So I've been playing for about a year. And when I first started it was new and exciting and I was enjoying playing the game and building and painting.
The thing is I've not improved at all in the aspect of the game. I seem to be constantly losing and I can't seem to turn it around.
It probably doesn't help that the club I play at has some of the best players in the UK and the rest are all tournament players.
People keep telling me to keep playing and it will eventually click. But I'm finding it ruff as it's no fun to get constantly beaten and the game to not even be close in terms of points.
I really enjoy the social side of the game. People always compliment my models and I love chatting about painting after the games which is keeping me going.
I'm just looking for advice on how I can turn this around. As I don't have this issue with 40k.
Picture for attention I did come third place in our rookie rumble and won best painted. But it's all been downhill from there.
Well if it makes you feel better I bought 6 teams, painted them up, learnt the rules deep.
Played one game: hated it.
Edit: my main reason for hating the one game I had was because it’s one thing to study rules and understand the game; but another thing to put them into practise. I do plan on playing more to get past that anxiety.
Relatable, my solution was to play against my best friend. That way it’s all about having fun, my LGC is pretty sweaty too.
I recognized this with a lot of LGS hobby’s like TCG’s and such, these groups claim to be casual but are meta to the core. It makes it less fun for newcomers all the time
That way it’s all about having fun, my LGC is pretty sweaty too.
I found a local place near me that plays in my language (I'm foreign) and the people are nice but they're all competitive.
It's fine if that's what they enjoy but I don't.
I don't want silly "technically correct" rules and nitpicking and other WAAC style gameplay. I'm very much a "I do this because it sounds/looks nice, not because it's competitive". I just want to roll some dice and have fun where I'll probably lose anyway.
If I played orks I'd just charge into melee, for example.
They're nice people but it's like they're all racers with souped up cars and I just want to go for a relaxing drive with a car I mostly bought to paint...
When I play with someone brand new, in their first game I always play to lose. I pick Ork Kommandos, replace like half my team with basic Boys, and I pretty much just suicide charge the enemy over and over again while explaining ways to counter some of my moves. So far, everyone Ive introduced to the game with this tactic is in love with the game.
Some people play Monopoly like their life depends on it, some just play it cause it’s a fun way to spend time together. Seems your playing soccer with Messi and barely know how to kick the ball. I’ve been where you are… twice! Once as a kid, now as an adult when i picked it up again. Clubs are full of competitive people and for me that’s not even why i want to battle. I like the game because in a game i see the playing field come to life like a movie, it triggers my fantasy immensely, and there’s the other side of the table bickering about inches, cover and whatever rule can be contested just to turn the game in their favor. Sounds negative and it’s never that gloomy but it’s definitely not fun for 50% of the players… Now i play with my 10 year old and he IS just happy to play with me and go ‘pew pew’ and claim his tyranids wield lightsabers and all and i let him. Because we invent rules and weapons on the spot because we feel like it. Ofcourse he wins every time, but i have FUN doing it. Surround yourself with like minded people, and don’t burrow in their competitive trap if that’s not you. Lately i’ve been playing Space Gits with my kid and i’m loving it. Completely dumb ass rules, very little makes sense, but boy is it FUN!🤩
That is true , pve aside at its core kill team is very much designed as a “sweat” type game , that is just in the DNA of kill team , that is how it was designed.
The only possible solutions would be:
- play with more casual folks
play against teams with a similar power level
play the pve
That being said at the end of the day if kill team isn’t fun then it might be time to look elsewhere as really we are spoiled for choice when it comes to skirmish games.
If we are talking about more on the relaxed side then halo flashpoint and cyberpunk combat zone are decent choices . I am also excited about the 2nd edition of fallout wasteland warfare but that isn’t out yet .
Well it's kind of up to you to learn a bit of what the enemy team is capable of...I played against a kasrkin and got bodied, but I was able to get back against the team in another game. Know your team and know a bit about the enemy team as well.
My recommendation would be find a 1st edition rulebook on eBay. It had balance issues but was just overall a much better game with massively more customization in your teams. Play it with friends and always steer clear of the competitive scene in any game.
Hah. I feel that. I painted over 2k points of a Blood Angels army and after I got them all nice and painted and ready to rock I played my first game. Hated it. They’ve sat on a shelf for years now.
I bought a kill team after quitting 5th edition. Tried three games and hated each one more than the last... Now I'm playing bighammer and it feels simpler and probably faster tbh
Both of you should buy an X-COM video game and slow roll thru it so you learn how to plan overwatch as well as action and movement timing in a format where you can do 30 battles in an afternoon instead of 2.
I would say you should consider messing with the NPO/Co-op modes then for a change of pace rather than constant head to head, especially if you're in a place where it's all sharks
I'm stuck in the first mission with my Pathfinders, I know that if you loose you can play the third mission, but I'm trying to get the best of my operatives.
PvE is the best part of Killteam. We almost strictly do narrative/campaigns. GMing has been a blast. Definitely takes a bit of extra elbow grease to keep things interesting (gotta jazz things up a bit) but well worth it.
If your average opponent is a tournament player, then to have any chance of winning you need to play a similar amount of games to them. But you'd be surprised just the sheer number of games the top players play - many will play a single team a lot, and also play on TTS to get extra reps in.
Why don't you ask them how many games they've played, and see if you actually want to play that much to get to their level? You might find you don't!
Aside from that, the standard advice is just stick to a team for 10+ games until you have the basics down.
Yeah, this sounds like a classic 'comparison is the thief of joy' type of sentiment. I know people want to win a game, but the winning is really secondary to the enjoying of the game.
