[2000AD]

Originally Posted by HappyJim

Cant agree with this one, i think the annoying players are the ones that slap down half their points in a single model and brag about how great they are at playing warhammer, these are what i call the MDTG players.

Yeah, they're annoying, but they're a different kind of annoying to what I was trying to illustrate.

Now i dont pretend that players dont call cheese whenever a unit is used they dont like because these people do exsist, i know i guy i used to play did this regularly, i think a best time was when my exalted daemon was called cheesy because it was a flying terror causer (i was playing TK..) yet in another game the guy turns up another time with totally tailored skaven list (at his omission). This guy really was a waac player, so this in my experience it was never the middle group that caused the problems, it was always the top, its a rare thing for me to call beard these days, i just make a note not to play people that share my views on the game.

I'm guessing WAAC means Win At All Costs, right?
This is more like the kinda player i was trying to illustrate, the player that wants to win, but will hinder themselves by being unwilling to use viable tactics because they think they're 'beard/cheap/etc.' and assume that their own decisions on what's 'beard/cheap/etc.' will apply to everyone.

This is usually something said by a person who confuses warhammer with Yahtzee, these players will want rules of social behavior obeyed yet are these really rules in warhammer? Of course! are they written, of course not, really isnt WAAC just a form of bad social behaviour?

Well technically rules of social behaviour are outside the purview of Warhammer. They are decided by the location where the game is played and vary from place to place, so as a wide reaching game trying to include such social rules in Warhammer is an exercise in futility.
Is playing to win bad social behaviour? Frankly no, and to suggest so is ridicolous. Warhammer is a game, and as such winning is a fundamental part of playing it. Is trying to run the fastest in a race bad behaviour? Is trying to tactically outclass the opposing team in a football match bad behaviour?
If you're a football manager and you say playing strikers is 'cheap' and you refuse to use them, then you'd be laughed at. So why is Warhammer any different?

Do not WAAC players do the same, do they not claim they have the moral high ground because it dosnt say you cant do this?

Not really, as for most WAAC players moral high ground is irrelevant. They're playing to use win and if the rules say they can do something then they do it.
If in a bizzare world the Olympics allowed performance enhancing drugs to be used, then no doubt the the ones that didn't use drugs would say they had the moral high ground over those that did. Chances are though that the drug users would be the winners and no amount of moral debate is going to change that. They played with the same rules the non-drug users did, that's all the morality that enters into it.

Really as i said with social behavoiur within a game isnt this just something that players expect from a game. Really people only obey the social code that suits them, isnt this really the bottom line.

Kinda. Going back to the scale of [Play to have fun-----Play to win] I was using earlier, again it's the people in the middle causing the problem IMO. The people playing for fun and the people playing to win will not cause much comment on their opponents playing style. The people in the middle however, by callling their opponents cheap/beard/etc are trying to force their own opinion on the opposing player, they're assuming everyone should follow their own 'moral high ground' in addition to the rules of the game.

This is just arrogance at its height, the problem here is that it sets one player better than the other, clearly one is not better than the other and really this type of attitude is what creates half the problems. For personally i found WAAC abit like perberty, some people just finish before others.

Arrogant it may be, I wont try to debate that. What I will say is IMO it's the truth.
Take a group of players who solely play to win and a group of players who want to win but will cry beard at stuff they don't like. Restrict them to just playing against their own group for a year and then put the two groups together to play each other. The result is almost a foregone conclusion, the WAAC group will massacre the "cry beard" group.
And that's because during the year the 'cry beard' group were putting up their own fences to hinder their developement as players, the WAAC were exploring the game, experimenting, trying the unknown, finding counters to supposably 'unbeatable' tactics/armies, they looked at what was 'beard' and instead of refusing to use or play against it, they found out how to beat it.
They're going to be using tactics and armies the 'cry beard' group never even considered and no matter how much bleating the "cry beard" group does about 'cheese' or 'we have the moral high ground' it wont change that they got beat by the better players.

The thing is that warhammer isnt a spot, it is just a game, i cant think of games such as risk that are ever taken as seriously as warhammer.

Well I can't remember there ever being a Grand Tournament of Risk. Maybe if there were serious competative tournaments we'd see more serious Risk players.

Now i personally hate 40k but this is a example or truth growth of WAAC players, i have two dwarf gunline players in my local GW, no the funny thing is they both player 40k which they claim is more tactical, one uses a Imperial guard tank company, one uses a orc army with lots of tanks, i dont know about you but i dont see the growth in playing style. Perhaps the problem is that so many people dont get fanatsy and play it likes its 40k?

There's no denying there's not much difference in style there. However if that's a style that they can win the majority of their games with then there's not much pressure on them to change their style.
However the beauty of Warhammer is that with the infinate variety between armies and regular changes in army rules, it probably wont be long till someone figures out a way to beat those armies. And when that happens you'll have the true test for a player.
Someone playing just for fun will accept defeat, but probably continue playing the same army the same way because that's how they like it, and that's fine because as long as they have fun their goal is met.
Someone who plays to win will now have the challenge of figuring out how to beat the new army and that's what someone of the WAAC mentality enjoys: A challenge.
Someone who cries 'cheap/beard/etc.' is just making an excuse to try and sooth their ego. They wont accept they got beat fair and square and as such will dismiss it. They wont change, they wont improve, but they'll continue to think that they are playing to win, in their mind they'll think they're better than the player that beat them. The very 'rules' they devised and adhere to will hold them back from being the player they think they are.


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In addition I'd like to point out something not brought up in my previous posts.
The very best WAAC players are the ones that also play some games just to have fun as well. (again this is inspired by the articles by Dave Sirlin)
In a quick summation of the linked article the main reasons why WAAC players will also play just for fun are:
- Research. If you only ever play the safe option you'll never know if it's worth taking the risk at the right time. Likewise if you dedicate yourself to playing one way you might never find out there's a better way to be playing. Playing just for fun allows you to test new ideas in an environment where there's no risk.

- Limited local player pool. Sure, in your area you might be a class above everyone else, but if you constantly demolish everyone then that's going to wear down even the most adamant 'just for fun' player. If the only options available to you are:
A.) demolish everyone once and then no one wants to play you again
or
B.) play for fun and keep playing week in and week out, bring out the big guns only when needed.
then obviously B.) is the only real option.