Historically the people who hold higher ranks in reenactment units are those who attend the most events. Experience has shown that a unit can typically expect 50% of its membership for turnout at any given event. The regrettable net effect is the most devoted members are the ones who comprise the majority of the attendees and inversely the majority of rank awards . This results in a disproportionate rank heavy appearance. To address our unit has taken two distinct courses of action: 1. All members new to the hobby begin at the rank of Grenadier for field events and remain so far a minimum of 1 Year in the unit until they can properly demonstrate basic skills. Every full-fledged member, regardless of years in the unit, numbers of events attended, is required to maintain the rank of Gefreiter as their primary field-based impression. For more Information on minimum uniform requirements uniform requirements. The only exception to this rule is for our Field Commander who must maintain an NCO impression minimally for field based events. Any other field ranks, will be designated on an “as-needed” basis as part of an Event Primer. 2. At Public Displays or Vignette Specific Immersion Events, additional secondary impressions that warrant a particular Dienstgrad in order to perform a specific role are permissible. This uniform is considered additional to the required uniform. There must be a compelling impression-based reason for any specialized rank/role requiring approval by the Unit Coordinator. Any impression that could have existed within 3PGD is allowed at public displays. Preference is for those roles which were part of the Motorized Infanterie Kompanie structure but are not limited specifically. Our focus whenever possible at display events is to present the unit in the Italian Theater of Operations and provide information and educational aspects that speak to this era in our units history. Awards Many units have a disproportionate number of awards, such as the Iron Cross. It was not common to see such an award during WWII; The actual ratio was 1 in 60. To this end we no longer issue certain awards. Instead, we leave the decision to individual members to choose to wear the various awards based on historical interpretation of the specific role or vignette which the perform and qualify based on their corresponding level of experience. We take a less is more approach but award historically plausible options that reward progression. OUR CURRENT CRITERIA