You Can Make Your OWN LORE in Wargaming?

[@slowking2088]

The answer is yes. I have made a custom Luna Wolves army to use in warhammer 40k so I have the simple lore for them. They got trapped in the Warp during travel and then came back out when the Great rift opened and now have heard of the Horus Heresy and are on the hunt to kill Abaddon. Having your own Lore makes you more emersed in the game so even if someone you know won't like it do it for your own entertainment.

[@eberwald4438]

Same. My 1st Duskenyan Guard Regiment fought Tyranid, and a Lictor jumped out of the bushes and annihilated an infantry squad. Last man standing plasma gunner managed to take off it's last wound and kill it in melee. Going forward, Private Duid got promoted to Corporal and joined the Command Squad. Skirmish games have more potential I think since you have fewer elements to focus on, but big army games can do it too.

[@tomgeytenbeek2207]

I would pay to see that fighting Abaddon on the tabletop, that sounds like an incredible army :) I absolutely love the time travel excuse for 30k armies in 40k, they lead to some of the most interesting stories and grudge matches (Luna Wolves are also, and will always be, seriously awesome lads)

[@cdh7453]

This is exactly my lore and chosen Chapter, I field Primaris scale Space Marines as I prefer the larger scale compared to human equivalent figures. The amount of butt hurt I run into online is really sad - at the end of the day, its your army so you can do what you want! Very glad that 30k isn't as lore-locked as people think. There's so much interplay between 30k and 40k anyway.

[@beowylfen]

I have an abhuman guard regiment who's in active rebellion against the Imperium but not chaos-ey they still love their Emperor just not the Imperium

[@slowking2088]

@@beowylfen that sounds very cool

[@JustQuitePro]

I recently got interested in playing some Frostgrave, but none of my friends were particularly invested in idea of playing wargames at all. But some of them are players in my D&D campaign, so I did this thing: I integrated Frostgrave lore in my D&D campaign with some tweaking, and after my players got through it, I pitched the idea of returning in this frozen ruined city they now know and love, but in a different format of a wargame. Now I'm finishing a ruined terrain set and all of my D&D friends are excited to try a new game. So I feel like lore is a great motivation to try something new.

[@gentlemancorpse]

Genius. You incepted them into a whole different game format. 👏👏

[@firstimpression7529]

Legitimately doing this with the wrath of kings and frostgrave in my D&D campaign. Did you integrate missions that were similar to forstgrave or just used lore? My next D&D session will be a treasure grab against some bounty hunters. Random rolls will have smaller dinosaurs after each round from the borders.

[@qw3rty829]

Similar story to yours. What got my friends invested in playing was the cool lore of frostgrave, and that we would have a mini narrative through our games

[@JustQuitePro]

@@firstimpression7529 No missions (although that's a neat idea), just lore. I run sandbox'ish kind of game, there were mysterious "Northern Ruins" on the map, and every second NPC was mentioning it in dialogue, so my players eventually decided to go give it a look. I made it as if it's already was raided by wizard warbands, put in some environmental storytelling (frozen soldier corpses, graffiti a-la "*wizardname* was here", a diary of an unfortunate scholar who caused Felstad's cataclysmic magic surge, lore hooks and hints in other words), and kinda focused on campaign-themed quests and events. But they really liked the location, got hooked on "what's going on with this place?" and started to unravel city's history first of all. Thanks for the great idea with missions by the way!

[@funwithmadness]

That basically is how D&D came about... What happens to the heroes/generals leading armies (Chainmail) and how did they get there? :)

[@kallisto9166]

Emergent narratives are what I love about RPGs. Good games lead to unexpected places that neither players nor DM could have anticipated. That's the real gold.

[@NightfireGamingYT]

Even if there's not a big overarching narrative, I like giving personality to my minis and teams. With my friends the phrase "That's not very Orky" gets thrown around a lot, which basically means don't take it too seriously and do whatever is the most entertaining move.

[@johncaisse2607]

I've noticed this on a few of your videos now, but I really enjoy your "no-frills" approach to you videos. No music, few to no sound effects. It's more like a conversation in a room with nothing going on in the background, I dig it.

[@dakkaflakkaflame]

I mostly think about lore for my army when building and painting it. It has a very similar feeling to creating a campaign world as a GM. Most of the stuff nobody else will ever hear about, but it's fun to do for its own sake.

[@ProrokLebioda]

I really like idea of Mordheim, due to how meta-narrative around a warband was growing after what happened in and after a game.

[@rutgaurxi7314]

Yes, it's barely a question. It doesn't matter if you just have the barest framework of a story, as long as it works as a setting and leaves room for your dudes.

[@harrisharris5276]

I love making my own lore for homebrew factions. I run a custom order of Sororitas who have the quirk of believing the Emperor is actually a woman. It gives them a reason to fight any other faction that shows up on the tabletop, and it's kind of a funny idea. My local tabletop group appreciates the level of effort I put into my faction (especially since I won't field anything not fully painted), regardless of their thoughts on the concept

[@onceuponakillteam-sean]

This is such a good topic of conversation! Its literally the reason I started the Once Upon A Kill Team podcast. Narrative play is so important as otherwise it all becomes very cold and detached, even those in the ultra competitive scene are still imagining these epic battles in their heads and making a story of it all! :D

[@NightfireGamingYT]

Soon as I saw the video title, the first thing I thought of was your podcast.

[@trevorharvey6928]

The simple lore is one of the reasons I'm really into Frostgrave at the moment, there's only a simple scene setting page or two - the rest is up to you. I do agree that emergent stories are more present in skirmish gaming but also every wargamer has a story or two about that plucky guardsman (or other basic troop) that did something amazing once....

