Commander assigned "Strike teams"

kelevra386 · May 2013

Hello,

Not sure if this has been mentioned before but being a pub player who is forced to comm often this crossed my mind today.

Would it be possible to group marines/aliens into teams (say alpha, beta etc) then assign them missions e.g. RT harass, RT defence, base pressure, roam, capture tech locations, etc?

Would make managing public players a lot easier and everyone would be aware of what they were "supposed" to be doing at least? Would also build on the "RTS" element.

Close if its been mentioned/discussed before.

Thanks

salvadorjer · May 2013

When i comm i usually hotkey groups for marines and direct from there. Aliens usually do their thing. However both of those are a last resort compared to mic communication. Usually it's more like: "2 marines are pushing ore processing, fade player go intercept them."

BLACKSasquatch · May 2013

I remember reading something similar with an additional idea being that players that followed these objectives (destroy RT's when assigned to harass RT's) got a boost to the score that they would normally receive for doing the task. Additionally there could be a hit to a score if they did a task they weren't assigned.

It'd be nice if they were auto-sorted into classes based on hidden stats, for example if a player had an abnormally high number of RT kills per life he would be assigned as an rt harasser automatically.

The hardest thing with this idea in general is adapting it to smaller teams. If it was 10 people and one was comm that would leave 3 people each in one of 3 teams, however if it were only seven people that would be one comm and 2 people per team or two 3-person teams.

Sherlock · May 2013

I think it would be hard to make sure people knew when their "primary objective" had changed, which it frequently does throughout the course of a game.

Also, with people dying / spawning in at different times, groups change and can be spilt apart, so it's easier sometimes to say "next person to spawn go cap Overlook and Sub", or "next two people in go and hit Cargo", etc. I could see progression becoming a lot slower if these individual strike teams stood about at spawn waiting to regroup with their "squad" before moving back out.

Sherlock · May 2013

Saying that, unless you could set an IP to Alpha team, and a different IP to Beta team, etc. The more IPs you put down, the more squads you can have.

And a feature to beacon only certain teams, or everyone. So you could pull your RT-builders back to defend whilst your offensive group don't leave their Exos.

Hmm... could work, actually.

BestProfileName · May 2013

I like this idea.

Implement it, UWE. I am tired of having to read names off, that I both cannot remember nor can I even read some of them

[Deleted User] · May 2013

salvadorjer wrote: »

When i comm i usually hotkey groups for marines and direct from there. Aliens usually do their thing. However both of those are a last resort compared to mic communication. Usually it's more like: "2 marines are pushing ore processing, fade player go intercept them."

If I go Commander I mostly do this as an Alien and on pubs it often happens that no one react to my orders, this is really annoying, so some sort of control would be very nice.

RedSword · May 2013

I thought about that too, but I wonder how you'd do about different orders; i.e. Squad Alpha defend X-road, then later on All squad retreat to Y. Would Squad Alpha still get its order ?

And what about deaf marines who go rambo ? i.e. one member of squad Alpha joins squad Beta on its own (physically; while still being in Alpha for the commander)... How would that be considered for the commander interface... (I feel something would have to be done without being too click heavy).

I feel the general idea can be implemented; but I also feel it can be shitly done, which I'm afraid of.

Calego · May 2013

Sherlock wrote: »

Also, with people dying / spawning in at different times, groups change and can be spilt apart, so it's easier sometimes to say "next person to spawn go cap Overlook and Sub", or "next two people in go and hit Cargo", etc. I could see progression becoming a lot slower if these individual strike teams stood about at spawn waiting to regroup with their "squad" before moving back out.

This is basically the main problem with a system of this sort. Things just happen too fast in NS2 to have people wandering half-way across the map trying to catch up to their "squad." Comms would be constantly rearranging the squads in an effort to keep them from becoming hopelessly tangled up.

The whole IP to teams thing is a bit funky. I think that's just complicating things without actually fixing the problems such a system creates. Selective beacons would be nice but that sorta goes against what the beacon is designed to do. There'd be no point in trying to force a beacon if you know that the pressure team is still going to be pressuring. You eliminate (or at least mitigate) the downsides to beaconing.

I love the idea but I can't imagine it working. In the end it all comes down to communication. Its a tough thing but the comm is reliant on his men as much as they are reliant on him.

CrazyEddie · June 2013

I think if you actually had this feature you'd find it useless in actual play. Circumstances change too often and too quickly to dedicate specific people to specific squads or tasks.

