@Derrault and whoever else.

There is the theory, then there is the practice. There's no way I can force anyone to do anything unless I'm the GM for a campaign. However, within our gaming group we all have a basic understanding of just sorta being cool about stuff. But aesthetics aren't purely optional, they're the reason this specific genre of games was invented. Aesthetics are why we aren't just playing with color coded wood blocks like in the pre-DnD days. Personally, if there were no miniatures, I would not be a gamer. In theory, I shoot for 100% painted, WYSIWYG, textured bases, paper flags added where needed, etc. Then life and compromises get in the way and I have to field some models with plain bases and pretend an ordinary knight is a character model or whatever. I shoot for an A+ so that I can be sure I'll get a B. Whereas if I shot lower, then after life got in the way, I'd find myself using grey armies and the game would have no purpose. Playing with grey and wildly proxied armies is like reading a script at home instead of watching a play in the theater. It's the same exact story, but chalking that up to "purely optional aesthetics" is a bit much.

The reality is there's all sorts of things that have to be hashed out between friendly opponents when you play across systems and decades. When I started, I gave my Leman Russ battle tanks some upgrades which became an inefficient use of points, or even illegal, in prior editions of 40k. Heck they weren't even all upgrades: side sponsons were the de facto law of the land in 2nd edition, and a really bad upgrade in 3rd edition. So I take my lumps and miss-spend a few points on side sponsons. It's not like my life savings is riding on the outcomes of these games. Much trickier was the tank where, I'd replaced ONE sponson bolter with a heavy flamer. In 2nd edition, that was legal and in fact kits only came with one heavy flamer part to use anyways. In 3rd edition onward, you either replace two or zero. So, I have to let my opponent know what that tank's load out actually is.

For the hero with the sword and pistol you asked about, yeah, they should take both. That might not work out though, if the options in the army list changed over time or whatever. Often times as our collections grow and we play across various systems and editions, every little detail like that can't be kept up with. But we try in our group to minimize such things. The time and effort that goes into painting the model is sort of taken as proof of good faith too, and we grandfather stuff in because the person's not trying to minmax, it's not their fault the rules changed out from under their models. Or sometimes someone will say something like "I just started this faction, if you really want to play with that many points, my landspeeder with heavy bolter will have to take an assault cannon instead." and we'd let that kind of thing slide. A frequent 40kism is, we'll allow power swords to become "regular" swords and vice versa if someone is having trouble rounding off the correct number of points.

What I don't like, is when compromising on aesthetics is used as a means to secure victory. There's always someone in the gaming group who tries to push the envelope on that. Sadly, the FLGS's (luckily with the exception of the SW: Legion store players I've found) grey vs. grey with a heavy dose of proxying is the norm. Like, the 99% norm. I have yet to encounter these mythical exclusionary clubs and stores that require painted armies. Only informal gaming groups of like minded people who all show up with painted stuff as a matter of course.

I also don't particularly care about official models. Like if we need a monster to show up and wreak havoc on both sides, well, why not use one of the really cool looking toy dragons or dinosaurs from Schliech or Papo? They're already painted, they're cheaper than a gaming mini, and they look good. EM4 will sell you something like 50 low grade, vaguely Warhammery styled, Orcs or Dwarves for like $10. If someone uses an army of those nobody in our group cares. It did start to get really confusing using them in Kings of War because no one rebased them, but that's another story*.

Then there's the cost issue. Sure we can't all afford the latest cheesy spam thing. But I put forth that the solution is, don't engage in a cheesy spam arms race. Lowering the bar just escalates the arms race. Once upon a time, spamming space marine drop pods was highly effective, and no other army had anything like them. But the pod models were expensive. So people made drop pods out of paper cups. There's nothing fun about a game with no spectacle and where rolling dice and moving is a formality because of how distorted the army lists have gotten. I think we're ceding too much of our own better judgement to games publishers, who are only human themselves.

If (a very big "if") valuing aesthetics and background is elitist , then I'd put forth that compromising aesthetics in miniature gaming in order to increase one's chances of winning then becomes entitled . Having the time etc. to play Legion and not being able to take 3x snipers or something is a pretty good example of 1st world problems.

*For those familiar with KoW . We had to bring in a 51% house rule because of the EM4 models. Ie, a unit had to be represented by at least 51% by headcount, in addition to having the correct footprint. Those EM4 orcs n' dwarves have molded-on bases which are kinda sorta close enough for lots of games. But they're rectangle not square, and slightly bigger than 20mm. Thus, only 8 of them fit onto a 20 man movement tray. So during games, you'd see two little rows of guys and instinctively think you were charging a Troop, find out it was a Regiment, and get a nasty surprise.

