Ok for the last ten years I've only been gaming online and mainly on rpol.net.

I understand that online games are hit and miss when it comes to longevity but I've found for some Reason only war seems to fail at the second hurdle.

Everyone gets all exited at creating the regiment and characters then as soon as the games start within a month or so the whole thing falls apart.

This is not necessarily the GMs fault there just suddenly seems to be a lack of action from the players and I can't seem to put my finger on it as it's a great looking setting.

I believe it could be the following

1) regiment creation takes too long when it's done online

2) character creation discussions go on forever until everyone is happy with their squad position.

3) as it's a game that can rely on one or two pcs being officers and giving orders many gamers can't get their heads round that type of game play

So I thought I'd post here and see if anyone has had the same experience online and whether it also happens with round the table gaming

People often seem mortified at talking in the presence/to a superior officer. I really, rreeaallyy need to push them to actually roleplay when they're in the presence of anybody of a higher rank than them. When they're by themselves, or with other regular guardsmen they're usually fine but golly do they get shy when it's not shooting stuff.

Nobody ever wants to play a Sergeant. They seem worried about playing people in power.

Some might not want to BE the person in power, either because they don't want to put up with everyone else complaining that they have to listen to the GM, AND now another player. Some of us also aren't as tactically-minded as we might wish, and that can suck if we find ourselves in a leadership role. In my group's I often get the job based on system familiarity, and a certain amount of seriousness in game that they all lack in spades; standing up in mounds of fertilizer spades. They just go a bit easy on me if I lead us into something dumb.

In OW though, were I playing, Sergeant would probably be my #2 option, behind Psyker. Were the role already filled, or a GM who doesn't agree with the Specialties as options running, Sergeant is my likely plan, or something else (Operator or Heavy) who will probably go for Commander.

really depends on the people you play with, most roleplayers usually want to be special so taking orders all the time is something that frustrates them over time
Only War is vastly different in that aspect than any other 40k game (except maybe DW) and most hero-systems like D&D

you really have to find a good balance between out-character discussion of the situation and the in-character finality of an order by a superior, quite hard to do that and keep up immersion but doable

Nobody ever wants to play a Sergeant. They seem worried about playing people in power.

Doesn't seem tobe a problem around here?

Nobody ever wants to play a Sergeant. They seem worried about playing people in power.

Doesn't seem tobe a problem around here?

Well, it is in my experience. I've run plenty of Only War with different people. There's always at least one perosn who wants to be the Commissar and Storm Trooper, heck Specialists go like hotcakes. Sergeants get avoided like the plague.

I wanted to be Sergeant in my OW campaign, but another guy snapped the role up before I'd even opened my mouth.

Now run a sniper instead. Works like a charm though.

Nobody ever wants to play a Sergeant. They seem worried about playing people in power.

Doesn't seem tobe a problem around here?

Well, it is in my experience. I've run plenty of Only War with different people. There's always at least one perosn who wants to be the Commissar and Storm Trooper, heck Specialists go like hotcakes. Sergeants get avoided like the plague.

This is, IMO a problem with the players not seeing enough "Special snowflake" in the Sergeant! Especially with the Commissar! The same player that won't play the Sergeant but snaps up the Commissar will typically still be barking orders and of course, threatening to execute everybody! To a lesser extent this is also true of the Stormtrooper player who will be the "biggest badass" and therefore the party leader. As a veteran (Like many others on this forum!) I find this mentality somewhat frustrating.

As others have mentioned, OW is a game that takes place within an organized military and this is somewhat different from the standard D&D IN SPAASH! that so many players seem to expect. This is up to the Gm to control and set the tone in their game! On the carrot end; The Sergeant has some phenomenal abilities that actually CAN turn a bunch of lasgun wielding flunkies into something that should be feared by almost any opponent! (A Sergeant calling a "get them" sweeping order can bring the damage of the humble lasgun up to as high as 1d10+9E Pen 2! This actually has a reasonably good chance of hurting a Chaos space marine!) On the "Stick" end, players should realise that no squad is going to deploy AT ALL without some kind of squad leader in the Imp. guard! Commissars are accorded the courtesy ranks of officers but they are NOT IG combat officers typically! Players that cannot wrap their heads around these concepts are probably in the wrong game.(sadly! I mean no insult, it's just the truth!) If the original squad leader is killed, The Gm should arrange for one of the squads players to "Elite advance" into the Sergeant class. This simply represents that character being promoted.