While it is secondary, having a >10% winrate can get pretty tiring, and I speak from experience. Nowaday I'm able to win a couple ones, but it is only against newer players, I often loses against veterans
The game is better balanced now than it used to but there's still a big disparity of power between the extremes. Maybe next time when arranging a game ask your opponents to play total bottom tier teams and you take the top one?
It might be an opportunity for them to bring a team they own but haven't played for a while (or ever) and using imbalances in the game like that is a common solution used in wargames to ensure players with a large difference in skill both have a challenging and interesting game.
I have many teams my favourite one is the Fellgores. I absolutely love them there the G.O.A.T. for me.
But I find them very hard to play and have received some of the worse loses I have ever had while playing.
Ive been advised to just stick with a single team for the mean time to help me with the basics.
So I'm currently running Nemesis Claw and trying out different configurations of the team.
My opponent last night was great and while I lost it was only 11-18 and talked me through where I had messed up.
But his main point was that I had kind of given up mentally early as I couldnt see how I was going to turn things around after turn 2.
It also probably don't help that my body can't tell the difference between a game and a life and death situation as my heart rate goes up super hight during games night.
"But his main point was that I had kind of given up mentally early as I couldnt see how I was going to turn things around after turn 2." - this is the kind of mentality that might be a part of what keeps you back.
Every game you play (not just KT) will have moments when you are on the back foot or suffer a localised failure. If the first moment like that in a game makes you give up mentally, instead of try your best to pull through than no wonder so many games are lost and feel frustrating. Manage this expectation, don't think "I'm screwed!" when the first bad roll or positioning fumble happens.
If necessary, switch expectations and goals to learn as much from a game lost as possible in a positive manner - set up mini-goals, smaller than the goal of an overall win to have realistic successes to aim for (for example -I am most likely going to lose at this point, but I will try to beat my opponent on Kill Op).
Practice stoic, detached approach to other people's actions and randomness (in games or in life). Focus on what you are doing and try to do it better each time without comparing yourself to others.
The heart rate thing is probably the biggest issue, if you aren’t at least enjoying rolling dice and moving the plastic men it’s no wonder you’re struggling to find the fun
Ah man, I relate to this, I always used to get super stimulated during a game!
Don't ever give up early, because sometimes fortunes can swing wildly! And if you genuinely feel you can't pull it back, just spend the rest of the game having fun, trying some reckless plays you're normally too conservative to try, and make your opponents victory as hard earned as possible. And you never know, "One fighter with a sharp stick and nothing left to lose can take the day".
Also, set your own mental victory conditions, like taking down their leader or holding an objective at all costs.
Most S&D teams right now play around turning point 3/4 due to how Dominate works, so as long as you are playing one of those if you don't completely throw turning point 2 you can definitely come back
That said maybe playing a lower mental load team might help. While Nemesis Claw is a solid team, it is a finesse team that has a lot of tricks to get the most out of it. If you are feeling overwhelmed it might be worth trying a team like AoD or Plague Marines that are fairly straight forward, so you can focus more on positioning and a consistent gameplan
That said if you like Nemesis Claw, keep playing them, never underestimate the power of a marine with a meltagun and the tricks to keep them from getting nuked before shooting off a shot
Also as everyone has said, Joint & Nemesis ops would be good for you to have more casual fun with the game
It may sound stupid but if your brain can't tell apart a real from a game life or death situation, try to imagine being some kind of commander, watching the skirmish through a screen, yelling orders to your crew instead of being in the skirmish
I don’t think that’s what happens your just getting the pvp jitters and excitement. You can play till that’s gone but I should be in a year are you playing a few times a week ?
Hey, honestly if this is the scenario you are having with every game, I would suggest a few things, and take my actual gaming advise with a grain of salt, as I am no rules expert.
As others have said, play solo games just to enjoy gaming and pushing models around and having fun blasting some enemy models.
Ask some of the players to play differently. I know that sounds weird, but if you've made any friends or acquaintances at the gaming shop, ask of they would play a game where they just walk you through everything as you play, give advice on what they would do in your moves, etc. Like removing the competition and just say you need help understanding the game because you are struggling with it. I think most people will be receptive to that, and if not, maybe thats just a sign that it isnt someone you want to play.
Lastly, I would work on the anxiety aspect. As someone that used to have severe social anxiety at times when I was younger, I put off addressing that for far too long. And it can be weird because I am extremely social, but some situations would send me into an anxiety attack. See a therapist and try to work on what causes that, because you wont ever truly enjoy gaming if you are feeling like that during a game.
Very similar for me when I was dealing with it. No problems with anxiety in most situations, but some things triggered it and then it becomes a fixation you worry about in advance and it makes it worse. I would see someone about it, I certainly wish I had sooner!
You say you’ve been advised to stick with a single team to learn the basics…. Maybe the first question should be: do you think you’ve learned the basics? If not, that’s the first place to study.
After that, just learning strategies for each crit op and tac op can go a long long way. It’s a game of point accumulation, and if you’re not familiar with optimal point gain, you won’t win.
If you regularly see some of the best players in the UK, ask for some coaching! Most competitive players love the game and will jump at the opportunity to ramble about asymetrical threat ranges and action/point efficiency all day.
So I was in the exact same situation as you, even down to our club having some top players. Kill Team was my first war game and initially I loved it, but once season 2 rolled around it started to lose its flair for me.
I found that I didn't enjoy tournaments, and like yourself found them to be super stressful. I've played against some of the top players in the world and never found it too enjoyable. I'm simply not that good at Kill Team and I find it's a game that's virtually impossible to come back from once you're losing (at least I'm not good enough to make a come back haha). I found it quite hard to just have a chilled out Kill Team game without it resulting in a sweat fest.
The club I was in was great and shared my kind of vibes, and a lot of them begun to burn out too. We've since tried a number of other games and found that we mostly jive with narrative based skirmish games such as Necromunda and Trench Crusade.
