Gotchahammer and Social Contract

[Maddpainting]

For pick up games he was a WAAC player and should have gone over his stuff with you. For events on the other hand, well thats on you to know. 

Also, yes the app is free and you can look, but a LOT of the rules that matters are not on the app. Army abilities, spells, relics, command traits, etc..

[Marcvs]

5 hours ago, Maddpainting said:

For pick up games he was a WAAC player and should have gone over his stuff with you. For events on the other hand, well thats on you to know. 
 

My experience (and preference) is the opposite of this: for pick up games, ultimately, who cares, so me and the other player would prefer to spend as little time as possible in pre-game discussion and just play. At the handful of tournaments that I have played, every opponent spontaneously offered to present their list and I did the same -of course, sometimes one of us would just say "yeah, I know what the SCE allegiance abilities do", "[groan] yeah, pink horrors, I know what they do" so this would be quicker. This army presentation would not include synergies or go into the details of each profile, but we would answer all the opponent's questions which deal with openly available informations (can you run and charge? do you have any teleportation? etc etc)

[whispersofblood]

Generally I keep strategic stuff to myself, and warn people against doing things I wouldn't expect someone who knew what was happening to do. Things like Multi-charging a unit of Namarti thralls with a bunch of heroes during high tide. Where it is a combination of multiple warscrolls, and allegiance abilities that make it a poor choice. 

On the other hand I've had issues where players just couldn't be bothered to check the warscroll for lifetakers. All they had to do was activate into them first and kill them but they didn't bother checking the warscroll my lifetakers got their 4+ and moved retained the objective and I won the game. That I have less sympathy for, and maybe it's a teachable moment. 

[Maddpainting]

8 hours ago, Marcvs said:

My experience (and preference) is the opposite of this: for pick up games, ultimately, who cares, so me and the other player would prefer to spend as little time as possible in pre-game discussion and just play. At the handful of tournaments that I have played, every opponent spontaneously offered to present their list and I did the same -of course, sometimes one of us would just say "yeah, I know what the SCE allegiance abilities do", "[groan] yeah, pink horrors, I know what they do" so this would be quicker. This army presentation would not include synergies or go into the details of each profile, but we would answer all the opponent's questions which deal with openly available informations (can you run and charge? do you have any teleportation? etc etc)

You missed the point, the point was explaining "Gotcha". If someone is asking "hey what should i look out for b.c I'm worried about a gotcha moment" you will answer in a friendly game, yes you will answer in tournaments too but normally in tournaments you don't talk about it b.c you are very limited on time and are already pressed to the max, spending 10min talking is a waste, and you also give your full list to the opponent, it is very common to ask your opponent at an event "Hey what does this command ability and artefact does?" but the are not going spend the full time explaining it will be a "basically this". But for a friendly game to then say "Thats how i win, why would i tell you" its very poor sportsmanship. 

[Sleboda]

Alrighty then, I've had some time to mull this over and am now in front of a PC instead of a phone.

Before I give my two (or seven) cents, I want to be clear:

I do not endorse cheating, deceiving ("You asked if I had any teleporting units, but not if I had any hidden glades movement units- ha!"), or playing psychological games. Nor do I believe in treating a new player who is asking you to help them learn the same as an opponent in a tournament.

I'm not about being "that guy."

It's probably good to keep that in mind when/if you read this to the end. In no particular order, here are my thoughts on gotchya moments and avoiding them (or not) -

I believe that using deceit to create an intentional trick situation is awful. I also think that there is more than just a little onus on the players to follow the rules, to know the rules, and to gain experience with them.

In the olden days, list sharing was not only not required, but not particularly encouraged. Many tournaments would require you to swap lists after the game as a way to discourage cheating. Sharing was not in the rules and was only an expectation when playing a small subset of the ways the game could be played. Today, this is not the case.  The actual rules of the game now tell us to share our lists before we play. Wow! That was a big change for old-timers like me. A welcome one in the end, but a big one. So, we have a base level expectation that you will share your list with your opponent. What that opponent does with the knowledge you give them in your list is up to them, not you. You could even take the extra step of giving them an AoS Reminders sheet, but that is up to you being generous. I have no problem doing that.

I will also answer questions my opponent has about the rules and stats of a unit, but almost never (exception as listed in the intro) what tactics I plan to use. What I won't do is run down the highlights of my army proactively. There are two main reasons why.

