29 - Mo' Models, Mo' Problems

In this episode of the "Grown Men Playing With Toys" podcast, Erik and Steve tackle one of the most common experiences in the Warhammer 40K hobby — the impulse buy — and discover that they couldn't possibly approach it more differently.

Steve is the guy who walks into a GW store for a battle line unit for his current army and walks out with a flashy monster for a faction that he has never played. Erik is the guy who spends months talking himself into a new faction but then goes "all in" to collect the entire army once he is committed. Somewhere in between, they manage to explore:

• What even is an impulse buy and do you have to be standing in the store for it to count?
• The good, the bad, and the "I paid to paint an entire army I gave away"
• How nostalgia and pop culture fuel some of the hobby's best (and worst) financial decisions
• The impulse that lives inside the game — and why "I choose violence" is a completely valid tactical framework
• What happens when your impulse collides with everyone else's at the table?

Whether you've ever fallen in love with a model you'll never field, talked yourself into yet another army, or just stood in a GW store knowing full well you're about to make a terrible decision — this one's for you.

Check out our other content: https://gmpwt.blog/ https://www.youtube.com/@GrownMenPlayingWithToys

Transcript

Intro

SPEAKER_00 0:00

You do realize you just did like the nerd version of you ever seen those like on Instagram or YouTube or whatever where it's like a husband talking about his wife, he's like, it's all started with a sundress. You just did the like, it all started with the wings.

SPEAKER_02 0:16

Yeah, it did. I mean, that was my first introduction to my wing problem. Back again. Eric, how are we feeling today? We're feeling puzzled. Ooh, puzzled.

SPEAKER_00 1:08

Yeah, puzzled. Puzzled because you picked out the subject for this episode, and I think I made the comment that sounds like a great YouTube short. And you're like, no, like you're gonna have to be on your director's chair, you're gonna have to shut me up. I could go for three hours on this. So I am puzzled as to how you and I could look at the same subject and you see a dissertation and I see an executive summary.

Defining Impulse Buying

SPEAKER_02 1:37

I'm very excited. I'm very excited about what we're gonna talk tonight. I've actually been thinking about this all day, about can kind of some of the things that I want to talk about, because it's it's gonna be a little bit of a different vibe for the entire podcast, right? Because something we're gonna talk about is relevant to gameplay, but it's also relevant to like the hobby side of things, but it's also like you know, for you and I who are a little you know older in kind of this community, maybe, um, you know, nostalgia's a big thing, right? And I think that that plays a part in what tonight's topic's gonna be. So I'm not gonna give the topic away, Eric. I want you to tell everybody how excited you are to talk about this topic.

SPEAKER_00 2:25

So we're gonna talk, at least the way we framed it up, and it sounds like you've expanded the scope a little bit. The original idea was talking about impulse buys, and what is the best impulse buy story you have, and why did you buy that thing, and potentially how much trouble did it get you in at home.

SPEAKER_02 2:45

Oh, well, that is part of this, right? I think impulse buys are the big, the big anchor to this subject. But uh again, I think that there's just a lot that gets wrapped around the impulse of it, right? So, so this game, this community, whether you're playing AOS, whether you're playing 40k, whether you're playing whatever, right? These types of games, these types of things, they just they can draw you in, right? You get sucked in, you get excited about it, you go into the store, right? You're seeing all these fantastic models, amazing, different, you know, uh just things, right, that are a part of this universe, right? And so, you know, you're gonna be drawn into some of them that, you know, maybe aren't necessarily the most strategic buy in the world. And I think that so I think that's what we define as like an impulse buy, right? So to define it, I'll start there. From my perspective, an impulse buy is when I go into a store not expecting to purchase a model or even you know, paint or something like that, or terrain or whatever, you know. Um when I go into the store and I'm looking for something else, but I just can't not go home with that thing. That to me is what I define as an impulse by. So, Eric, what is your definition of an impulse by?

SPEAKER_00 4:21

I see, I see now how you can get a full hour plus out of this, because I don't know that I have ever experienced the situation you just described, because my Warhammer shopping experience goes something around the lines of this spend more hours than I should doing research, looking up the rules, potentially building a list on my phone, and then once I'm at the point where like, hey, I've got a list where I think this thing fits, now I'm going to go into a store with purpose to look for that one specific thing and buy that. So my there is a level of impulsiveness that goes along with my approach, but it is not the like I'm in the store, oh my god, I fell in love with whatever that Hell Drake thing is. I gotta have it. Yeah, it's I have never had that moment, but mine is I I certainly have I think I have more impulse buys than yours, but mine definitely come from a starting point of I have to do the research and build a list, and then when I see myself wanting to play that list, then I'll run out and get it.

Steve's Impulse Story

SPEAKER_02 5:40

So that's why I'm excited about this topic. Because I think it's a really fun part of you know, the hobby, right? I think it's a really fun part of being in this universe is that I look at an Impulse by as, and you kind of spoiled it, you know, the situation of when I first started playing 40K, right? My cousin, cousin Josh got me into playing 40k, and we, you know, we he came to visit, he brought these things, we're real excited, and we were playing orcs and necrons, and I'm like, this is really cool. Like, I I could get into this, like, all right, explain to me how this works. And he's like, Well, you know, you buy these models and then you get them and you have to put them together, and then you have to paint them, and you have to do all this other stuff, right? So I'm like, okay, cool. Well, I want to buy models that work with what you have here. So my intentions were let's go to the store, and we did. We got in the truck and we drove over. We Googled and found the closest store that sold GW stuff, and we we go in and um I I forget what I bought, but I I don't know. I bought like Orc Boys or something like that. It was some it was a normal starter model, right? But as I'm picking that up, I scan to my left, and there it is, right? This beautiful Hell Drake model that I'm like, what is that? Right? And so he goes, Oh, well, that's a Hell Drake. And I go, Well, what's that used in? And so he starts rattling off what it could be used for, and so then I look at the I I think it's on the back, or maybe I looked it up on my phone. Uh, I can't remember the box art. But basically, I looked up the box art and there was this beautiful like blue and gold gilded one that somebody had done up for the Thousand Suns color scheme. And I'm like, Yep, I'm buying that thing. I had no purpose buying it. It was not for any reason, but I bought that model. Now, what that led to is something interesting, and I think that this is kind of where I do want to talk a little bit. So, your definition of impulsive buy is kind of really funny because to me, there's no impulse in that at all. There's nothing, right? You have researched it, you understand what it is, you're now setting out with a mission. I bought a Hell Drake that spun me into developing and building an entire Thousand Suns army, of which I was terrible at playing, and I kind of hate it the entire time. But the whole purpose of me getting into Thousand Suns was because I still and to this day, and even on our Instagram, I have a picture of the Hell Drake that I bought that I painted to that color scheme because it's so cool, right? So the moral of the story for here, and what I do want to get into is impulse buying can can be good and it can be bad. And I think sometimes it'll work out for you, and sometimes it won't work out for you. And so I think we can definitely play off of that and talk through that a little bit.

