Monday 5 September 2011

Know Your Rules - Njal At Nova

They're more a set of guidelines



AKA What the FAQ?
There's an old saying in Texas - Fool me once, shame on... shame one you. Fool me twice... can't get fooled again! So after last year's problem with points, it seems like Tony Kupach has been playing fast and loose with the rules again this year.

Now, the issue revolved around Njal's Lord of the Tempests rule and the fact it has been FAQ'd so that some of the results have no in-game effect if you're going second. Now it seems a bit churlish to moan about getting nerfed by an FAQ bearing in mind what happened to the Tyranids, even if the ruling didn't really make sense. The question here is should you be expected to know the rules of the army that you're playing?

Tony has claimed ignorance of the rule but I find it slightly odd that he's never played against someone else who has read about the FAQ on-line or even against another Space Wolf player who has read it themselves. Most tournaments these days ask you to bring your rule book, the rule book FAQ, your codex, the codex FAQ and your army lists. Surely, you'd have a quick glance at the FAQ?

Now, at this point I'm going to out myself as a bit of a hypocrite - last year I played in a tournament that used the INAT FAQ. I started to have a look at it but found it frankly ridiculous and so ignored it since I didn't consider it to be "official rules".

So what are your thoughts? Do you slavishly download and read every FAQ, just those that relate to your army or none of them? Do you go into a game expecting your opponent to know all the rules about your army? Is it reasonable to expect everyone to have an overview of the FAQs since they're so widely reported on the 'net these days?




9 comments:

  1. I don't think I've properly read the Big Rulebook and my own Codex properly yet, never mind FAQ's.

    This may explain my rather poor gaming record.

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  2. I would say, if all things were equal, you bring up a good question.

    I would also say:

    1. This was the last game of a fairly intense weekend. I'm sure both players were pretty fatigued at this point, mentally and physically.

    2. Mistakes happen. If it was accidental, that happens all the time in professional sports where millions of dollars on on the line. Nobody likes it, but it happens. If it was intentional, that person has to live with that knowledge and probably has other issues to deal with.

    3. It's only a game.

    I say cut him some slack and move on. Blackmoor will be back.

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  3. One person who played Kopach told me that he is very knowable and seemed to know the rules inside out. Just sayin'

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  4. His opponents weren't aware of what Njal did. For example, Tony used his Chain lightning against Dash at the END of the ASSAULT phase. Now at one of the "biggest" tourney's in the US, I would of assumed his opponents knew their codex's but clearly not. Tony played out his assault phase THEN played out his chain lightning, and this happened twice. This clearly shows that he had forgot to do chain lightning so did it anyway in the assault phase which cost Dash the game. In my opinion this should of been stopped as if you forget, tough shit, more so on table 1 but maybe that's just me being anal I dunno. Table 8 or 9 where the title isn't being played for I would let that go, but table one round 6 is another story.

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  5. even in a tournament, FAQ's are there primarily as guidelines.  if both of you think a ruling is stupid, then you are free to ignore it.  they are not rules, they are suggestions for what to do if a situation is not covered directly in the rules.

    the situation you are talking about is an unintended side effect of another ruling and is so obscure and so utterly nonsensical that i am not surprised both players ignored it.  frankly you would have to be a complete ass to try and pull that crap in any game, even the final of a major tournament.

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  6. since it happened to you mate, i am sure you do feel this way ;)

    but seriously, you are quite right, except it wasn't spotted by either player, or the judges, until well after the event was over.

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  7. Is that how Mick keeps beating you? He rolls a dice every turn and if he rolls 2+ he wins!

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  8. I resemble that remark good sir

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  9. Agreed it did happen to me and i took the consequences and apologised, so now more than ever it is sad to see it played out, more so on a live feed.

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