1. Princess Bride. Sort of. If I offer up proactively what the highlights of my army are, I can quite easily, intentionally or not, tip my hand as to what I plan to do. I am naturally going to want to talk about the coolest things my army can do, which are likely the things I like about the army and will try to do. I'm often giving my game away before we start if I do this.

On the other hand, if I am a ****** (and I've seen this all too often, sadly), I can give my opponent a red herring of sorts by highlighting the things I want them to focus on while I am secretly planning to do something else.  I tell them that Unit X can teleport behind their lines, so they guard against it, committing troops to defending the rear, while all the while I have zero desire to do that and now I get to worry less about some of their forces. Shady as heck.

It's best to not proactively share capabilities in order to avoid being on either side of the psychological rope bridge.

2. Experience matters.  This is not "git gud." This is recognition that we grow more from experience than being told what to do. We also gain knowledge of what other armies can do by actually playing against them and, yes, getting burned by something you didn't see coming. It's not fair to the experienced/informed player to give up that advantage that they have earned through playing, reading, etc. It's also not fair to the less experienced/informed player to deprive them of a chance to improve through actual game play. Again, accumulating knowledge through actual experience (and research) is a part of growing as a player, and it should be both rewarded and earned.

 

Next, secret info. Another old time thing was that information used to be quite deliberately kept secret. If you had a magic item that could burn out after using it on, say, a roll of 1, you were under no obligation to let your opponent know if it had failed. The Staff of Volans is a great example of this. When you used it, your spell could not be dispelled. That meant your opponent would not waste dispelling resources stopping a spell cast with it until the staff had burned out. You had to decide to commit the resources without knowledge of the staff's status. If it had not burned out, you wasted your resources if you used them. If it had and you assumed it was still functional, you might not use resources and the spell would be cast unchallenged even though the staff could not power up the spell. It was a guessing game based on not sharing info. Heck, in those days we didn't even use dice to cast and dispel.  You had cards that were dealt secretly that governed the winds of magic. My point is, the game used to be designed with hiding info as part of the experience, and for many veteran gamers this idea of freely sharing info is tough to get used to. I'm not saying that justifies bad behavior, only that in the OP's case, the opponent may have had some residual influences knocking around. Maybe not, but maybe.

I also want to draw a distinction between hard rules and optional choices. Another poster above talked about reminding the opponent he has Nurgle saves to make when the opponent forgets to take them. That's not just courtesy or an option.  That's the rule. If you know they get a save that they forgot to take, you are obligated by the rules to inform them. This is not a case of the opponent not learning new tactics, new options, having a brain glitch, making an error, etc. This is them unknowingly skipping a rule, and both players have a responsibility to enforce the rules. If you are inwardly gleeful that your opponent forgot to save and you win as a result, you have cheated because you knew the rule for resolving that save and chose to ignore it.

 

That's it for now.

TL;DR:

Don't cheat. Don't deceive. But also don't grant unearned advantages or play psychological games.

Winning is the object of the game. Having fun is the point of it. Cheating or defeating yourself is against both.

 

[Kadeton]

10 hours ago, Sleboda said:

f I offer up proactively what the highlights of my army are, I can quite easily, intentionally or not, tip my hand as to what I plan to do. I am naturally going to want to talk about the coolest things my army can do, which are likely the things I like about the army and will try to do. I'm often giving my game away before we start if I do this.

This is a perspective I find interesting, but hard to understand. It also seems to be the only point of real difference among the opinions people have expressed here - all the other stuff seems to be supported by everyone, which is really nice to see.

There are two main things that make the above idea seem strange to me:

1. No "game plan" for any army in this game is sufficiently complex that it can't be immediately deduced, based on your army list, by someone who knows what they're doing. The combos and synergies are obvious. The only reason your opponent wouldn't be aware of them is if they lack the required in-depth knowledge of the details of your army - i.e. they are inexperienced. In that case, I'd rather warn them of what's coming so they aren't surprised and upset when it happens, because that's no fun for anyone.
2. If I beat someone because they never had a chance to disrupt my game plan (because they weren't aware of what I was trying to do, and didn't see it coming) then I haven't learned anything. I already know how the plan is supposed to work when it goes off without a hitch - what I need to learn, through gameplay, is how to keep the plan on track while my opponent is actively resisting it.

So that's where the fun and the experience come into the equation for me, and it leads me to reveal my army's game plan in advance. I'm not afraid of "giving the game away" if it leads to a more enjoyable and engaging game for both of us, and in my experience it does.

