If you follow any of my content you would know that I recently went to my first Age of Sigmar 4th Edition event last weekend. Overall, it was a very good event but it is no secret that I had a bad time in my first game for many reasons.

In this article I want to talk about bad sportsmanship and mindsets when approaching the tabletop medium. It something that is more often whispered about than spoken openly. So let’s change that and create a conversation.

I have given a lot of thought to it since the event ended and I want to talk about why I think things like my first game happen.

In my experience, it is very rare to have a bad experience with someone during a competitive event. I can count it on one hand and it would maybe be three fingers. Keywords here is competitive event. Casual events (and by extension players) are whole different ball game for a different article.

When I say bad experience I do not mean, “They rolled really good and I rolled bad because I need that excuse to cope to play this game.” We all have that moment. What I am talking about is when you find yourself playing a fully different game from what your opponent is.

If you have played this game long enough and in the circles outside of your friend group you will eventually discover that while winning is a priority there is a certain way you have to win.

What am I talking about?

Often, we are told to play with intent. This is the idea that when your opponent says they’re going to do X, you understand what they are trying to do an verify that they have done so.

Intent isn’t “My intent is that you can’t reach me even with a 15″ move,” Intent is where you declare your intent to be X, then you and your opponent both take the time to make sure via measurements and other rules that X is possible.

If my intent is to be able to be in heroic intervene range of an objective, I need to measure that and confirm with my opponent that I’m not missing something which can interfere with that.

The difficult part of this is trusting the other player to be honest about what is possible.

If I ask you, “Can Bladeguard advance and charge?” and your answer is no. But actually you’re running Stormlance so yes, but that’s not what they asked.

You didn’t technically lie about not having advance and charge on the Bladeguard, but you’re going against your opponents intent by telling them no. You know they meant “Is there anyway the Bladeguard can advance and charge?”

This is loser-behavior.

Intent is comparable to being good faith in an argument. In a way, Warhammer is an argument, just a super friendly one. But it’s not a productive one without the intention to try and make the game as fair knowledge-wise as possible.

Are you compelled by the rules to remind your opponent about your flamer overwatch 15 times in a row? No.

But you should, because we are all human and you should be better.

Even if you are annoyed by them constantly forgetting about it, you should want to win the game with your opponent knowing what you can do when it’s relevant.

Overwatching with five bolt pistols? Maybe not so relevant. Overwatching with a flamer? Yeah. Please remind me.

There’s an odd notion even at top tables where you’re expected to not have to be reminded of these things. “You’re at the top table, you should know.”

Which is actually insane and genuinely WAAC. I commonly reference the final table of LVO where Richard Siegler gets heroically intervened on by Trajann. Siegler did not know he could do it from 6 inches instead of the normal 3. And what happens? His opponent Matt Lorah lets him take it all back. This is winner-behavior.

If they are doing it at the top table of an event that large, why can’t you do it at some nobody two day event? Insanity.

Intent can be weaponized of course, but to weaponize intent is probably the worst thing you can do in any game. If your intent is being able to make sure the objective can not be stolen without X,Y,Z happening, it is on you to make sure that you demonstrate to the opponent all of the reasons why they will not be able too.

Saying your intent is not enough.

But that’s enough of intent speak. It’s time to talk about mindset and how yours is the problem.

If you are an average person (you are) who is living in this century, the majority of your gaming interactions was likely online games.

We go into these games and find people to engage with anonymously for 10 minutes at a time where no mistakes outside of a skill issue will be made. You can not do things which the game does not allow.

Lets break that down: We are conditioned to not care about the other person on the other side of the screen. If you grew up in Modern Warfare 2 lobbies you know this. If they have a bad time, it does not matter. It’s 10 minutes and you’ll very likely not see them again.

It’s cold and grindy by nature. That’s fine for those games, that’s the curated experience.

In contrast, Warhammer necessitates that you spend a large chunk of time with someone, likely from your local area, to play a game in which you will both feel like it was worth the three hours.

You will see this person again, many times if you are both active in the community, so whatever impression you leave will stick around.

“What does this have to do with mindset?”

I’m saying that for a large majority of us, it takes mental work to understand how to approach the a tabletop game and why it’s different from online games. You are expected to give some amount of respect to the person who came out to get a game in with you.

I said earlier that an online game does not let you make mistakes. Warhammer is very far from that. It relies on both players having taken the time to read the massive amount of rules and remind the other when there’s a mistake.

A perfect game of Warhammer is rarely ever played. It something we should strive for but human error is far too common. So if your opponent does make a mistake, if you can conclude it was innocent, maybe don’t worry about it so much.