SPEAKER_00 9:05

You do realize you just did like the nerd version of you ever seen those like on Instagram or YouTube or whatever, where it's like a husband talking to his wife, he's like, It's all started with a sundress. You just did the like it all started with the wings.

SPEAKER_02 9:21

Yeah, it did. I mean, that was my first introduction to my wing problem. Um, so so yeah, I mean, and it is a cool model, it's a super cool model, but I went in with intentions of playing an army and came out with an expensive model that quite frankly, it sits on my shelf right above where I'm sitting right now, and I look at it every day, and I'm very happy with it and I love it, but I am never gonna play it. And so there's an aspect of impulse buying in this game, because the models can be so expensive, can also lead you down some really interesting paths, and we can talk about that for a second. So we'll get into that, but first you walked through what to you impulse buying means, right? And so we'll even take the buying out of it, right? But I think what you're actually getting at is the discovery of how you move into figuring out what you like from one faction to another, and figuring out how maybe you expand your army ideals. Um talk about that a little bit because I I think it's really interesting that that's what you call your impulse, but it's really it's highly structured, and you know, you kind of come into that with a real good plan, and you know, I don't know, help me to understand where the impulse is.

Erik's Slow Burn Impulse

SPEAKER_00 10:53

I I think it's funny in that when we were spitballing this episode idea, you you're like, yeah, you know, I've I've got a couple of impulse buys, and you rattled off the names of the models, and you know, the Hell Drake was one of them. And I was like, Man, I've got impulse armies. Exactly. Let's talk about that. So for me, it's a I mean, I I think we've talked about I think you enjoy the totality of the Warhammer experience more than I do. I enjoy the game and the playing of the game more than you do. And so for me it it always starts from the like we we talked in one episode about both of our experience getting into it, and for me it was a like I can't just jump in. I I spent the whole time when you guys are like, yeah, and that like orcs and like you call the wa and like they have DACA, and I'm like, but there's a book over there I haven't read. I don't I haven't read the rule book. I don't know what I'm doing. Like, it can I can you leave me alone for three hours so I can go read the rule book, please? And I think there's an element of that where part of what hooks me is you know, I have the factions that I that I would call mine that I play, and it started with space marines and necrons. And I always kind of like I think early on when you sent me the total list, I was like, oh, Grey Knights sounds cool. I didn't know anything about them, they just sounded cool.

SPEAKER_02 12:21

Right.

SPEAKER_00 12:22

But at first it was space marines and necrons, and then I was like, but I you know, these gray knight things, the more I learn about them, the more I get excited about it. I always kind of knew that's where I wanted to work up to. And then I got there and I I had like those three armies that were quote unquote mine, and then my boys played a couple different armies that uh I had to learn so I could teach them. And then what I found when I hit a point where it's like, okay, I I understand enough about the game, and I've got these armies, and Necrons and Space Marines don't play exactly the same, but they both play a pretty honest standard variant of 40k that's a mixed arms type approach, maybe a little bit more shooting than melee. So for me, it was the opportunity to discover and enjoy the diversity of the game that led to the like I would find myself, I think we've talked about I love listening to a lot of the the social media class or the podcast class where they'll you know a new rules update comes out pretty germane to today, and everyone gets on YouTube or the whatever podcast and they'll tell you their breakdown of it. I eat that stuff up. I love listening to that stuff. I don't take it as gospel, but I love listening to it. And it what I find is like I'll almost get this brainworm. Like it it happened last summer with Chaos Knights, where Chaos Knights codex comes out and everyone starts talking about it. I'm like, you know, I really like Emperor's Children and Chaos Space Marines. And I like how Chaos plays more aggressively than Imperial armies. And I don't really have an army that has a mechanic like Chaos Space, like that kind of creeping as the game goes along, progressive, your aura-based thing. I don't have an army that plays that way. So I haven't really learned that style. This is a part of the game I haven't explored yet. And it was like a over the span of two to three weeks, I kind of talked myself into a you know, I I could probably do this. I I I could enjoy this, I could see myself liking this. And then like lo and behold, like I'd I'd ordered a Chaos Knights codex. I'm like, well, yeah, I'm just it I'll just experiment with list building. Like it, I'll just see. And then I built like two or three lists, I'm like, well now I gotta play it because I want to see what these lists do. So that that's kind of like the progressive I slide into talking myself into a bad decision process.

