Etiquette in Pick-Up Games

For those of you who aren't suffering from Multiple Personality Disorder another person to play against is an essential part of the hobby.

Most of us have regular opponents, some of which may be your friends; others are people who you'd probably never see again if you gave up the hobby tomorrow. Gaming clubs are also another source of regular opponents as is your FLGS (depending on how it's set up, obviously) which also may or may not be filled with people you know.

Of course there's also those times when you end up in a game with a complete stranger. This is often accompanied by the immortal phrase "*insert name here* is looking for a game" and more often than not is (at least in my case) a good excuse for not painting that model that you've been meaning to do for a month ;-)

So, here in no particular order are (imo) the minimum acceptable standards for gaming etiquette.

Essential Equipment.

Main Rulebook

Everybody should have one of these even if you only throw it at somebody else to look up the rule for you.

Appropriate Codex

I have a very good memory for rules, but occasionally things just slip my mind. If your not sure if your Librarian is WS 4 or 5 or how many attacks your Scouts have then you should have the appropriate Codex with you to check. Even the most amicable of games can be soured retrospectively if won (or lost) due to an error on someone's part.

Army List.

Unless my opponent is someone I know very well I'd expect to see a legible army list before the game started as I find this alleviates a lot of potential problems later. It is also a very good indicator of what sort of person your playing against and enables you to get any questions out of the way before they create 'in-game' issues.

Measuring Tape, Dice, Templates

This seems a bit obvious, but I've had games where my opponent has been using all my paraphernalia and it can become a bit irritating if your having to ask to use your own stuff. A variety of different coloured dice is also nice as it enables you to roll all the dice for a unit armed with different weapons at once (as long as you tell your opponent what is what of course) and can help speed up working out wound allocation as well.

A WYSIWYG army

More on this in the next section.....

WYSIWYG.

My own biases may come out a little here but proxying in a 'pick-up' game should be avoided at all costs on pain of death.

This isn't a cheap hobby by any stretch of the imagination and I understand that people want to test out the viability of some units before shelling out their hard earned cash. However games where your testing out units with models that aren't WYSIWYG should be kept to prearranged games with friends and avoided at all costs in spur of the moment battles.

If you need an example then here's one. Using a Dreadclaw to 'Count As' a Drop Pod in your Renegade Marine army is fine,Using a pop bottle or random drinks coaster isn't. Or if you want a more extreme example, using 3 advertising flyers as War-shrines in a Chaos Warriors army is just plain wrong*

*Yes that actually happened in my FLGS.

Terrain.

If the table is already set up then that's great. If it's not then getting a 3rd Party to set the table up for you both is the best alternative. Even though it may be only a subconscious reaction I tend to find that armies (for example) with a unit that works best sitting in a building in their deployment zone always tend to have buildings in their potential deployment zones if the owning player sets up the table...

The types of armies your both playing should be taken into account at this point as well.

If the table your using has 3 tiny bits of terrain on it and your opponent is going to have to run towards your gun-line across a minefield under cover of daylight** then regardless of if that's the way the table was set up adding some cover for the benefit of your opponent actually having some fun would be a nice gesture on your part.

** Yes, I stole that line from a TV show but most of you have probably never seen it anyway so I might have been able to take credit for it if I'd have kept quiet. Damn my honesty...

The Actual Game.

Full Disclosure.

Dice.

All dice rolls should be accompanied by an explanation of what your rolling for and which unit is doing it. This doesn't need to have a 'Black Library Author' level of detail but "My Unit 'A' is shooting at Your Unit 'B' and the red dice is the Meltagun shot" is clear enough and lets your opponent know exactly what's going on.

Transports.

Putting any Independent Character model that is in a transport vehicle on the top of it (or just behind if 'on top' is impractical) along with any special weapon guys is common courtesy and prevents any issues with the 'inter-vehicle' teleportation system that some people I know seem to have as standard in their armies***.

*** You know who you are, you bastards.

Benefit of the Doubt.

In the event of a difference of opinion I find the traditional 'roll-off' to be an extremely unsatisfying way of sorting out the problem as typically you both think your right and one of you is inevitably going to feel cheated by the result. The rule set provided by Games Workshop generally has an answer if you look for it hard enough so it's worth taking the time to double or triple check the appropriate rulebook.

If the issue is 'Line of sight' or 'Does that tiny twig give me a cover save' then giving your opponent the benefit of the doubt is always the best answer as long as he's polite about it. If he's a Wanker or has brought his own cheering section with him then the aforementioned Roll-Off will probably have to do as I don't like being nice to people unless they actually deserve it.

Gamesmanship.

There are lots of little 'legal' but unsportsmanlike ways of moving the odds in your favour. We all know what they are so I wont list them here.

There is no excuse for using them so don't.

If your opponent does then just make sure that he knows that you know and never play against the fucking twat again. You should be better than that even if he isn't.

We can't all be the Winner.

It's possible to be a bad winner just as easily as a bad loser.

Shake your opponents hand at the end of the game regardless of the result, be constructive with any criticism you feel the need to give and be receptive to any you receive (even if you don't actually think you need it, lol).

I've probably missed out a lot of things that you guys (and gals) have encountered or feel are necessary and mentioned a few that you don't believe are important. So any comments or other input is (as usual) most welcome.