I have occasionally run into this problem with Rogue trader as well (With players either avoiding or abusing the role of the RT himself.) My solution to this has been simple; I explain to the players that the RT is very much like a 18th or 19th century ship Captain and that their authority aboard ship is absolute! Knowing this, the players elect their Captain. Once elected (And if they need it) I explain the nature of being a captain in more depth to the player. I also emphasize that NO RT will get very far without attending to the needs of his crew! Especially his command staff! This has worked pretty well so far. Perhaps some variant of this would work for an OW game?

Nobody ever wants to play a Sergeant. They seem worried about playing people in power.

Doesn't seem tobe a problem around here?

I have occasionally run into this problem with Rogue trader as well (With players either avoiding or abusing the role of the RT himself.) My solution to this has been simple; I explain to the players that the RT is very much like a 18th or 19th century ship Captain and that their authority aboard ship is absolute! Knowing this, the players elect their Captain. Once elected (And if they need it) I explain the nature of being a captain in more depth to the player. I also emphasize that NO RT will get very far without attending to the needs of his crew! Especially his command staff! This has worked pretty well so far. Perhaps some variant of this would work for an OW game?

I like this, except that, in RT, the party can't as easily mutiny, and throw the Captain off the ship. Well, I suppose they CAN, but his power comes from his Warrant, and they can't use it, in his place, unless they have plans for an elaborate game of "guess who I am today."

My biggest problem with Sergeant, as I see it, is the dumb Commissar. He's often viewed like a second Sergeant, even though that's not his job, AND he can cap the Sergeant, if he really wants to. I would hate for my failing to get me shot by another player, who thought that they were just playing their role. I know Commissars are a part of it all, but sometimes, I really wish that they weren't playable. It's also why, in DoW: DC, I really like how they show Commissar Anton Gebbitt as GM Lukas Alexander's *****; he stands there, lets Governor Alexander boss, and shoots someone who caves, to sell the point home. He doesn't act like another leader, but the leader's enforcer. He doesn't give orders; he sees them done. Not the Commie's only job, I confess, but better than trying to run the show, when the Sergeant, Planetary Governor, or whoever is to fill that job.

a thing most commies seem to forget is that they have superiors who judge their actions
lord commissars are usually attached to company or regimental commands and are their superiors

if a commie acts out of line let his boss step in, make absolutly clear to them that leadership is not their primary duty but enforcement of the sergeants orders

a thing most commies seem to forget is that they have superiors who judge their actions

lord commissars are usually attached to company or regimental commands and are their superiors

if a commie acts out of line let his boss step in, make absolutly clear to them that leadership is not their primary duty but enforcement of the sergeants orders

Enforcement of the ENTIRE chain of command from the lords of terra themselves to your humble sergeant!Commissars are invaluable for keeping the men on mission but it is the Sergeants and higher officers who make things happen!

Commissars are actually over-qualified to serve as line officers or non-commissioned officers (Sergeants). He is fully capable of stepping into the shoes of just about any officer at any level of regimental command...and in fact is expected to do just that in case of leadership failure.

The thing to keep in mind though is that a regiment will typically have between 1 and 3 commissars. Thus, a unit's commissars simply cannot perform all of the command and leadership duties that a regiment of troops require, even if they are able to easily replace any single officer within the unit.

The purpose of the Commissar is to maintain discipline at all levels of the regiment, and ensure that the Imperium's doctrines and mandates are followed. They do this by putting fear and respect into the troopers, and reminding the officers that the price for failure is very steep and that no one is so important that they cannot be replaced. The commissar is a sort of military policeman and nearly superhuman role model rolled into one.

That is the stated purpose, but of course humans being what they are things often get very muddied on the ground.

All of this also does make it hard to integrate a Commissar with a squad of joes, as indeed is the case with most of the support specialists. While I'm glad to have the options, it would have been very nice if the character creation section had more advice on integrating support specialties in various types of campaigns. Most experienced GMs don't have too much problem with guiding their players into making characters that fit with the campaign they want to run. But I think new GMs who are unfamiliar with the setting could easily run into problems.

This is one reason that I require that one player be a sergeant.

I play exclusively PbP too and the media is I think inherently prone to drop outs simply because it's easy to get distracted.

