# What is considered "Beardy"



## Elchimpster (Jan 31, 2007)

Sorry folks, not trying to open a can of worms per se. Just wanting to get a wider consensus of what is considered "Beardy".


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## LongBeard (Dec 22, 2006)

Personally I have a pet hate for IW's and their 'std' 9 oblit list but at the end of the day If It's legal and the wielder of said list plays It fairly I'm all for giving It a run for It's money! :twisted:


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## Anphicar (Dec 31, 2006)

IMO-- 

It is laregly in the eye of the beholder. If someone dislikes someone's tactics, they should adjust theirs, not paly them, etc. 

I do realize however that some thing such as (For example's sake say 10 Dreadies) is hard to deal with. 

But thats the name of the game, really. Who is the better general and who can use his resources?

There is no official rule for "cheese" or definition for "beardiness" as deemed by GW, so that is how i stand.


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## Galahad (Dec 21, 2006)

Anything that wins over the guy calling you beardy


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## The Wraithlord (Jan 1, 2007)

No matter how you look at it, beardy will always mean different things to everyone. To me, the ridiculous 9 Oblit/4 pie plate IW list is beardy but it might not bother someone else. I think my Tau list is a decent and solid mix of Mech and static units yet I have been told to my fact that is a ridiculously cheesy army because it has 7 Crisis suits. In the end, it is all in the eye of the beholder.


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## Lord Sinkoran (Dec 23, 2006)

I was looking through some of my older brothers white dwarves and found one with a page on gaiming terminology. 

Definition taken from white dwarf issue No.216 page 91.

Beardy (adjective)
The practice of unashamedly exploiting an aspect of the rules to gain an advantage despite it being out of character for the army and/or gaming background. A unit, vehicle, character, etc. that is so designed.


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## the cabbage (Dec 29, 2006)

Lord Sinkoran said:


> I was looking through some of my older brothers white dwarves and found one with a page on gaiming terminology.
> 
> Definition taken from white dwarf issue No.216 page 91.
> 
> ...


This covers it for me entirely. I have no problem with an opponent maxing out on any fluffy unit or combination but IMO he must keep the entire army in the same vain. For example if an iron warrior maxed out on obliterators and heavy support I believe he should think twice about fielding a CC Daemon prince or lord with CC retinue. If he is fair he should be willing to take the rough with the smooth, ie take the heavy firepower but at least be vulnerable in CC to some extent.

For tournaments however I would argue that there is no such thing. They are a competition and entrants must sign up to that.

One other thing which I consider to be 'beardy' is the over use of proxies or incorrectly painted models. I can only give an example which was an opponent who brought what was clearly a vanilla marine army in dark blue armour to an event. He was convinced by a friend to call them blood angels and played the day with a shared codex and no idea of the blood angels rules. There were no markings on the units to mark them as any kind of successor chapter and they weren't even really assault heavy. And obviously no baal or furioso.


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## Jeridian (Jan 4, 2007)

The problem with 'anything goes' at Tournaments is that the 40k rules and armies are clearly not all equal.

Some are ridiculously easy to use and likely to win (IW's for example) whilst others rarely have a chance (most Ork armies).

So if everyone follows the 'take only the best' then everyone will be playing the same army, and list.

I prefer to see 40k as a game, not a sport (yes, there is a distinction)- and variety in a game should be encouraged.


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## Lord Sinkoran (Dec 23, 2006)

I haven't got much tournement experience infact I've been to one which wasn't very big called Devouer. There I saw no Iron warriors but lots of infiltrating slaanesh marines.


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## Elchimpster (Jan 31, 2007)

I've played against some Slaneeshi armies that were ungodly devastating. (pun only partially intended).

I don't think "beardy" is necissarily a bad thing. I mean it's cool to watch a couple uber-well built armies go at it. There are a lot of ways to min-max most armies in to being very effective, and that's okay.

I usually get owned by the folks who are more serious about being good at the game. I'm not very competitive at all; really just there to have a good time and use the figs I spent so much time and money on. Winning ocasionally is fun, losing occasionaly is fun too (especially against a cool player). Getting owned in the first couple turns...not so fun, but then again, it's my own fault.

In general I play against casual players, or newbies and usually have a 50/50 chance of winning. Once in a while I get to play warm-up to a tourney player or a really efficient player and get schooled. As long as it is still fun I guess it doesn't matter.

I dunno. I think "beardy" is just a name, like min-maxer, or rules-lawyer or anything else. I imagine as long as people play aginst people who are playing for roughly the same reason (competition or just goofing around) then it is all good.


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## Wrath of Khaine (Dec 29, 2006)

When I do use the word beardy, which is pretty rare, I intend it towards people that intentionally bend the rules for their own benefit. This can also be directed at people who outright break the rules in composition or gameplay and think it not necessary to inform me. Most people call such things cheating, but I just call it being beardy. As above, it's pretty much you want it to be, as is most slang, but more than anything I use it for people that heavily maim the WYSIWYG rule. I played a game of Mordheim against a guy who made me show him my list and made sure it was WYSIWYG, then proceeded to shoot me with a dwarf engineer's blunderbuss which was not at all modelled on the stunty, nor were anything else but a tiny walking cane. I just packed up my stuff and told him that was pretty beardy to do.
So, bending/beaking the rules for personal benefit and not for both players is my take on being Beardy. Running min/maxed lists is just powergamed, cheesy, and competitive over fun, but it's all still legal.