I think it's ok to accept that a game just isn't for you. It might be worth trying to pin point exactly what you're not enjoying about Kill Team (for me it was the snowball type losing and too many teams being unviable) and seeing whether that's something you can change or is a fundamental part of the game.
Look at it as a rogue-like game. You start everytime over but with more experience. There is also so much variety in the teams. You can try to learn the most popular ones.
Regarding the individual games: try to see it as a cool story. You are loosing but you won‘t go without a nice farewell. Like I had a game against kasrkins, did stupid mistakes and in TP4 I just stormed the heavy guarded room and almost wiped it. I lost by 2 points and it was a great game.
Also, look for other people. Try to help beginners, play PvE. I went to my first tournament and expected to lose 6 times. I managed to win two games against other beginners.
Played two tournaments so far. The first was the Rookie Rumble and I came third.
I think that had more to do with the team I was player rather than any particular skill of mine (the one in the image). And the second one was pretty much mid.
I do want to try some of the PvE options of the game. As they do look interesting especially Nemesis ops.
I definitely recommend Joint Ops. I started playing it with my friend and it's amazing.
I get to build and paint the models and play the game, but it gets to be a fun co-op experience where we win or lose together. Perfect stuff.
They also release new joint ops missions all the time so there's lots of content. The White Dwarf that came out recently just included a cool one where you're trying to escape a sinking ork submarine.
I can't recommend Joint Ops highly enough. If recommend just asking one of the people at the store you play at to play joint ops with you instead of the traditional head to head mode.
My personal tips would be:
1: start playing defensive (almost passive). Let the game unfold a bit before you charge in and lose most of your operatives. It’s called kill team but it’s all about scoring points.
2: pick a team and really dig into it (many ppl already mentioned that)
3: find an opponent that’s close to your level and play some „open“ games with tac op etc. revealed and let each other know what your idea behind every activation is. Memorize (or take photos) of some crucial board states and go back to the moment and see what would have happened if you picked a different choice this time.
I love playing against better opponents because I can learn from them. But that’s not the case for everyone. Anyway: try to stay positive and think about playing chess against yourself with an opponent who tries to interfere with you.
Hope this helps
I love playing against better opponents because I can learn from them. But that’s not the case for everyone.
I would argue there's a balance to be struck though. Generally I agree, and would prefer to lose to someone slightly better than me than win against someone slightly worse. But you need to understand enough of the basic tactics to be able to figure out what your opponents more advanced tactics are. If a tournament player is going all-out against a newbie every time then it's not gonna provide much of a learning experience.
Anyway: try to stay positive and think about playing chess against yourself with an opponent who tries to interfere with you. Hope this helps
Heh. That's just "playing chess against yourself" for me. I know I'm not that good at traditional chess tactics. What I am good at though is figuring out what my opponent is trying to do; making a one for one trade that throws a spanner in their plan; and profiting from the ensuing confusion.
Might be Blood Bowl time 😏 There are sweats in every game but I find certain games bring out certain players. Kill Team has a higher sweat to normie ratio than other miniatures games in my experience; co-op games and sillier games (like BB) tend to bring out my kind of people.
Best advise I have ever got about playing the game is to think about it like golf. The goal should be 2 things; 1-try and get a little better each time and ask for feedback, 2- make friends doing it. It should be the way you ask a new bud out to the pub to chat through what you did wrong. Turned my whole gameplay experience around.
I recognize your minis from the group chat! Next time I'm in the area we should definitely get some casual/narrative games in. Far more fun than sweaty tournament play. Speak to Mitch and my brother Fred when you get the chance - they both have the same mindset as me. We tend to ignore the competitive format and prefer playing with nemesis ops, custom terrain layouts, NPOs controlled by players, etc. It's a lot of fun.
Sorry your having a rough time.
Playing against really good players sounds difficult!
I can't compare to playing regularly at a club because all my games are casual games between me and 2 friends. In that setting I still loose EVERY game, but it's much more casual, it's lots of fun and at the end we all talk about how the game went, what moves we liked that everyone managed to pull off, what gambles really didn't pay off due to luck and what we would love to play in the future.
It might be hard, but if you found yourself clicking with some people playing with them in a casual setting might be nice.
Sounds like your trying really hard! Fair play to you. I think you'll get there eventually 👍🤞
Now, without real hard evidence to back it, I do feel that I’ve improved ten fold.
All I did was keep the same team. So, only play 1 team, no switching.
This way I can learn not just their rules, but also their synergies, how they play into hordes, elites, shooty or stabby opponents.
This takes all the brain load of the team itself out of the equation when I play.
I still need to think, but I kind of have a plan, depending on who I’m facing.
So now I can focus on the game instead. Scoring points. Counting activations. Tracking my opponent.
Another thing that is perhaps, a mid tier player hack, is to simply hold back and play reactively.
This forces your opponent to come to you, to open up, and hopefully screw up and allow you an easy kill/point.
Not sure this helped, but it’s helped me.
I’m still hugely invested in Kill Team and enjoy it immensely.
But then I also run BrokenTokenGear on Etsy and have a miniature painting academy for kids. So I’ve dug a pretty deep hole for myself.
Not to be promoting my gear too much, but the dashboard I make, that tracks both yours and your opponents KillOp with breakpoints clearly visible… was a game changer as well.
Before I designed it I just use to sort of, treat KillOp points as some sort of collateral bonus. Points that happened as a result of something else.
But now I’m super aware of when to deny, when to push for a kill etc.
Keep in mind, games are decided by a single point. That’s all you need.
I think the current scoring system and lower number of objectives coupled with the large amount of team and model specific rules is what causes these problems. There's so much to keep track of and remember that it's really difficult to know what you can do with your own team let alone keep track of what your opponent's team has. I've never been good at playing Kill Team but I did have a lot more fun during the Into The Dark days when the mission you were playing really mattered and killing the other team was de-emphasised. Perhaps you might prefer to play like that?
