I'm going to open the can of worms here. For those who dislike counts as, why? Let's outline the arguments 'for' counts as and make distinction between the two.
The first one I think we need to discuss is representing an army with another codex where the rules 'fit' better. Classic examples are SneakyDan's Thousand Sons as Grey Knights and Vinsanity's Night Lords as Blood Angels. Both of these armies originally hail from Chaos but the Chaos book currently has very little flavor and ability to make unique army lists. Yes, the Chaos book is also a poor competitive choice but rather than considering Vince and Dan as having gone "I'm going to migrate these armies I already have over to this book because it's better on the table-top" both of these guys have started a completely new army with the more competitive book and rather modelled their armies as Thousand Sons or Night Lords. They may or may not have had this hidden love for these armies before and the Blood Angel and Grey Knight books gave them the chance to make them effectively on the table-top AND themed, or they may have decided they didn't want boring old Red/Silver marines and thought this was a great idea from a modelling and a gaming perspective.
So this is where my real question is. What do the people who have issues with counts-as really dislike about this type of army? In the end it's simply a name (Thousand Sons, Night Lords, etc.) to represent an army. Particularly if the individual owning the army has forked out for new models, converted them, etc. I'm honestly curious so let's hear it.
The next type of counts-as isn't really counts-as and I imagine is the source of much of the 'angst' against counts-as armies. That is Marine armies which change. I.e. my Ice Claws or Goatboy's Space Goats.
Now I know both of us put a lot of effort into our armies and make sure everything is WYSIWYG but through the use of magnets (and thereby saving money), our Tactical Marines can turn into Assault Marines and Grey Hunters and our Razorbacks, Rhinos and Predators can all swap their layout, etc. The issue here I think for people is they all end up the same color and sometimes someone who has a more traditional color schemed army (i.e. Blood Angels, Space Wolves, Ultramarines, etc.) can end up with the codex that doesn't represent their army (i.e. fast Ultrablue tanks) or that a single captain figure ends up being Vulkan, a Wolf Lord, Librarian, Dante, etc. Personally I always make my characters different because they always have different wargear and the reason I magnetise my Space Marines is to allow myself multiple armies to use (even within the same book) whilst saving money. Unfortunately unlike Vince I don't have a huge amount of cash to always burn on new minis :P.
I think another reason against this type of counts-as is Xenos armies can never do this. You cannot change the arms and backpack of an Kabalite Warrior and turn him into a Tau Firewarrior for example. On the other hand I think if everything is obviously represented (WYSIWYG) and your 'Space Wolves' army is clearly different from your 'Blood Angels' army in turns of what the units look like, I have no issue with it.
In the end I think this type of counts-as is done more often but not as much effort in the models or ensuring WYSIWYG is the most common type of counts-as and has soured people against counts-as in general. So my question is if this type of counts-as is done properly (everything clearly WYISWYG, custom chapter, armies clearly different, etc.) do people still have issue with it? If you do, why and why is that such an issue for you?
Anyway please discuss and keep it polite. There are some very divergent opinions on this topic and let's keep it civil and not turn into a gibbering mass of frothing gamers.
Logging you in...
The GunGrave · 731 weeks ago
GMort 71p · 731 weeks ago
http://www.houseofpaincakes.com/2010/12/who-says-...
Meister_Kai 1p · 731 weeks ago
Also, WYSIWYG is another major factor, especially when you have to keep asking what something is or god forbid the player himself forgets whats where.
There are also the fluff nazis, but honestly who cares what they think.
Da_Fitz 26p · 731 weeks ago
I have no issue if someone makes a army with the full intention of having it counts-as. Like the ork guard or thousand sons counts-as grey knights were gonna see alot of. Its just the gamers who play the Dark Blood Templar Wolf Knights and their army is completely sprue grey that I cant stand.
Also since they are counting as the most pwerful codex at that time the counts-as player beats you. Saying the only reason someone won is because they are a counts as army is the new "cheesy"
Naz · 731 weeks ago
lexingtonnet 110p · 731 weeks ago
So, really. The concept's fine, but the vocabulary and victim mentality attached to it is embarrassing for everyone involved.