[@KevinoftheCosmos]

I've been working on my first Warcry warband, which is The Unmade. When reading the Black Library Warcry short story, I really started resonating with the idea of a warband that lavished in pain. Being in a sort of exctatic bliss while getting carved up in battle, contrasted strangely with being relatively chill towards one another for a Chaos warband. They love pain so much that they flay their own faces off for decoration, adapt exceedingly well to amputation, and rank up the more pain and injury that they take on. I thought it was terrifying that a group of psychotic wanderers relish in the agony that results in battle whilst heeding the calls of either their trauma-inflicted psychosis or their actual chaos god. The subtle and scant lore lends so well to creating your own gang, setting, and story. For example I've written so much about them: The pack were all once young nobles; unsatisfied with their life of excess, relative safety, comfort, boredom. A surgeon's daughter, a former artist, the inheritor of a vineyard, a torturer, the son of a tax collector, and an herbalist were among the first. Over time the feral and sadistic blood drunk pack grew greatly in number, and were impossible to kill due to their total lack of fear and cunning ferocity. They'd pick enemies off by baiting them into traps before going head-on. Gleeful shrieks and laughter, moans of enraptured bloodlust, and a cackle of adrenaline laced excitement were the first thing their victims would hear as they'd sprint into fray. No doubt, seeing them slicing into their own skin with implements of rusty metal along the way was enough to shock or disturb even the most stalwart. Even if they didn't win a skirmish, they effectively retreat due to one or more always happily staying behind to meet their orgasmic ending. The two leaders, blissful ones, tower over the rest, bounding foward on spiked metal stilts strapped to the bloody stumps where their lower legs once were. Rentokk - The Taker, their senior packmother, is so enraptured in exctacy that she can nary utter a sound. The other is nameless, a seamstress that lovingy provides sewn scalps harvested in victories for her pack to wear when not in the throes of battle. Additionally, they know much about nature and build immunities with concocted brews, hinder the advancement of infection with salves, ward off tetanus, poisons, etc, with what they gather in the wilderness. They all dream, or are tormented by, nightmares of a looming red obelisk. They wordlessly follow the visions of their clairvoyant whom paints what he sees in stretched canvases of other's flesh and his own blood. The pack fears only one thing, if you can even count it, which is not being able to live another day to feast on and inflict more pain; to not please their god. See what I mean? I could keep going all day with this mad bunch. I'm so excited by the thought of future narrative play as soon as I find some other people interested. I'm getting my partner her chosen Gloomspite warband (which was calling out to her, as well as the Daughters of Khaine) and encouraging her to paint with me. She loves the modeling and painting aspect so I'm sure she'll gradually craft some lore for her own little guys.

[@timothyyoung2962]

One of my favorite campaign skirmish games is This Is Not A Test. The playing card system it uses can generate after mission events that can really create some nice emergent narrative and our group has had a lot of that in the game. My son had a raider who always kept getting eliminated, but every condition roll after the game was over always resulted in him being disfigured and gaining an intimidation bonus. This happened so often that the running joke was the raider never died, he just got uglier. I played a crazy cult in a few games and my warband was new, so had less experience and good gear than the other warbands. In one game I was able to take a bunch of extra men to even the odds, so the narrative was my cult put out a call to all members because they wanted revenge on another warband from the last game that defeated them. My son also made up a cult warband at the same time as me. We never discussed anything about the warbands and found it funny we both created the same type, and both were led by women. So in a four player game we teamed up and decided the leaders were sisters who each had a cult that fallowed them. This led the other two players to join forces and the emerging narrative for the mission was that the sisters joined forces to take over a town that had banished them when they were younger and the other two warbands were mercs hired by the rich merchants of the town to protect it from the encroaching threat. We have a lot of narrative to our games, but we are also a bunch of roleplayers on top of minis gamers so it's just second nature really. And we all love characters, so skirmish games are all we play.

[@MogoPrime]

That all sounds absolutely rad. Love the way you and your son think!

[@MstrPhoenixMHD]

This was a wonderful think piece. I actually came up with a short lore to justify fielding rocks in Warhammer as a unique army. My thought starts with a living sentient planet, which was exceptionally rich in some Zenth-metal. After some humans eventually found said planet they soon set up a mining operation of sorts. Unfortunately for everyone involved this was the first time said planet had ever felt true pain and it reacted rather violently, consuming the entire mining depot and all who had moved planetside. Some amount of time later it was deemed wholely beneficial to harvest this planet, despite it's opinion. And so an anti gravimetric warhead was used to shatter said planet. However when the people came along to harvest the asteroid field of the dead planet, the found far fewer samples than they had expected. Even more alarming was that these asteroids had retained sentients and now were quite happy to squash any organic that crosses their path. This is just a quick summation of my thought but it opens up the option of an ad hoc army of any size that could show up any where or when thanks to spatial temporal anomalies.

[@ryan.1990]

Rocks?! Not heard that before I guess!

[@MstrPhoenixMHD]

@@ryan.1990 thanks. When I got my first box of minis I didn't have a second set to fight against. Portions of my brain are more active than others and this lore jumped out of my brain's Nexus to fulfill the role of a secondary Army. Plus as someone who spent a lot of time researching how to play dungeons & dragons without ever getting to, making an adaptation for the Rock elementals seemed amusing.

[@ryan.1990]

@@MstrPhoenixMHD It's ingenious and doesn't require much beyond... A handful of rocks! I love it 😂

[@magimon91834]

About the opening. When people ask I'll usually just say "you buy you soldiers, you build toy soldiers, you paint toy soldiers, you argue online about toy soldiers, and occasionally you play against someone else's toy soldiers with yours"

Fun fact! The first version of dnd described itself as rules for wargame campaigns, and the first version of warhammer called itself a role-playing game!

