One criticism people are raising, myself included now, is a lack of customization at character creation. Dark Heresy had Homeworlds, Rogue Trader had the even better Origin Path. These helped not only differentiate one character from another, they gave the character's depth and some mechanical advantages to go with their background.

In Only War, all the characters (Support Specialists perhaps excluded) are part of the same Regiment, drawn from the same Homeworld and put through the same Basic Training. This is good and right, because that's what being in the Imperial Guard is. But despite the Departmento Munitorium's best efforts, the characters are still individual human beings. So the question becomes, who were they before?

I, at one point, argued that this what the starting exp is for. However, with a little experience in making characters behind me, I see that it doesn't work that way. Because of the Aptitude system and the very high cost of buying non-aptitude skills and talents, that starting experience (still in theory more than practice) refines how you fill out your speciality, but it doesn't really, freely let you define who the character was before the Guard. A Weapon Specialist who was a Hive Ganger ought to be a little different from one who was a Manfuctory Laborer or a Schola teacher.

I'd like to propose another aspect to character creation: Background. Perhaps just a single skill, chosen from a short list (Athletics, Common Lore, Decieve, Trade). This would, IMO, help breath some life into the characters.

How about giving everyone free training in 1 or 2 skills from a certain list (stuff like Common Lore and social skills) and using the BC scale for advancement pricing? This should give more versatility at char gen to further differentiate different characters from the same homeworld and makes it possible to add things related to the characters past, while also permitting players more freedom in advancement selection (IMO, the costs in BC are much better, as they encourage specialization instead of confining advancement like the OW costs do).

LuciusT said:

Except you already DO get to customise your character… each player character gets a choice of skills and talents from the Regiment choices and from their speciality choice. You can have been an exceptional Athlete in your past life, which is why you chose to re-roll your Strength score and why you ended up being a Heavy Gunner. At the same time basic training in the guard will drum out a lot of individuality from a trooper, molding them into a basic grunt that can later be given specialist training if they show any aptitude for it (shown by how you spend your Xp and how your attribute rolls turn out).

Actually, I kind of like the idea of adding a literal notion of what is being mentioned here:

An actual table of professions, of what the PC used to do before they joined the IG. A table, very similar to the divination table of DH, that just uses a random d100 roll, or GM permission (in other words, all relatively equal bonuses), that each maybe give a +2 to a characteristic and some "off" skill ("useless" Common Lores, Trades, etc.). Certain specialists wouldn't have access to all of them.

Really this may be good on a per specialty basis. I'm unsure of the usefulness of the recommended advance table.

The problem would be page length, which I imagine is killing em right now

KommissarK said:

Which I why I'm trying to suggest something really short and simple. Doing it reallty right, with the tables you suggest, is probably something for the first expansion book but I'd like to see at least the foundation laid in the core rules. Certainly, if it doesn't make it into the core game, this is going into my list of house rules…