Thousand Sons - A Lesson in Regret

SPEAKER_02 14:53

Eric. I'm gonna build you an avatar called slow impulse. Yep. Because you have the slowest impulse I've ever seen. Me, I go into a store and I buy an entire new faction just because it has a cool flying model. You're like, let me slow roll this earworm I have of I I think I might like this, and then let me roll into it. So, okay, so we've both kind of talked about, you know, where impulse kind of lies in in what you know we do from I I guess from selection of model and thing like that, right? Um, I kind of want to talk about the goods and the bads of Impulse because I think there are some really good ones and there are some really bad ones. And this this whole the whole idea behind this, I'm hoping is that we can talk through some of the things that we've experienced and seen with, you know, uh the folks we play with or with ourselves, um, around, you know, just being aware of what what this game can do when you have impulsive thoughts, I guess. When you let the impulsive thoughts in. So I want to start out with I talking about Thousand Sons, right? I went hard into Thousand Suns, right? It was because I bought a Hell Drake, and then I started looking into some of the other models, and I really just love the paint scheme, and I love the aesthetics, I love the idea that these guys are dust, you know, Egyptians, and you know, they're like dust wizard Egyptians, which is also pretty freaking cool. And so I'm like, wow, this is really awesome! Okay, great. Let me just stockpile as much as this stuff, um, and let me get it all in. And I mean, I went to painting, I went to the whole nine yards, I hadn't played anything yet, and I had this army and I was really proud of it. It looked really good, it presented well. It was like this big giant blue, you know, sea of awesome dust wizards on on the table, and it it was amazing, right? Then I started playing them, and I just did not jive with them. There were aspects of them that I thought was really cool, but they were almost infuriating for me to play because it just felt like I was fighting myself the whole time, and so then I'm stuck in this like loop, right? I'm stuck in this aspect of man, I I have a lot of money on the table. I got a lot of blood, sweat, and tears on the table, and it's not fitting me. So there's there's an aspect of sometimes this hobby brings out that impulse in you, right? But you gotta be aware of it, you gotta think through it because you can pull a Steve and get stuck with a 2000-point army of really coolly painted, um, I mean, really coolly painted Thousand Sons that I I don't play. As a matter of fact, actually, a friend of ours plays them now. Um so, you know, they're my my models are are being used, but they're not being used by me. So I think that that's kind of one of the areas where, you know, when you're very impulsive and there's lots of little things in in this universe that that can lead to your impulsive thoughts creeping in. Just be just be cognizant of that. Other than that, go go wild. What what did Ted Lasso say? You you do what you do, like you you do what you want. Like go out there and do it. But yeah, I just want to a public disclaimer that um impulse led me to a very expensive shelf dweller. Not just one. Yeah, well, we could talk about the others too, but yes, you're correct. So I mean with you though, your impulse is a little bit different. So can you talk about the excitement that you've gotten out of so you talked about your chaos nights a little bit, right? Um talk about what it what it really has done for you. I know that you play a lot of games and you do a lot of your you know, battle reports and things like that. But I've seen over the last year or two years or so that impulse has actually taken you down some really interesting places from a strategic perspective. And I think that that's a really good thing that comes out of impulse in the game.

SPEAKER_00 19:39

Yeah, so it and I mean it's probably very true to our personalities that yours is very aesthetically driven and mine is very nuts and bolts driven. Like me my impulse as it relates to 40k is almost like the kid who used to take apart the the CD player or the VCR or the fan just to see how it would work. Like I there's a part of this game that I'm fascinated by the variety of interactions you can have in the game, the variety of playstyles you can have with different armies, the the different variety of rules and how they interact with each other. And so I think a lot of it has just been a like I'm not gonna claim that I'm interested and I love them all, but there's a bunch where I'm like, oh, like I haven't tried this thing yet. I wonder if I'd like it. I'm interested in trying it out. I'm curious how the things that I do really like and that I do understand interact with it. And I mean, hypothetically, I could get on TTS and just try all this stuff and save myself a lot of money, but I also have this weird brainworm where I want the physical tactile interaction of standing up, walking around, seeing it on the table. Um, I'm probably the most OCD about everyone in our playgroup about having a fully painted, fully based, like looks like an army army, and I'll I won't even play something myself unless I have no other option, unless it's fully painted. So I for me it's all about exploring those different rules and interactions, and it's I don't know, it's it's why I have so much fun with the battle reports. I don't just try and chase the meta with them. I'll look at okay, what are some interactions that sound like they would produce a a meaningful and kind of exciting experience? And then I I want to go see how that looks.

SPEAKER_02 21:37

So my next aspect of like this this impulsive aspect, right? So to that point, right? You got into practicing, right? Why did you get into practicing? What drove that? Because to me, this is one of your one what I would consider one of the biggest impulse wins. I've seen you have.

SPEAKER_00 22:03

A couple things. One I'm not so we we did an episode a couple back about, you know, list hammer and math hammer and then war hammer and the relationship between the three. I'm not very good at list hammer and math hammer. Like my first yield first yield rate going through that process is not good. So one of the things I found is when I wasn't playing very frequently, I would spend a lot of time doing list and math hammer, and I'd put something together, and then it just it wouldn't work on the table the way I envisioned. It my first iteration of it would be really bad. And I was getting really frustrated by kind of, you know, we we would show up to Barnhammer, I'd go to play in my LGS, and I mean there's probably another episode we could talk about, but things would get more competitive than they probably should in a friendly casual environment. And I would leave feeling really bummed out because I went in there to kind of workshop and figure out, okay, I've got this list, I know I'm not great at getting it through the first time, I want to workshop it, and all of a sudden I'm getting my face stomped in, and I'm not learning a whole lot from it. So the practicing started from a point of, well, I need a way to build a feedback loop into my bit list building because I know I'm not good at getting it the first time, and I'm not even if I just go netlist something, I'm a very experiential-based learner. So I would I needed a way to test these things and to build a feedback loop for myself. And then when I started doing it, I fell in love with the process of practice and the ability to understand both the micro and the macro of what was going on. And and that led to the impulse of well, now that I'm doing this for four armies, like what happens if I expand it to six or eight or twelve.

SPEAKER_02 24:04

So now, folks, now we're finally seeing where the impulse eric comes out because it it's real. Um you know, the more that he gets into the these practices and seeing the different things that can happen and what the what-ifs, right? We do a lot of what-ifs. Um, the what-ifs start coming out. Well, what if this one faced off against this one on this map, you know, and this this whole thing. And then next thing you know, Eric's off building a whole nother army and you know, building another table in his shop so that he can make space for a second table or something. I don't know. You you you'd go down that route. And I but but I think that, you know, I talked a little bit about where in this hobby, um, you know, that kind of impulsiveness that can come with this type of a hobby can lead you down a bad road. I think that in this case, it led you down a great road. I mean, you have found a way to embrace the hobby um that, you know, it scratches the itch of that impulse, which is I I need to figure out what all these things do. I need to take the fan apart and figure out how it works. Um, and so I think that that's a really good kind of you know, juxtapose against my kind of bad version, um, which I think is really cool and it's really fun.

SPEAKER_00 25:26

I don't think it's I don't think either version is a good or a bad version. I think they both come with their pluses and minuses. Like it, I know one of the minuses that goes along with mine is I can be really annoying when it comes to our Barnhammer group because you'll get the and it's not just our Barnhammer group that does this. I think this is the general community. You'll get a oh well, you know, that detachment in this book is bad, so why bother playing it? I'm like, I'm three games deep into it. You sure it's bad?

SPEAKER_02 25:57

I I wouldn't say that okay. Well, it was bad for my bank account. Let's put it that way.