[@basiliskprime]

Anthems of War does a neat thing where the lore is written into the gameplay. Your battles are told by bards in a tavern and the story of your battle can be anything. It has lore and flavor text all through the book but it gives you a blank slate to put your lore on top of that. There is even a system in lore where that bard can affect the weather and rolls by embellishing the story

[@campbellharris8999]

It's interesting how much of GWs stuff started out as emergent narrative. A good example being how the early gazghull/yarrick story came from the results of various battle reports. This kind of culminated in the armageddon and black crusade campaigns. Certainly up until 3rd edt 40k GW (or rather certain people at GW) really pushed the narrative side and coming up with your own stuff. I suppose Inquisitor was the ultimate expression of this. Heck I still come with stories for my original Necromunda gang 20 odd years later, it's been fun looking back at thier record sheets and thinking about how thier live would (or wouldn't) continue. Of course none of that had anything to do with using those figures as inquisitorial acolytes...

[@KuK137]

They still push it, no? 9th edition has the whole Crusade game subsystem, which is all about narrative. I wish it was more prominent/streamlined though...

[@tomgeytenbeek2207]

@@KuK137 used to be the origin of entire characters and plot points, though- the blood angels Captain Tycho, and his alternative Death Company datasheet, came from a White Dwarf campaign where their Blood Angels captain just kept getting unluckily maimed, until they made him his own figure :) I wasn’t even alive before the early 2000’s, but there’s a beautiful nostalgia of sorts for the early days… it had a different heart to it.

[@Commodore22345]

@@KuK137 It's all about narrative, but it's not really about creating your own narrative. That's what we are talking about when we say "emergent narrative." The crusade stuff that GW provides still pigeonholes players too much down the narrative paths that GW wants players to go down. Past editions would give you some basic structure for how to play certain types of campaigns (linear narrative, tree campaign, matrix campaigns, etc.), but didn't give you any pre-established narrative to follow. It was entirely up to you to come up with your own narrative. I wish GW would go back to that, but I know they won't because the modern 40k player isn't exactly the most creative or imaginative type.

[@noahdoyle6780]

Well, you're describing pretty much exactly how I play. Stories build from the models and crafting decisions, up through play. I have a loose WarCry campaign going on with my oldest son, which has organically turned into the saga of my hapless Skaven furious at his Chaos Warriors who stole their warpstone, and it's a blast, even as I keep losing. Re: large army games. I tend to give personality to units, rather than each model, just scale up the characterization. Space games, each ship becomes a character. Same for stompy robots, etc.

[@nerdfatha]

In all my years of gaming I have had emergent story pop up twice in games where I didn't expect it. once in a 2000 pt game of Age of Sigmar. Sons of Behemat vs Gloomspite Gitz. after a brutal encounter with a mega Gargant, a squad of Squig Hoppers was reduced to 1. That little guy kept the gargant busy for two more rounds biting at his ankles, while the Mega kept missing every attack . We were literally role playing it at the table of this brute trying to swat this tiny little stubborn bastard.

[@lorenzovive5801]

You have spoken DIRECTLY to what most of my gaming group enjoy - lore and narrative even in one off scenarios in mid to large level army games. Bravo!

[@TheVagrancyhorror]

The short answer is yes. I would even argue that, to a degree you need to invest some of your own legends to get full enjoyment out of the models, and the games.

[@SlyLilFoxo]

I played a few Crusade games with a buddy where I was playing Lamenters. My Captain, Lefron, had The Burning Blade and Sword of the Imperium, which basically means he's an exceptional duellist. Well, despite all this, he would "die" in *every* match. Even the ones I won, he would still be defeated. So, true to Lamenters, he was literally cursed. Although, similar to Dante, he was also cursed to never die. So while his men and friends would fall around him and stay dead, he would continue to live with his mistakes. Progressively getting more and more disconnected until, finally, the final battle happened. He failed the siege on the fortress and it wasn't even close, but he did defeat the enemy warlord. So, in a bit of custom narrative, it was the final bit of his will gone. He became an icon of vengeance. Though he may lose and lose, he'll keep trying until he eventually wins. No matter the cost. With a burning fury that blinded him and carried him into the Death Company, consumed by his Black Rage, yet directed enough to unleash it solely on his foes. Needless to say it was very enjoyable. Even though I got my ass handed to me more times than not, Lefron's misfortune was incredibly fun to witness.

[@Hudjunababa]

Back in the day I enjoyed heroes that appeared out of my 40k battles. The Holy Gun Drone became a thing (got a special paint job) after it killed a Terminator in close combat. Also my pathfinder rail-gunner that was a true slaughter house and was all but untouchable. He had a name, that sadly eludes me now, and custom paint and bits to represent his many trophies.

[@saintcityriot1]

I write narrative skirmish campaigns (Hobby Dungeon on wargame vault - sorry for the shill!), and I usually take a new skirmish crew through one of these campaigns to help build up their story and myth. Once you play 5 or 6 games with your squad, some character starts to emerge, maybe you have lost some friends along the way. That's the fun stuff.

[@annabialke705]

I play Space Station Zero with a friend, and we both enjoy the game a lot! Because there is no specific story lore to fall back on, the lore of our own individual crews (unique personalities, behaviors, and tactics) are really highlighted, especially when the two crews cooperate, which make for a great organic emergent narrative. I've changed paint themes or kit bashed models for different TTRPGs because of an emergent narrative, and it's a strong fun factor for many games!

[@FakeAccountIsFake]

This is exactly why Necromunda has become my favorite miniatures game lately. My local gaming group has had a campaign going for a few months now and there are SO MANY little stories that have come out of little interactions between the gangs. Major highlight for me was losing both my leader and one of my two champions in a single match (permanently dead). The very next game I played was a rematch against the same gang and my surviving champion, now promoted to gang leader, won a close combat duel against the absolutely terrifying melee fighter who was responsible for killing his comrades... using the long blade he had just inherited from my original leader. That kind of storyline emerging totally naturally through dice rolls is just so special and cool and makes me want to play as many narrative campaigns as I can.

