Read an interesting article about gaming styles and compatibility. It's about tabletop wargaming, but I absolutely see it being relevant to our choice of gaming too. Link at the bottom, but this bit defining the three play styles sums it up nicely:
http://www.belloflostsouls.net/2015/04/ ... tyles.htmlCompetitive: you like to win. In fact, it’s the main reason you play. The other person is there to serve as a challenge. You may or may not enjoy the social aspect of the game, but that dopamine rush as you take the victory is why you pick up the dice. Losing is anathema to you, and while you may not despair when things go your way, losing is an uncomfortable experience emotionally. You find it hard to understand why anyone would willingly go through it.
Narrative: you want to tell a story. For you, wargaming isn’t like other games exactly because of this opportunity. Sure, you enjoy when things go your way, but even if you lose, as long as your side got to participate in some awesome events (maybe good, maybe bad, maybe funny), you’re less worried. Your ‘win’ doesn’t come at the end of the game, but much later, when you get to tell people about what happened: the dice roll that let the Genestealer kill the Dreadnought, the time the guy with the 2++ invulnerable bought the farm to a laspistol… If there’s an interesting enough anecdote, you might even forget who won. You go all-in to for the fluff, and probably have hugely detailed army backgrounds… Not to mention named characters leading. And not named characters created by GW. As a side note, this is obviously the player GW is pushing us all to be, what with their ‘Forge The Narrative’ thing.
Casual: You’re just here for a good time with friends. You’d like to win, but mostly? It’s about the chat. The game is simply a structure to hang your social engagements around; a shared interest that gives you and your buddies something to jaw about.
It's interesting because I see this in 5punkers. We're all about the casual, everyone knows that. People who come here wanting to play competitively don't enjoy the games. Dota is a great example of the opposite - we played it seriously (not srs bsns, but tried to play properly, tactically, and well) because you have to in order to enjoy it, and quite a number of us bounced off it. Even then, when someone came along and tried to get us to play hardcore we laughed and ignored them because it's just not the sort of gamers we are. Fortunately, being an online community, we're able to come together here, unlike local wargamers being stuck with whoever else is at the club. Seems obvious, but that article really explains it well.