SPEAKER_00 26:02

Yeah, it yours is I mean, both of our approaches are bad for our bank accounts, let's be honest here. I it there's a meme that I resemble where it's someone takes a picture of their Warhammer army and says, My nightmare is that when I die, my wife is gonna sell my Warhammer army for what I told her I spent on it.

The Baneblade - When Impulse Works

SPEAKER_02 26:24

That's very accurate. Um, but my wife listens to this podcast, so honey, they didn't cost me anything, okay? We we traded for them. Um so alright, so we've talked a little bit about the good, the bad. I do have a good story, by the way. Uh, you know, I gotta share it, right? So I had another similar interaction, right? So the Hell Drake got me into Thousand Sons, but there was a model that got me into Imperial Guard, and everybody's gonna roll their eyes when I say this. But I every time I went into a store, the biggest box in there for an individual model was a Bane blade, and I would look at this thing and just be like, that is so stinking cool. Like I I honestly I just wanted the model, and so the I didn't buy it. It was one of the one times where I was like, you know what, I'm just gonna let this ride, right? I didn't buy it, but then I started doing something similar to what you do, Eric, where I took that impulse and I kind of turned it into a curiosity, and I said, Okay, let me let me look into the guard. And then, you know, we started talking about, well, yeah, they kind of do fit your playstyle, and here's some of the things you could do with them. And then I was like, you know, reading some of the lore and things like that, and learning about Cadia, and I'm like, wait, I could paint an entire army like Canadians, that is awesome. And you're like, no, they're Canadians. I'm like, no, in my mind, they're Canadians, and he's like, Oh, sure. They're my favorite painted army that I have today, right? But now I have Canadian painted infantry who that required a very, very large tank, right? So that impulse led to this whole interaction, which led to me actually getting a bane blade. And when I got the bane blade, I was like, I'm not just gonna, I'm so here's the bad part of it, right? I'm not just gonna build one of these. I'm gonna make this thing completely magnetized so that I can have every version of the bane blade that there is possibly out there to have whenever I want it. It will all be painted appropriately so that every aspect of that, if however I want to play it, whatever configuration it can be there on the board. I think I took what, I don't know, it was like three weeks, I think, finally, to get that thing all put together, and then it probably took me another month to paint that dang thing. But it's the coolest bane blade, in my opinion, that there is out there. I mean, it is freaking cool. I put a desert storm package on this thing. I created custom tiger stripes, it is awesome. But again, an impulse led me to finding, right, a really good army that that actually fit my playstyle, which now I'm engrossed in. It's one of my favorite armies that I play. Um, and it's probably the largest army that I have collected. So I do have a good story to go along with the fact that I'm terrible when I go into a GW store and I spend way too much money on these things.

SPEAKER_00 29:44

I mean, it you're reminding me of there is an area where and it's where the brain worn also starts for me. And it it's probably like you said, the slow burn impulsiveness. But the way you described that with the like, oh, I you know, for you it's I see the model, and then I start thinking about I start looking into it, I start doing research, and then I think of like this paint scheme and the narrative behind the paint scheme. I am probably the biggest nerd ever when it becomes to that kind of stuff because I I will do like full, like I don't do the whole I'm gonna create my own custom war band or chapter or that, but I will find ways to as I'm talking myself into something to connect it to something that I really care about in pop culture or nerd culture, and to combine the two, like no joke, and this is the level of nerd that I am. When I first got into Space Marines after we did the like, hey, try orcs, and I just fought you for an hour, and then I wanted to go read the book instead of being social. Like, I came back and I had two fully painted thousand-point armies, one was space marines and one was Necrons, and you're like, Oh, like that's really cool, and they're cool space, you know, cool paint schemes. Like, what what are you going for with space marines? Like, is that white scars? Uh, and and what dynasty for the Necrons? I'm like, No, no, no, hold on. Like, I'm gonna put some music on my phone when we start deploying. You ready? And you're like, okay, so you deploy first, and I you know, clicked on it, was like, dun, dun, dun, dun, dun, dun, dun, dun, dun. Like, they're stormtroopers, get it?

SPEAKER_02 31:28

Yeah, I mean sorry, that broke me a little bit because you were very excited to put his stormtroopers and Darth Gilliman out onto the table.

SPEAKER_00 31:43

I still get a giggle every time I like when I bring my space marines to the LGS, and everyone's just like, oh, white space marines. Are they white scars? I'm like, no, they're stormtroopers. Get it? They think they're the good by good guys, but they're really the evil empire. You know, there's Darth Gilliman. So I I'll have this whole like Voltron of nerd pop culture that goes into all of my armies, and I've printed and scrapped and repainted multiple armies while I try and get the right combination of nerd culture combos in them. Like my my space marines are stormtroopers, and they're meant to mimic Star Wars. My Blood Angels, which are a variant of the Space Marines, that's when I was watching the Mandalorian, and so they're like the special Mandalorian the the dark troopers or whatever that have the jet packs that they're breeding in the Mandalorian. The Necrons, I mean, easiest reference ever, but they're little Terminators and they're all painted up to look like you know Terminator 2 movie. So I've got one of those for literally every one of my armies except for Emperor's Children.

SPEAKER_02 33:00

And it just Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. Wait a second. No, no, no, that's not true. Emperor's Children has an impulsive paint scheme.

SPEAKER_00 33:11

What's the impulsive paint scheme? I mean, Chaos Space Marines 100% does. Emperor's Children, which is an offshoot of the Chaos Space Marines one, I'm not sure.

SPEAKER_02 33:20

So in your impulse, you went, Hey Steve, I really want to paint these guys really good and I really care about this. So I'm calling it out that that's the one where your impulse went, Hey, I should, I should maybe, maybe dial it back and and I really want to put some love and effort into painting these guys. So they're impulsively different than you normally do because your paint schemes generally you get an idea in your head, and then you're gonna go out there and you're gonna you're just gonna battle your way through that paint and you're gonna get through it as fast as you possibly can. But on that one, it was like, mmm, maybe, maybe I want to take my time on this one, or I want to do something special or different. And it was it was actually a complete flip for you. So that I don't know. That could be an impulse as well.

