Vindication through FAQs

On a long enough timeline the survival rate for douchbaggery drops to zero.

I love the latest GW FAQs for 40k. When 6th Ed dropped, I was impressed with the tightness of the rules. Things seemed very clear and loopholes were mostly covered. What was not covered seemed like you could work it out with some logic and reasonable compromises. However there were a few things that did not sit well with me. turns out that it was the power gamer community centering around sites like BoLS that were deliberately misinterpreting the rules for advantage, but no news there. In an impressive move of listening to what the community was getting wrong and responding, GW addressed these holes and grey areas with speed and aplomb.

Backing up a little, we went through similar self correcting with the Space Wolf Codex. There were lots of folk that wanted to say that if they took 9 Grey Hunters and attached a Wolf Guard then that made a 10 man unit. That earned you a second special weapon. BS. When you try to call them on this nonsense (and you know I did), they come back with that it is now a 10 man unit and due to the ambiguity of the wording they can do it.

A few months later, GW has to release a FAQ specifically telling these people that not only can they do that, but they were DBs for doing it in the first place. It would be nice if GW took a leaf out of Privateer Press' book and beta tested the rules with the community a little before releasing the books to weed out this kind of end run around sanity and rationality, but that is too much to hope for. I guess that we (and by we I mean me), will have to put up with a few months of people trying to break the rules for advantage. I guess that is because they can't compete on a level field.

Coming up to more recent events, the gaming community that was not the douchbag core was lit up like a pinball machine over units of characters namely Paladins and Ork Nobs on bikes. The 6th Ed rulebook had those models listed as Cha and the community took that to mean they they were all Characters and could all make Look out Sir rolls for each other. I pointed out several times in several places (here I could link to me calling jerks out on BoLS but I don't want to visit their site any more than I have to or read their garbage), they this makes no sence on several levels. There are no other units that are made of all Characters. From a fluff/rules/reasonable point of view, why would the people go through acrobatics to each get shot for each other every time they are shot at? It does not make any sence for the purposes of the rule and it really slows down the game.

It is now a few weeks after GW has specifically corrected this and there is nothing from the DB community other than a a pouty face they they can't use this particular brand of cheese anymore. And that is how it goes. In my perfect world, there would be a black mark on the people that not only used this "tactic" but promoted it. Insted they go on to break the game in other ways.

So why write rants against this? Because it makes me feel good that I have the right interpretation of the rules and that few of my plans are changed when an FAQ comes out. It makes me feel like I have a good grip on the spirit of the rules.