Model specific rules is a big one for me, that makes me not like the game, gives it that gotcha feeling. The more recent teams, no body is just "a guy" - hard to learn the rules too as a new player, when every model has its own rules, the rules for when Guy A, shoots Guy B,.. never really follow the rule book, because one of those models will have a rule that circumvents the rules.
Kill Team is just a bad casual / fun game as it is designed.
As a purely competitive, sporty type of game enrivonment, it is a lot better.
Poorly written rules, non-stop continual gotchas, a teams spread that isn't sustainable, ongoing chasing of a perfect balance (which will never exist) rather than addressing underlying design & implementation issues, and adding in the GW ecosystem— it's not built as a game for fun.
I've been into it for sometime; as a reentry point after 25years away from tabletop gaming, I wish I didn't use it as my reentry point. Most of the time, when my local meta is focused on competitive match play, it's soul and energy sucking.
What has saved me are joint ops, and nemesis ops; the latter in particular. These formats have helped to take much of the suck out of the game and bring some of the 'game' back into wargaming.
You should also look into One Page Rules. Rules are free and much easier to keep up with than all the Games Workshop shenanigans. Model agnostic, so you can use whatever models you want for the most part, but every 40k model line has an OPR army list that work really well. It's incredibly balanced, mostly because of the simplicity of the rules/keywords.
I can't go back to Games Workshop rules. Ain't nobody got time to keep up with all of that. Besides OPR is getting really popular in my city and tons of tournaments are popping up all over.
Are you able to identify why you’re losing and why by so much? Are you able to talk to the player after a game and recognise where you went wrong and why? Are you getting trounced because you’re forgetting rules and then getting wiped because of stuff you forgot existed?
First step is to ask in your next game if you can be a bit more open, invite discussion on what move you (and your opponent) are making and why and what’s going on. Ask if you can lower the stakes to allow some take-backs and a slower approach to discussing team rules and tricks. Ask to do preliminary ops instead so that there’s less stuff to focus on and around
A better alternative is to consider some narrative or simpler stuff, whether it’s still asymmetric PvP like Airborne Assault or Nemesis or a joint ops mission from Terror on Devlan, tomb world or Shadowhunt, something that isn’t the same, cutthroat competitive PvP might give you more breathing room and that social/hobby side without the feeling of getting constantly crushed by the most competitive format possible.
Yeah, I get this. It's like chess: the best way to learn and improve is to be beaten by people who are slightly better than you. Only slightly better though, because if they're masters of the game and they're taking it seriously then you'll lose in a way that doesn't really teach you anything.
Perhaps it might be worth asking your opponents for feedback as you play, and offer with take-backs (eg: things like "That's not a great move because I can counter it with [...]. Do you want to do something else instead?" or "I'm going to make this move because it sets me up to do [...]")? You could also ask them to make it easier for you: not letting you win, but at the same time avoiding blocking certain moves that would be fun for you to pull off.
You could also try games where you both prioritise RPing over tactics. (Eg: I remember playing an early game like that against my brother, where he deployed most of his Plague Marines in a sensible, defensible block but then placed his Plaguecaster at the opposite end of the board. When I asked him why he was going for that tactical disadvantage his reply was "Because that sorcerer thinks he knows better than everyone else, and refused to follow his deployment orders.")
All in all I'm sure most players would be fine with being asked "Don't let me win, but please go easy enough on me that I have space to learn." Honestly, with my experience of 40K players they probably genuinely believe that you will have you "click" soon, but they just don't realise that going all-out every time isn't helping.
Finding some less competitive players to play against might help, because you may well discover that actually you are really good at the game, just not at the top competitive level.
It might also help to set yourself personal win conditions. For example going into a game and what you personally will consider a victory is if your position is good or if you use the right plots at the right time etc. That way you can create a sense of achievement for yourself without having to actually win the game.
There’s a huge chance it’s a balancing problem. I’d ask the Necron subreddits for some advice. Then I’d possibly watch some sort of guide video. What do your opponents think? I always ask them for advice on what they think I could have done better in the match.
It sucks that you’re not enjoying kill team currently. I’ve been playing with a friend of mine and we’ve been doing custom terrain layouts, antigravity missions, teleportation pads, and hopefully a dark game with candles as objectives.
Playing a new kill team could be the ultimate answer. I recommend getting a Crusader Squad to use as an Angels of Death Kill Team.
Well, it’s an unpopular opinion in this sub, but: Kill Team has one of the worst game designs I know. It’s not because of it’s core mechanics but because nearly every faction has either some serious buffs in one aspect or can break core mechanics. So, now you have a n-dimensional (n=number of teams) matrix you interact with. Some people are fine with that but some (me included) just get lost. Why is that a bad game design? Well, good games are easy to learn and hard to master. Kill Team is not easy to learn because…remember the n-dimensional matrix?
It's perfectly valid to be in the hobby just for the collecting and painting.
But if you want to give kill team a few more chances, I'd suggest you flip the script a bit. You said that your club is pretty enthusiastic and it seems like you're not keeping up with them.
Have you tried teaching someone else how to play kill team? If you have two teams and a buddy who is interested in kill team, you could try getting them into the hobby. Set up an intro game with them. Use rather elite teams on both sides (there's a reason why the starter box contains two space marine teams) and ideally have a good understanding of the rules for both teams.
I think it might help you to step out of the sweaty tournament crowd for a bit. Teaching someone how to play the game gives you a different perspective on the game and makes you mentally revisit a few concepts. You may have a bit of tunnel vision how you play each of your games and playing against someone who doesn't know the meta and asks a lot of questions along the way might help reframe a few concepts in your head.
