Quote:
Originally Posted by Rainbow Six
As those who have gamed with me before are probably well aware I also find the military chain of command that exists in many T2K games to be something that can cause issues. I’ve seen games where people playing officers have thought that gives them carte blanche to tell other players what to do (to be fair, I’ve also seen games where it’s been done very well - looking at you Fahd). I tried to circumvent that in one game by implementing a ‘no officer PC’s’ policy to encourage a more inclusive structure. In another game the PC’s started as a Free Company (essentially mercs for hire). While that game had a rank structure it was relatively fluid / collegial.
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I've seen the concept of rank cause problems in T2k campaigns before too. The whole idea of a pecking order or hierarchy in a
game can be a turn-off to a lot of people. And if someone wants to play a civilian, it's usually with the understanding that they will be at the very bottom of the rank totem pole. I can't imagine it would be very fun being expected to follow orders from a PFC.
IIRC, v2.2 rules give civilian PCs very few skills, compared to military PCs. Even conscripts get a lot fewer skills. If a player doesn't want his/her PC to be useless to the party, this might dissuade them from playing a civilian. I've found that v2.2 kind of encourages players to gravitate towards the special forces templates. Hence parties of 5th ID survivors that contain a Green Beret, a couple of Rangers, a USMC Scout-Sniper or two, and at least one Navy SEAL.
I've seen rank cut both ways too. I've seen instances where the player with the highest IG rank becomes a martinet and starts bossing other players around. This hardly ever ends well. I've also seen instances where low-ranking players rarely show any initiative. Instead, they wait for someone playing a higher ranking PC to give them orders. That doesn't lend itself very well to collaborative play either. And lastly, I've seen instances where decision-making becomes a very painful exercise because players are too unwilling to pull rank. Too little hierarchy can cause problems too. Rank, IMHO, is a double-edged sword.
As for sexuality/sexual identity, I've played in probably 10 different PbP or PBeM campaigns over the last 15 years or so and I only ever encountered one gay PC (and her player had to tell me she was gay years after the fact). I have no idea how much of this is down to player preference, and how much it has to with US military prohibitions against LGBTQ service people in the 1980s and '90s. T2k seems a little on the macho side of the spectrum, so I can see how that perception might scare some interested people off.
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