Help with Coalition campgain

[Phadeout]

I am mapping ideas for a Coalition Campigain . How would you deal with rank ? What getting issued Supplies ?

Coalition War Campaign does have a page or two on playing coalition characters.

On Supplies: This should be determined by your commanding officer (unless you are the officer) - so for most 1st level PCs, determined by the GM.

On Rank: starting rank is determined by OCC. From there, the CWC book goes through the basics of increasing in rank.

[Dustin Fireblade]

I am mapping ideas for a Coalition Campigain . How would you deal with rank ? What getting issued Supplies ?

We are thinking about the PCs running a mutli crew robot. My first thought for combat each PC is assigned to a weapon or system .

How many players? The CS Skull Smasher takes a 5 man crew and the CS Linebacker tank has a 8 man crew. If only say 4 players, then have them divide and operate a pair of robot vehicles like a Enforcer or Hellraiser. The players may also prefer to play a Power Armor team as well. Whichever one works best.

CS OCC's list their starting rank, I'd recomend only one officer.

On supplies anything standard, such as e-clip recharges or body armor repair I hand as being done automatically. For something more, like using a non-CS designed weapon or equipment, the players would need to make a succesful Military Etiquette roll.

[Mack]

I cringe at games where everyone is in the CS military. In my experience, 2 things always happens:

1) Someone thinks they are a drill sergeant from the movies, and tries to treat the other PC's that way the entire time.
2) Someone else makes a character who likes to disobey orders, and does so at every opportunity. Or they have a "secret mission" from the General that no one else knows about.

And, for me, the worst part is neither type actually understands the military. Last time I kept myself out of it by playing a S-Spec merc.

As for supplies... the GM giveth and the GM taketh away. Equip them based on the mission, i.e. your story/campaign.

[Mech-Viper Prime]

I cringe at games where everyone is in the CS military. In my experience, 2 things always happens:

1) Someone thinks they are a drill sergeant from the movies, and tries to treat the other PC's that way the entire time.
2) Someone else makes a character who likes to disobey orders, and does so at every opportunity. Or they have a "secret mission" from the General that no one else knows about.

or the ones who go awol ten seconds after getting transferred to their active duty.

[Mech-Viper Prime]

I am mapping ideas for a Coalition Campigain . How would you deal with rank ? What getting issued Supplies ?

We are thinking about the PCs running a mutli crew robot. My first thought for combat each PC is assigned to a weapon or system .

best bet is to have a NPC NCO in charge like old sarge ( he has been there and done that and has a story or two about it). keep everybody the same rank, have them prove themselves. Give them what they need, not what they want, but don't take away anything they need too.

[AdmTolval]

If you ever have the chance, read the Rifts Novels. It's about a CS group. Lots of ideas for adventures on and off duty.

[Crazy Lou]

We started playing the coalition game . the basic outline of the adventure is they are responding to downed Death head transport .

They were being moving by ship to their assigned base . They were sent a head to locate the crash site . The first crash site was just the saucer selection that was being hooked to cables from a TW blimp .

The fight was between IAR 1 and titan flying PA plus the TW blimp . their bot took a beating but manage to win . I enjoyed as they worked together and role play during the fight .

This is first 1/2 of the adventure and I will post what happens in the second 1/2 .

Sounds awesome man! Also, I basically have the same stuff to say here as most of the others. I've never experienced a CS game, but my biggest campaign ever was in the service of Takematsu in Japan, and my GM ran it similarly to what's described above.

As a funny note, our rather large PC group plus our 6-8 or so NPC buddies wound up bankrupting the Takematsu gov't b/c they tried to help fight the oni invasion head on with us and blew loads of resources that way, plus they had to clean up after the enormous colateral (sp?) damage wrought by our big fights in the very city itself and still pay us -- some were mercs, many were military -- (our Ninja Crazy in our second ever fight took out a 30 story 5000 room hotel and it crashed down on top of a nearby elementary school with a couple mini-missiles to it's foundation support columns... but he managed to put the blame on the oni...). By the time the campaign was cut short the government was some 2-400,000 credits in our debt plus what it owed to the Republic of Japan and its own inside parties, and though we'd finally stopped the floods of oni, we still weren't done with the last of the Otomo Shogunate's Ninja Clan or the rapidly growing presence and threat of the Yakuza now that the huge Blaster gang had been dealth with by us as well.

