"Retro for gaming stability" Topic

My friends and I like to play many periods. We have tons of scifi, fantasy, and historical. It seems that we are always trying to learn a new system, and getting mostly frustrated since nothing new is essentially giving us a better game. So last week we made a major decision to stop looking for new rules and regress to the ones we liked best and use them.

We now use WotR for fantasy and WH40K 4th ed for fantasy. Why? And why bother telling anyone? Because I am wondering if others have reached a similar conclusion. At a point we weren't playing games for pleasure but playing to keep up. All of the new rules, especially for scifi leave us cold, and we always thought the WotR rules were better than any fantasy rules available. Sure we want to support the hobby, but we need quality gaming without relearning new ways to skin cats.

Please feel free to discuss. I am interested in the opinions pro and con of this approach. Thanks

It sounds like you have reached the same coclusion as the OFM. I too feel that I would rather get my gaming pleasure out of well-painted models, nice, practical terrain, and interesting scenarios, than learning new rules all the time.

We had a fellow in our gaming group in San Diego who would jump in with us on whatever the new hotness was, buying rules and painting figures. Then he would go on deploment for six months or more, and when he returned, we would be onto something else, having left the first thing behind.

We vow several times a year to only use 1 ruleset per period we like. I love the idea and fully support it.

It lasts until the next shiny book comes out.

I'm trying to convert the club to using "Fantasy Warriors" for mass combat.

Partly because the rules are freely available and contain largely pretty generic fantasy figures hence people can concentrate on building armies. It hasn't had any surprising rules updates invalidating anyone's army lists for about two decades now…

Recently played GW Skaven/Grenadier ratmen vs Perry/Gripping Beast humans :-)

I'm working on an Orc army of EM4 plastics with Grenadier/Black Tree/Foundry/Alternative/Kallistra metals…

I think it's also nice to 'plug in' to what might be a bit of nostalgia and capture some of that sheer wargame pleasure.

It can actually take a while to get the best out of a set of rules, so always learning the latest set cantata something away from the simple pleasure of gaming without a rule set in your hands.

I've been playing ASL since 1991. Miniatures wise I've stuck to a couple different rules sets per period and scale, only changing when something more to the group's taste comes along. As an example I used to play Command Decision 2 quite a bit but switched to FFT3 since the group prefers that to the CD4 rules set.

I don't like reading rules so I have found things I like and pretty much stick with them.

I would much rather read a history book than a rule book.

I'm using Black Powder for most things now. If something looks very interesting, like when Dropzone Commander came out, I'll give it a shot but that is a rare event.

We like 40k, but not the last three editions. We also use WotR for basic fantasy…great rules, totally unloved because of the twin association of GW and the movies…they work great for generic fantasy. We have house rules for napoleonics and AWI. We tried many WWII, but return to SL with minis always.

I would love a one set meets all, but I don't think it will happen.

Even when you design/write your own, you can't just leave it as-is. Something inevitably comes along that is a better idea and into the rules it must go. What I cannot ever understand is this "support" of blatant new editions to an already existing rules set, just so that the publishers can sell more books. That is just bogus….

It isn't bogus, it is an attempt to make money both in selling the books and more figures. That is what companies exist to do.

Nothing wrong with using what works for you. The "Oldhammer" phenomenon is a clear indication of that.

Want Old Hammer (clarified) and Rouge Trader to do the same.
I know a bunch of old Frt-miesters who use WRG 1979 Renaissance solely because one of them cut his teeth on them, swears by them and knows them backwards.
I do try new stuff and some of it is eye opening in their elegance, others sadly shine bright but short.
Guess good old standbys and a new try out new and then is good
Cheers happy gaming year ahead.

Yeah, whatever works :)

I like Laserburn and Rogue Trader as much as I do 5150. One of the neat things about gaming is that a game never really goes away.

So we have all the best ideas from each era of gaming.

It is frustrating when the group you play with has such a short attention span that you never get a chance to get the most out of a ruleset (such as playing a campaign), or even fully assimilate the rules, before moving on to yet another period or being dragged along in pursuit of the latest 'shiny'.

