powergamers

So In the previous thread I saw a lot of hate towards powergamers. I feel this is somewhat unjust. So I'd like to describe my philosophy towards gaming and see what you guys think about that.

I am in NO way trying to insult or offend anyone, so if you feel that way I can try to clarify.

ok so lets begin(I DO type alot, don't I XD)

I feel there are two ways i can approach a game
a ) Just for the fun of it.
-I play to enjoy the game, and thats really it, winning and losing doesn't matter as much, if at all, because the fun comes from within the game itself.
b ) "It is not enough to win, all others must lose". I WILL win, my opponents WILL lose. I go into the game trying to win not necessicarly "at all costs" but I will use every ounce of player skill and ever resource at my disposal.

I, personally find it very difficult to enjoy a game I can't win...so I lean towards b often...

I'm a competative gamer(I do believe I can use the term "gamer" safly). I used to be a 40K tourney player before I got out and now I'm on a competative league of legends team.

So when I approach a game I look to win, obviously, but there are many ways in which a player goes about "winning"

1st there is the actual game. a W in the win colunm, simple enough right?

2nd I want to make sure that I am constantly trying to improve how I play the game. There is ALWAYS something I can learn all of the time, It is more important to become a better player(and human being) than it is to win the game, because what's one game now, when you can gain some deeper understand for the future?

3rd This is by FAR the most important. I must do my best to make sure my opponent has the time of his life. Sometimes there is nothing I can do to get him/her out of what Jervis Johnson called "the face", but I will do my darndest to crack jokes, make bad puns, ect to try to make sure that even though they lose, and they KNOW they lost, that they still really enjoyed the game. It IS a game after all and I am not willing to sacrifice my social life to get some cheap thrills. Thankfully I find I don't have to! ^.^

I feel like people like me get a bad rap and are bunched into the same catagory as people who ragequit and flip tables. People who throw models and scream at people because they are superior. I hope that I would NEVER, EVER, IN MY LIFE stoop to that level of inhumanity.

Just because I find my enjoyment of the game in mastering it, does not give me, or anyone else the license to be a jerk. And lumping all competative "powergamers" into one group seems like steryotyping and labeling. Of COURSE we all have bad expirences with the extremes in people, of COURSE that's what we remember most, but I know that there are many people who share my viewpoint and they don't deserve to be lumped together with meanies.

(sry no time for spell/grammar check, I wanted to post this quickly before it got ninja'd)

Mors Lucis

i play to play. dont care bout winning or losing. we play a set number of turns or time limit and after the game its done over finished. we tend to not count points at all. it was a good game played over good food and good music to laughs and teasing.

see we once had a special rule in our games. it was called ed has the stupid baton. this rule was simple, big ed, who was a 6 foot 3 biker who played warhammer games since the very beginning and actually won best klingon costum at a star trek costume party just by showing up, would moderate the game. not to catch cheating but to catch people who had bad attitudes that ruined it for eveyone else. ed ruled with the stupid baton, which was a two litter coke bottle half full of water. you did somthing stupid aka throw a tantrum then he moderated, found the culprit and hit you full force in the head with the stupid baton. sounds mean but it actually kept us in line and was fun even lol.

power gamers as ive heard before are in my veiw point not bad on their own though i wont play one. i tend to play in groups of freinds who play in games with a theme to it as ive said elsewhere, therefore whenever we play a game we have preset stipulations set by the moderater or gm who actually will almost roleplay the game. it tends to knock the power gamer out of our games. i dont care who you are you have fun with us. as well as certain armies and troop types are banned with us. for instance ive never played the grey knights. when the book came out we deemed the list broken and banned them. theres a freind in our group who does nothing more but write codexes for old armies to keep them up to date and even writes his own. ever play space skaven?

its long winded but as youve noticed i didnt say wether i love or hate the power gamer. only the steps we take to prevent unpleasant games.

See this is what seperates you from from the real power gamers, in my eyes.

For me, first priority is always to have a fun game.

Another reason competitive gamers get a bad time of it, is because in pursuit of being a better gamer, you often only see a handful of army types. Necron Scarab Farm, Draigowing, if you see Chaos, you'll see 2 Lash of Submissions, Daemon Fatecrusher, with 'Nids you'll see as many Monstrous Creatures as possible.

It limits the game when armies can be reduced to that, takes some fun out of it, for me.

hmm.. "Ed has the Stupid Baton" rule should be obligatory at every Gaming Club.. Usually, our Gaming Club is actually a group of friends that come together and play at a vacant store we rent for almost nothing including electricity. There was only ONE incident once that made me want to do an "Ed has the Stupid Baton". Here we were playing Warmachine & Hordes, and I was having a blast with my Blindwater Congregation Hordes army against a Cygnar army. All of the sudden, we hear one of the guys raise his voice and almost shouted "Awww, come on! This is so darn unfair!" and slammed his fist on the gaming table. The resulting tremor sendt both part of his army and his opponents army to the floor, breaking several models.

We did the next best thing to the "Ed has the Stupid Baton" rule.. I (being 2.07m. tall with some meat on my bones) gave him a "Gibbs-slap" and we all agreed giving him a small "fine" of £10 for showing such poor sportsmanship and disrespect.

Ah, the Gibbs-slap solves everything...

Have to say, when I'm at a club I'm normally the one to tell someone to calm down and be a bit more sportsmanlike. Then again, half the people there know I'm a security guard. And I apparently have a passing resemblance to a Wookie

I don't have a problem with people playing to win, as such, more those who want to win at any cost, including the cost of your opponent having a good time.

Rules Lawyering, abusing certain tactics (I actually faced a Scarab conga-line once, even though that tactic was clearly broken and in need of FAQing, and using it is just unsportsmanlike) and generally unpleasant behaviour are what stop me from considering playing competitively. It's a game, something you play for fun, without that, it stops being a game.

yea we would have just beat his then shown him the door. but i understand things happen to. you like the stupid baton? lol. he also had the left foot of ed. hed kick the table and any models that fell over on any side was dead and removed regardless of rules. it makes for happy freindly games hehe. then there was the right foot, he kicked you. of course that only happened when you upset the ed lmao.

ya know back on subject of power gamer. i knew one once but we tended to chear him on. he did strange things just knowing he was ahead of everyone else. like his 5000 point snotling army. it was one goblen warlord roughly 5000 points of snotling bases and snotling pump wagons. it was a site to see lol. he of course played in our way. take your turns and on the beginning of turn two everyone has to take a shot of hotsauce and gets nothing to drink till beginning of turn three!!! or the old SWAP ARMIES!!! hehehe