Bugs: Recent Topics Paging, Uploading Images & Preview (11 Dec 2020)
Recent Topics paging, uploading images and preview bugs require a patch which has not yet been released.
The Benefits of a Lifestyle Game
- san il defanso
-
Topic Author - Offline
- D10
-
- ENDUT! HOCH HECH!
- Posts: 4623
- Thank you received: 3560
It's caused me to reflect on the unexpected pleasures of taking on a true lifestyle game. I know a lot of people here play Magic, 40K, Hearthstone, what have you, and for many years I thought it seemed strange to primarily focus on a single game to the exclusion of most others. But now that I'm neck-deep in D&D, it has provided a measure of simplicity to my gaming life to allow myself to focus on a single system.
The biggest part of that is simply the ability to not have to track with a ton of different releases. Of course, all lifestyle games have their own treadmill to keep up with, but there is something kind of dependable about the ability to keep drilling into a new system. I think there is also a refreshing ability for a game to become more human when it exists on the lifestyle tier. There's a bigger community built up around it, and they are producing new content, new ways to play, and recommendations at how different corners of the game can be used. There's also that element of organized play, though I've never taken advantage of that in my own situation. (I've not yet seen an Adventurer's League group in Manila.)
This all feels more rewarding than the increasingly quick turnover in board gaming. I still sometimes like the less ambiguous aspects of board games, that allow for more structured enjoyment and less preparation. But I already have a lot of that stuff, and I don't really want to add to it. It also makes me really cautious about engaging in any OTHER big lifestyle game, because there just isn't enough time.
How about you? Do you have any "lifestyle" games that take up a lot of your time? Do you have any that you wish could take up more of your time?
Please Log in or Create an account to join the conversation.
- Michael Barnes
-
- Offline
- Mountebank
-
- HYPOCRITE
- Posts: 16929
- Thank you received: 10375
Like you’ve pointed out, Warhammer also gave me a way to enjoy the hobby outside of the gaming session, and it has become very much my lifestyle game of choice. And it also connects me back to the gaming I was doing in the 1980s and 1990s in a logical arc.
To be honest, even as a games writer, I can’t keep up with all the releases. Most of them I don’t care anything about. My Twitter feed has been full of posts where folks have shown off these massive piles of review copies and I’ve seen maybe 5 games that I’m really interested in. There’s maybe three games I think are going to be with us for a while (such as Root) But I’ve seen title after title that are going to be just like the “hot” games of. Gen Cons past...forgotten and irrelevant within a year.
But Warhammer never fades, nor does D&D or Magic.
Please Log in or Create an account to join the conversation.
Total games played: 4, the last one 4 editions ago.
Not one bit of regret over that.
Please Log in or Create an account to join the conversation.
- hotseatgames
-
- Offline
- D12
-
- Posts: 7185
- Thank you received: 6315
Please Log in or Create an account to join the conversation.
- SuperflyPete
-
- Offline
- Salty AF
-
- SMH
- Posts: 10733
- Thank you received: 5119
I just don't care that much about games anymore, as a lifestyle. I do my one con a year, play games on the back porch or next door, or occasionally head to my buddy's group but honestly, with my lifestyle and history, I figure I have maybe 10 years left and I don't want to spend my time thinking and playing games obsessively.
Please Log in or Create an account to join the conversation.
As has been mentioned, I love having that community of people into the same game and willing to have unnecessarily long and involved conversations, but man, fans can just be the worst. I’ve followed podcasts and Facebook groups for all these games, and the level of entitlement and whining just blows me away constantly. Restricted lists and errata are always demanded immediately, and when they are released, they aren’t good enough.
Part of the problem is a divide between these hyper-competitive players and what Fantasy Flight offers. There is an official tournament scene, but I struggle to see why people get so fired up when the literal top prize in the game is the chance to design a card. No money at all is on the line. Cripes.
At least the Minnesota communities have always been chill and unwilling to just netdeck the best thing. I think there’s an independent streak in the state that wants to win but in our own way.
Please Log in or Create an account to join the conversation.
I moved away from my original gaming group and the city where I [edit: not group] grew up back in 1991. Since then, my social circle has tended to change every few years, with maybe one or two people staying friends with me after a given social circle drifts. Just now, I have realized that those social circles tended to coincide with my lifestyle games, because all of the friends that I have made since 1991 have been gamers. It's been two years since I wrapped up a four-year D&D campaign, and if not for Facebook I would have completely lost touch with half of those eleven players by now. I haven't made any friends through any of my long-term girlfriends either. The first one was a grad student from China who was very focused on education and career. The second one was a drug addict, so her friends were mostly criminals. My current girlfriend has always been self-conscious about our age difference, so I rarely encounter her friends.
