Coming from a military background one of the changes I made was the Idea of playing musical leadership. Anyone who has ever been in the military knows that it is not a democracy. So what I had done was give everyone a position within the squad so that everyone knows who they are subbordinate too. This is important because leaders can die in combat, then who gives the orders? This is a very foundimental thing learned when you join a new unit. As far as decieding this in game terms I took a few things into consideration, The skill command and talent Air of Authority, Their Rank(of corse), and Tactics.

That being said their are exceptions to the rule in special situations, for instance in a medical situation the Apothecary would have authority over treatment ect, though the need to move or hault treatment to fire on the enemy would rest in the tactical commander. A tactical marine would of corse have no Idea on how a Librarian works with the warp, but he would have an Idea of his abilities and order they be used if applicable.

This type of realism will really only work with mature players not taking their "leadership" to extremes, but might be something to consider in your games. All my players are from simular military backgrounds so we have this understanding ingrained and might not be simple to pick up for players not familar.

some special forces units do have flexiable leadership as in deathwatch and i see a deathwatch kill team being very much marine special forces, you still have chain of command with the watch officer who sent them on the mission but if hes not about flexiability, I have found in most groups one players becomes the natural leader

Fluffy wise just make sure everyone has the spotlight and no one feels like the beat cop on a detective show.

Crunch wise it comes down to squad mode abilities, as the missin leader is the major factor in picking those abilities, and those abilities are based on the leader's specialty. Not a huge deal, especially if you're not big into the mode abilities, but it's something to consider.

But overall I do agree with Hardrain, every group I've ever played with, someone steps up to kind of run the show, even if that person isn't the 'official' person in charge of something. So even when trying to get the librarian to play squad leader, when the player's not into it, it can be difficult, and the variety of mode abilities that are provided pale in comparison to the frustration of being led by someone that doesn't want to lead you

Well the main point of it is that the "Natural Leader" can of corse die. And yes in some SF units the leadership is flexible to a larger degree, but the orders still come from the top to bottom even though you call him Chris and not Sir, he is still your superior.

Good point on making sure every one gets spotlight, and this is really just a way to eliminate some confusion in the instance that a leader dies ect.

in my games players have other method. their choosing.

if mission will be "recon & stealth" style then plan of mission will be made by that marine who have highest Tactics(Recon and Stealth) skill. On ground that marine will be also leader. If mission will change from S&R to tank battle then marine with appropiate tactics will take lead and so on. in theory. practice as always is more unpredictable.

Nimon said:

I have a pretty mature group of people playing, and they decided that they would only ever have one leader. There was a Space Wolf AM and a Dark Angle Lib that both had the right fellowship scores for the job, and of course they had to do a ritual duel anyway, so they staked permanent leadership of the kill team on the outcome (The SW won). Made for a good start to the campaign.

Funny thing is that they all wanted a permanent (until death or demotion) sergeant because they recognized the value of chain of command even though none of us have military experiance.

I figure if they are cool with it, it makes my life easier as the GM because I can start to predict the kind of leadership tests/decisions that will be made and craft the story around that.

This rule is made for the that very reason, Until Death, which can happen in the middle of the battle and then who takes charge? So you have a sergeant, who is you lance corp, your Spec-p, your PFC, your PV2 and your PVT? Now if you want to just let them take a time out and choose after the fact, ok, but if want to add alittle more difficulty this can be good.

A lot of armies work just fine without excessive numbers of NCO ranks... Having an IC and a 2IC is plenty good enough for a small team.