SPEAKER_00 34:08

I'll give you that one so that yeah, they are actually I'll run through the roster because it I don't know I've ever thought about it holistically, and it is tremendously nerdy. But my Space Marines are painted like the Stormtroopers from the Star Wars movies with Darth Gilliman. My Necrons are painted like specifically Terminator 2, the Terminator robot in that movie. Um Blood Angels, like I said, the the Dark Troopers from the Mandalorian, the Grey Knights, which I'm on my fourth iteration that I finally settled on a paint scheme that I like, because I went back and forth with them multiple times and hated the paint scheme each time. I finally settled on, they're all painted up to look like Dark Jedi from Star Wars as well, and they've all got like little lightsabers, and some of them I kit bash so they have dual-wielding lightsabers, so they look like little Darth Mauls. So I've got those custodies, they're my current impulse problem. I'm scrapping and repainting my custodies because I fell in love with the Targaryen armor from a Knight of the Seven Kingdoms, so I'm having them all repainted to look like the Targaryens when they do the the Trial of the Seven in kind of the black with silver spiked armor with the red cloaks. So I've got that going on. Uh Chaos Space Marines, which is probably the funniest and most random impulse, was you were showing me your blood angels and you were talking about how cool they were, and I was like, hey, they kind of look like Shawn Michaels getup from the old WWE. And you you went on a tangent, you're like, yeah, he was my favorite wrestler, and like that guy stunk. Bret Hart was way cooler. And they're like, I can paint my Chaos Space Marines to look like Bret Hart. And then lastly, the Chaos Knights are painted to the big knights look like Mighty Morphin Power Rangers, and the little knights are a tribute to all of the unique Chaos Space Marine detachments.

SPEAKER_02 36:15

So do you guys remember when I started this show? I talked about how we were going to talk about impulsive buys and all this stuff, and Eric was gonna come into this show and he was thinking we were gonna talk about what's our greatest impulse buys and all this other stuff. Well, I just want everybody out there to know that I got Eric to talk about one, the nostalgia that goes into the impulsiveness of his paint schemes, but also I timed it. That was like three and a half minutes of Eric straight talking about nerding out over the hobby aspect of Warhammer, and I am so here for it. I honestly I could sign off right now and I have made my night. He it's I'm over here losing.

SPEAKER_00 37:02

I'm still not through all my armies, by the way.

SPEAKER_02 37:04

You have more to go. I do know that, but I just I just want to point it out that there was a I was I was really trying to cook that one the whole way here, trying to paint that whole picture so that we could get you talking about the nostalgia aspect of this because I think it's really cool, and you just talked about it. So one of the most impulsive things I think that you get is you'll be sitting there doing something, and all of a sudden you'll be like, I could paint it like this, and then we lose you, and then you're off you're off painting all of your you know um Emperor's children to look like Bret Hart with zebra stripes and pink, and he was not the coolest wrestler. I'm sorry, man, he he just wasn't.

SPEAKER_00 37:47

I I mean I get it was, but that's fine. But yeah, I mean you're right. And I mean, if I'm being honest and rounding it out to further prove your point, like I've got my Harlequins, which was an impulse, granted, probably the easiest and cheapest army to impulse by, but one of the hardest to paint unless you do what I did. That's the Crow movie, like the old Brandon Lee one, which I absolutely adore, even though it's not a great movie, but still I I love it because I saw it at a time in my life where I was just like, this is the coolest thing ever. Old classic. Yep. The I have way more orcs than I should, and they're all painted to look like war boys from Mad Max Fury Road.

SPEAKER_02 38:34

I mean, your orcs are really cool, though. I think it just fits the orc aesthetic in general, but it it they are really cool.

SPEAKER_00 38:42

Yeah, it it's and if I'm being very honest, the one that of the armies that I routinely play that annoy the crap out of me, and I won't touch them because they're technically my sons, and he loves them dearly, and he has put a lot of work into painting them. Every time I see a tyrannid, I think Starship Troopers and the bugs there, and I just want to go repaint all the Tyranids that are in my house to match that, and I know I can't because they're my sons, and I but yeah, that's another one where this nostalgia kicks in and I have to restrain myself.

SPEAKER_02 39:21

So I'm really excited about this because it it actually worked. I had to hoodwink you into having a discussion about paint, and and I'll tell everybody out there, Eric will talk about paint, but I guarantee you he's gonna roll his eyes. But see, the thing is, Eric's paint schemes have to come to him on an impulse. It's one of those things in this this you know hobby that we're in where I think it's really cool when you get an impulsive thought and you can go off and you can go, you can go paint your entire army to look like whatever you want. I mean, you see them all the time uh, you know, on on Facebook or on Google or Reddit or whatever, right? People that just get really creative um with the paint schemes. And I I think that that's one area where having you know impulsive actions is really cool. So, all right, so I've grilled you now, and I made you thoroughly excited but uncomfortable at the same time. Um, I know you had some things about impulse that you want to grill me on, and I am an easy target on this one, so go ahead.

SPEAKER_00 40:26

I mean, I think you already self-disclosed them, which is the yours is very aesthetically driven, yours is like every time you you come home from the dork store and you tell me about the thing that you probably shouldn't have bought. I I just inside my head I'm like, you probably fell in love a lot as a kid, didn't you? Like, you're probably the kid who came home in like seventh grade and was like, Mom, I'm in love. There's this girl, and I'm in love, and she sits next to me in science, and I'm just like, and now you just have the ability to, you can just buy that thing.

Impulse During a Game

SPEAKER_02 40:59

Well, that's the nostalgia aspect for me, right? So, like, as a kid growing up, I mean, I grew up in an age where commercials and things like that for toys were like that's how you found your toys, right? You watched a commercial on TV, I don't know. Tyco RC was like I wanted Tyco RC in the worst way, and those dang things were expensive, and my parents were not buying three of them because I come from a family of three, so never got them, but they had the coolest commercials. So sometimes like when I walk into like a GW, it is a little bit as an adult, like walking in there, and in like in my mind, it's like walking into like one of those toy commercials, but like I can actually like afford one and touch it and take it home with me. So, yeah, a little bit. I mean, there it is, um, I don't know, I guess like a a a romantic aspect to the whole the whole thing. Um, but there's there's other aspects of impulse for me that I I find really interesting in 40k. It's not just on the aesthetics, there there are other things, um, good things. So we talk a lot about understanding the tactics and understanding um how to play the game and um what to do when you're in the game. One of my favorite aspects about this game is you are constantly battling impulse. Constantly. You are in a tug of war in a game of do I do this, do I do that? Your opponent could potentially be trying to make that harder on you, you know, make you have more decisions. And so, like you're constantly trying to think through that from a strategic perspective. It is my favorite part, hands down, of playing this game. It's just the fact that from the start, from the first roll of the dice, you're trying to do logic, you're trying to fight impulse, you're trying to decide which one to go with. And that turmoil is something that I just think makes this game so so cool. It's it's so you know engaging. It's my favorite part. So that's the that's the other side of impulse, I think, for me, when it comes to 40k stuff, not just buying and the aesthetics of the models, which are really cool, but I also think it's the aspect of inside to the game, you know, being able to kind of choose your fate, and you're gonna live and die by it. And sometimes in the moment you just gotta go with your gut. Trust that impulse. But sometimes that can that can get you too. So it's I don't know, it's it's a really cool thing to me, and that's that's my favorite part of playing.