Social circle # duration/lifestyle game:
1. (original gaming group)/1979-1991/wide range of games, especially RPGs
2. 1991-1993/GURPS Fantasy & Stormbringer
3. 1994-1999/Jyhad (1st group)
4. 1994-1996/Call of Cthulhu & Stormbringer & some CCGs
5. 1997-2003/Call of Cthulhu & Legend of the Five Rings RPG
6. 1999-2010/Jyhad (2nd group)
7. 2001-2004/Vampire LARP
8. 2005-2012/Call of Cthulhu & boardgames
9. 2013-2016/D&D 3.5
After wrapping up that last D&D campaign, I was hoping to play a lot of boardgames. It's been a little less than once per month. When I host, the turnout has been low. Every other month, somebody invites me, and their turnout is low. Part of the problem is that several of my gaming friends have current lifestyle games that don't interest me, like Shadespire or one of the Star Wars games. But mostly this is my fault. I live within a few miles of two gaming stores that regularly host boardgaming, and I rarely seem to find the time or energy to go.
On a positive note, I recently met a fun couple at a goth birthday (batday) party, and they invited me to their monthly boardgame event this Friday. They invited 125 people (!), though only 12 have said yes or maybe so far. They have four gaming tables set up in their basement, and facebook pictures show that they have had maybe two dozen people show up for past sessions. Both the invite list and the RSVP'd list is split roughly 50/50 male/female, not counting the androgynous ones. The host posted his game collection in the invite, and it's a mixture of AmeriTrash and light euros. The couple is also into RPGs, including a current D&D campaign. Maybe this will be my next social circle.
Please Log in or Create an account to join the conversation.
- GorillaGrody
-
- Offline
- D6
-
- Will kvetch for free
- Posts: 439
- Thank you received: 742
It was one of the reissues of Space Hulk that kicked off my Warhammer obsession. One of the great appeals was that the Space Marines and Genestealers from that game could be used in other games. So, too, with Silver Tower, Gorechosen, etc. I can use my small GSC army of in about 5 different games, not counting the different "modes" of wargame play. Do I? No, but between Kill Team and Space Hulk, I feel I've gotten my money's worth. Had I bought the figures 20 years ago, I could probably continue playing with them now. It's fun, it's friendly to house ruling, the figures are worth spending time and money on.
I mean, I like to think that the best part of my "lifestyle" is reading, learning stuff and helping people in need (aspirationally and sort of practically this is sort of true). Making room for GW stuff is what, then? A sort of economical selfishness? For no reason I can articulate--and for reasons that often prove totally untrue out in the field--it seems like Warhammer people have lives in a way that other lifestyle games don't allow for. For instance, I'm trying to imagine a conversation about Netrunner or Magic that would be threaded with self-exploring irony in the way that most conversations about GW's nutty, antiheroic world tend to be. Maybe it's just the Britishness of the whole endeavor, I don't know.
To my opening point, it seems like FFG is attempting to breach this lifestyle market in the worst possible way. Sort of cheap, sort of good, sort of worth your time, utterly resistant to creative house ruling, not very fun to paint, swimming in self-seriousness, and two years later you have to buy it all over again; not just the books, but everything. It all swims in this very American sea of gormless, heroic nostalgia combined with a flinty, cynical market-first attitude. And there are three versions of everything, none of it cross-compatible. I guess they need to make a case to their shareholders that the merest generosity does not equate to theft, and no one on the team is smart enough to do that.
As for boardgames, my main competitor is my wife. She likes to dig in to single games with limited variables and get good at them. Azul is a current favorite. That doesn't leave a lot of room for reading semi-competent prose off of a card and then ripping up the card and then putting a sticker on a map. Even good Legacy games don't seem to penetrate. Gloomhaven sits on our shelf, unplayed.
Please Log in or Create an account to join the conversation.
- Posts: 10
- Thank you received: 14
I've been playing seriously for 25 years now, and there's no sign of it getting stale. Just the opposite, actually: I love being so familiar with a game that the the rules become completely transparent and when you sit down with a friend you quickly fall into a gritty, tense, pugnacious, flow state. Before I had kids, I used to play five-hour games every weekend. You'd hit you clock, start thinking, and then look up 40 moves later and realize 4 hours had passed and only now were you getting to the truth of the matter.
Glorious stuff.
Please Log in or Create an account to join the conversation.
- ChristopherMD
-
- Offline
- Road Warrior
-
- Posts: 5243
- Thank you received: 3800
Please Log in or Create an account to join the conversation.
