Marine highlighting in command view

Gravity Grave

<div class="IPBDescription">Any effect?</div>Sorry if this is a dumb question, but I searched the forums and couldn't find an answer.

When you're a marine commander, you see a cool-looking dynamic highlighting system that morphs its shape around groups of marines as they get closer together. Sometimes it's red, and sometimes it's blue. Does anyone know if this has any effect on the game, other than being a visual cue to the commander that multiple marines are standing near one another?

Price

<!--quoteo(post=1912970:date=Mar 14 2012, 09:46 PM:name=Gravity Grave)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Gravity Grave @ Mar 14 2012, 09:46 PM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1912970"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->Does anyone know if this has any effect on the game, other than being a visual cue to the commander that multiple marines are standing near one another?<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
There no dumb questions, just dumb answers :P

no effect, just a visual for the commander to do squads i guess

Align

It shows you which marines are in a squad together, you can see it as a marine too by the list of names in the corner of your screen.

Laosh'Ra

it used to determine the number of medpacks dropped at once, but they removed that. they'll probably add additional functionality in the future.

Gravity Grave

Does "in a squad together" just mean that the commander set a control group (err, "crouch-key group" *cough* BUG *cough*) for them? Or is there another squad mechanic I'm missing, like with Battlefield 2 or Nuclear Dawn where you choose which squad you want to be in?

It would be cool if UWE would implement something like this (assuming it hasn't yet).

douchebagatron

i believe you can also select all marines in that group by clicking on the blob

Feha

A squad is dynamiclly formed by marines being close to eachothers. If the commander clicks on this blob he will select the whole squad and can order them around.
The marines also get a small (and nearly unnoticeable and hard to understand at first) indication of what color of group they are in, so ppl can use mic to order them around.

I think they had plans to add effects to being in a squad, dont remember what, and not sure if they still plan on doing it.

ScardyBob

<!--quoteo(post=1913062:date=Mar 14 2012, 05:06 PM:name=Feha)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Feha @ Mar 14 2012, 05:06 PM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1913062"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->A squad is dynamiclly formed by marines being close to eachothers. If the commander clicks on this blob he will select the whole squad and can order them around.
The marines also get a small (and nearly unnoticeable and hard to understand at first) indication of what color of group they are in, so ppl can use mic to order them around.

I think they had plans to add effects to being in a squad, dont remember what, and not sure if they still plan on doing it.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Mostly this. I believe the intent was to make squad formation/break up more representative of the actual situation (i.e. no more squads with people on opposite sides of the map). While it sort of does this for the comm, players have no idea which, or if, they are in a squad at the moment. I think the eventual plan is to implement more squad-specific features besides just giving them the same orders.