Kevvo 86p · 731 weeks ago
I will say, though, that I have no objections to counts-as armies which are fairly sane in what they represent (ie the aforementioned Night Lord/Blood Angel Jumpers and Thousand Son/Grey Knights). The Night Lords variant works because large numbers of jump packs is something supported in their background: similarly, the Thousand Sons, in the old book, used to have two-wound Terminators, so both of those lists are pretty faithful to the background. And I am all for using counts-as as a means of representing armies which either currently don't have a book, or are no longer represented-- ie Orks as Lost and the Damned, Imperial Guard as AdMech/Genestealer Cults/Arbites, etc.
So in short, I applaud uses of counts-as when it either adheres to fluff, or when it is used creatively. If you're using counts-as just as an excuse to use a more powerful army ("Hi, here's my Ultramarines with Space Wolf rules!"), then you have no right to wonder why some people hate counts-as.
gdmnw 50p · 731 weeks ago
The Good
The Briar knights counts as WoC = Uber Pass
Space Goats = Healthy Pass
Counts as [anything] looks like [anything else] + WYSIWYG, cool conversions and consistent theme = pass to uber pass depending on quality.
The Bad
Counts as [anything] looks like [anything else] with 0 to 1 effort invested in conversions = fail
Counts as Dreadnought looks like chess piece on 60mm base = uber fail
Counts as [anything] looks like [anything] without WYSIWYG and/or Theme and/or consistency = fail
Counts as [something I clearly think is better than what I own] looks like [what I own] = fail
I think that's most types of Counts As.
AFAIAC Counts As is the peak of the hobby. Brilliance is an excellently converted army with superb paintwork. Mastery is a thematic conversion using logical and transparent connections to an underlying ruleset. The Briar Knights, The Space Goats, Fallen Dark Angels, Undead Ultramarines, The Grot Rebellion, The Mech Tyranids, AdMech Imperial Guard and so on.
Model substitution, a preferred term, is where someone substitutes their models with little or no effort in converting them to represent an army that they would prefer to own and play with. There's no harm in it, we all like to 'try before we buy' but to confuse it with the hobby mastery that is a successful full army thematic counts-as conversion and paint job is, to put it gently, mildly irritating.
gdmnw 50p · 731 weeks ago
abortedsoul · 731 weeks ago
At a tournament, it's different- I'd like to be able to focus on the business at hand, without taking the time to learn everyone's counds-as distractions with each new match.
nockergeek 43p · 731 weeks ago
As far as the reasons, I think it goes back to my experiences with other faction-based games, like the Legend of the Five Rings card game. There's a big element of faction/clan loyalty in the fanbase of that game (or at least there was when I played, years ago), with a general feeling of disdain for players who would just jump from faction to faction based solely on what deck design was considered strongest at the time. They weren't doing anything wrong or illegal, but they were seen as bandwagonners just looking for the easiest win (which, we'll be honest, that's what they were doing). The clan loyalists sometimes had a feeling of "hey, I stick with Clan X regardless of how well it performs in the current environment, not like That Guy over there." It was the same kind of rift between the story-focused players and the purely-competitive players that you see in 40K sometimes, and whether or not it's a bad thing, I've carried a bit of it around with me.
So, yeah, it's a shard of faction-loyalty-think jammed into my brain when I insist on playing CSM with the CSM codex, regardless of how it's favored amongst the other codexes, and that makes me pause with a hint of disdain when I see a CSM army played with other rules. It's my own bias to bear, and I try not to let it get in the way of my or anyone else's enjoyment of the game/hobby - which is why you'll never see me complaining that players of well-converted counts-as armies suck, or swearing that they're bad people and are ruining the game. I may not like it myself, but no one appointed me High King Overlord of What Counts In 40K, so I'll just keep doing what I'm doing (regardless if I win or lose with my CSM) and let others do what they do.
Elbrun · 731 weeks ago
http://paintingsanctuary.blogspot.com/2010/09/cou...
Enjoy.
Jcd386 · 731 weeks ago
In order to make a single marine function in the different marine armies he would need to have: Pistol, CCW, Bolter, Stormbolter, backpack, jumppack, and a nemesis force sword, all magnetized. You would probably need to make 30-40 marines like that, and then you would still need models for scouts, rhinos/razorbacks/whirlwinds/predators, terminators, bikes, speeders, dreadnoughts, special and heavy weapon marines, as well as HQ models and chapter specific models like TWC and Dreadknights.
Fluff-wise you can make up whatever you want to, simply deciding that depending on the encounter the marines bring different gear and use different tactics.
Honestly i would be more impressed with someone who had crafted such an army that i would with someone who had a simple ultramarine army, because it would have taken a lot more time, money, and thought.
