Not only OSR games suffer from the same old, same old problem with initiative rules. Essentially, those rules boil down to two alternatives: the whole group gains initiative and the individual members can determine in which order they act, or the rules determine who acts when.
It works, of course.
(And personally, I like group initiative a lot.)
But I think the single best twist on these age-old rules are Dan Sell’s Troika! initiative rules. You can use them in every roleplaying game. Speaking from a professional standpoint (I’m a certified intructor for reality-based self-defense and instructor-in-training for a Russian martial art), Dan’s initiative rules are realistic. Realistic, as in yes, it really works like that in melee, it’s all a huge fucking mess, and things happen you just don’t want to happen and everything is going in all directions all at once.
So, yes. Do yourself a favor and use Dan’s rules. They’re that good. AND they’re fun.
Darkworm Colt 
I 100% agree with and endorse this post. It is both accurate and erudite.
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Russian martial arts? What's the name? Might have heard of it.Also, the initiative system reminds me of several wargame rules. And yet I've never thought of translating that to roleplaying before this post, so many thanks!
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It's called Systema – my teacher is Martin Wheeler:http://wheelersystema.com
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Hello! I'd like to say that your blog is my favorite RPG place on internet. So did you see that Troika! has a SRD document now?
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Why, thank you, Randell! Yes, Troika! got its own SRD now, and that's so cool!
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What a bizarre coincidence… I've also been studying Systema and just took Martin's street boxing class in Florida.I wonder if anybody else is in the tiny sliver of overlap in the Venn diagram of Systema and OSR rules-light games?
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