But honestly, kill team is a difficult game. The rules are difficult, getting into it is difficult, teaching it is difficult and sometimes even liking it is difficult. I recently had an intro game with a friend who has never played a wargame before but is heavily into board games and played a lot of warhammer video games and while he understood the rules surprisingly fast, he really didn't enjoy any of it.
Towards the end of turning point 2 we called it, shook hands and I don't think we'll give it another try. So if you decide to give someone an intro game, don't be disappointed if it doesn't work out. That is definitely an expected outcome and (most likely) not a personal failure on your part.
I wouldn't get too down on yourself. From what you describe you're already playing at a club with strong players and getting involved in tournaments. The more experience you get at that level the better you will become, more than likely the issue you're having isn't that you're bad at the game so much as the players around you are already of a high skill level.
A lot of people who start playing do it with a few friends and do kitchen table games so the level can be a lot lower, if you went to that sort of environment you may see how far you've come.
The benefit to the high skill games however is you'll get better faster, like most games the higher level you play the better it forces you to become it's just the journey is a lot rougher.
It sounds like you're enjoying the painting and if you're having run downs of the games afterwards you're doing the right thing. Moving to just one team can help as once you know the team inside out you can spend more time focusing on the fundamentals of the game, which ops to use dependant on opponent, kill zones, layouts and even board edge while also expanding what you know of other teams into yours.
Like most games as the skill level goes up the game can feel completely different just on how it's played but the more you push yourself the better you'll become and wins will come in time.
Maybe it is just something you will never be really good at. Thats life. I will never be a good poker player no matter how much I learn and practice. There are a lot of things that one will never master and thats normal and okay. Dont force it. Try solo Play and the joined ops
I think the Great Thing about warhammer is, that you can love Individual parts of the game and hate others. You love building you love painting, then this is your hobby. You don't Have to love every aspect of it.
Apart from that, have you tried a different Team? Maybe another Team with different mechanics would suit you More. Have you tried asking one of the persons your Playing with to swap teams?
This might not be the recommendation you're looking for at all, but it might be fun to use the models for an entry-level mini-agnostic game with some friends who don't normally play tabletop games. Something like Space Weirdos is perfect for that!
Have a look for other clubs in your area maybe there some with newer players or more causal players, you will always lose to hyper competitive players if you don’t play it like they do it’s like a gold player playing with GM players it will never be fun
Honestly I think that's just the fault in modern GW games. Kill Team and 40K have become super competitive and it sounds like your club is the same. If you enjoy the hobby side and the social aspect try other games. Necromunda was a good one but it might fall into competitiveness with the current edition update... 30K has also seen the same.
It is okay to separate the feeling of enjoyment from the actual winning of games. I enjoy playing even though I'm terrible because it's an excuse to get together with friends. I think I can count the number of wins I've had on one hand (including a 0-4 tournament!) I am aware that I'm unlikely to win, so I try to make moments that will be fun to just play out and see what happens. I don't totally ignore the game's strategy, but I don't have the mental bandwidth to keep up with the others most of the time.
It's like if you're part of a running or cycling club; it's okay if you're never in the lead, as long as you're finding your enjoyment somewhere whether that's painting, socialising or (for people who maybe aren't us) heavy strategizing and aiming to take home trophies. If you're really not enjoying it, there's no harm in sticking to what you do enjoy. Clearly you're a good painter!
I've only played one game so can't really judge too much... But I'm in a similar boat, it's a lot of mental load to keep track of all the general rules, your own team's rules as well as any particular tricks the opponent has up their sleeve.
I came to Killteam as a hobbyist rather than a player though, so its less of an issue for me. I just enjoy being able to buy small teams to paint up for display.
As a guard enthusiast I have a healthy respect for people who have the patience to paint horde teams well...
Do you have a lot regular opponents or random each time?
I like it but I wouldn't play any Warhammer against anyone who is ranked in anyway lol. It's a completely different mindset from how I play. Ill do things bectit would be cool not because it would be effective and it's more fun for me to play people who do the same.
I ran in to this experience with my local group. They are all very analytical and tournament focused. I was getting beaten regularly and was beginning to not enjoy playing. When I had a conversation with them a out it they offered to help me out and explain what they were doing during the game. It changed the dynamic completely. I still loose a fair bit but now there is a chance to learn from their experience.
I feel this. I started building KillTeams because I thought it was an escape from the rules complexity and growing bloat of 40k. I was so wrong. The complexity of rules interactions , FAQs, constant rules updates, changing seasons, it's beyond me. But it's okay to say a game is good, but for it not to be your cup of tea. Also my playgroup fell apart a couple months ago, so...
Why do you want to win? What is to be gained? Or does losing conflict with your view of yourself? Ask yourself these questions to better help yourself move to a process oriented mindset as opposed to a results based mindset (w's and l's). What does your process of improvement look like?
I played competitive fighting games and fps for a large chunk of my life and ive seen countless folks hit the 'no wins=no fun' wall esp surrounded by strong opponents. Having goals outside of winning helps. Like when I was learning Tekken vs a much stronger opp (we have a dedicated tekken scene here who have been at it a long time) I knew a dub was a long shot so my goals were learning oriented (the character matchup, proper defense) during the match. Try to apply this to your matches, record what happens, make your own battle report and watch it back to reflect on your decision making. A better process begets better results.
Hell I only tried the PvE NPO stuff and I think there are too many weird rules with the concealed and cover and vantage and all the keywords. I couldn't imagine having to play against sweaty competitive players. This game feels especially punishing in that you can miss the timing for a lot of things.
Joint ops narrative custom npos and nemesis all allow you to play at home to practice if you like. I started with PMs got distracted by legionaries then went to Hierotek as my main team cuz I love it. Then picked up 6 more teams.