The only thing "count-as" that i might have some issue with are the races that are not already represented by models, such as ad-mech armies. I love the idea, but it could to hard to model them so that the opposing player can easily tell what units are what. If the modeler can somehow get around that, either by using the same weapons as the codex they are representing (the robot with the melta has a melta) or by making differences clear by modeling them (the bigger guns are missile launchers, the little ones are bolters, and the ones with the fire coming out of them are flamers, ect). Guardsmen counting as marines would be a bit strange, and i probably would not like it very much, but I am pretty sure that as long as everything was clearly marked and close to what they were supposed to be representing (the floating thing is a speeder, the big robot is a dreadknight, and so on), i would not only play against the army, i would enjoy doing so.
Badger · 731 weeks ago
I don't mind competitive player, as long as they don't pretend to be fluff bunnies.
Dan · 731 weeks ago
VT2 79p · 731 weeks ago
As long as people can identify what you're using (no, your tacs can't be grey knights. Get them stormbolters and power swords, then we'll talk), there's no need for anyone to whine.
Fra3ture · 731 weeks ago
i've done it. Though I do like to at least have a painted army to do it with.
I seen one chap that had literally magnetized everything he had (no problem there) and every single space marine codex in his carry case. Did I mention his entire collection wasn't even undercoated?
People need to remember this is a game. Let people enjoy it the way they want and mind your own.
Fra3ture · 731 weeks ago
Grovel 61p · 730 weeks ago
When people get too elaborate in their conversions they sometimes forget that their opponents can't as easily tell whats what at a glance... I think this also causes a bit of the nerd rage.
Slightly off topic, but GW releasing so damn many marine books is making it more and more temping to do 'counts as' since there are just so many options compared to any of the Xenos. I'm still an advocate of having all the marine variants in one (maybe two) books, with both special character and generic HQ choices akin to the current C :S M special characters, but with more added/altered to reflect the "style" of various chapters. Makes it a hell of a lot easier to play un(der)-represented chapters, and GW gets to combine even more kits together. Hell, just have plastic HQ choices come with a tonne of conversion kits to keep them fluffy for their army type, and the HQ choices would be the only models that required seperate boxes for the various loyalists.
Dalinair · 730 weeks ago
I dont like doing it but it was just a friendly game at a mates house, really this whole thing depends entire on who and where you are playing.
Rav · 730 weeks ago
That and 90% of count as armies look like terrible abortions, with total disregard for the fluff. Ive already seen "abaddons space marine hunters" pop up at the local GW with the guy reasoning they are all corrupted grey knights.
Im sticking with this stance, if you put a megan fox mask on your girlfriend does she count as megan fox? Would you tell all your buddies that she counts as megan fox? No? Why? Cause it makes you look like you've gone full retard, and you never go full retard.
doomicon · 730 weeks ago
That being said... I don't want to play against them, I've tried and it's just too confusing. I'm having trouble enough as it is trying to memorize units and their abilities to be a better player.. Now throw in the Chaos Player using a BA Dex(ive tried this) and it's just not fun.
"So is that the Death Company? no, ok so that's them, and these are the Combat sqaud Tacs.. what do you mean that's the Sang Guard?!?!"
Guestivus · 730 weeks ago
I mean, what if you were playing, say, a successor chapter of the BA where they didn't mark their Death Company out? A player can do that, presumably, unless the fluff fundamentalists want to be even more ridiculous than they already are. But any player worth playing against will have some way to broadcast to you that 'this unit is DC, and this unit is SG, and these other four units are not.'
The problem evidently, is confusion, not confusion arising from one source rather than another.
Joe · 729 weeks ago
Also @goatboy since when were razorbacks pre-heresy?
frank · 723 weeks ago
Gregory · 695 weeks ago
If you are using the same models all over to play all and any kind of marines or swapping eldar & dark eldar, then by all means please gtfo-ESPECIALLY IN TOURNAMENT/COMPETITIVE SCENE! I know that you dedicated time working on your magnets and all but hey-not all have the time (or "skill"/energy but that is irrelevant) needed to do that! So yeah, I kinda feel cheated when something like that happens because guy A (count as) gets roughly 1000% more value from his money than guy B , just because he has that much more time. Also, most of the times, count as armies find themselves swapping gear arround a fixed number of bodies, making it that much more difficult to play larger point battles (mainly over 2k).
But hey, that's just me!