-Khaine-


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## uberschveinen (Dec 29, 2006)

As far as I'm concerned, beardy is what happens when you're more concerned about your chances of winning than the integrity of the game. Anything short of this is merely focusing in winning, and anything beyond this is outright cheating. It's the bleeding edge of getting called out by a judge, and it is a great plague on gaming, principally in that it is utterly unavoidable, and completely unnessecary.

I've seen, made, and fought against lists that, while quite strong, are completely in character and correct in modelling terms. These lists are so very close to being as strong as a outright beard list as makes no difference, but almost always result in a fun game. With a good player at the helm, these lists are capable of winning the heavy-duty tournaments (providing the dice comply). By taking the beard army, you're not actually improving your chances of winning in highly competetive arenas, since the small increase in win likelihood is more than compensated for by the fact that bleeding-edge armies are occasinally and deservedly deemed over it. In casual games the problem is orders of magnitude worse, since a beardy army defies every core concept of the casual game. you don't need a strong army to win, and you're playing for fun. As such, beardgaming doesn't actually benefit the player in the suitable arena and defies the very notions of gaming on the casual level. However, it's still in common use. Why? The people behind these armies need to win. They don't just want to wn, they _must_ win, regardless of any other consideration. Now the question of whether they're desperately seeking the approval their fragile ego needs or whether they're compensating for some external factor by this is something I'll leave to the psychoanalysts, but suffice to say these are not healthy people. As such, the best method of dealing with them is the same as precocious children, attention whores, and terrorist groups; just ignore them, and they'll go away.


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## The Wraithlord (Jan 1, 2007)

> beardgaming


LOL! 

Dunno why but that struck me as hilarious when I read it 

Couldn't agree more with the rest of the post. I used to know a guy who was constantly changing his list each and every time he lost because 'the list obviously isn't strong enough'. And he would try the cheesiest things each time until eventually the rest of us ganged up on him and started a campaign that lasted for several months. The kicker? No changes to the armylist allowed, ever, until the campaign was done. Wasn't long before he left our group to game elsewhere which really didn't bother us all that much to say the least.


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## Skcuzzlebumm (Dec 21, 2006)

I'll just quote my friend spooky in regards to this, i think this is quite an interesting view and tbh have encountered this kind of mindset plenty a time before (i.e those who called my nid horde cheese and beardy):



spooky said:


> from http://www.sirlin.net/Features/feature_PlayToWinPart1.htm
> 
> in defence of Gus, playing to win doesn't make you a dick. building an army specifically because its competitive doesn't mean you're a dick. see below, from a far wiser person than anyone on this forum. (i've replaced the word 'cheap' with 'cheese' for relavency)
> 
> ...


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## Grismund (Jan 31, 2007)

lets thinck abuot this right i go to lenton on gt days to have look around and i see marine drop pods and iron warrios and eldar every where but no orks and no dark eldar as orks were my first love i feel sorry for them i now play armoured a lot more than i should relly 5 games in a day and 25 in a week is bad what you need to do is look at the very essence of gw and where its been andgone in the last 3 years and tthere i belive you shallfind the anser you happen to be looking for

gris


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## Black Mage 257 (Jan 25, 2007)

Umm.... beardy tactics i've seen and played against thus far;

6 Carnifexes and 2 Hive Tyrants in 1500pts (Before Nid Update)
3 Monoliths in 1500pts
3 Wraithlords in 1000pts (before update)
9 Obliterator List and an extremely over equipped daemon prince in 1500pts

Could name more but these are the ones that stick out......

Beardiness annoys me, but it feels so good when you actually beat the extremely beardy lists even though everyone else has fallen to them


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## philbrad (Jan 26, 2007)

Taken straight from a similar post on warseer ...


_The general consensus of 'cheese'/'beardy' IMO is a player maximising the allowable uber units/allowances/wargear available to his army list and minimising the core units. The army is built purely to win, often for all their killy power they lack in certain aspects of tactical flexibility. Quite often they'll be low in numbers also.

As I've said every race in 40K has the possibility of this being done its built into their army lists during design. There are well known examples of such armies but gamers should look wider afield for this. As I've said on numerous occasions, until GW put something in their rule set to stop such armies , they'll be constantly fielded and the day the rules change, people will loose interest, as the units that give armies character will be removed or neutered. Of course if all armies were created equal everyone one would be happy .... well wouldn't they ??_

Prosecution rests m'lud 

Of course back in the summer at Lenton with my kids, my son was challenged to a few games by a young gamer with no army list, an Eldar/SM army and using a Phoenix Lord (without permission - or even consultation) army had one troops choice I could count and several Elites ... cheesy ... nah course not, sometimes a grasp of the rules helps. :roll: 

PhilB
:twisted:


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