Why do marines never fortify the west nexus road instead of north?

[Iatots]

It's shorter, barely a screen's lenght.
It's partly fortified on the west by atmos.
Leads directly into leisure, which can itself be fortified, and once secured negates the xeno's #2 favourite ganking spot for retreating marines.
Oh, and it also negates the #1 xeno ganking spot that is the long and jungle-ridden north nexus road.

Even if you think atmos is hard to keep an eye on because of the vines, it's still better than north nexus jungle since the aliens are boxed in by the walls. Combine it with a small detachment at engie's entrance and you never have to worry about flankings from that general direction.

[Skimmy2]

To answer your question, Unfortunately the only religion that Ungas worship more then their Attachments, is the philosophy of "Meta".

Still, it should be easy enough for a CO to order it or a SL getting hands on with his engies to do it. Its great that your giving it attention for people to attempt.

[Rataca100]

I usually try to get the roads and flanks leading to the area the main garrison is fortified. (never works) But the meta is hydro and then a river attrition assault to the tunnels on LV.

How ever in the few times i have sent people to hold power, they should have fortified that area.

[Artemis111]

Most likely the marines just got into a habit of fortifying that one road only. Unless a officer orders them to fortify anything else they will default to fortifying that one path.

[Blade2000Br]

I as XO once ordered a fortification on the roads leading to hydro, all of then. Tjey simply ignored and only fortified nexus/hydro road.

Later on the round, marines were loosing and I was being called shit.
Ungas simply can't follow basic orders that deviate from meta.

[Casany]

I also think it’s a lack of materials. Marines don’t get a lot of metal and plasteel and it costs a lot more points to get more with the updates so it’s nt like they have a lot to spare.

[Iatots]

I am not suggesting fortifying west and north. I am suggesting fortifying west only, because it's shorter and more easily defendable.
Edited the title for clarity.

[Casany]

I am not suggesting fortifying west and north. I am suggesting fortifying west only, because it's shorter and more easily defendable.
Edited the title for clarity.

Well simple. It’s easier for the xenos to win an offensive if they’re coming from the north, if it’s not well defended. There’s more space for more xenos so a wave will just rush after a Queen screech and smash through. In the West it’s a lot easier to defend if they come from there but the problem is no sane Queen will order an attack to the west.

[Iatots]

Queens already attack from the north as soon as hydro falls. I don't think there is quite enough room to attack hydro from the east, so in my opinion it boils down to either have a fortified road attacked, or a fortified nexus, and I prefer my alternative since it (theoretically) makes for a better supply line.

[RunAwayScientist]

If these last few weeks have shown anything, it's that the old metas are stale and need to change. Iatots is on point with this, since by falling back from Hydro (and leaving the trays in it) you actually create a buffer there.

The benos have adapted. It's time to try new, radical strategies.

[DriedMilk]

No matter what you do, protecting the roads reliably in LV is impossible. You gotta be quick and robust if you want to travel them alone. Cading it is a waste of metal and placing an entire squad there is a waste of manpower.

[Skimmy2]

No matter what you do, protecting the roads reliably in LV is impossible. You gotta be quick and robust if you want to travel them alone. Cading it is a waste of metal and placing an entire squad there is a waste of manpower.

Except the roads on LV are small as fuq and defendable with a a single fireteam on patrol?

[DriedMilk]

Except the roads on LV are small as fuq and defendable with a a single fireteam on patrol?

No such things as patrols. The standard PFC prefers charging Tfort like a madman.

[BillyBoBBizWorth]

None of this even matters anyhow, because regardless of where you do or dont fortify.You have this breed of marines that will open or jump the cades and go into whats meant to be the killzone and block pretty much all effective fire from behind said marine and usually gets killed and/or captured very easily.These marines tend to do this also when there is no obvious signs of anyone pushing either, which makes it even more puzzling.Furthermore, if you watch for this, you'll realize it happens more than you think and that sometimes just one marine jumping into the killzone and blocking allies gunfire can allow not only the idiot marine that blocked all the guns behind him to be killed, but allows the xenoes to push and destroy a flanks defenses because none of the marines can or are actually putting fire downrange, possibly getting them all killed too if the xenoes utilize the window of no resistance properly.Totally negating a flanks defenses entirely.One marine can cause all that.