(I wonder if this is partly a function of the armies people normally play? I'm running Beastclaws, and an unprepared opponent will almost always get hit so much harder and faster than they could have anticipated that the game is over on turn 2, especially if I get a double turn. It's also a dead-simple game plan, so there's not that much to reveal, or to disrupt. I can imagine if I were running a more subtle army with crucial but fragile key synergistic elements, then I'd be a lot more reluctant to tell my opponent "Kill this squishy guy here and I'll lose, don't kill him and you're dead." But I hate using 'brittle' strategies that can be so easily foiled, where you have to hope your opponent doesn't stop you.)

[Hvy]

I will tell you what my army can do- especially sub-factions and artifacts. I will not tell you how I will use them. If you are a new player I will make sure to point out what could end up being gotchas in the first couple turns- I expect you to remember by turn 4. This game rewards system mastery- which includes what other armies do. I certainly can't remember everything that every army does, but I do know the key units and tactics for most armies. I do not want my opponent to tell me too much info about their army. I have found- for me- that the surprise of it happening in game, regardless of whether it causes a loss or not, is more effective as a way to remember what that unit/rule does. All of this applies to matched play only of course.

[Fairbanks]

On 8/23/2020 at 7:43 PM, Athrawes said:

I guess I have two questions for the community about your local metas, is walking your opponents through your rules to help avoid traps uncommon? And or, do you or opponents you regularly play against consider surprise rules/traps/gotcha moments a core part of the gaming experience. 

Personally, if I haven't experienced a rule/trap, I prefer to be taken by surprise that first game, and then talk about it with my opponent after the game and how I could have gotten around it, as opposed to hearing about it first and then trying to play around it. That way, second game on, it's down to me to remember how that thing worked and be able to avoid it. But that's me letting experience being the best teacher and all.

Cutthroat Tournament/Match: No, I don't expect them to answer my questions or tell me how their army works.

Friendly games against Strangers: I hope I was up front enough to make them realize that we are having a friendly game, thus I'll answer their questions and I expect them to answer mine.

[Sonnenspeer]

Please help me here: in my last tournament I told my opponent that I have the Cloud of Midnight and what it can do. I also explained Forgotten Nightmare.  But that the combination of both prevented a whole shooting phase he was not aware of and so he lost the games (KO player) 

Was this unfair? I still feel a little guilty about it. Because how could you know how it works? Only if you read the FAQ. 

So was I "That Guy"? 

[Kadeton]

9 hours ago, Sonnenspeer said:

So was I "That Guy"? 

I don't think "That Guy" labels are actually very helpful in that situation. It's too black-and-white - either you were that guy and completely in the wrong, or you weren't and you were completely in the right. Neither judgement actually helps.

Instead, I'd think about it like this: Did your game plan rely only on the strength of that interaction, or did it also rely on your opponent failing to understand how it worked? If you'd explained the interaction in full at the start, would your opponent have won instead? And even if it meant that the outcome of the game was less certain, would you have enjoyed the game more (and felt less guilty afterwards) if you'd been open and honest?

This stuff is all pretty subjective. Personally, I would put 'not feeling guilty' ahead of 'winning a game'. Some people don't mind feeling a little bad if it gets them the win, and others wouldn't even feel guilty in that situation. Nobody's right or wrong, it's more about discovering what works for you, and what's needed to keep your play group healthy.

[Kasper]

11 hours ago, Sonnenspeer said:

Please help me here: in my last tournament I told my opponent that I have the Cloud of Midnight and what it can do. I also explained Forgotten Nightmare.  But that the combination of both prevented a whole shooting phase he was not aware of and so he lost the games (KO player) 

Was this unfair? I still feel a little guilty about it. Because how could you know how it works? Only if you read the FAQ. 

So was I "That Guy"? 

If you explain two mechanics it is kinda up to your opponent to piece them together, especially in a tournament. If you explain that when you put model X here, you will effectively shut off all his shooting for a phase, you are starting to talk tactics and what you plan to do. I would probably do it against a less experienced guy during friendly games, but not in a tournament.

[Sonnenspeer]

1 hour ago, Kasper said:

If you explain two mechanics it is kinda up to your opponent to piece them together,

Probably I could show him the FAQ to enable him to piece it together? 

4 hours ago, Kadeton said:

This stuff is all pretty subjective. Personally, I would put 'not feeling guilty' ahead of 'winning a game'

I think this is most importent - we play to have fun together

Thank you! 