Still planning on getting even more teams.
If you play to win only it's not that fun. If your opponents are clubbing you like a baby seal never even letting you do anything it's also really not fun.
So work with your players and practice to come to a happy medium.
I only play 1-2 times a year with friends because I hate playing against randoms. Too often someone will take things too seriously and the game will get sweaty or a debate over rules will occur - I don’t have time for any of that. I play to have fun, so I play with friends.
We eat and drink beer, and there’s never any stress whatsoever. If a rule causes confusion, we just do whatever would be most fun. The enjoyment should be in playing the game, not winning. Getting tabled every time you play by people who take the game too seriously can get exhausting, so find the people you like to spend time with and play the game with them.
I found myself in a similar position as you. I did everything I could to try and improve but I just never seemed to get the hang of it.
I was looking into other skirmish games and discovered Battletech and along with some others at my LGS we started a community and regularly play. It's now my one and only tabletop game and I absolutely love it.
So not every game is for everyone. I still love kill team conceptually and the WH40K universe as a whole, but GW games just arent for me and that's okay.
Find people to play, not pick up matches. You need to create your own buddy sub club, and to play 4 fun and not competitive. Play other modes, like solo and coop, and yes, eventually you will get better at it. But no bruteforcing it
There’s two ways to play it: thematically, where your guys are shooting behind cover and advancing over something, ignoring the asinine turn limit and playing until one team is wiped or achieved the objective.
Or: you play with tournament sweats who whip out laser pointers and play the cover line game and suck the joy out of it and pre measure every turn before the game even begins.
Try narrative gameplay, or seek out opponents who aren't sweats.
Might also be you're just playing the wrong team; I've played a dozen or more, hobbied more than 20, only really enjoyed playibg 3 or 4 of them.
Could also be killteam isn't your thing.
There's a million other games out there you could try though
At the end of the day it’s a luck based game like you can have godlike planning and tactics which are used by real military and still roll 1s. Probably buy a couple weighted dice, if ur rolling all 6 ppl notice but if 1/4 is a 6 that’s just statistically probable 😉
On the subject of improving, you mention that people at your club are all experienced players. Have you tried asking them to help you learn and improve? It's not a tournament, I'm sure many of them would be happy to give you advices.
As well, if you're burned on your team, perhaps it's time to experiment with another.
Finally, perhaps try a new game mode, something more narrative.
I am not cannot and never will be a Melvin Spike some of them are great guys who just want to bring new people into the hobby and want to help people learn the game and that kind of stuff but there are others of them like the one I played against one time in a magic tournament who complained that I was playing the game wrong because my deck wasn't hyper optimized and because my basic land art didn't match I might give my opponent extra information and that was wrong and I should feel bad about playing magic that way. So no I totally understand you I don't know how to find fun when everybody in your area in the game is big tournament players and all they want to do is play hyper optimized tournament lists I had that happen back when I was playing war machine and it meant I played less games of war machine than I would have liked because I didn't want to just play against people who were constantly practicing for the next tournament and probably didn't have fun playing against me because they were like well he's not playing a list I'm ever going to see you in a tournament so why should I have fun when I'm playing against him
Its best to play with friends and more chill players at an LGS man its all i can say and offer, it helped me love Killteam better because most LGS players ive interacted these days play like its a tournament and it drains the soul out of the fun and story you make for your team.
I mean, there's some answers we can suggest, but whether it's applicable depends on your situation.
First, have you played multiple different teams, or just one? It could be a case of the team you built not really meshing with your style.
There's the option to try for different modes of play- trying out a cooperative Nemesis mission, or Joint Ops, or even just a team match where you have someone else on your side.
You could also focus on the parts you enjoy- if what you really like is building and painting, why not get other players to commision teams from you? Get them involved in what their team will be like, and have fun kitbashing bespoke characters to their preference.
Past that, I suppose you could always ask the more experienced players to tutor you- sit down with ypu after a game and go over plays you made they'd have done differently.
As the local "to beat" guy: I usually do a sort of after action with my opponents where we could have done things different and how and where things go wrong, is that not something they do where you are OP? Since without knowing what goes wrong, we can't really advise you how to do better?
I mean, if you want to improve, I'd suggest you have post game chats in what your opponent can say you did wrong, and analyze the reasoning behind your actions and how it looked to them. I've learnt a lot more from my losses than my wins, and if your local area is competitive, I'm sure they relish the chance to have more opponents, even if they steamroll you, I'm sure they are willing to help you learn and catch up to them so the matches become fun for you. (At least, this was my experience.)
Best thing if found is find one person you really vibe with and play with them till it does “click”. Thats what I’m doing and it feels so much better than being waffle stomped by some hardcore player.
If u don't enjoy chess then it's hard to enjoy the aspect of kill team think of it ass a chess match mixed with call of duty u have to see the moves ahead of it happening so u can make and create a response that's the beauty of it it's entirely a different game then 40 k or combat patrol it's a game of wits outsmart your opponent if u have some of the best players in uk watch the game and analyze them see the motive behind the decision
Sounds like the level of your opponents are the problem, generally it can be educational to practice against better players but in all sports you wanna play real games against your peers
Love the minis hate the game. Try to find people with a non competetive focus, can stand losing a victory point over explaining rules and don’t discuss rules like a lawyer
Do the people you play with take it super serious? I know overly competitive atmosphere can suck of that isn’t your bag ya know? Maybe you could ask some of them for pointers?
Kill Team — and most GW products — have been focused on tournament play for the last few years. I really don't understand it, except maybe as a business decision (you can sell more models if you rotate out teams and constantly adjust the meta). In addition to trying the PVE rules, I'd say to check out other rule systems if you can find other people interested in playing them, since there are a lot that are more narrative-focused.