Which reminds me that my Only War game has been inactive for a couple of weeks now....

Me, I'm looking for an Only War PbP game. I know PbPs are usually prone to failure if it's left stagnant too long, but as long as it's not the GM, the game can keep moving.

I've never been in a campaign where there weren't at least 2 people wanting to be the Sergeant. It's just awesome, and good ROLEplayers - not ROLLplayers - will generally love the RP potential in that career.

Best way to get someone to be the Sergeant? Eliminate the Commissar.

I've never been in a campaign where there weren't at least 2 people wanting to be the Sergeant. It's just awesome, and good ROLEplayers - not ROLLplayers - will generally love the RP potential in that career.

Best way to get someone to be the Sergeant? Eliminate the Commissar.

I repeat; In my game I eliminate ALL specialist classes until there is a SPECIFIC REASON for them to be there! The Players role up the "core" squad and the specialists come (and go) when necessary. From a background point of view this makes perfect sense! Specialists are a very finite resource! The munitorium is not going to assign one to a any one group of line grunts for a myriad of reasons! In situations where a specialist's talents are needed, certainly! But not unless or until! For example: Your Tank platoon is stranded in the middle of BF Nowhere and you vox for help. Command will likely send aa Engineseer out to repair the asset (The tank) but they will not assign said engineseer to you for any longer than needed. Now, in the course of this repair, Your group may come under attack and the Engineseer's transport may be destroyed! It would then become part of the groups mission to see said specialist to safety. once there the specialist will have fulfilled their objective and would depart for reassignment. ( the player could of course retain the character sheet for future reuse should that specialist be needed again!)

There is one exception to this: If one of the players has Elite advanced into the Commander class. This character is now an Actual Officer and may attempt to requisition a specialist he or she feels may help with a specific mission or objective prior to the beginning of the mission. I would then determine said specialists availability and the player could roll for it. This would further be modified by applying a cumulative -10 modifier for each additional specialist requested beyond the first! (If you take from this that I seem to bear a fair amount of distaste for the Commissar, Psyker, Engineseer, Stormtrooper parties; you would be correct! That sort of thing is for Dark Heresy not Only War.)

My stated policy:

All players start with a guardsman. Not a specialist, a guardsman. No exception.

When you need to roll up a new character, we can talk about it.

That being said, I play in a group where another person is the GM. His approach was to allow a single specialist - a psyker.

A priest has been added, but only after our Sergeant made Commander and Lieutenant. Work acceptably well.

I've never been in a campaign where there weren't at least 2 people wanting to be the Sergeant. It's just awesome, and good ROLEplayers - not ROLLplayers - will generally love the RP potential in that career.

Best way to get someone to be the Sergeant? Eliminate the Commissar.

I repeat; In my game I eliminate ALL specialist classes until there is a SPECIFIC REASON for them to be there! The Players role up the "core" squad and the specialists come (and go) when necessary. From a background point of view this makes perfect sense! Specialists are a very finite resource! The munitorium is not going to assign one to a any one group of line grunts for a myriad of reasons! In situations where a specialist's talents are needed, certainly! But not unless or until! For example: Your Tank platoon is stranded in the middle of BF Nowhere and you vox for help. Command will likely send aa Engineseer out to repair the asset (The tank) but they will not assign said engineseer to you for any longer than needed. Now, in the course of this repair, Your group may come under attack and the Engineseer's transport may be destroyed! It would then become part of the groups mission to see said specialist to safety. once there the specialist will have fulfilled their objective and would depart for reassignment. ( the player could of course retain the character sheet for future reuse should that specialist be needed again!)

There is one exception to this: If one of the players has Elite advanced into the Commander class. This character is now an Actual Officer and may attempt to requisition a specialist he or she feels may help with a specific mission or objective prior to the beginning of the mission. I would then determine said specialists availability and the player could roll for it. This would further be modified by applying a cumulative -10 modifier for each additional specialist requested beyond the first! (If you take from this that I seem to bear a fair amount of distaste for the Commissar, Psyker, Engineseer, Stormtrooper parties; you would be correct! That sort of thing is for Dark Heresy not Only War.)

