RE: Card initiative - alternative

I was in a game (actually it was a Western Gun Fight) that had an 
interesting
action system. Each character (man? section? squad? for SG) had an 
action level
and the turn was broken down into phases. Here is an example how it
would work:

In a 4 phase turn
Elite	    - 4 actions
Veteran  - 3 actions
Regular  - 2 actions
Green	 - 1 action

A - Action / N - No Action
phase	 Elite	  Veteran    Regular	Green
1	     A(4)    A(3)	 N(2)	     N(1)

2	     A(4)    N(2)	 A(4)	     N(2)

3	     A(4)    A(5)	 N(2)	     A(3)

4	     A(4)    A(4)	 A(4)	     N(0)

Actions:
    Move half / Move Full
    Fire
    Overwatch (may fire this turn or until next Action can be taken)
    Command (change/give orders)
    Call for Fire
    Whatever (feel free to add to the list)

The limits are that if you are moving you can not move more then is
allowed
for the turn. If Firing can not fire more in a turn then is allowed. Be 
very careful
when intermixing skills as it can cause problems (Sergeant is Regular 
phase 2,4
and squad is green phase 3) but  it could still work as long as you 
don't have
to many different skill levels in the same unit.

You could also set a 6 phase turn:.
Elite	    - 4 actions
Veteran  - 3 actions
Regular  - 2 actions
Green	 - 1 action

A - Action / N - No Action
phase	 Elite	  Veteran    Regular	Green
1	     A(4)    N(3)	 N(2)	     N(1)

2	     N(2)    A(6)	 A(4)	     N(2)

3	     A(6)    N(3)	 N(0)	     N(3)

4	     A(4)    A(6)	 N(2)	     A(4)

5	     N(2)    N(3)	 A(4)	     N(-1)

6	     A(6)    A(6)	 N(0)	     N(0)

The advantage would be that everyone would be doing something in the
game with none sitting around as you can have in a card based game.

Scott Siebold