Throttling Back
One major focus of this website is winning games. I put out a lot of advice on building army lists and improving tactics, and I'm getting better all the time. This is a game we play, and we should generally play to win. Today, however, I want to talk about how to reduce your margin of victory. Now why in the wide, wide world of sports would you want to win by less? Well, maybe you are playing a teaching game, or maybe you just realized the person in front of you is not in your league and you don't want to embarrass them. It's harder to enjoy a game where your army is getting shredded and your weapons are useless against the enemy. For that matter, it's not all that fun to beat up on a noob, either. I've heard competitive players refer to it as "clubbing baby seals," which is an apt reference.

For those of you that don't know, I'm a martial artist. A couple of years back, I was at a big national competition. One of the segments of our competition was sparring (point-contact punching and kicking) and I knew that last year's World Champion and the new World Champion were both competing in my ring. I knew the level of competition would be fierce and I pumped myself up to get ready for it. When I got called to the ring for my first match, my opponent looked a little confused, like he didn't quite know what to expect. I just chalked it up to nerves and got ready to spar. The center judge said go and I whipped a kick upside my opponent's head. Honestly, I'd expected him to block it, but he seemed to be moving really slowly. I was awarded the points for my kick and the center judge said go again. My opponent's reactions were really kind of bothering me at that point. It was like beating up on a 5th grader or something. I decided to just spar defensively from then on. It doesn't matter if you win by 1 point or by 5 points, it's just a win, so I just played defensively and sparred at his pace for the rest of the time. I didn't want to embarrass him, and I certainly wasn't going to get anything out of skunking him 5-0, so I didn't. This, incidentally, is the problem with Battle Points in 40k tournaments, they encourage people to try for the largest margin of victory possible, which means they encourage you to club baby seals and table every opponent with extreme prejudice. If you just need to win by a little, you can take a more relaxed attitude to it and you don't have to pull out all the stops unless it's against someone of similar skill level.

Enter the New Guy
Sometimes you'll end up playing a game against someone that's just not as good as you are. Maybe they are new to the game, maybe they just don't get to play very much or they just don't know any better. (One of the reasons that I started this site was the sad lack of useful tactical information on the internet. Very few websites have a clue as to how to use an army, and even fewer actually bother to explain it.) Much like in martial arts, it's not really a big ego stroke to beat face on a newbie. (Okay, there's a few people that seem to enjoy it, but do you really want to be That Guy?) Unless you are in a tournament with battle points, a simple win is still a win. In fact, I would suggest that a simple win is _better_ than a big win, for reasons I'll articulate below.

Teaching Games
When you are doing a teaching game, you want to keep things simple and not overwhelm the student. One thing that can overwhelm them is if you are beating them by too much. If the game isn't close, they can end up focusing more on how badly they are losing instead of on how to play the game better. In addition, if you play just a little better than they do, it gives them something to shoot for. Later, as they have a better understanding of how to build and use an army, you can start showing them the next level of how to play sharper.

Pulling your Punches
It's easy enough to tone it down by taking a less-competitive list, just don't put as much of the good stuff in there. On the other hand, it's a bit harder if you already have your tough list for the big tournament and then realize the 1st round opponent is totally new to the game. (Or all you have with you is your tournament army and somebody wants a teaching game.) Then what do you do? Let's start off with tactics. I remember reading an interview with a very experienced 40k player that was known for running a lot of demonstration and teaching games. When asked how he avoided beating the snot out of new players, he said very simply, "I just don't take advantage of situations." Basically, if you expect to blow up a transport, don't necessarily have an assault unit ready to assault the troops that just fell out. If killing a unit gives you a clear shot at the HQ character behind it, see if you have a shot at something else instead.

Another way to avoid capitalizing as much on your successes is by avoiding forking or skewering. Forking is when you've got a unit that can have two separate targets. (For example, your devastators can shoot at that rhino or at the landspeeder. If another unit takes out the rhino first, the devastators are free to take out the landspeeder.) You would normally want to take advantage of forking by having the units with the fewest targets attack first, leaving the others free to either keep hitting the first target if it is still around, or to attack another target when the first is destroyed. Skewering is the same idea, but it involves a unit that can attack more than one unit in the same direction. (Perhaps your assault marines can assault the chaos marines right in front of them or, if another unit wipes those out with shooting, they can reach the Obliterators behind the chaos marines.) If you choose to have your forking or skewering units shoot first, they may take out targets that were the only thing some of your other units could damage. This is a very good way of limiting your effectiveness and it's very unlikely your opponent will notice you doing it.

You can also pull back on certain rules. For example, let's say you've got a unit of 5 models, with 3 separate groups for wound purposes. (call it 2xMelta, 2xBolter, Pistol/CCW.) They get hit with 3 Rending wounds and 3 normal wounds. With more wounds than models in the unit, you could put all 3 Rends on the Bolter guys, and a normal wound on each of the others. On the other talon, you could choose to put the rends on separate wound types (1 Bolter, 1 Melta, CCW/Pistol) and kill off most of the squad. You don't have to use the Wound rules to your advantage, which will help you avoid crushing the other guy.

Another thing you can do is to get in your own way. Move tanks so that they block or partially block each other's lines of sight or get in the way of stationary units. Put stationary units like devastators in areas with limited line of sight, or put other infantry units in their way to give the opposing army cover. Similarly, you can bottleneck your assault units, either with each other or with vehicles.

Finally, you can make suggestions (in a teaching game) or make pointed questions in a game where you want to soften your win. For example, you could tell the other guy, "If you move your Captain onto the ridge there, my Lascannon will have a clear shot at him." Or in a "soft" game, as he moves the captain, you might say, "Does my Lascannon have line of sight to there?" (knowing full well that it does, but making it clear to him in the process.) You can also suggest alternate targets that would be better. "That missile launcher won't do much to my LandRaider, but it will do nasty things to my Rhinos, while your Meltas have a much better chance against my LandRaider." If it's not a teaching game, don't use too many of these direct suggestions, or it will start to become apparent that you are trying to help them. On the other hand, if you say things like, "Shoot, I just can't get out of sight of those Lascannons, but I need to get my Terminators over there. I guess I'll have to chance it," it'll clue them in to your plans and their potential counters without being totally obvious.

The Rising Tide Lifts all Ships
Okay, again with the martial arts story time. Some years back, a new guy moved into the area where I compete. He was a spectactular sparrer, but really wasn't much good at forms or weapons. We were talking after our first competition, and he commented that he was pretty much just there for the sparring. I replied that I like each of the different aspects of martial arts for it's own emphasis (grace, speed, etc.) He thought about it for a while and then said that he'd like to get better at the other aspects, but he wasn't sure where to start. Knowing the master that was his new instructor, I told him to respectfully ask for advice on how to improve those aspects. We went our separate ways, and at the next tournament, I could see an improvement. I commented on it and we had a good time. After a few more tournaments, he was getting pretty close to my level of competition, and eventually tied me. This spurred me on to improve my own performance. The better he got, the better I had to get to beat him. I'm not saying this to toot my own horn, but to make a point. If you train newer players to get better, you'll have to get better to stay ahead of them. In addition, as you show them tips and tricks to improve, it will sharpen your understanding of those tricks. If you want to win big tournaments, you need to get better. If you want to get better, you need better opponents. If you don't have good opponents, train some.

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