and it’s been happenning less and less lately because things
got too complicated to fit inside my brain. Recently I started playing in
DrRacket and I had a few zen moments so far.

------
YeGoblynQueenne
Well, isn't that nostalgic...

I haven't touched my paints and brushes for... let me see, since 2011, when I
graduated and started working. Nine years. Huh. There was a time, after I got
bitten by the warhammer bug that I would apply paint on just about everything
that would take it.

Only the other week I was moving some stuff about the house and found some of
my GW stuff and a bunch of my 1/72 historical minis.

Here's my little 1/72 Italeri Indian Warrior:

[https://i.imgur.com/EPe38S4.jpg](https://i.imgur.com/EPe38S4.jpg)

[https://i.imgur.com/FMRCP3h.jpg](https://i.imgur.com/FMRCP3h.jpg)

I think I started by painting some Zulu Warriors in Goblin Green (a GW
colour). They made nice Orks. Then I thought I'd paint some Conquistadores for
the Empire and perhaps Romans for Elves, Vikings for Dwarfs etc. At some point
I felt the historical models (well, _some_ of them) were so pretty they
deserved a better fate, so I started painting them in more realistic colours.
I still have boxes of the gorgeous 1/72 historical models from Zvezda. See
these guys for instance:

Greek Infantry

[http://www.plasticsoldierreview.com/Review.aspx?id=335](http://www.plasticsoldierreview.com/Review.aspx?id=335)

Or the Samurai infantry:

[http://www.plasticsoldierreview.com/Review.aspx?id=448](http://www.plasticsoldierreview.com/Review.aspx?id=448)

Or the War Elephants:

[http://www.plasticsoldierreview.com/Review.aspx?id=349](http://www.plasticsoldierreview.com/Review.aspx?id=349)

Oh god. I am _never_ going to find the time to paint all of those minis... :(

------
cHaOs667
"Burn the Heretic! Kill the Mutant! Purge the Unclean!"

And I sit in my, partial empty, office and have to work - damn :(

~~~
Xelbair
"But I am already saved, for the machine is immortal. For even in death, I
serve the Omnissiah."

------
noelwelsh
I never really got into the miniature / battle side of Warhammer. It just
doesn't appeal to me for some reason. Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay, on the other
hand, I greatly enjoyed. It's a fantastic world in which to create stories and
it's also a heck of a lot cheaper. The mechanics are bit clunky compared to
modern roleplaying systems, but it is easy to adapt modern systems to the
setting if you so desire.

The battle game must be a much better product from the business point of view,
due to the need to buy a lot more stuff to participate, and I imagine that is
why it has continued whilst WFRP has mostly been sidelined.

Update: I see a new edition of WFRP has been published in the last few years.
I played the first edition. I don't know what the other editions are like.

~~~
bencollier49
I thought the career / profession mechanics in WFRP were very clever. Never
bought it myself, just coveted my friends' copies back in 1991 or something.

~~~
Fjolsvith
Character development in WFRP was so attractive coming from D&D, but dammit,
gameplay was so deadly and lethal.

------
simonh
[https://www.penny-arcade.com/comic/2020/03/04/primarch](https://www.penny-
arcade.com/comic/2020/03/04/primarch)

~~~
cpach
Woah! Had no idea that PA is still around :) Two decades and still going
strong!

~~~
mysterydip
Check out PAX and Child's Play if you haven't heard of them :)

[https://www.paxsite.com/](https://www.paxsite.com/)

[http://www.childsplaycharity.org/](http://www.childsplaycharity.org/)

------
nappy-doo
I would add that I recently started getting into Bolt Action, a WWII based
miniatures game. It's got surprisingly clean rules, the lore is more
realistic, there's even some movies about the lore, and it's way cheaper than
any Games Workshop game.

As I'm new to the hobby, I'm a slow painter, but I can see why people do it.

~~~
themodelplumber
That's cool to hear. I didn't even know there was lore. I bought the Bolt
Action book but haven't cracked it yet. Operation: Whitebox and Osprey Black
Ops are just ahead of it in the queue here.

I did recently test out One Hour Skirmish Wargames and One Hour Wargames, and
discovered that I'm a major house-ruler. So where minis are concerned, I've
been curious to try out that side of the hobby and see if I'm somehow better
suited to kit bashing my own minis, which I would guess might be the
equivalent there. Currently I use LO Draw and Inkscape for playing out games.

Oh and I've also been impressed by some of the Ogre minis I've seen...

Anyway, you got me excited. Fun stuff. :-)

------
INTPenis
Why the shame? Self-deprecation I hope. Because there should be no shame in
having a productive and creative hobby.

I wish I had the patience to paint such tiny figures but whenever I've tried
my hands start itching, I even feel itching behind my eyes, in my brain, and I
just scream and throw things on the ground.

~~~
fatboy
When I was at secondary school I was in a group that was big into warhammer.
We spent more time war gaming than we did in higher education, but we never
spoke about it at school! At that age it was hard to imagine any girls would
even speak to us if they knew how dorky we were.

Part of our concealment of this extremely uncool hobby was the method we used
to enter the games workshop stores, which we dubbed "the nonchalant walk". It
involved walking "past" the shop entrance, pointedly not looking its way, then
making an abrupt ninety-degree turn when we'd reached the shortest distance to
it.

It must have looked very odd to anyone who did glimpse it.

------
doyouevensunbro
Warning: it is a very expensive hobby to get into. With the complete lack of
time I’ve had, I have a box pile of shame that I really should start working
on...

~~~
_0ffh
If you want an expensive hobby, get into modular sythesizers! Other stuff is
of course even more expensive, but this one's the worst I've personally ever
dipped into. It's a bit like CCGs, only instead of booster packs you buy that
fascinating cool new $300 module. Argh!

------
ArtDev
I have been working on making space to start painting minis again. The zenlike
trance I was in for hours when modeling did wonders for my attention span.

The minis are expensive but I collected quite a bit over ebay.

40k Kill Team makes the game much more affordable too.

------
andrewflnr
Does anyone familiar with the community have other counterpoints or hypotheses
about its friendliness? I can't help but feel that's the most important part
of the article.

------
watwut
I hate you all, cause I have less time then before and I am more tired then
before. Now I have to cook the lunch instead of just going next door and I
have to play teacher cause kids wont do homework by themselves.

And my team expects me to work normally (rightfully) so it is not slacking
from home anymore then it was in the work.

------
arvinsim
For me it's video games. I do have my music and drawing hobby to compete
against it though.

------
rishabhd
and I am re-playing Metal Gear Solid 2 for the nth time, a postmodern gem.
Never ceases to amaze me.