You probably didn't care about that, but whatever. I was just giving an idea of how much fun big military games can be despite the fact there's rank, and other stuff involved.

[Razzinold]

Your game sounds cool, wish I could play a military campaign, nobody in our group ever wants too except me and the GM. I agree with some of the other posts, unless people really want to play it (and sometimes even the ones who do) people make a mess out of things. They don't know how to play "in character". quick example. we are running a Chaos Earth game and we were securing a building, while myself (spec.force so highest rank) and another went to find the generator, the other two decide to open the doors and walk outside towards an opening rift, they never listen to commands or suggestions even though i say them politely. I know why the GM gave me the high rank, it was to help the two new players along, but people stopped playing in character and stopped listening to the commanding officer, so i stopped giving orders and now he had to put in a NPC commanding officer, and they still don't want to listen. two because they are new and one because he has always hated military games, but that's because he has always been a munchkin power gamer, who thinks guns are boring and every character he ever had, has at least 3 mutant powers, one always being SN strength. This time around he is a werewolf (group doesn't know except me i saw him transform to kill a vamp) so I carry one revolver and two auto-pistols at all times loaded with silver,

[Crazy Lou]

Here is the best piece of advice for running a military campaign.

If your group isn't composed of military (former or current) personnel...don't do a military campaign.

Every time I've gamed with non-military folks in a military campaign they always think that orders are just suggestions and that even if your CO gave you an order you can argue about it in the middle of a fight because they thought their idea was better.

If you're going to do any kind of actual military campaign your best bet is to have the group play as mercenaries with a professional soldier attached as an observer and liason to the military. If you just have to run an actual full military campaign, begin by restricting their alignments from the very beginning. Anarchist and below are forbidden. If one of them decides to not follow orders during a combat scenario, have him executed afterwards and make the player roll up a new character.

The military is a serious place....not a collection of Rambos.

I feel quite fortunate that my campaign didn't have that problem (orders = suggestions to some), even though none of us'd ever been in the armed forces. I guess we just had a better grasp on its reality (I think many of our relatives'd been enlisted though, so that may've been a significant factor as well).

[T-Willard]

Here is the best piece of advice for running a military campaign.

If your group isn't composed of military (former or current) personnel...don't do a military campaign.

This right here.

Unless you can make the players understand how the chain of command works, why you have to obey orders like that, and why you have to do all the stupid seeming stuff.

Sometimes you get lucky and you'll find people who naturally work together, but most of the time you get people mad that one person is in charge, that one person gets a robot while they are stuck with infantry gear, and why the SAMAS pilot has to walk because the CO told him too instead of fly around at 200 mph.

[Colt47]

I've never had any problems with playing a military character. It's just that most of the time adventurers are not exactly military personnel. I just play a principled character when it comes to that kind of stuff. Also, I always go with the most basic weapons available. Well, as long as I get a grenade launcher / laser combo weapon. I'll take a normal laser rifle, but probably wont be happy with it.
Also, I prefer playing special forces characters. They get much more interesting assignments then the infantry, and can justify being in just about any situation. Plus I get access to the Special forces armor, and it's standard issue.

Edit: now that I think about it, I raid regularly in World of Warcraft, so I know what happens when one person decides to do something stupid. Everyone goes boom and the situation turns to hell. That is what usually happens when someone wants to play rambo. Albeit, young fresh officers are still going to make mistakes here and there and are more likely to mess up in a high stress situation, so give new guys a bit of leeway.

[Mack]

robtheman74,

Please do not Spam the forums with the same post. If no one responds to your post, so be it.

Thanks,
Mack