SPEAKER_00 43:44

I mean, I I'm with you on that one. It it's a human side of playing it that I love. It's why I I I love like this is my version of playing video games. Like, I don't play video games all that much in Anymore because I find it doesn't have that level of impulse, I I guess you're calling it, where I just find it a very human experience because you're battling both sides of your brain. You're like and it fits now that I'm saying it out loud, it fits with the pattern of how I fall in love with armies and how my impulse brainworm starts. But the other thing I've noticed, like, you want to know what my absolute favorite thing to do in the middle of a game is, and it's I don't even realize I'm doing it half the time, and I know I picked well, I know where I got it from, which is I got it from one of my favorite TV shows, and I also got it from you, but now I'll just unconsciously do it, which is when I draw my secondaries and I'm doing the thing at the beginning of the turn where you know everyone kind of surveys the board and you're building the plan for the turn, and you're trying I will talk to myself when I'm doing that, so I'll be talking to myself about what I'm trying to do this turn, and then I inevitably I'll make the decision, and it's like, do I want to go do an action or do I want to go do this other thing and try and kill a unit? And like I'll just say it start, uh I started saying out loud, I'll just go, I choose violence.

SPEAKER_02 45:12

Heck yeah. And do not judge Eric for talking to himself because if you are saying that you don't talk to yourself when you're playing 40k, you are absolutely lying to yourself right now. Everybody does. Your internal monologue is going haywire when you're doing it. I don't care if you think that the little guy is cool on the table, or you're sitting here going, man, what do they want to do? What do I want to do? Where do we want to go? And absolutely, I 90% of the time choose violence as well. I think that's probably my impulse in the game. Actually, that's an interesting thought. Because sometimes my my impulse is very you know what I'm gonna do most of the time.

SPEAKER_00 45:54

I was gonna say, you and I have played enough that I know if I put a juicy target out there, you're gonna go for it. Yeah, of course. Because I already see that thing die. Yeah, like we there are more than probably five games that we have played each other over the past year where I will put something that looks like a juicy target out. You'll look at me and you'll go, That's your distraction, isn't it? I'll be like, I don't know. And you'd be like, I'm pretty sure that's your distraction. I don't know, man. And then you do like this three-minute talking yourself into I know that's his distraction, but how cool would it be if I killed that thing? I think I can kill that thing. Like, yeah, but it's his distraction. Yeah, but I really want to kill that thing. You know what? I'm gonna screw it. Like, I'm gonna go kill that thing. And then you're inevitably you'll go kill that thing. And then you'll turn to me afterwards, you'll be like, was that the distraction? Did I did did did I do what you wanted me to do? Am I in trouble now? Like, I don't know, we'll see.

SPEAKER_02 46:56

I mean that happens like almost every time we play, but the the it it's real. And and to be honest with you, I will um it is infuriating to people that optimize the game. Um, but sometimes I will just throw out the whole strategy of the game because I want to go kill that thing, and I just want to see it go down, and yeah, so um, you know. Maybe I should just always go against my impulse in the game.

SPEAKER_00 47:30

Do the George Costanza from Seinfeld just do the opposite of what your natural instinct says, and all of a sudden you're gonna be like the top-rated player in the world.

SPEAKER_02 47:40

Watch, I'm going to worlds because I just pick what I would normally do and totally say, screw it up going the other way. I've been playing the wrong factions this whole time. I've been buying the wrong models, I've been having the wrong strategy. I'm just gonna flip everything on their head. That's it, cousin Josh. I'm playing Necrons next time.

SPEAKER_00 48:02

All right, I've got a question for you, and this one's a little bit out of left field, but I think it fits into the impulse, which is what do you do when people's impulse because two pla you know, 40k is a two-player game that typically I've noticed people form communities. What do you do when your impulses start to clash with each other?

SPEAKER_02 48:22

That's a good one. Um from my perspective.

SPEAKER_00 48:25

I'll use I'll use myself as an example of what I mean by that is you asked me at the beginning why did I why did I start practicing? My impulse was clashing with the larger group's impulse because I was getting very frustrated. I'm like, every time we get together, everyone plays the same exact army. Everyone plays pretty much the same exact list. We're we're not exploring the diversity of the game at all. We're all just playing the same thing over and over again. And eventually I had to realize like I can't force other people to go do different things just to meet, you know, to help me scratch the itch that I have. So I had to go find another solution.

SPEAKER_02 49:04

I think to that point, right? I kind of touched on it a little bit there in my rant. Um but you know, sometimes my impulse is to not do the optimum thing, right? I know that my friends, I drive them up a wall. And and that's I guess that's a clash, right? It's a clash. I mean, I I I think that in the end, right, everybody is gonna have this like inner thing that's gonna tell them like yay or nay, right? Just like randomly buying hell drakes when you walk into the store. Um I I think it takes time to realize when people when people are doing that. I mean, I I've seen that with you, right? Like it it took you time to realize that you had to find a way to practice, you had to find a way to to get into that diversity of the game and expand kind of your knowledge. Because if I'm being honest, I think we we saw from you an aspect before you started doing this where you were just kind of bored. You were kind of bored, like you weren't getting the satisfaction out of playing the game because it felt very repetitious to you. Um, and I think that, you know, uh honestly, it's it's really hard to know when your impulses are clashing like that. Um I mean, you can be a uh butthead like me and do it just to tick everybody off in the room because I think it's funny. Um but you know, I I think that this is one of those ones where when it feels weird and it it feels off, maybe just have this in the back of your mind of like, hey, that's probably not what their brain's telling them to do. That's you know, probably not the the random idea that they popped into their head is optimize this way, right? Instead of whatever I did. Um, you know, I think that that's the grace part of playing a two-person game or even multiplayer game, I guess, in any way. You know, have that grace to know that that you're the other people around you aren't potentially sharing in the same impulse as you are. Not everybody's going into GW and buying a Hell Drake just because it's a cool and pretty model with really neat paint schemes.