- fightcitymayor
-
- Offline
- D6
-
- Cuddly yet angry.
- Posts: 370
- Thank you received: 718
This delightful bit of satire does showcase one downside to "lifestyle games" and that is approaching them as though they were boardgames. We all know at least one person like this:ChristopherMD wrote: My lifestyle game is Kickstarting. Its soooo much fun. The anticipation and excitement that goes on during a campaign is second to nothing. Watching the previewers make all these great videos showing what the games might be like to play is fantastic and they really deserve more money too. Not to mention the community of other backers that are all just as hyped as I am. Really makes me feel like I'm a part of something special. I remember watching a recent campaign and cheering on with the community while watching the counter to see if the final stretch goal would be unlocked. It was a close one and I had to lie down for a bit afterwards to calm down. Usually I just drop off the games at the thrift store after punching them out, sleeving the cards, and assembling wooden inserts. Because the fun in Kickstarting is all in the purchasing not the playing and besides I have to make room for more. There's literally no downside to this lifestyle game and lots of great memories to be had.
January: "Dude, I found this English Civil War minis ruleset made by three guys from Britain! It's amazing! They also cast all their own metals, so I put in a $500 order for 3 complete armies, it's gonna be so rad!!!"
February: "Yeah, woohoo, my minis showed up today! Gonna prime them this weekend & read the 200-page rulebook in small bits during the upcoming break, should be amazing!"
March: "I haven't been reading that much, and I think I have half the first army primed, but haven't painted yet..."
April: "Naw, dude, I don't play that game anymore... sold the whole lot off on eBay for like $50, but I found this new Wild West minis game that has plastic starters for a really good price, so I just zapped a PayPal payment of $350 over to the publisher and they should show up this week, super stoked!!!"
The Moral Of The Story: A sampling boardgame mentality rarely meshes well with lifestyle games.
Please Log in or Create an account to join the conversation.
- Legomancer
-
- Offline
- D10
-
- Dave Lartigue
- Posts: 2944
- Thank you received: 3873
Please Log in or Create an account to join the conversation.
san il defanso wrote: But now that I'm neck-deep in D&D, it has provided a measure of simplicity to my gaming life to allow myself to focus on a single system.
It's an easy way to avoid making choices. I mean that in a positive way. We live in an era with way too many choices, most of them meaningless. Outside of gaming, it's an unexpected but great side effect of being vegan. I don't have to waste my time in 90% of a grocery store, or looking at 90% of a menu.
With gaming, I think it goes back to most of the real, lasting value of the hobby being social. If you are part of a community then you form relationships with them. It's easier to be part of a community when you don't have to worry about person A who doesn't like Euros, person B who thinks dice hate him, etc. -- just get together and play.
Please Log in or Create an account to join the conversation.
- san il defanso
-
Topic Author - Offline
- D10
-
- ENDUT! HOCH HECH!
- Posts: 4623
- Thank you received: 3560
One thing that has been nice about focusing on a single game is that it's much easier to find decent conversations about the games in question. In board gaming the online discourse has been so thoroughly poisoned by Kickstarter that almost every online conversation is about acquiring more games. If you want to talk about actually playing stuff, I've only really had luck making that work on this very site.
But if I want to talk about D&D online, there's a pretty active Twitter community, a couple of decent subreddits, some Youtubers, and some notable blogs that all talk about the actual process of playing the game. Not about whether to buy something new or bragging about new purchases, but about actually playing. Part of this is because WotC has been pretty slow about releasing new content for 5e, but it would not surprise me if it was the case for other games like 40K or Magic.
Please Log in or Create an account to join the conversation.
- Colorcrayons
-
- Offline
- D8
-
- Wiz-Warrior
- Posts: 1693
- Thank you received: 1703
san il defanso wrote: How about you? Do you have any "lifestyle" games that take up a lot of your time? Do you have any that you wish could take up more of your time?
I'd likely hurt entire boxes of puppies to get my old D&D group back. But I played consistently for a decade and while I loved the immersion, I'm ok that it's no longer a part of my life. I got the memories.
My lifestyle games are any games that I enjoy, whether it be M:tG or a boardgame like Wiz-War. I don't like to do the churn. I like to find something I enjoy, and keep on enjoying it regularly. perhaps my long experience with D&D played a role in that mindset.
Good games deserve to be explored. Exploration rewards players with heightened enjoyment.
To me, playing games for any other reason is more than likely a waste of time. Hence why my collection is lean, lithe and energetic.
Please Log in or Create an account to join the conversation.