Say 3 PC's get 5,3,1 on their init test, the gobbo's get 2 and the orc gets 4, the init tracker looks like this:

P-N-P-N-P

Where P is player turn, N is NPC - so after a few rounds one of the PC's dies, so does the orc, what does the init tracker look like now?

Kaptain O said:

P-N-P

I don't think it says if you take them off the top or bottom. I'd take them off the top (dying means things are going bad for your group). Either way, it's the same in the example you gave.

well if it was less uniform, say

NPPPN

it coud become either NPP or PPN, I hear your way of doing it (PPN) but is there an official answer?

While I don't believe I've seen anything that states this explicitly, the spirit of the rules would seem to dictate that the lowest markers would be removed.

Truth to tell, I don't think it matters enormously either way so long as you are consistent.

I personally think that the initiative stays exactly the same. It doesn't change when someone on a side dies/goes unconscious. Each individual can only act once in a round, and slots on the initiative track are not tied to an individual. So, individuals still retain the option of which slot they can act in. If you remove slots from the track, you are altering their choices. If you leave the slots, nothing changes, except there are fewer opponents that can act/use the slots.

We have been playing it that the track stays as is and the PCs and NPCs can use any of the activations they would normally.

Ok, that makes sense.