You should play bread & butter 2 apl teams against each other. Teams like Death Korps, Kommandos, Tempestus Aquillons, etc.
Elites teams don't really play normal Kill Team. If everyone is playing elites you will technically have a balanced game but it's like two players launching nukes at each other. I could see not enjoying this game if all I ever played against was broken Space Marine horseshit.
A year ago people recognized how broken elites were and this was common advice, and after multiple successive broken fomo boxes having a team of space marines that fly has become normalized.
Like if I run a Kroot guy up to a blob of your Death Korps guys and kill 3 of them you still have 11 guys left. That's obviously bad but it's not necessarily the end of the game. If you blunder away one of your elite units the game is over right then.
I would just look for different people to play with as a whole if it's that big of an issue. Not saying that the people you play with now are purposefully making you lose, but maybe look for someone around the same level as you. Have your tournament buddies shadow you so you get a better idea of what you need to work on. That input and you playing against someone thats in your lane will make the experience of the game feel a lot better
Kill Team is fundamentally the sweaty competitive warhammer game. That doesn't mean you can't or shouldn't play it as casually as you like, but it does mean that playing casually while trying to adhere to the many many rules and team rules interactions becomes slow, complicated, and mentally draining.
It also means that playing against someone who is on the other side of internalizing all of these things is not fun if you care about winning. The way to get on the other side is not to play ten more, once a a month 4 hour sessions, it's to treat decision making in a chess clock style and rip through dozens and dozens of games making decisions as fast as you can, then afterward understanding where you went wrong or broke the rules. If you played a dozen games over the course of two weeks where the highest rule is 'you have 30 seconds to complete your actions or you forfeit the turn', your mental model would develop so that you can think in front of the basic mechanics of the game and actually worry about tactics and points and stuff.
Please note that you don't have to do this at all. It's totally valid to just show up and go for it, but you clearly care about winning. And you can't start winning in a competitive sport until you internalize the fundamentals to the point that they no longer consume 100% of your brain power during the game.
If the only way you can "have fun" is to win you probably need to reflect on why that is.
It is a 1 vs 1 competitive game someone has to lose. The point of the game is to play, yes it has a winner but ultimately that is the icing on the cake not the cake. Going out, socialising, playing a game and the interactions that come from it are the prize not a win. It's especially going to cause stress in a game where you can theoretically play perfectly but the dice are just not on your side and lose.
The reason you're not improving is because you don't know why you're losing.
The #feelsbadman is because you're not achieving your goal, and that's because your goal is wrong.
Winning should always be a secondary goal, that way you can always have fun. Even the best players in any competetive arena lose. If you have to win all your games or even most, it's not gonna be very fun.
My first game was advertised as a 'friendly' 1k tournament of regular 40k and I got absolutely demolished by everyone and their meta lists, to come in last place, and that it prevented me from finding a group to play with for a solid year. Now that I found a different group to play with who play for fun, it's much more enjoyable win or lose!
Reminds me of a story my friend told me. It wasn't killteam, but he was new to big 40k and a player told him his list 'beginner friendly'. The list in question had a baneblade.
This is coming from other games, our play group had some of the best players in the world. Learning the games was a trial by fire where you would lose as until you caught up. The in between sucked
Same guys recommended I stay away from kill team due to the number of gotchas
I can relate. I started in 2e with my friend and it was a pretty rough time as he was really good and played desth korps, which was honestly pretty strong back then. I played phobos and it was an uphill battle as they weren't very strong.
I really enjoyed the mechanics and strategy that went into it, but I wasnt having fun due to a combination of stuff. I wasnt able to win, which would be fine, but it really felt like I couldn't do much with how death korp used to be able to cover so much ground early, score, and also set up much better than I could. If I moved up to score, he could use comms to give his melta an extra ap to dash and heavily Injure or kill a space marine. It didn't help he usually got lucky (I remember that he always rolled atleast 3 crits everytime he shot that melta). If i played back and picked off his men, I don't score and still lose. Also, they had alot more heavy hitting stuff like the demolition being able to throw the bomb into control range and detonate it (which is not a thing for anyone anymore in 3e) and could even give the basic trooper armor piercing on his lasguns. Combined with some bad luck and not being very good myself and I felt that I can accept not winning, but I wasn't sure if I was even learning or improving. Rng told me that my basic infiltrator could miss 3 shots and fail to kill a basic trooper but the melta gunner always scores 3 crits, especially on moments i needed it most. I try aggressive and defensive plays in different games and i still lose by large point differences, not sure what did or didnt work because it felt like every choice was the wrong choice in my end. I know it was a matter of getting good, and I really tried with different strategies and team comps, but it doesn't change the fact that I was still getting stomped out of the game and I felt like couldn't do anything without being punished hard.
I went a whole year without ever winning a game, and that was with the friend group who all fielded different teams.
My mental went down and I was honestly feeling anxiety when playing because every choice mattered so much and I was trying so hard to win and understand why i'm losing and have fun and not get punished for leaving my model exposed from a sight line I didn't expect and etc, etc. I was genuinely spiraling when playing and even when something went well, I didn't enjoy it because i felt like I needed miracles like that the entire game just to survive. I tried different teams because I felt like they are all so unique and fun, but also to see if I found a playstyle that fit me if space marines were not working. While the teams still had fun abilities, it was still outweighed by how one-sided I was losing. I was really hoping that mechanics and different playstyles would be fun enough to not care about losing but it didnt work.