[@RoseKindred]

This is what first drove me to WHFB and WH40K, making my own lore and models. I would spend hours planning out a character's backstory and converting minis to fit it. I once got laughed out of a GW because of my army idea of an Undead Slayer army using VC rules. Now with my printer I am making the army, I would have bought about 3K in model points back in the early 00s.

[@waynegoddard4065]

I have my own lore going through my head every time I build a new miniature. The model has his own backstory that goes into detail when I add a new piece to it. He got that sword from such and such when he killed such and such in a duel to the death and took the sword from dead such and such because his bravery and courage meant a momento of such and such needed to be kept and happened to be such and suchs sword which is nice.

[@yggy2498]

That's why I'm very interested in Space Weirdos & the upcoming Sword Weirdos. It guides me in a certain way as to how to play the game but lets me create a custom data sheet for my army like custom loadout, ability and such that still have certain limitations in check. In my mind, I instinctively create an origin story for my army and have them be in a kind of a theme. The possibility for creativity is endless and together with enjoying war games it kinda excites me.

[@yggy2498]

Also looking forward to trying Space Station Zero once I've painted more alien like beings and kit bashed my own team.

[@bocatt9202]

I and my spouse have been having our friends over for nights of gaming and RPGs about once a week for a few months now. Last Saturday, I somehow managed to convince everyone to have a hobby sesh together where we just got out some primed models laying around, brushes and paint and had a go of it. And it was a really neat feeling for people to be talking about lore and stories for models and what looks and styles they wanted reflected in their paint jobs. It really makes me look forward to more painting sessions and maybe even someday playing some games with these models lol.

[@briochepanda]

"In The Streets Of Spacetown" sounds like a Snarling Badger game to me.

[@datfox2844]

I'm a big lore guy tbh. Brings everything together for me. I still enjoy the other parts of the hobby (painting, regular games) but its my favourite part.

[@nixcomments]

Hell yeah! Making your own lore brings so much more to the table :D It is such a flavourful way of building your army with a personal/custom background!

[@colonelturmeric558]

Hell yeah, nothing beats making a successor chapter with their own fleshed out lore to add to the gameplay experience

[@RedRainMerc]

This video honestly gave me an idea for me and my friend. I'm a forever DM for DnD for some context. My friend got necrons and I got space Marines. I was thinking of letting her necrons do a Campain where they find other units that she can add people to here army (that I'll buy or print) to help her add story to her army and build her army up over time.

[@MegaMindfreak666]

I'm currently working on a Deathguard army where every model is a kitbash. It started with a box of Space Marines bits I got from a friend, which I combined with Deathguard Marines. Of course, this left me with a bunch of Deathguard bits when I was finished, so I bought a regular Space Marines box and did the same thing again. My lore idea for these Marines is that they were left to die on the battlefield by the Imperium, where they were later picked up by the Deathguard. Since the Deathguard saved them, they then decided to join them and got corrupted over time.

[@RylanStorm]

Depends if you publish that lore under the OGL

[@kartchner7]

No place is safe from an ogl reference!!! 😂 well done!!!

[@chrisboyd4433]

This emergent narrative is one of the big reasons I like Five Parsecs From Home so much. I write a one or two page narrative version of the campaign turn that fleshes out the die roles and turns them into a story. That is how my space pilot turned pirate crew morphed into an A-team style crew in search of a stolen space yacht with a top secret cloaking screen.

[@andrewburgoyne4728]

I recently started playing Five Men from Normandy by Nordic Weasel Games. It is excellent for coming up with your own lore and becoming personally invested in your own little "band of brothers."

[@idontwanttopickone]

I really think emergent narratives are what sell games. All types of games. Think about all the stories in any game you have played and I bet the things you remember are when something happened that was reliant on your choices and actions, not the story that was written out. The games people recommend or talk about or watch are the ones that people can add to them in a way that increases the narrative. 40k was designed from the ground up for players to add their own stories to it (that's why there are loads of different sub-groups/warbands/chapters/etc. in each army - so you can make your army your own). Minecraft was successful because it was solely based around the narrative you put on to it - you don't just build something, you have reasons to build something , you have a story about trying to build that thing. E-sports and sports aren't about the rules of the game, but the story about how the players and their skills make the game. Some games are beautiful and wonderful to play for their own enjoyment. But the ones that become massive often leave space for players to express themselves. In that space, emergent narratives are created that those players tell their friends about and those friends buy that game because of those stories. So, if you are designing a game, leave space for player creativity. Remember, once you put a piece of art out into the world, it is no longer yours, let it go and grow with those who enjoy it.

[@dominicd3168]

I got in to Warhammer 40k because I need a quiet "new dad" time activity. And it has been a lot of fun to build and paint the models. But coming from play MTG and DnD for years I had to make my own faction / color scheme for the models I was painting. So now I have my own Hive fleet and Sisters chapter. Getting into the game not knowing a ton of lore I wanted to make my own so I didn't mess up decades of "that's not how that army works". oddly it seemed safer to just make your own then mess up what was already know so well. I still have not played a single game of 40k in any capacity but last year painted close to 100 models.

[@Rhone007]

Fantastic video Uncle Atom!! This is exactly why I prefer skirmish to giant army games. Being an avid RPG fan as well, I tend to slant my games towards this kind of narrative. 😁

[@threewiseman1]

Mt friends and I took this to a new level by making Munchkin cards that reference the greatest (and funniest) hits from our RPGs over the years (as well as some in jokes we all share from our lives). 'Lord Door', 'Kinky Tinney', 'Ominous Lamp post', 'Cloak of Bayne', 'Bovine Intervention'. Ah, great times.

[@a40kjourney]

My friend and I adapted 40k into a co-op because we wanted to fight with and not against each other, and our own lore began to emerge around a guard squad: Cadian 8th squad 144, who always survived despite being pushed into the worst possible place. We imagined them grizzled and grimey with genestealer guts, their gun barrels smoking and warped as they slogged back to their Valkyrie, ready for a ration and a rack. We haven't played in years because COVID and all, but the legend of squad 144 lives on.