Nailo · June 2013

As a rule of thumb, I don't generally assign squads. I start off by asking them to split both ways evenly to find where the enemy is and that about all my orders are at the start. The game is about having fun and most players know what they prefer to do. If they want to assign themselves to a particular goal, such as gorging crossroads early, I'll be on board and ask if anyone wants to guard him before the game starts, and I tell the rest to split even and find the enemy team.

As aliens, I like to designate zones for certain people to defend and if someone offers I'll gladly accept for a few skulks to do nothing but bite RT's all day long. I could always ask for someone to go for a early gorge to speed up my RT's or for an extra lerk, but I don't because not everyone finds that fun.

For marines, be wary of exo's. I've seen many a close game that shouldn't have been simply because more than half the team went exo. Usually if I get exo's I usually try to verbally limit the number of exo's to about a 3rd or 4th of the marine team, doesn't always work though *sigh*. As far as squads are concerned, they fall naturally into place on my even split. On occasion if I want a 'pressure' squad or 'suicide' squad, I'll ask cheerfully if anyone wants to sacrifice themselves on some upgrades or RT's, usually I get some hilarious replys and sometimes I don't even need to ask.

A question I often ask myself when I hop in a game is what do I want my role to be, and I usually tell my commander what I intend to be so they can figure out what to do with me

RaZDaZ · June 2013

Just a couple of ideas that sprung up in my mind after reading through this thread, obviously it's not a perfect suggestion but I find that this strike team feature could be utilized in some way.

If this is cleverly implemented and is simple and intuitive to assign or reassign players then I could see this being a pretty good addition. Most people listen to a commanders orders as if it were gospel anyway so it would be reasonable to expect players that are assigned to stick to their roles. Could have something along the lines of:

- Resource Maintenance
- Base Maintenance
- Resource Harassment
- Assault Team A
- Assault Team B and so on
- Maybe even a squad that can have a custom name

You could select players, holding down shift to bring up a drop down menu and select a role that I listed as a suggestion. Selecting a custom name squad would activate a typical text box to input the name.

Your role would be listed on screen just above your Resource count.

This could help with commanders that are less likely to be vocal in their commands. I imagine that many players don't feel they want to command simply because they feel like they are forced to communicate, some people are just natural leaders and natural followers. Some don't like being in the hotseat but bridging that gap between being vocal and not is imo, a good thing. It may encourage more commanders as they feel more confident in just assigning a role and leaving it as that. This may allow them to transition comfortably from being a grunt on the ground to being a true commander.

Obviously there are problems with this such as more experienced players are less likely to be content with a commander assigning them a role like base defense when they are one of the best aggressive players on their team, players getting lost in the game and forgetting about their role, people just unwilling to accept their roles, etc.

If this feature were to be considered, what if players could create a profile in NS2 similar to a new soldier in the older Battlefield games that could be "Shift-clicked" in the game stats "TAB" in the same way someone could be muted. The profile would give a brief summary of what type of player they are. This profile could allow them to select a few of the following:

- Favorite weapon
- Favorite team
- Favorite role such as support, mainenance, assault, etc
- Favorite lifeform
- A small note for themselves kinda like guild player notes in WoW
- How experienced they are, hours played, etc
- A clan or team
- Favorite servers
- Favorite map
- Hell, even favorite mods

Favorite roles could be listed in the stats menu next to the shift-click profile.

It's a feature that isn't really relevant to veterans of the game but it would be a neat little addition to welcome new players into the mix and feel a little more unique and set themselves apart from another marine.

I'm not a game designer, far from one so I have no idea how big of a feature this is and how difficult it would be, just a suggestion although probably more important stuff to work on right now.

TL;DR - Easy-to-assign squads and custom NS2 profiles that players could use to describe themselves as a player, could be selected from the shift-click TAB stats screen and setup on the main menu. It's obviously all clunky and a little unfocused but it's something I came up with in 10 minutes.

Nailo · June 2013

I like your idea RaZDaZ but its main problem is that not everyone prefers to be relegated to one task

I often enjoy switching between being a gorge and fade. Sometimes I like being a Spartan Gorgie who holds the bases down, other times I enjoy being a Battle gorgie, rushing in behind the skulks and lerks to heal and shoot. For the indecisive ones who always want an order to do something I'm sure this would be wonderful but I figure letting the player choose what they do will more often than not insure that we both have a good time.

I guess what I'm saying is that there are too many situations and squads themselves cannot be prepared for everything, if my base defense team dies I'm going to ask other teams to phase through regardless. Squads are best left in my opinion to the smaller competitive games.

Commander assigned "Strike teams"

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