How, exactly, does this fly? Is the Specialist Character a pregen that the player handed it has no investment in, beyond a cool ability, or a player-generated one that wouldn't have all the same XP your "core" of grunts has? And then we have to decide which gun with legs isn't coming, so that the eviscerator-toting Priest can come along? While I can see the whole "meat grinder-food grunts don't permanently get specialists" fluff-wise, that leaves the character incapable of developing with the group, and seems, at least to my limited perspective, to have a lot more "wandering characters", both soldier and specialist, then the Guard usually illustrates. Also maintains the "just another gunline grunt" motif that I don't totally favor, when I want my characters to be a bit more than all the nameless, faceless NPCs, even if they shouldn't.

I've never been in a campaign where there weren't at least 2 people wanting to be the Sergeant. It's just awesome, and good ROLEplayers - not ROLLplayers - will generally love the RP potential in that career.

Best way to get someone to be the Sergeant? Eliminate the Commissar.

I repeat; In my game I eliminate ALL specialist classes until there is a SPECIFIC REASON for them to be there! The Players role up the "core" squad and the specialists come (and go) when necessary. From a background point of view this makes perfect sense! Specialists are a very finite resource! The munitorium is not going to assign one to a any one group of line grunts for a myriad of reasons! In situations where a specialist's talents are needed, certainly! But not unless or until! For example: Your Tank platoon is stranded in the middle of BF Nowhere and you vox for help. Command will likely send aa Engineseer out to repair the asset (The tank) but they will not assign said engineseer to you for any longer than needed. Now, in the course of this repair, Your group may come under attack and the Engineseer's transport may be destroyed! It would then become part of the groups mission to see said specialist to safety. once there the specialist will have fulfilled their objective and would depart for reassignment. ( the player could of course retain the character sheet for future reuse should that specialist be needed again!)

There is one exception to this: If one of the players has Elite advanced into the Commander class. This character is now an Actual Officer and may attempt to requisition a specialist he or she feels may help with a specific mission or objective prior to the beginning of the mission. I would then determine said specialists availability and the player could roll for it. This would further be modified by applying a cumulative -10 modifier for each additional specialist requested beyond the first! (If you take from this that I seem to bear a fair amount of distaste for the Commissar, Psyker, Engineseer, Stormtrooper parties; you would be correct! That sort of thing is for Dark Heresy not Only War.)

How, exactly, does this fly? Is the Specialist Character a pregen that the player handed it has no investment in, beyond a cool ability, or a player-generated one that wouldn't have all the same XP your "core" of grunts has? And then we have to decide which gun with legs isn't coming, so that the eviscerator-toting Priest can come along? While I can see the whole "meat grinder-food grunts don't permanently get specialists" fluff-wise, that leaves the character incapable of developing with the group, and seems, at least to my limited perspective, to have a lot more "wandering characters", both soldier and specialist, then the Guard usually illustrates. Also maintains the "just another gunline grunt" motif that I don't totally favor, when I want my characters to be a bit more than all the nameless, faceless NPCs, even if they shouldn't.

How this flies is as follows:

Each player generates one guardsman and may generate one specialist if they choose to do so. When a mission calls for a specialist of a particular type, the player with that particular specialist brings them along on the mission as a secondary character. They collect full experience while on mission and return to "reserve" status when the mission is over. If, Over the course of the game the player's squad needs to use said specialist again than I will award roughly 80% of the experience difference from when he last played to present. This assumes that while the character may not have been with the active squad they have been doing something! Similar in concept to when you play Mass effect and chose a squad mate you haven't played with for awhile! (That's where I got the idea actually! )

If you mean how does this fly with my players? I have been bkessed with a group of 'Mostly' Role players vs. roll players. They understand that each setting is different and thus each will have it's own limitations and benefits.

Also; As to the number of wandering specialists: I don't think so! Your squad is a member of a regiment numbering in the the thousands or even tens of thousands! Each player having one of the specialist types means they are literally one amongst thousands. that's not much when you think about it!

My whole reason for doing this is that OW is not Dark Heresy or Rogue trader! Your characters are not the specialty groups that those games envision! You are soldiers! Weather you fight in tanks or as infantry on foot your life is ONLY WAR! The dynamic must be VERY different in order to maintain immersion IMO. In all cases, if it's your game, do it however you like! This is just my read on it!

This is one reason that I require that one player be a sergeant.

I did the same thing with my face-to-face game; one must be a Sarge, as in RT, one must be the Rogue Trader.