[@codyweaver7546]

Whenever a really cool happenstance occurs with emergent narratives, that is how my rando mini #7 gains a name and a place of honor on the shelf.

[@IronGuardsman]

Narrative is the most important thing for me, and I think you can get it in big Army games, though it does tend to revolve around characters or squad leaders! I ran the Battle of Pelennor fields as a big participation game, and over drinks later people were arguing about what would happen next. My gaming is group is going to do a four way battle between our new 40k combat Patrols in April, and muggins has volunteered to write the narrative for how we got to the start line. Everyone is going to get their commander’s perspective, and I am planning to pre-write some more “evidence” for the first player to get to the wounded Guardsman, wandering servitor, the crater, etc etc. Hopefully the big reveal will only be foreshadowed, not telegraphed!

[@jamiecampbell3058]

I’m working on lore for my own Space Wolves successor chapter, called the Omega Wolves. Concept is that Guilliman encountered various Lone Wolf marines over the course of his crusade and gathered them to give them a new mission in the face of the Great Rift and its repercussions. The first mission was crossing the Rubicon Primaris.

[@reversegoat3260]

Back 20 odd years ago my brother loved to play 40k. He would get a 6-8 (sometimes 10) hour session each week on his only day off for about five-six years. Thousand Sons was his favorite army, even though they could be rough to play sometimes. He only played 2000+ battles and would write a short story based after each battle. If something crazy happened, he would even make adjustments to the army. For example, early on his chaos lord was demolished by something fierce, like a three las cannon shots in the same turn. So, in desperation his legion tried to save them by shoving him in the defeated foe's dreadnought and casting spells to keep him alive. He ended up as a writhing multi-colored blob of chaos stuff but mostly kept his mind and became a (count as) demon prince. Every unit and sorcerer had some story behind it based on what they did in battle.

[@RSBurgener]

I'm glad you bring this up. My brain is spontaneous and powerful head canon machine, especially when I start building and painting. I pretty much don't have any control over it. I find it useful for making painting and modeling decisions. I just haven't had the chance to get in on a long narrative campaign to make use of all this stuff. I hope to one day.

[@mordecaitoth6703]

The Warhammer 40k community would be having a much better time if they understood that they can play authentic in lore games of Warhammer 40k without limiting themselves to the official GW games that, in my experience, pretty much none of them enjoy. My Dark Angels were successfully purging xenos scum and hunting the Fallen within the Space Weirdos ruleset throughout 2022 while the majority of my gaming group left their models collecting dust on the self.

[@tabletopminions]

That’s exactly the way to do it. Thanks for watching!

[@sweetandsaltyminx7310]

I finally got my friends to really commit to their hobby stuff for AoS after coming up with some lore and background that would create a shared setting for all our armies. Pretty soon we're going to start a Narrative Play campaign.

[@DiceDweeb16]

I'm currently running a grueling campaign between my Emperors Children and Dark Angels. So many awesome moments and clutch dice rolls. The Astra Militarum had to send reinforcements to aid in the Dark Angels defense of my hive city.

[@firstimpression7529]

Omg! I love wraith of kings!! I have every miniature but one! Game system is so simple yet extremely strategic. Only one roll is needed and it was super affordable to jump into. Unfortunately, I can rarely get anyone to play war games. But I’ve be using their world for D&D as I DM for my friends.

[@johnsantillano6528]

Of course we can. I used to have a blood angels heavy list entirely made of tanks and dreadnaughts. They were outcast who chose death as total absolution and tribute to Sanginuis, I would tell the stories while we battled each other on the tables. It was a good time and I wanted other people to try the same ideas of more building.

[@percyblok6014]

Or... historical jump-off point for a campaign (inciting event) and as the campaign unfolds, so does the "lore" or history in your gaming universe. Layer campaigns and you can get alternative history going strong, or get to something like Weird WWII.

[@edwardclay7551]

Anyone who has created their own Space Marine Chapter or Chaos Warband does this. I tend to create my own units for most factions and given I typically only play Kill Team sized games these days its interesting. I have the whole backstory of their chapter, their company and now its down to this individual Intercessor Kill Team from the greater Company deployment. The Kabal I built for my Drukhari was immensely fun. Same with my Asuryani craftworld. (Though I eventually want to get the extra 90s Striking Scorpions etc.) My main project atm is some Warcry warbands. I have a heap of Sacrosanct Chamber Stormcasts (about a 2000 pts army) but I want to field them as a Warcry Warband. A Lord Exorcist, Knight Incantor, Knight Questor and some seqiturs and castigators. The Slaves to Darkness warband I am building is a Chaos Sorceror Lord and a heap of very old Chaos Warriors with two handed axes all from the 90s. So im likely to use them as Chosen with great weapons. I may pick up some other more Melee based Champions but overall I am liking the idea of Warcry nowadays. (I'm waiting on the second Sorceror Lord to arrive.) From there I still have some Nighthaunts to paint up and im considering getting some more Soulblight Gravelords to use for another Warcry warband.

[@KendricStern]

One of the things that keeps me from finishing army units as quickly as my friends is that every single model must have a unique kitbash, base, and name. It makes it more fun to have all of your cultists shot off an objective if you can tell the person who did it the names of the fallen. Tyranid names are hard.

[@ScytheNoire]

Emergent narrative is usually the most memorable. It's a story experience unique for you and those you experienced it with. Games that foster emergent narrative are great.

[@maxwalker66]

Emergent narratives are the big reason I like campaign play and RPGs. I don't care for the big names in the 40k like Guilleman or whoever, but I thoroughly remember Engane-6, the leader of my cyber-cawdors who became such a melee beast during a Necromunda campaign.

