Is it just me or do Commissars not have ANY "cheap" stats? As in, stats they have two aptitudes for. I can't see any, are any of the other specialties so hindered?

They have cheap agility. Agility + Finesse

How could I be so daft?

Fenrisnorth said:

In general I'm very disappointed with the commisars' aptitude selection

they aren't really good at anything except possibly intimidation - and that's only because intimidation is for some reason still based on Strength.

Newsflash: Once we leave middle school play grounds, intmidation based on Strength is a looser's path. Commisars would base intimidation off of Fellowship or even Willpower. They aren't scary because they can beat you up. Commisars are scary because the can shoot you with impunity - and will do so, as they have very little incentive not to.

As they are, Commisars end up being good at really nothing at all, even disciple.

Tenebrae said:

In previous books, the GM was free to arbitrate on situations when an Intimidate check could run off Fellowship (or even Intelligence) instead of Strength. Sadly, that doesn't seem to be the case in Only War. Worse, with the replacement of Strength with Fellowship among the Commissar's Aptitudes, they now have neither of the aptitudes for that skill, making it expensive to advance. This sort of thing (I.E. Where a character cannot purchase things that should be totally run-of-the-mill for the Speciality) is an unfortunate and nigh-unavoidable side effect of any sort of "Aptitudes" system like this, and perfectly illustrates why they would probably have been better off using the advancement system DH and RT used…

What is it with people thinking Commissars should have Intimidate?

Terrifying your troops into obedience is a special action from Command, not Intimidate. It's practically the only time when the Commissar is supposed to be scary - abusing intimidation isn't any good for morale in the long run.

Morangias said:

I agree with this idea.

In my mind a commisar use a combination of several skills, his main objective is to motivate troops and punish. Depending on the unit a commisar might have to use intimidation, front-line leadership or maybe even bluffing. Being a trigger-happy psycho isn't good enough for the commisariate, and such commisar won't probably survive very long. A bolt pistol to the face is a great tool for intimidation, as long as the running man isn't aiming a meltagun to your guts.

Going by the official version of the IG Uplifting Primer every regiment should have 90% of losses due to the work of the commisariate, since 9/10 of the offenses listed are punished with summary execution. Clearly this is not a viable line of work.

@Woodclaw

Depending on the unit a commisar might have to use intimidation, front-line leadership or maybe even bluffing .

I have no idea who you're referring to with the last part. Certainly not a HERO OF THE IMPERIUM…

I'm more surprised that the Storm Trooper doesn't have access to Finesse even though he gets both offense and weapon skill. To me it makes more sense that a storm trooper would be able to shoot better compared to fighting in melee.

Droma said:

The big issue with Storm Trooper is, many Talents he logically should develop key off Offense, while the BS keys off Finesse.

ST needs serious work, it's a mess right now.

Morangias said:

Agreed. In the storm term my solution for my group has been to switch Weapon Skill to Defence and change their regiment so that they can pick up one additional aptitude of choice (Finesse being the obvious one for Stormies) rather than gaining a set one. This is much more eqiutable for classes who don't already have the aptitude the regiment provides as opposed to those who do.