4 hours ago, TauntaunScout said:

@Derrault and whoever else.

There is the theory, then there is the practice. There's no way I can force anyone to do anything unless I'm the GM for a campaign. However, within our gaming group we all have a basic understanding of just sorta being cool about stuff. But aesthetics aren't purely optional, they're the reason this specific genre of games was invented. Aesthetics are why we aren't just playing with color coded wood blocks like in the pre-DnD days. Personally, if there were no miniatures, I would not be a gamer. In theory, I shoot for 100% painted, WYSIWYG, textured bases, paper flags added where needed, etc. Then life and compromises get in the way and I have to field some models with plain bases and pretend an ordinary knight is a character model or whatever. I shoot for an A+ so that I can be sure I'll get a B. Whereas if I shot lower, then after life got in the way, I'd find myself using grey armies and the game would have no purpose. Playing with grey and wildly proxied armies is like reading a script at home instead of watching a play in the theater. It's the same exact story, but chalking that up to "purely optional aesthetics" is a bit much.

The reality is there's all sorts of things that have to be hashed out between friendly opponents when you play across systems and decades. When I started, I gave my Leman Russ battle tanks some upgrades which became an inefficient use of points, or even illegal, in prior editions of 40k. Heck they weren't even all upgrades: side sponsons were the de facto law of the land in 2nd edition, and a really bad upgrade in 3rd edition. So I take my lumps and miss-spend a few points on side sponsons. It's not like my life savings is riding on the outcomes of these games. Much trickier was the tank where, I'd replaced ONE sponson bolter with a heavy flamer. In 2nd edition, that was legal and in fact kits only came with one heavy flamer part to use anyways. In 3rd edition onward, you either replace two or zero. So, I have to let my opponent know what that tank's load out actually is.

For the hero with the sword and pistol you asked about, yeah, they should take both. That might not work out though, if the options in the army list changed over time or whatever. Often times as our collections grow and we play across various systems and editions, every little detail like that can't be kept up with. But we try in our group to minimize such things. The time and effort that goes into painting the model is sort of taken as proof of good faith too, and we grandfather stuff in because the person's not trying to minmax, it's not their fault the rules changed out from under their models. Or sometimes someone will say something like "I just started this faction, if you really want to play with that many points, my landspeeder with heavy bolter will have to take an assault cannon instead." and we'd let that kind of thing slide. A frequent 40kism is, we'll allow power swords to become "regular" swords and vice versa if someone is having trouble rounding off the correct number of points.

What I don't like, is when compromising on aesthetics is used as a means to secure victory. There's always someone in the gaming group who tries to push the envelope on that. Sadly, the FLGS's (luckily with the exception of the SW: Legion store players I've found) grey vs. grey with a heavy dose of proxying is the norm. Like, the 99% norm. I have yet to encounter these mythical exclusionary clubs and stores that require painted armies. Only informal gaming groups of like minded people who all show up with painted stuff as a matter of course.

I also don't particularly care about official models. Like if we need a monster to show up and wreak havoc on both sides, well, why not use one of the really cool looking toy dragons or dinosaurs from Schliech or Papo? They're already painted, they're cheaper than a gaming mini, and they look good. EM4 will sell you something like 50 low grade, vaguely Warhammery styled, Orcs or Dwarves for like $10. If someone uses an army of those nobody in our group cares. It did start to get really confusing using them in Kings of War because no one rebased them, but that's another story*.

Then there's the cost issue. Sure we can't all afford the latest cheesy spam thing. But I put forth that the solution is, don't engage in a cheesy spam arms race. Lowering the bar just escalates the arms race. Once upon a time, spamming space marine drop pods was highly effective, and no other army had anything like them. But the pod models were expensive. So people made drop pods out of paper cups. There's nothing fun about a game with no spectacle and where rolling dice and moving is a formality because of how distorted the army lists have gotten. I think we're ceding too much of our own better judgement to games publishers, who are only human themselves.

If (a very big "if") valuing aesthetics and background is elitist , then I'd put forth that compromising aesthetics in miniature gaming in order to increase one's chances of winning then becomes entitled . Having the time etc. to play Legion and not being able to take 3x snipers or something is a pretty good example of 1st world problems.