[@JeffAndresWilliams]

I highly recommend reading the lore in the Hell Dorado rulebooks.

[@digitalwastrel]

Hell yeah Wrath of Kings! Hadross are some of my favourite faction designs in any game

[@SuperKingslaw]

Great video that reveals another important aspect of the hobby. Thanks!

[@CloverBoe]

The emergent narrative has been something I have enjoyed with playing warcry and killteam, watching my bloodied Pathfinder beat up the Phobos mine layer after the mine layer charges him or when the leader of my Pathfinders fought back 2 kroot dogs with his possibly std riddled knife has definitely made each game feel more lived than how I see 1k+ point games

[@manyslayer5889]

I've always said if you aren't roleplaying when you wargame you are doing it wrong. I mean, that's for me. Play how you enjoy but it is a large part of it for me.

[@kartchner7]

Have always enjoyed the stories that come from campaigns in whatever I’m playing. In my old 40k games or in the imagination-nation games of historical gaming, it makes the tabletop games much more flavorful. I’m sure a lot of it comes from playing dnd as a kid.

[@HacksawsHobbyBunker]

One does not *need* a reason to fight other gangs in the Underhive, but when, say, Cawdor Redemptionists prevent a group of Goliaths from getting to Shorty's for some hot dogs....That is a reason to fight!

[@AndICanTalk2]

I enjoy your videos immensely. Thank you.

[@Alkid1]

Good video! There is one point I would like to add: story driven skirmish games without a too strict lore allow you more options to alter the official setting to fit your personal narrative and mini collection even if they are not "miniature agnostic" per definition.

[@robmildon8612]

A Wrath of Kings reference! Best skirmish game I ever played - and continue to play. And yeah, the accompanying story is terrific, it's a shame so few people got to read it.

[@totalburnout5424]

I personally disbanded 40K as Wargame - the rules.. are not my style - but I still play the 40K RPG. 😄 The stories are constantly being changed by the companies anyway. You take what suits you and ignore the rest. For me, all games have to be emerging, otherwise they don't make enough sense. The heart is missing. One reason why I like campaigns. 😉 At the end it's always YOUR lore.

[@tomgeytenbeek2207]

I thought I was getting into an RPG of sorts, honestly, when I dived down the rabbithole… I’m still a bit disappointed at how focused on winning the game seems to be- I always thought it would be ‘could these Eldar from this Craftworld we made up together beat this Daniels Ork boys in their Space Hulk’, or would my guard survive the beginnings of a Necron reawakening. In my mind it was the story, and while I’ve come to appreciate the fun and crunch of the competitive aspect, I do pine for the days when I thought it was a two-player roleplaying game where things were more chill and closer to an interactive story :) My best friends are rather of the same mind, though, so I’ll never be quite alone in that idea, and we’ve had some fantastic stories

[@totalburnout5424]

@@tomgeytenbeek2207 The idea of ​​"winning" is difficult. When everyone is having fun, nobody loses. Some forget this, especially army list optimizers. But they are welcome to GW because they always need the latest, shiny models. 😥

[@tomgeytenbeek2207]

@@totalburnout5424 bit of a shame, just having a custom apprentice chaplain I’d built up leading my first squad of tac marines felt awesome, even if they weren’t particularly optimal together… I wanted to play them because I’d made them :) Luckily I’ve fallen into a community that’s quite far from constantly buying the new things for the rules, and I know if I run into any Votann any time soon, it’ll be because someone locally genuinely liked and put a lot of effort into them. It really can be a beautiful game when you take the pressure off and just take things off your shelf with your friends, or build terrain together All the best, I hope you’re having a great time!

[@totalburnout5424]

@@tomgeytenbeek2207 Thx. Hope the same for you. 👍🏻

[@benjohnson9707]

The lore is my favorite part of warhammer. I love creating the stories for path to glory campaigns. I often add my own elements and game plots to each campaign that I run. Great hobby for sure. 👍

[@MrZippidydoodahh]

Decimation is when a tenth of a population dies. In big army games, even if you win, your force will probably be decimated several times over. It's hard for me to get overly connected to my individual dudes when they are fed into the meat grinder every turn.

[@ovan2190]

Really liked this video, I recently got a book for a game called Five Parsecs from Home. It's a mini agnostic scifi game that has a lot of potential for those types of narratives which is really cool

[@recursivecoin359]

Back in 4th edition Warhammer my Tau Fire Warriors killed my friends Necron C'Tan. I shouted, "Give that squad leader a promotion." The next time we played my Stealth team killed the same friend's Black Templar Champion. We both laughed and said, "That has to be the same guy from last week." At which point I gave my Stealth Team Leader a name. Over the next several games, my Stealth Team continued to preform well againt my other friends too... and Eventually my Stealth Team killed the Necron Lord from that original friend's army. That's when I decided to paint a new Tau Commander to represent the young Fire Warrior who slayed a C'Tan and Emperor's Champion and rose through the ranks on stealth missions... to become a renowned Tau Commander.

[@MechMK1]

My Ork Warboss has his own lore as well, basically being obsessed with all things "dakka". While he of course loves to Waaagh! just for the sake of it (as any self-respecting Ork would), he is also on a quest to find the biggest, shootiest, most awesome kannon imaginable. All the Orks around him have similar obsessions with guns and will absolutely go ballistic (pun intended) over anything that makes boom.

[@Ben-there-paint-that]

Absolutely made my own lore as I paint my models. I already try to make them unique so as to not have everything exactly the same, and that's a big part of my enjoyment of the hobby.

[@ThePlayplay64]

I made a black templar successor charter. My lore for them is shortly after everything went to hell they looked at how insane and crazy the templars became with the death of the psykers and "for the god emperor". Thought to themselves " ok they're just full nut jobs now" said **K this let us do our own crusading. I love working on the lore for my chapter and working it into the existing lore. Back in the day, Warhammer encouraged you to do things like that. I think it was the 4th ed code that even had a custom chapter section for rules. I feel like they dont want you doing that anymore.