When they made their Regiment, they went with a Penal Legion (Last Chancers) and of course, the first round of characters went as so; Ogryn, Tech-Priest, Storm Trooper. After explaining them that specialists, in a Last Chancers regiment, is a no no, it fell to Sarge, Heavy, Ogryn. The Sarge who wanted to be the TP (and play a smart char in contract to his bloodied merc in DH) boosted his command and fellowship got 80 in it, and just bought up commander, and he's having a blast. The Heavy (the ST) is also having fun running around with his missile launcher. The Orgryn got into criticals a couple of times, managed to already lost a companion and cried alot, and everyone laughed.

But yeah-one must be the Sarge, to get things done else it's just grunts with some NPC Sarge and that just falls to the GM telling you what to do and setting up traps, epic scenes and drama and all instead of the players making their own discoveries and plunders.

As for having Commissars in the squad, really, they're there to make sure things gets done, which can be done without having to pop the other players just 'cause...really the player who does that really got no idea on how to play a Commissar, short of the stereotypical kind, and that's the most boring type

How this flies is as follows:

Each player generates one guardsman and may generate one specialist if they choose to do so. When a mission calls for a specialist of a particular type, the player with that particular specialist brings them along on the mission as a secondary character. They collect full experience while on mission and return to "reserve" status when the mission is over. If, Over the course of the game the player's squad needs to use said specialist again than I will award roughly 80% of the experience difference from when he last played to present. This assumes that while the character may not have been with the active squad they have been doing something! Similar in concept to when you play Mass effect and chose a squad mate you haven't played with for awhile! (That's where I got the idea actually! )

If you mean how does this fly with my players? I have been bkessed with a group of 'Mostly' Role players vs. roll players. They understand that each setting is different and thus each will have it's own limitations and benefits.

Also; As to the number of wandering specialists: I don't think so! Your squad is a member of a regiment numbering in the the thousands or even tens of thousands! Each player having one of the specialist types means they are literally one amongst thousands. that's not much when you think about it!

My whole reason for doing this is that OW is not Dark Heresy or Rogue trader! Your characters are not the specialty groups that those games envision! You are soldiers! Weather you fight in tanks or as infantry on foot your life is ONLY WAR! The dynamic must be VERY different in order to maintain immersion IMO. In all cases, if it's your game, do it however you like! This is just my read on it!

Sry, wasn't going for the adversarial. Having just finished a playthrough of ME3, I can completely relate to that example of the mechanic, and Vega would have no points to spend after Mars, if the game didn't hand out "shadow" experience to them. While I don't necessarily appreciate the whole lack of "in the game world, your characters matter; that's why you are here" feeling I get from other games, I can see how it works in Only War, and having this explanation significantly helps my brain in figuring out how you have stuff set up. Thank you.

Why not just let a character be the sergeant without playing the actual class? Noone wanted to play sergeant in my group, so the player holding the rank of sergeant is a weapons specialist. Like many of you I allowed no specialists in my group, I believe what I said is "If one of you REALLY want to play commisar you can try to convince me.", but noone tried. I have 3 players, 1 heavy with a heavy stubber and 2 wpn specialists.

I play with the rule that mooks die when they hit 0 wounds, nobs and officers get critical wounds, but regular orcs die immediately when they hit 0 wounds. I hate sitting and throwing dice forever, I want combat to flow fast so the it feels dynamic. I want the players to be able to stick with the lasgun without feeling like they have an inferior tool. I don't know, it might be because of my time spent in the armed forces, but I find the idea of a squad where every soldier only uses a special weapon completely offensive.

Orks that die at 0 wounds are not Orks, because their main feature -- True Grit -- does not come into effect. They are humans with axes -- actually they are easier to kill than Guardsmen. Raise their wounds at least by at least x2.

I don't know, it might be because of my time spent in the armed forces, but I find the idea of a squad where every soldier only uses a special weapon completely offensive.

No, I completely agree. Gotta remember the comrades though, pretty sure they all use lasguns.

Orks that die at 0 wounds are not Orks, because their main feature -- True Grit -- does not come into effect. They are humans with axes -- actually they are easier to kill than Guardsmen. Raise their wounds at least by at least x2.

Good point.

Really there are so many talents involving lasguns there's no reason someone can't stick with one for the whole time. I would.