There are obvious exceptions to the rule, but when I say innocent I mean brother picked up a single two by accident when hitting on threes, once during the whole game.

Another common issue I find with mindsets and Warhammer is the expectation of a power fantasy. Raise your hand if you know someone like this:

They discover the newest hottest combo online for their army, get the models, hype it up in their head, then it either doesn’t do what it was suppose too, or it gets shot turn one. Bam, “This game sucks,” or “This unit is so bad.” And the whole game is ruined for them because 1/16th of their army didn’t solo the entire enemy force.

It’s not the unit, it’s not the game. Buddy it’s you. Genuine skill issue.

Usually.

It is also a dice game, and sometimes you roll all 2s when you need 3s and you’re rerolling 1s.

That’s rough buddy. But that is what you sign up for with a dice game. It’s okay to be upset when you re-roll a 2″ charge into another 2″ charge. You have to expect these things, laugh it off and move your next set of plastic toys made for children.

I’ve been watching a lot of poker recently and the amount of times I have now seen 92% vs 8% odds of a win go on the side of the 8% is pretty crazy. If you complain about it you’re told “That’s just the luck of the draw.”

So buddy with kindness I tell you, it’s just how the dice roll.

No crazy internet combo will give you an automatic win button, and especially not after one or two games. You need reps I promise you.

Every time Eldar become broken you see a flux of new players who try it, get mad that bolters killed them and sell the army. Shout out to all the cheap Eldar I can buy.

We even saw this at the start of 10th. Wraithknights were the closest thing we could of had to an automatic win button, but people still lost and got salty. Why? Because spoiler alert, it turns out you still suck. Put the work in, be rewarded.

The worst is the ones who rage when they lose their special snowflake unit because of something you did during the game that you warned them about. My guy if you don’t respect the other persons flavor of the month unit, you will end up sad.

Warhammer is a flawed game, and that’s the beauty of it. If my Companion weapon misses all it’s attacks hitting on 2s, I just say they’re very tired and that’s the end of it. I have a cute little story in my head.

Let’s talk solutions. Where do we go from here?

You want to get a game in, and you come across someone with a poor mindset and attitude, what do you do?

Unfortunately, packing up and leaving isn’t always an easy option. You came out to play a game and it might be your only of the month. That’s rough and I sympathize.

I would like to say just talk to them if it’s minor, which usually works. But likely it’ll be less well received if they’re just being a rager pouting over their Lord of Change who they left out in the middle of nowhere getting 1 shot by 10 Incubi (real story).

To those individuals you have less options.

The first is to be confrontational, I’ve dropped the line “Look mate, I’m not having a good time and it’s because of your attitude” once or twice and it usually works as a reality check that they’re crying in the middle of a game store. Sometimes you just have to inform them to stop being wieners.

But we’re not all confrontational, people are scary.

The other option is to just get through the game and let others know how this person is. We all know who the genuine problem players are in Edmonton, word spreads fast.

You will very rarely have to have another game against them. If you have to get a game in with them because it’s the top table of an event or something, just explain to the TO how the person is and request their presence at the table. A good TO will likely oblige as much as able.

In classic World of Warcraft, if you did something wiener-like during a dungeon, the whole server would hear about it and you would be hard-pressed to find a group anymore. It’s a lot like that, and I think that implied threat of being ostracized keeps most people in check.

The problem comes in when the opponent is not aware of how their actions can have consequences socially. They are use to the Modern Warfare lobbies, these are new expectations being thrust upon them. Can you blame them?

Maybe it’s on us to demonstrate to these players the proper way to socialize in these games. A question for the scholars I suppose.

That being said, we all have our moments of weakness. Where we get pouty or upset. Which sucks, but usually if that happens , just explaining that you are more upset with your own inability to be good and not with the opponent. I think that eases tension.

Believe me, I suck at these games, and I have been upset with myself pretty openly many times. It’s important that the other person doesn’t leave feeling attacked, y’know?

If you’ve read this whole thing (thank you, by the way) and you think you might be part of the problem let me give you some advice.

It’s never too late to start having fun again. Ask yourself if being upset or having bad sportsmanship over plastic toys is worth losing the chance to make a new friend. Personally I don’t think it is, I really like having friends.

I have a feeling you will start to enjoy the game way more once you reap those rewards over the fleeting joy of scoring 56 VP over the other guys 15.

Besides, I don’t know why you wouldn’t want a fair and comfortable game. Treat others how you want to be treated, it’s that simple.

That’s it from me today though. Thanks for taking the time to read my ramblings.

Drink lots of water, tell your friends you appreciate them, and treat yourself.

Thanks for reading.