[NinthMusketeer]

I feel that it can all be simplified to: what an army CAN do vs what an army WILL do.

The former is information freely available to anyone with access to the army's rules. It is polite to provide this information, and should at the least be made available. GW themselves have made clear in the recent GHB that this should be the case. To be asked on it and then specifically not provide it? I respect the OP for walking away from that game and absolutely encourage anyone to do the same.

What an army WILL do involves in-game decisions. This falls into tactics, strategy, and one has no responsibility to reveal such information (bar learning games of course). I would go as far as to say such information may even be unwelcome as the opponent could want to figure it out on their own.

Unit "gobnobber" with move X targeted with spell "movebuff.exe" becomes buffed to movement 2X. It has an ability that allows it to run & charge. This makes its threat range when buffed 2X+6+2d6, because a run move can be made an automatic 6 with the universal command ability. I am casting movebuff.exe on gobnobber so that it will have sufficient movement to get around an opponent's front line and charge squishies behind it.

The first two sentences are what the unit CAN do, but I put the second one in there to have an example of assumed knowledge; it is fair to assume an opponent already knows or can deduce this information. This would be something it is OK not to share, because it is based on the core rules that every player is expected to know in order to, ya know, play! That same reason is also what makes it something important to point out in learning games, though, and it can be helpful to do so in casual games as well.

The third sentence is what the unit WILL do. Outside a learning game I see no responsibility to share this information, even if asked. In casual games, especially with a more skilled player against a less skilled one, it could be nice to point out--but that is a matter determined by context.

Anyways, to reiterate to the OP; good job walking away. It can be agonizing to get prepared for a game only to turn around at the last second, but I really feel you did the right thing for everyone involved.

Edited August 27, 2020 by NinthMusketeer
Typo

[Grimmlock619]

This past weekend I went to my first ever 2k 1 day event. 3 games, 20 players over to the course of 2 days to maintain social distancing. I’ve only played like three 2k games before hand and wasn't really familiar with other armies aside from my friends who play Ironjawz, Stormcast, and Nighthaunt. So I knew going into the games, I was going to run into armies I almost knew nothing about. I watch batreps but I retain the knowledge better in the moment as opposed to watching a game. 1st player was a Nurgle player. He did a great job marking which units belong to which blob and went over his rules very clearly and openly, all without letting me know how he would use it. I won, but only by 2 points. It was a great game.  2nd game was against OBR with Negash, Deathrider spam. He, again, explained his rules clearly and told me how his army works without giving away strategy (not that he needed to, it was a basic "im gonna charge you and you can't cast against me") I lost but it was still fun. I even asked what I could have done differently to have a better chance. It was my deployment. 3 game was against That Guy. I knew I'd run into one eventually but oh well. He played Fyreslayers. Everyone looked the same, heros looked exactly like his units and he wasnt clear what they do. I asked him what his tbreat range was, he assured me he is slow, next thing I know he is in my face turn 1. He was vague when I asked what his heros did with answers like "they make my guys tougher" or "they make them hit harder". I even caught him trying to deploy deeper that he could. When I asked him what I could have done to do better, he said "nothing". I was pretty surprised but I just shrugged it off. It won't stop me from going to events if I know there are WAAC player out there. But I can see how it can be a deterent to new players.

[Carnith]

Throwing my two cents in. 

When I go over lists, I explain the situations of how rules interact. For Slaanesh, you have to be within 6" at the end of charge phase of one of my demon heroes to do this. It works on both of our turns as well. If a unit if further modified by an ability (daemonettes in a 30 girl squad get 3 hits per 6, instead of 2 hits per 6), and I'll read what spells do, partially as a reminder for myself, and partially so my opponent knows "okay his spell is wholly within 18"... 

I expect my opponent to do something similar. There are too many armies in this game, and if they aren't a regular opponent, I probably haven't committed to memory what their armies all do. 

[stratigo]

If you ask someone what their units do, and they don't tell you, they're a ******. If they're doing at a tournament, you should tell the TO there what an ****** that person is. Indeed I imagine a TO will give that person a talking to. I will, otherwise, demand they show their books and then, slowly, read every single entry. 

 

Telling people what your army can do when asked is level 1 courtesy. Knowing what units do doesn't tell you how they're going to be used, or how the support pieces are going to buff the other parts of the army. It robs nothing, at all, from the strategy of the game, it just prevents a cheap shot of "oh, you didn't know this unit could stack a couple buffs and triple their damage output. Gotchya!" 