SPEAKER_00 51:28

I mean, maybe there's a lot of people doing that, but then I'm betting there are a lot of very unhappy painters because I've heard that model is brutal to paint.

SPEAKER_02 51:37

That model is excruciating to paint. Um, and I did the best job I ever did, and I I painted that when I first started painting too. And it's one of those ones where like I look at it now and I'm like, oh man, I could do so much better. And I'm like, yeah, but I'm not gonna. It's just that's just the way it is, and it's gonna stay that way because I just I I I already am losing a ton of my hair, and I don't need to lose more over another model.

SPEAKER_00 52:05

So that that leads me to a question. What's the biggest impulse 40k thing you've done that you regretted? Oh, that I regret it? Yeah. And then follow-up question the biggest impulse 40k thing that you've done that you didn't regret.

SPEAKER_02 52:24

Um I don't have a 40k one. I have actually an Age of Sigmar one.

SPEAKER_01 52:31

That works too.

SPEAKER_02 52:33

I bought an entire, what are they, Battle Force or what the an entire box, spearhead box? No, the bigger one. What's the bigger one?

SPEAKER_00 52:42

Uh we'll call it a battle force, yeah. Yes, it the big box.

SPEAKER_02 52:46

I bought an entire big box of the daughters, and um I never played them, not once. I didn't even put any of them together. I paid for it, paid and shipped, and I gave it to somebody because I got into reading their rule book and kind of seeing I think we played a spearhead, maybe, or I watched somebody play a spearhead, and I'm like, Yep, that's not for me. All right, they're really cool models, and I loved them. I'm all into it, but ship that sucker right up the road. Like uh, you know what I'm learning through this podcast is that um if you're really close to me, you're probably at some point gonna get some free 40k models.

SPEAKER_00 53:26

I was gonna say you have an absolute talent for falling in love aesthetically with something that you hate from a rules perspective.

SPEAKER_02 53:36

It's why I am so careful of getting into like AOS because I love all of them and I know nothing about their rules. So it's like it's like okay, don't don't even look. Like I just look away when I walk into that store. I just I just I look away from that section because I wait until I understand the rules first, and then I will buy accordingly, or I wait till somebody says, Hey, this is this type of an army and they fit you this way because I I I I can't. I I just will buy an army based off of aesthetics, and it bites me in the butt every time. So that's probably my worst Steve.

SPEAKER_00 54:19

Sons of Behemoth.

SPEAKER_02 54:21

Yes, I like to stuff things in a bag, that is amazing, and I should have bought the Giants the first time when I went in here. Although they're also a really cool model, so I I don't know why I didn't buy them, but anyway, so that's my worst one. Definitely I bought an entire army, and I never even put one of the models together. I just gave it away.

SPEAKER_00 54:45

I think it was me who played Daughters of Cain in a game of Spearhead. It was like my one game of Spearhead, and you are watching me play them just with this look of abject horror on your face, while I'm going, you know, I was pretty judgy about this AOS thing, but this army's pretty cool, and you're like, oh my god, that looks terrible.

SPEAKER_02 55:05

It was horrible. I'm like, no, there's nothing about this that I like. Uh give me those giants over there. Let's stuff some stuff in a bag. Oh man. So yeah, that's that's my worst one. What's your what's you wait, what's your worst one?

SPEAKER_00 55:23

So my worst one, and I'm I'm not even sure if you were aware that I did it, but it technically somewhere in my house I have fifteen hundred points of Imperial Knights. And then the Yeah. I've got fifteen hundred points of Imperial Knights, and I played like a game and a half with them, and I hated it. Wow. And so they're just they're sitting in my house somewhere, and it luckily air quote luckily, one, I was able to get a really good eBay deal on one of them, the other ones I 3D printed, and then this was when they were on an index, so I didn't have to buy a codex, so I didn't burn a whole lot of money getting into them. But yeah, I played like a game and a half, absolutely hated them, and was like, nope, I'm not doing this anymore. This is way this feels way too passive for my tastes. I don't want to do this. So I they're hiding in my office somewhere tucked in a drawer.

SPEAKER_02 56:28

So that's fine. I find that interesting because 99% of the time, whenever you have something new or you've bought something, or you've done, and you won't play models unless they're painted. So this means you also have painted. Yes. Oh my god. And you just you just stuffed that away. You're just like, you it's listen, folks, we were never gonna know about this nights unless we did this episode.

SPEAKER_00 56:53

Well, and it's partially it's because I was I got into like the second game that I was trying them, and I was getting progressively more frustrated, and then the Chaos Knights codex came out and I was like, wait, there are cooler versions of these big robots.

SPEAKER_02 57:11

And Cousin Josh and other Josh are over there going, thank God we didn't have to play Imperial Knights too.

SPEAKER_00 57:20

I mean, low-key, I asked you the question earlier about when imp people's impulses cause friction. I think I am the most exasperating exasperating member of our Barnhammer group to everyone else. Because that reaction you just described, I have seen that on people's face when we show up to play and I walk into the barn and I'm carrying like a brand new army that no one's seen before, and they're just like, Where the heck did he get this from? Like, what?

SPEAKER_02 57:49

You're like you're like a magic eight ball of armies. Like we didn't the future is not known, like, or whatever it says. Like, we have no idea where you're bringing in half the dang time, but I had no idea you had knights.

SPEAKER_00 58:04

Yeah, I've got I don't even remember what they're called anymore, but I've got three big ones and then a c like five or six little knights, and then I hit a point where it's like this just there's there's too much shooting, there's not enough melee, they don't play aggressively enough for me. I I'm not enjoying this.

SPEAKER_02 58:24

Like the only one put them in shame. You you put them in shame, you shamed them.

SPEAKER_00 58:29

The only one that I enjoyed playing was Canis Rex.

SPEAKER_02 58:34

Uh I'm I'm f you guys are finding out a lot about Eric tonight with his paint schemes. I'm finding out a lot about Eric with him hiding shameful armies in his house. This is this is amazing. So what I'll donate them to the barn and you I completely forgot what the other question you were gonna ask me at this point was.