[@stuffandnonsense8528]

Yes! This has always been the main reason I am in 'the hobby'. And despite the problems with heavy prescribed lore, that is also why I love Warhammer so much and why it was such a problem when they buggered up the lore. Warhammer began as a far more story driven thing and it has always been that for me. The whole point (for me) is to imagine what happens before and after a battle, what these forces are. It is also why I like to imagine The End Times were in a parallel universe (and why the latest post on Warhammer community rubber me up the wrong way).

[@IzzysIssues]

I picked Stormcast for AoS sheerly because of the emergent lore possibilities of the "great heroes that died and are reincarnated into this army" narrative. I've made every model a little unique in their paint scheme in that one of their shoulder pads has a logo of a super hero or other recognizable character, usually with a little bit of weapon modification to match. Then when I post pictures of them I include a one paragraph description of how their history is different and fits into the Stormcast lore. e.g. "Antonius Starkhearted was one of the greatest engineers among the Greywater Fastness, but was slain when chaos cultists stole a helstorm rocket battery and let it loose in the city" is all to justify why I've got an Iron Man helmet on my Lord-Ordinator

[@erikbraun473]

Tldr you can totally have the same story feeling in big army games you just have to be willing to embrace those emergent narratives when they happen. I only play campaign games lately but my friends and I do that because we're in it for the narrative that we create. So we'll pick a time and a place and create an overarching story that occurs in that place to explain why the games are taking place. And the narrative evolves based on the outcome of the games. My Stormcast eternals failed to kill the necromancer villain of the week 2 sessions in a row, now that necromancer has a name and she's become more of a lieutenant working with a vampire coven and my armies leader has a personal vendetta and will make tactically wrong decisions to try and kill this necromancer who has become his nemesis which then just adds further to the emergent narrative.

[@alienpriest]

You can get tons of emergent narrative from your big army games by linking them in a classic, Tony Bath style campaign managed by an umpire (DM) or two. Rules for this have been republished in various forms since at least the 60s, and are mostly the same. A recent one I've checked out of the library is "Wargames Campaigns" by Henry Hyde. It's the same old Tony Bath / Donald Featherstone style campaign rules, but with knowledge of more modern play methods mixed in. It works out similar to how the Warhammer Total War campaign games play out - with all the campaign mechanic but without the prescribed story (unless your GM adds that in. Totally optional. Like a D&D game.)

[@udahkubamba9751]

I have 3 steps type answer for the hobby question: "I make and paint miniatures", "mainly fantasy and scify type", "many of them are for boardgames called "wargames", it's like chess but with more rules and some dices"

[@PaintedThumbVids]

Historical miniatures games make great emergent stories! They create a type of alternate history that makes helps build the world

[@magratheabuilderofworlds7141]

This is entirely what I do - I shelved big game play years ago - For me it's all about building those stories. Can't wait to start our new campaign fro Burrows & Badgers with my group:0)

[@troublesomezorua]

I haven't really played anything enough to have real emergent lore like this, with one exception. When I was putting together my first Force Grown Drones for the game Conquest, I didn't realize that the different arms and legs were specific to specific torsos, and so some of them were simply wrong, resulting in weird poses. The worst being a soldier I actually put the legs on backwards. I could have just removed them and fixed it, but it kind of worked for me, and actually inspired the whole concept of my force. Being super amaturish and underfunded resulting in serious mistakes in the creation process of our mass produced units. And the actual lore and concept of my army grew around that. Starting as kind of plucky down-on-their luck antiheroes and then (since that was a bit too heroic for my army tastes) evolving into unhinged social darwinists who PRETEND to be plucky underdog heroes for PR, while still being loveable because they're just so bad at it in general. I remember when looking into that one campaign miniature game based around Roadside Picnic and Stalker, I forget the name, wanting to make a warband that was a pack of mutated feral dogs and kind of adapt the town mechanics into stuff their pack could do, similar mechanics but in a more animal approach, and seeing how the pack developed. That seemed really fun; there are lots of miniature games with more alien or monstrous factions, and there are lots of campaign-based games, but I feel like there's little overlap between the two which is why I have so little interest in most of the latter. Might have to look into if there are any cult-focused (or at least viable) ones though. I really like the cult mechanics in Blades In The Dark and how the Roots rpg fleshed out the Lizard Cult, so there could be some potential fun there at least. That's honestly the sad thing about Genestealer Cults; you can make your own cool lore and religon for them, but since we know what their whole deal ACTUALLY is, no matter what you make it's going to be wrong. There is an appeal to seeing what creative spins you can put on the whole thing, but it just doesn't work for me. Although I did once do a thought experiment on a Pastoral Fantasy setting in the 40k universe that doesn't break any hard rules of the setting, the cult in that was kind of cool. Due to a mix of failures, tiny numbers, and coincidences, they ended up as this weird genestealer cult, semi-public militant religious order, and Imperial Knight worshiping cargo cult hybrid. But again, I had to go really crazy with their concept to find a hook that I liked. I'm going to stop now; before I just start spewing out lore about the settings protagonists and their giant moth-themed Knight. ...I had a lot of fun with the setting, okay? Seriously though, it's my dream to someday get good enough to do that Knight design justice. I want it to still feel like an imperial knight, while also absolutely being the moth deity that the characters believe it to be. And yes, I did take the divine moth idea from Mothra, specifically the anime trilogy version.

[@bruced648]

with any game, the genre sets the tone or feel of the gaming environment. grim dark vs star wars vs star trek vs d&d vs cthulhu. each known universe gives the GM and players a sense of the game world. a 'my little pony' character would be out of place in the Riddick universe. the original game concept and timeline provides the setting. it's up to the participants to make things happen within the setting.