*For those familiar with KoW . We had to bring in a 51% house rule because of the EM4 models. Ie, a unit had to be represented by at least 51% by headcount, in addition to having the correct footprint. Those EM4 orcs n' dwarves have molded-on bases which are kinda sorta close enough for lots of games. But they're rectangle not square, and slightly bigger than 20mm. Thus, only 8 of them fit onto a 20 man movement tray. So during games, you'd see two little rows of guys and instinctively think you were charging a Troop, find out it was a Regiment, and get a nasty surprise.

I agree, owning the units entitles the owner to run them with any combination of arms/upgrades that they see fit.

1 hour ago, Derrault said:

I agree, owning the units entitles the owner to run them with any combination of arms/upgrades that they see fit.

But when they DON’T own them? And use them as the latest minmax wonder? Why even play?

In all my years of playing, I’ve yet to find a miniatures rules set that is superior to Pente.

I have done the "try it out by proxy to see if I like it" before. Especially if it is a more expensive model/unit. But if I found I liked it (note I said liked it rather than it was effective because I'm the guy who plays stuff I think is cool or looks nice even though it may be considered a "trash unit"), THEN, I would go and buy/paint it up. When it was out of my price range or when I could convert something to look cooler, I would use the actual model or my cooler conversion.

I am usually fairly careful when I make such posts as this because my stating that I thought the rule of cool should go for conversions and that the fun was more important than the win or loss got me banned from Portent/warseer/dakkadakka lol.

19 hours ago, TauntaunScout said:

But when they DON’T own them? And use them as the latest minmax wonder? Why even play?

In all my years of playing, I’ve yet to find a miniatures rules set that is superior to Pente.

They have to own them for tournament purposes, the cards have to be there.

What they don’t have to do is magnetize the Laser Cannon on the AT-RT in order to swap in the Flamer when they want to play it with the cards for that. That’s the unreasonable part of WYSIWYG; not the owning of the unit in the first place, the unwillingness to agree that a unit is a unit.

6 hours ago, Derrault said:

They have to own them for tournament purposes, the cards have to be there.

What they don’t have to do is magnetize the Laser Cannon on the AT-RT in order to swap in the Flamer when they want to play it with the cards for that. That’s the unreasonable part of WYSIWYG; not the owning of the unit in the first place, the unwillingness to agree that a unit is a unit.

Oh yeah. I just use AT-RT’s however.

Edit: Of course, in Legion (like Rogue Trader and D6 Star Wars) the smaller number of models makes stricter WYSIWYG it less important. In later incarnations of 40k, there's so many models on the table it's impossible to grok the nature of the threats around your pieces without it being modeled or slowing the game down to constantly ask what's what. Also, the post-RT editions of 40k get into some really big distracting details on models. The different weapons for an AT-RT are honestly all pretty minor details. Whereas, vehicle configurations in 40k can totally change the silhouette of the model and thereby a cause a much more instinctive mistake in your opponent.

Back in my day we built our Falcons with (metal) starcannons and ran them like that every game because that is what is done.

Now you just need cheap magnets and you can build whatever you like because all the options are in the actual kit. No excuses, especially with the infantry.

I’m not sure if this one was resolved, but the key here is this: If it says mini, you need a mini to represent the upgrade (like a DLT). If it doesn’t, you don’t have to do anything at all. The hard point cards exist for a reason. Use proper identification (like a list or unit markers) and you’re fine and within the rules. That’s the way it’s run at the highest level.

5 hours ago, TalkPolite said:

I’m not sure if this one was resolved, but the key here is this: If it says mini, you need a mini to represent the upgrade (like a DLT). If it doesn’t, you don’t have to do anything at all. The hard point cards exist for a reason. Use proper identification (like a list or unit markers) and you’re fine and within the rules. That’s the way it’s run at the highest level.

True.

But at the same time I don't think this thread was necessarily about resolution, it was more about understanding other people's views. We can all read the rules, but not all of us agree with them in the same way that morality and legality aren't always on the same side. Sometimes the rules don't feel right to some of us.

When you say 'highest level' it makes me think of games where the background and common sense are secondary to the rules which is the opposite of the gaming culture I've grown up in. This isn't necessarily true and is a generalisation at best but threads like this remind me there are players who work with the rules as written without deviation and that is a good thing. There's a universal clarity there which is very useful and I should be mindful of this, especially with unknown opponents.

No-one is right or wrong, we're just different. Inifinite diversity in infinite combinations makes for a healthy gaming community.

WYSIWIG isn't required by the rules though it makes games slightly easier and immersive if an opponent can see what they're dealing with at a glance. Slightly. It's handy but very far from essential.

Having painted models is probably more important, though also not required.