How to enjoy hobby games

This is another blog I'm doing in reaction to a lot of the negativity that surrounds hobby games. In the midst of all the attitude shown towards it by people who have nothing but criticism for it, it's sometimes all-too-plausible to forget that it's actually quite good fun and you're supposed to be enjoying it. There's no tricks involved with enjoying hobby games; it's all to do with the attitude you go in with, and if you want to enjoy it, you will.

But first, what do I mean by hobby games? Broadly, hobby games is what I say when I'm describing board games, card games, role playing games and war games. They'll almost always include some material components, have a set of rules to them and are mostly - but not always - played competitively, e.g. players play against each other. It could be anything from Chess right the way up to, I don't know, Warhammer would be the obvious choice.

Those who play these games generally have a great time. Those who don't and have no intention to play these games generally look upon them in a passive, dismissive and sometimes quite hostile manner. For a great many people, it would simply not occur to them even to give it a go, and since they're either quite rude or not very forthcoming about the reasons why, (the latter, I suspect, to avoid the former) I'm left to speculate about them. I'll tell you what I think a lot of it is: Stereotyping Start talking to the man on the Clapham Omnibus about Warhammer or Dungeons and Dragons, and his immediate thoughts will be of fat sweaty nerds who live with their mothers on a diet of KFC, and have no hope of a social life or any kind of meaningful sexual relationship. And quite understandably, that is not a world most people want to be a part of. Of course, it's all rubbish, and what we get as a result is people being presumptuous about a group of people who are nowhere near as bad as all that. That having been said, about half of that rather cynical and condescending description applies to me, and the people who I play games with - nice people though most of them are - don't do much to counter the stereotype. Some other arguments centre around not having the time or the money, but these are pretty poor excuses really as you can always get things cheaper if you know where to look, and it's actually not that hard to make time to do something you want to do.

So, a lot of negativity comes from outside its demographic, but what continues to astonish me is the hostility that comes from within its own demographic as well. I've said much of what I want to say about that in the blog I did last year about Bitter Veterans, but I will add that this blog is derived from looking at the posts that Dungeons and Dragons make on their Facebook page. They're talking up what's being released and design-related articles (we're not far away from 5th edition/Next now,) and invariably there are comments under these posts to the general effect of: "Death to Wizards of the Coast!" "4e (Dungeons and Dragons 4th Edition) destroyed DnD!" "I'll only ever pay 1st Edition!" and it drives me FREAKING NUTS. Especially if comments like this actually have nothing to do with the feature that's been posted. And that's just with Dungeons and Dragons! That's called trolling, guys. You're trolling your own hobby. Well done.

With turmoil within its own demographic, and a significant amount of the rest of the universe wishing hobby games didn't exist at all, how is anyone who isn't already involved in it supposed to give it a chance, and get in to it?

Well the answer is really quite simple: You've got to WANT to enjoy it.

If you want to give it a chance and have a go, you'll probably enjoy it. If you don't, or you can't work out why you're there, then you won't enjoy it.

So, say someone's starting up a Role Playing Game and asked you to join in. You've never done it before. Chances are, something like this may happen:

If you go in there thinking to yourself "Hmm, games with dice and toy soldiers aren't really my thing, and I don't want to have to learn a lot of rules out of those massive books they all have" then you're not going to enjoy it. Reason is, the real reason RPGs are fun has very little to do with dice or toy soldiers, and only a little bit to do with the rules. However, this is all you expect from the game so that is what all your focus will be on. For the record, it's the engagement with the characters and the immersion into the world of the game that makes it fun. Get that bit right and it can quite often become the highlight of your week. But if you're not aware that this is the whole point of the game, then you'll need to work it out quite quickly or you'll find yourself wondering what's going on.

If you go to the game thinking that "Only nerds play games like this!" - and yes I DO mean nerd in the derogatory sense of the word -  well, if you think that, then the only reason you'd go to the game at all is to prove yourself right, which you will. You will see what you expect to see: A small group of people talking about something you neither know nor care about. You won't be able to join in the conversation because you won't know what they're talking about, you'll feel isolated from the group and you'll come to resent hobby games because of the level of involvement the other guys have in it at your expense. So it's probably best not to bother.

If you're there because a friend has brought you along, well that can go either way depending on your pre-conceived ideas, but if that's the only reason you're there, think about this: Your friend has asked you to go to the game because he or she thinks you might enjoy it. The reasons for them thinking about that are their own, but there will be a reason for it. It's not a bad thing to find something new and fun to do in your spare time, and it's certainly a good thing if a friend thinks you might be interested in it as well because they are pro-actively trying to give you something new and fun to do in your spare time. The least you can do, in that situation, is give it a go.