[Overread]

44 minutes ago, stratigo said:

If you ask someone what their units do, and they don't tell you, they're a ******. If they're doing at a tournament, you should tell the TO there what an ****** that person is. Indeed I imagine a TO will give that person a talking to. I will, otherwise, demand they show their books and then, slowly, read every single entry. 

Actually at a tournament there are limits. A player hiding information when requested is not good, however at the same time there is a balance and if you are asking about every unit all the time you can equally be done for time wasting. At a competitive event players are expected to have a generally more wide understanding of the game, at the basic level. So continual pausing for information can be seen as an attempt to waste time during a game. 

It's one of those balance things in behaviour, just like taking a "long time to plan your turn" can also be an issue at events. Again its more when its at the extreme end and when its clear that they player is trying to stall the game; perhaps to hit the time limit so that they benefit from denying the other player hteir fair time. 

[MOMUS]

Gotcha tactics is one of the more shameful behaviours you can see in this game and should be discouraged at all levels.

I feel with the rise of alpha strike style armies in AoS the gotcha mechanic is definitely more prevalent, I usually warn newer players of this so they are less likely to get caught out by other players just looking to earn a scalp. 

Its common courtesy in the UK to have a quick run down of units and abilities in the deployment phase, if you win a game due to your opponents lack of knowledge on X or Y, it’s not a win.

[Kramer]

 

17 minutes ago, MOMUS said:

f you win a game due to your opponents lack of knowledge on X or Y, it’s not a win.

I like this as a principle. 

Slightly off tangent but I'm reading a book by the coach of the Australian Hockey team. And one of the things he writes about how they, in the year of their olympic gold medal, put sportsmanship over winning. He talks about how in a quarter final a Striker already signalled to the referee that his goal shouldn't be allowed before the opponent asked for a video referral. Same princple.

[JonnyTheKing]

I would actually be all for a basic cheat sheet being mandatory to give to your opponent on the basic stuff in your list like spells you have given, command traits etc and honestly its what I plan to do. I won't put the entire warscroll on them because at the end of the day it is up to them to learn what stuff does at a basic level but I will always answer questions they have on units 

[Overread]

1 hour ago, JonnyTheKing said:

I would actually be all for a basic cheat sheet being mandatory to give to your opponent on the basic stuff in your list like spells you have given, command traits etc and honestly its what I plan to do. 

It's not a cheat sheet its an army list. Army lists should detail all the choices you've made in building your army. That means spells on models where there are optional spells; model equipment choices - everything.

 

A useful army list for yourself and your opponent might also note when you give a bonus, what the bonus is. Eg the Heart of Shiny Goodness +1 attack or such. Rather than just listing the name, that way it also helps act like a reminder for you. 

[JonnyTheKing]

1 hour ago, Overread said:

It's not a cheat sheet its an army list. Army lists should detail all the choices you've made in building your army. That means spells on models where there are optional spells; model equipment choices - everything.

 

A useful army list for yourself and your opponent might also note when you give a bonus, what the bonus is. Eg the Heart of Shiny Goodness +1 attack or such. Rather than just listing the name, that way it also helps act like a reminder for you. 

Yeah this is what i mean, something a bit more than a typical army list that you usually have as army lists will usually just have the names of spells and stuff but not their casting costs and what they do etc. So just allowing for your opponent to always be knowing what exactly is going on and not just hearing names of stuff being spoken and having to 100% remember it all

Edited September 5, 2020 by JonnyTheKing

[Kramer]

21 minutes ago, JonnyTheKing said:

Yeah this is what i mean, something a bit more than a typical army list that you usually have as army lists will usually just have the names of spells and stuff but not their casting costs and what they do etc. So just allowing for your opponent to always be knowing what exactly is going on and not just hearing names of stuff being spoken and having to 100% remember it all

What about the AoS reminders print out? Or would that be too much info? 

[Overread]

I think once you're at AoS reminders that's the kind of thing that if someone wants they should bring themselves. It's far more detail and information and its designed to remind not inform. So its built around having some familiarity at least with the army in general. 

[T10]

On 8/24/2020 at 2:43 AM, Athrawes said:

 

I packed up my army and went out to lunch instead of struggling through that match.

 

I mean, you could always go through the game asking "What am I getting into if I do this" every step of the way, but lunch sounds like a wonderful option wherein there is at least one guy having a good time as opposed to that game that sounds like it would be two guys being miserable.