I wrote my own rules for my own amusement. I add to them if I want to play something else. They were written for WWII. I have since added Modern, Superheros, Role Playing, Dinosaurs, and all sorts of other things. I see no need to learn a whole new mechanism just to play a game.

Mike Bunkermeister Creek
Bunker Talk blog

I suppose if your game handles, dinosaurs, super heros and Panzerfausts, you're all set :-)

It takes some wargaming-maturity to look beyond the latest shiny new ruleset. In my group, this realization came also after many years of hopping from set to set. Now we have a stable system, with a preferred ruleset for each period we play. Half of the sets are house-developed rules. As long as we like them, no need to change.

That does not mean we don't buy or read new rulesets. But it takes some discussion and thought before we actually play them. Usually, someone brings up an argument along the lines of "guys, ruleset x really has some clever mechanisms for … . Anyone interested in trying it out?" After a try-out, we discuss the rules, and whether we should Have another go, or whether we will just stick to the old rules. Sometimes we adapt the clever and new idea into our own rulesets. Sometimes, the new rules are discarded as "not worth it". And exceptionally, we discard our old ruleset in favour of the new one. But not after much tought and discussion.

BTW, I am talking about rules here, not army lists. We never use army lists in any game we play. People also get confused between army lists and rules too often these days, and in my opinion, the reason people want to change rules has often much more to do with the so-called army lists rather than the rules themselves.

This is always a huge problem for gamers, jumping onto the next rules set, tbh this is how the industry is growing at a huge rate, we have so much choice to rules, minis, terrain etc. I think its a natural to be looking at the latest shiney, not many people keep there first car or wife for that matter.

The thing I do crave in a game is old school tabletop, dice throwing, tape measuring, beer drinking games that fire your imagination in a cinematic way and bring your friends together.

After all its all about having a good time with your pals

Exactly so. I want the hobby to grow, but reality is that it isn't really. We who are a part have more income to provide, but the number of sustainable younger folks is marginal…and usually a relative of a grognard.

Games like 40k and FoW are enormously popular and that is good, but neither translate into long term gaming commitment or even expansion into other periods. They are plastic crack, but every time a "new" edition comes out it obsoletes fans. This is one reason my group has started using 4th edition again; we have the rules the figs and the knowledge already, we enjoy it, and we create our own little universe of the imagination.

What we are not doing is supporting GW or the hobby however, and this begs the question "is that our responsibility individually".

I was introduced to Warhammer and Wargaming in general as a "hobby." It replaced my Model Railroad regarding table space and my allowance. When I worked in the store where I gamed, this is how I sold the miniatures, as a "hobby." Treating it as a long-term investment was the way to talk parents into choosing miniatures for their kids rather than a new video game.

Unfortunately, the game companies have drifted away from this model. They talk it up & price it like a hobby, but in reality, when you look at the turnover in rule books, army stats and miniatures, it is just another game. And that's the difference & where so many of them are failing. They could easily have built up & added onto their game base but chose instead to cannibalize & replace them. Short term gain in exchange for long term stagnation.

No surprise those of us who still consider it a hobby are planting our flags in our favorite editions and staying there.

And isn't that reality a sad note. Growing the hobby is tantamount to abandoning the hobby for an industry. I remember when this hobby was like a small niche of enthusiast. Now we are made to feel responsible for the hobbies decline. The decline is the result of the industrialization of the hobby…

I lament having to regress to enjoy my games/friends. I am saddened that i am not "growing" my hobby. I am happy I am satisfying the small child inside that likes to paint, model, and game within a group. As sad as I am for neglecting my responsibility to the hobby, is as happy I am to no longer carry that weigh.

Carrying that wieght…

'Boy, you've got to carry that weight, carry that weight a long time…'

Just trying to trim up a bit 💩

Gaming systems are a matter of personal preference. I usually prefer to stick with older systems I already know and enjoy rather than get the newest edition of a game. That's because the new edition may have so many changes that I'd have to relearn the game all over again.