We took a break from killteam, but I found that I still liked the game as I loved watching battle reports for killteam and trench crusade, so I came back for 3e. I'm having fun now, but I honestly think it's because alot of stuff in the game has changed and that my friends don't play nearly as much as we used to so we're all kinda meh at the game. The difference in power between the teams changed alot but i don't know how much that really effected my enjoyment because i'm just happy i won a single game. All I know is that some annoying stuff I didn't like (homing grenades, hard cover denying shooting at all) were removed and it felt better for me to look at the game with a fresh perspective, and i managed to win for the first time in 2 years. Yea, it was against my friend that was super rusty, but it still felt good to finally break the loss streak and not lose by a landslide.
I get where you're coming from, and I think it's important to acknowledge that getting steamrolled again and again isn't fun. Some people are ok with that and love the challenge or whatever, but I think you are also valid for not responding to it that way and wanting to have a sense of accomplishment beyond saying 'i tried my best' after an unsatisfying loss.
I would say to try and find someone at or below your skill level and see how that feels. Either of you would be making similar mistakes and not be so punishing to each other, so it may feel more satisfying and closer. I also think having a win in general may help you feel better or atleast help you understand what makes this game fun for you. Maybe try to find a wider pool of players at different shops or even online if possible. It's a mixed bag, i know, but where you're at, it seems to spawn really good players.
It sounds really rough going against people who are at a much higher skill level, so unless you can change your mental and find a way to deal with those feeling, it sounds like a lose-lose in that area where you either suffer through a beat down or just don't play In general.
Don't be afraid to take a break if you need to or even make a decision that this game may not be for you. Killteam made me realize that I like war games, but I can't possibly handle this stuff happening on the scale of an army. Atleast in skirmish games (that I like) I can alternate activations and keep track of a less rules and model stats.
Genuinely, I wish I had half the access to community that you do. Asking some of the top/tournament players for a coaching or strategy session, talking about how to successfully pilot a team, matchups, map strategies, where you’re falling short.
You’re more than welcome to dm me if you’d like to even start the discussion, but it starts with investment from you, and learning from others is almost always more efficient (and fun) than doing it on your own.
I've definitely gotten better as a player. And I know I'm lucky to have access to so many good players.
But it's more of a mental game. Im a very good painter but a very mediocre player.
I can only really play one game on the club might as I'm done and have no head space or the energy for another game.
There are just so many rules. And each team has it's own rules and ploys so it hard to keep all that in my head.
Its not about winning the game but feeling like it was at least close. I can't help but feel that I haven't given my opponent a good game and feel like I've also let myself down.
As I've said I also play 40k and have none of these issue apart from my heart rate going through the roof.
I'm also a pretty mid player in 40k but I don't feel like ever been curb stomped in that game.
It's hard to grow as a player when your lost half your team by turn three and not managed to score any thing and maybe killed two thing.
I just want to roll some dice and enjoy the experience.
Would love to share some methods of simplifying the game with you.
I think the cognitive overload and mental stack is what is making this “unfun” or at least having you feel like it isn’t clicking.
There are a lot of shortcuts you can apply to KT which are still within the rules, as well as ways to best communicate with your opponent to ease off your mental load.
Any sort of serious competitive play with this kind of thing is the wrong way to do it IMO. It’s silly nonsense with little figures set in an absolutely ridiculous fictional universe (which is all what’s really good about it) and should be enjoyed with that in mind
Get Table top simulator and join Command Point discord. This way you can play against both new and experienced players even from your home.
There are a lot of great people to play against. Newbies and Pro's alike. There is also a channel for each of the KillTeams where people share their experiences and help everyone improve.
And it's going to be hard to comprehend this, but you have to lose to get better. Took me a long time.
Losing with canoptek circle? I play the same and winn almost everything. They are top tier ATM. Downgrading to a less meta team to have more fun. What's your strategy?
The activation system kills it for me. I don’t do chess with guns…
I had a similar problem. I have many teams that I like and have built and painted. But every time I play the game it’s just a no fun trading game. All the new teams are just nuts and I’m not gonna buy one just because you have to, to be competitive. It’s supposed to be a fast game but the decision paralysis is insane. The missions… just don’t do it for me. The archetypes don’t do it for me either.
Just a lil vent idk if peeps have similar issues. I mostly played Harlequins and Kasrkins into Krieg or Nightlords. I have several marine teams but it’s way too easy.
I feel you. I love the lore, building, painting and reading White Dwarf but when it comes to playing ... Well meh. No matter how many times I read the rules, I still spend most if the time checking the rules and still getting them wrong. I feel the rules are unnecessary complex and vague which take away from the fun.
I know that feeling. Play trench crusade instead. Free rules and resources. Perfect system for kitbashing and conversions. Narrative over competitive approach.
I can't stand kill team. I love the idea of it and have a load of kill teams through being a 40k player but every time I've played KT it just feels really clunky and dense for no real payoff.
Worth checking out OPR Grimdark Firefight. It's more like older KT which I vastly prefer to the 2021 and newer versions which feel decidedly different than it used to (More "gamey", more competitive focused, less interesting fire team building with bespoke teams which are now the ONLY type of team, and SO much more rule/profile bloat which just turns into a lot of "Gotcha!" moments). They're much friendlier to just picking up and playing than how it is right now, where you really need to have consistent "reps" of playing and know your enemy's team as well as they do.
Otherwise to stick with current Kill Team it means getting a lot of reps, remembering a lot about *other* teams that you face, as well as all the tacked on missions and combat zones etc etc. Or checking out guides. But of course, given it's a GW game, your particularly team might currently not be ""good"" which doesn't help anything either.
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u/Professional-Paper75 Jul 04 '26 edited Jul 04 '26
Well if it makes you feel better I bought 6 teams, painted them up, learnt the rules deep.
Played one game: hated it.
Edit: my main reason for hating the one game I had was because it’s one thing to study rules and understand the game; but another thing to put them into practise. I do plan on playing more to get past that anxiety.