If you come in to it thinking "Never done this before, let's give it a go and see what it's like, then I'll decide what I think about it," then that's absolutely great and we need more people in the world like you. My advice here would be to look for things you enjoy about it, rather than expect to find things that you don't. And if you don't understand something, it's OK to ask other people how it works. Again, ultimately it could go either way. If you decide you enjoy it, then that's great, I can't think of many people who would say no to more people being involved with hobby gaming. If you decide it's really not for you, then that's fair too, and no one will think any the less of you for giving it a go.

And then there's the one that applies to me: "I've always wanted to try this out, let's go to a game and see how much fun it is." I remember going into the roleplaying group for the first time - I had no idea what to expect from the game, but I really wanted to enjoy it so I gave it my best shot. I've made better characters and played better games since then, but for a first attempt - and I had and appreciated a lot of help from the guy who was running it - it could have been far worse. I also remember my "intro game" at Games Workshop, who hadn't really got the idea of doing intro games at that point and put me in a mass participation battle with a tank I had no idea how to use, got blown up in the first couple of turns and I hadn't got a clue why. By the standards of what we would expect if that had happened to a casual onlooker, they should never have seen me again. But I wanted to enjoy it so I came back and gave it another go... Well the rest of the story's another blog in itself.

But you see my point? Because I WANTED to enjoy it, I did - and still do to this very day. Some more than others, but I always try to find the fun in what I'm doing.

I think it's what's called having your glass half full. A lot of people I know could do with re-filling their glasses entirely...

If that tailed off quite badly then it will be something to do with the fact that it's 2am and I've only had 9 hours sleep in the last 48 hours. Time to go to bed I think.

See you all next time!

Matt

40K: Chaos Space Marines vs Dark Eldar 11/7/2013

Again behind a bit with the blogs...

So I had a game of 40K last week at Games Workshop Dudley, it didn't go so well for me! Here's why:

Sometimes I have managed to win games by insisting that my opponent uses a smaller army. This worked quite well in Warhammer 7th Edition, where I would tell opponents I could only go up to 1500 points which would mean that they couldn't use their Lord choices, which in turn would cost them the game.

However, insisting that people go from using a 1500pt 40K army to the 600pt army I had ready to roll is taking the piss a little bit, especially on Thursday nights where you get all the tournament-style play going on. Normally I would avoid situations like that but I go into Games Workshop as and when I can, and this particular night I found myself in on a Thursday. My opponent, Craig, was all ready to play 1500pts, and I only had 600... so I had to cobble together an army out of 2 different armies that were both Chaos. On the plus side this was the first time my Khorne Bezerkers had got an outing. On the down side, they never had a chance...

My army consisted of the following:

• Chaos Lord w/ twin lightning claws, a jump pack and the Mark of Slaanesh
• 2 squads of 6 Chaos Space Marines w/ the Mark of Slaanesh, plasma guns and twin lightening claws, and an Icon of Slaanesh which gives them Feel No Pain
• 6 Raptors with 2 Melta Guns, a Plasma Pistol and the Mark of Slaanesh
• 2 squads of 8 Khorne Bezerkers with a Power Axe and a Plasma Pistol.

This brought me up to roughly 1100pts, which Craig matched.

Craig's army was built around Venoms; squads of 5 Whyches riding in 4 venoms which I'm sure is making many of you who know what that means shaking your heads in sympathy.

Not much to say about the battle really; it was The Emperor's Will game which means that there is one objective on each side, Craig won the game 4-1.  I was completely unprepared for fighting this kind of army, and my army was not geared towards tournament play. To my credit I lasted 4 turns before I was tabled, but with far too many shots coming from the splinter cannons on the venoms, I'm astonished I lasted that long. The Bezerkers got wiped out to a man very quickly, and the Raptors didn't even make it into the game, having Deep Striked off the board.

The one victory point I did manage to earn came from having my CSM squads shooting that Craig's Archon and his Incubi. I didn't take them out; 3+ is a tough armour save to get through, but I did take enough of them out to force a panic check which they failed. They also failed the subsequent check to rally, and the game was all over before I'd managed that.

So, what to do next time?

Well, I probably won't be playing a tournament-geared army unless I'm prepared for it, because it made me feel like a nut being cracked with a sledgehammer. But, with that army, the only thing I could have done differently is take my Khorne Lord rather than my Slaanesh one. Reason is, that would make the Khorne Bezerkers count as Troops and therefore scoring units, so on the off chance any of them were still alive by the time they got to the top of the board, they could in theory have taken the objective. As it was, they were Elite, so they didn't have that option.

Can't say I enjoyed that game too much! Got some more work to do before I try taking Craig on again.