SPEAKER_00 58:54

Oh, your your biggest impulse 40k decision that you do not regret at all. Votan.

SPEAKER_02 59:04

Yeah. Votan is a hundred percent. And and the the reason why Voton's an impulse for me, um, one, it was new, no one knew what it was, right? And so um, you know, when it first came out, I forget what I was doing. Uh it might have been during a Barnhammer thing or something, and we were looking at it and they released some of the models, and I was like, oh my god, these things look like Lego Aquanauts. How cool would it be if we painted these things like aquanauts? And then I got the models, and I was like, oh heck no. Eric just painted all his things like stormtroopers. I'm painting mine like rebels, and so that's how my Votan got their paint scheme. But I I literally just bought the Votan because I thought it'd be really cool to paint them like aquanauts. But I'm so happy I did. It worked out so well. I I love the Votan.

SPEAKER_00 1:00:00

I was gonna say that one fits you like a glove. That that's the exception that proves the norm. That is you impulse buying things that you regret.

SPEAKER_02 1:00:09

But literally every one of the impulse buys that I've had tonight or we've talked through tonight started out with I saw something and I thought, oh, this looks great. Every one of them. So uh here's what's gonna have to happen. I'm gonna have to go with a chaperone to GW stores from now on when they release new models, and you guys just get a spray bottle or something, and just when I go up to the new model, just spray me, and then I'll maybe not go home with it.

SPEAKER_00 1:00:36

Well, see, here's the problem though. Your closest friends are a group of you know early to middle-aged men who will encourage your bad habits by we'll walk through the dork store and we're all just be tapping you on the shoulders, like, Steve, look at that one over there. It's a stompa, isn't it cool?

SPEAKER_02 1:00:55

Yeah, you know you need this. Yeah, they are bad influences, and I think that now that you're saying this, Eric, I want to say that it's all of their fault that I am the way that I am.

SPEAKER_00 1:01:06

Uh that sounds about right.

SPEAKER_02 1:01:09

But back to the whole thing. So I did actually have a big thread here that I I know I took some time to weave a little bit here, but but the idea is that there's a lot of impulse in this game, in the hobby, in the universe, and it's pretty cool to think about it. It's pretty cool to abstract it. Think about your impulses, think about the things that that that have driven you to make the decisions you're making, whether it's in-game, whether it's buying crazy things. Um, I don't know. It's just it's one of my favorite things to do with the hobby, and I just really wanted to share it with everybody.

SPEAKER_00 1:01:41

It's okay. You can go into wrap-up mode and not ask me that my biggest impulse thing that I don't regret at all. My my feelings won't be hurt by that.

SPEAKER_02 1:01:49

Okay, alright. What's your biggest impulse thing that you don't regret? Emperor's children. I mean, we knew that. That's why it's going into wrap-up mode.

SPEAKER_00 1:01:59

There's so Okay. You're gonna say no duh, but you wanna know how like we have proof in this episode that the Emperor's Children are my favorite child. You wanna know why? Yeah. What is the one army of all the ones that I collect and play with that I don't have this like uber complicated, I'm gonna weave all sorts of cult pop culture, nerd culture things into the story on why I like this art. What's the one army that just stands on its own as, yeah, it's just this thing?

SPEAKER_02 1:02:34

Yeah, that is emperor's children for you. That's fair.

SPEAKER_00 1:02:37

It's just there's no backstory, there's no weaving of of pop culture or nerd culture, there's no music that goes along with them, they're just emperor's children because they're you just love that every time we talk about emperor's children on this podcast, that you have a little fan club and like you get a bunch of people that I mean Emperor's Children, those guys faction for faction, right?

SPEAKER_02 1:03:01

Emperor's Children rolls deep. Y'all love each other. Hey, hey, easy there. Oh man, we're gonna have to end that. Um, but anyway, so yeah, you just have your little group of Emperor's Children people that would have been upset if you didn't didn't go on talking about how great they are.

SPEAKER_00 1:03:24

I I realized it as I was doing my like five minutes of how nerdy I am rattling off the complicated interweaving, how I fell in love with this army, and then I got to it and I'm like, the only one I didn't name is Emperor's Children, and literally it's it's Emperor's Children. How can you not think this is cool? I'm like, oh, that means they're my favorite. I don't need another reason to make them cool. Oh my gosh.

SPEAKER_02 1:03:49

So, with that being said, embrace the impulse that is out there in the 40k world. It's really cool, it adds to the magic, it helps with engagement, it also drains my bank account and um, you know, all those fun things. But it it is it is a big part of this, and I think it's really cool to talk about. I don't think I don't think anybody talks about that enough, and uh that's why I was really excited to do this episode.

SPEAKER_00 1:04:15

Yeah, it's I mean, I think it's really cool. There's definitely a, and we didn't cover it here, but an interesting overlap between when impulse and meta chasing overlap with each other. Oh sure. And I say that as someone who probably resembles that when you zoom out today, because I did just pre-order two defilers, and they look like they might be the new meta hotness for Emperor's children. But it's there's an interesting overlap there. And I think that, you know, one, that's something you can optimize for, and that some people do. I think there's other times where the impulse can make it appear that someone is meta chasing, but it's more just the impulse of look at that cool thing that came out, and then it just so happens to be the meta thing.

SPEAKER_02 1:05:04

I think that's a really strong discussion that we could have. That's a fun one.

SPEAKER_00 1:05:10

Yeah, it's and I mean we can use my I burned my April allotment for 40k budget on day one, so we can uh the Easter bunny came early. I I have a monthly budget I stick to with my vices, and I may or may not have burned it early this month on two defilers, two mutilators, and the new Iron Wars character, but don't judge me for it.

SPEAKER_02 1:05:36

Wow, no judgment. I don't have a budget, that's why I make stupid impulse buys.

SPEAKER_00 1:05:42

I don't have a budget, I have a Bane Blade.

SPEAKER_02 1:05:45

Yeah, exactly. Uh all right, everyone. Well, enjoy your Impulse buys. Think about it and laugh about it because they are fun. Um, but also think about all the other ways that Impulse, you know, interacts with you and your 40k experience. It's pretty cool to kind of look at things from that lens. So I hope you enjoyed. Um with that, you know, have a great night.

SPEAKER_00 1:06:37

Take care, everyone.