[@michamalinowski8015]

That's the thing I like about dark ages wargaming as an historical gamer. It's more immpersive- as the history of guys like Caesar or Napoleon are set in stone so in that aspect you ade recreating a particullar scene from history. But the dark ages are full of thousand of warlords lost to history. And it's for me more immersive to immerse myself into such a fugure- I rule a petty domain, I have maybe a couple of dozen retainers top, I try to defend my cattle from sea raiders, I launch raids into neighbouring polities ruled by some other warlord, I try to attract more skilled companions to my retinue with gifts from the obtained loot. It's more personal and it's easier to put yourself in the schoos of such a person and think "How would I go about this situation"?

[@SneakyNinjaDog]

This is very much how I remember playing back in the day. We would make mini campaigns for our Fantasy battles. Also something I feel is almost gone - we made up our own chapters and colorschemes. People don't do that now becuase so much of the rules in 40K are tied up with what your chapter is.

[@maxxon99]

Emergent narrative is more fun IMHO. Consider a wimpy goblin who through luck makes his saves, survives through several games and become known as the ”Unkillable goblin”… Vs. The character set up as unkillable from the get go and given special rules to make sure he survives. (Of course the trick here is that with enough goblins, one of them is bound to survive…)

[@simonschleicher8857]

Interesting topic. You should explore this further and brainstorm more examples for different games types.

[@rodneygaul2227]

I (we) have done it several times in 40k , BUT 2 big issues 1) Increasing stat lines ? level 20 Inquisitor still has basic stat line Basically you end up playing Necorumda ( increase secondary abilities ) , Kill team and now : Boarding Actions untill the "big" battles : 40k at 2000pts , Battle fleet Gothic , and Apocalypse basic squad : The "New" Cadian Command Squad w/ Magic user / Psyker Priest / Medic ( Krieg 's battle field surgery like "raise from the dead" spell ) Rogue /Techno mage ( lock pick / find traps ) Thief / Rogue Trader ( if you have to ask you shouldn't be playing ) Paladin / Inquisitor in training ( requisition whole Guard regiments foot / armor / mechanized , ships of the line and favors from SM or SoB's ,,,,,,,,,,BUT at a heavy price ) Warriors / Space Marine , Ogryn ( Nork Dead Dog ) , Kasakin , Scion , Arbiter ( with dog ) , Guardsmen NPC's / Vox caster , Astropaths , Pilots , Bulgryn , Ogryn , Navy Breacher Squads , Guard Squads , Gun Servitors , Voids men at arms , Necromunda Palanite Subjugator Patrol , The normal henchmen and whatever you can think of ( my personal favorite is the 1054 Vostroyian Void stalkers ) 2) staying out of the way of general direction 40k is headed , which 40K ( GW ) is doing now . AND / OR / BUT I think that is what the different "war books" are about . It reminds me of playing in ADD "Forgotten Realms" or "Dragon Lance" without the pre-made "dungeons"/ "adventures" GW's latest and newest "war" book was about control the a narrow pass in the Galaxy through the warp storm and gaining control of space hulks to for the next phase ( boarding actions ) The Next "war" books will be about Chaos on an Easter Egg hunt ( basically ) to gather parts of a "key" to release/ make a 4th God of Chaos

[@dragonbait1]

I find that Zona Alfa is pretty close to an RPG for me. If a group of players wanted to individually control the teammembers, I could see that working. Space Station Zer0 also falls into that with the way that it's almost player vs the environment/GM more then player vs player.

[@artistpoet5253]

It's funny how this is so much of how I play games; small forces of specialists with lots of character. I really didn't enjoy my twenty years or so playing what I call 'big board' 40k. Yeah, it was fun to see my little horde of Ork, Tau or Tyranids get blown off the table by Biker Nobs, Biker Marines, Never ending Necrons and Pierced Purple Nipple Tentacled Ticklers...but really what I wanted, what I missed most was the over-the-top, tongue-in-cheek, camptastic feel, play and narrative of Rogue Trader. WH40K '1st' edition. So yeah...probably going to give Space Station Zero a try.

[@paintingbyminions8360]

“So its like a combo of DnD and Monopoly?” Sure close enough

[@Rathammergames]

Yes I do this a lot. In 40k I name my sgts and characters for this same reason. They are heroes!! (And villians!)

[@minacapella8319]

The thing about war gaming, is that depending on the game, you can make it as much about the story of "your guys" as you want. Not so much with games like warmachine where you can't make your own characters and backstories, but in a lot of them, you can really flesh out your story as much as you want, and use games to determine how that story progresses.

[@minacapella8319]

Or even just... play the game and not get into fleshing out your lore.

[@thomasmonks5715]

When I play Necrons I like to imagine I'm safe in the tomb commanding the forces from afar. As a kid I would imagine I was giving orders from the battle cruiser when playing my marines

[@davidwheadon2419]

Originally that's what Rouge Trader and Space Hulk the precursors to 40K were in the late 80's early 90's, more of a role playing type game with fewer models. Fantasy Flight Games had a Deathwatch role-playing game for Warhammer40k where you and friends created a Deathwatch team that went on 40K universe adventures with a core rulebook and it also had a couple of campaign expansion books to go with the original adventures laid out in the core book. It played along the same lines as a D&D type adventure except in Space. It also had experience points and such to level up your characters and improve their skills and weapons. I don't know why it didn't catch on as you could also use your 40K models like D&D did at its start till scenery and such started being produced. I think 40K pushed more towards the large army battles in the early days to sell more product, but as the recent Kill-Team, Dark Tides and other smaller skirmish games have become more popular again, maybee it's time has come again for a full out 40K RPG game like Deathwatch to re-emerge where you do Not need $ 500 dollars worth of figures and a thousand dollars worth of scenery to play. The Battle Map Books and Mats would work especially well for these RPG style games once again

[@shawncarnes9471]

Ahhh those rough and tumble streets of Space Town.