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Message: <blockquote data-quote="pemerton" data-source="post: 6822697" data-attributes="member: 42582">And I gave you an example: Aragorn inspires Boromir but is not his commander. The Fellowship doesn't have a commander as such - it is not a military unit - and to the extent that there is an informal "boss" it is Gandalf.Not too far upthread [MENTION=31754]Lord Twig[/MENTION] says the same thing.I just don't see it as such a big issue, because of the form the "leadership" takes. When the leadership takes the form of conferring extra actions outside the action economy, or buffs to dice rolls, there is no interference with the agency of the other player. Of course there is colour/flavour - the other player's PC is inspired - but I don't see how this differs from the relationship between those other PCs and paladins, bards, clerics etc.But this is true for any example of literature, unless you are talking about the Order of the Stick or some similar parody.The warlord, mechanically, is primarily about manipulating die rolls, hit point totals and action economy. These are all features of the mechanics, not features of the fiction.Your own comments on initiative are no different in this respect. "Rolling initiative" isn't something that occurs in JRRT's fiction. You're projecting a particular mechanical framework onto that fiction.There are FRPGs with no action economy (eg Dungeon World) -  in a system like that, one could imagine Boromir's player having written down a Bond or an Alignment statement that means, by joining in Aragorn's charge, he gets a point of XP.The relevant question isn't "Is there a work of literature in which the fiction can't occur unless there is a warlord class along 4e lines"? The question is, "Does the existence of a warlord class along 4e lines reliably generate fiction and tropes that one wants to find in a piece of fantasy fiction?" I think the answer is yes - it's a reliable way of having one character call "Elendil!" and charge, and have another follow, inspired by his/her companion's example.</blockquote>

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