And if you want proof of this you can be guaranteed to observe on almost any round, just observe the doorways when a SD hold is ordered, you will see it.Many, many times.If they cant even hold a single room with only one flank to the west, well what do you expect when asked to hold a position with more than one flank...?

Solution :

Marines need to hold a position more and move around less.It will decrease friendly fire, body blocking, increase effective fire, flank strength, reaction time and the list goes on.Half the time when im observing a marine, i see them literally moving around for absolutely no effective reasoning at all.The best roles to observes this as, are medic and engineer because they do need to move around ALOT for many reasons that are fairly obvious, the amount of bumping you get from other people as these roles for what the purpose of them moving seems pointless is amazing.So good on you private! You just stopped the medic doing a time critical defib, or a engineer doing a squad saving task of putting cades up and keeping electronics running.Good on you.

[Renomaki]

to be honest, when I go on LV as CO, sometimes I order marines to set up a pair of road blocks on both the north and the west roads.

Normally when I say this, I am asking them to make a minifort of sorts that blocks off the path and acts like a checkpoint, but most marines take it to mean they should fortify the ENTIRE road and expand more resources than is needed. Old habits die hard, I suppose.

Thing is, marines WILL change the meta (slightly), if Carson's "South LZ1 FoB" is anything to go by. But it helps if they know who you are and that you have experience. They'll still insult you in the long run, but then.. COs are the marine's punching bag.

[Casany]

None of this even matters anyhow, because regardless of where you do or dont fortify.You have this breed of marines that will open or jump the cades and go into whats meant to be the killzone and block pretty much all effective fire from behind said marine and usually gets killed and/or captured very easily.These marines tend to do this also when there is no obvious signs of anyone pushing either, which makes it even more puzzling.Furthermore, if you watch for this, you'll realize it happens more than you think and that sometimes just one marine jumping into the killzone and blocking allies gunfire can allow not only the idiot marine that blocked all the guns behind him to be killed, but allows the xenoes to push and destroy a flanks defenses because none of the marines can or are actually putting fire downrange, possibly getting them all killed too if the xenoes utilize the window of no resistance properly.Totally negating a flanks defenses entirely.One marine can cause all that.

Marines usually do this because either
A. They’re bald or
B. They actually understand that marines will always loose a battle of attrition VS xenos and they want to try to start an offensive to get the marines on a front they can win. The second you start holding a position instead of attacking one you’ve already lost.

I usually do this for reason B. If marines would be less cowards and actually try and stay on the offensive they’d be able to win a bit more. But winning isn’t everything.

Best FOB defenses are with like 3 guys and one turret before those turrets were nerfed. Now it’s boring and a waste to be on the defensive.

[Sambalu]

It's because of the meta that has established itself over the long time we've had LV. Xenos are always going to attack mainly from the north, and the marines know this. And they also know that if they fortified the west road, xenos would roll in through the north. If the FOB squad isn't great, thy're going to have a difficult time defending two points. That's why usually the fortifications to the west consist of only a few barricades near the center of the nexus. Habits like these are difficult to change without altering the map, so we're likely going to see marines prefer the north road for quite some time.

[yogurtshrimp69]

Getting marines to do absolutely anything different on LV is an insurmountable task, which is why I was so blown away when Bill Carson actually convinced marines to build a south LZ1 jungle fob instead of a FOB in the nexus. I agree that one of the biggest limiting factors to trying new things is often the lack of metal and resources in order to get creative. I think the marine favorite meta in terms of where to build is almost a result of what cade-able areas are the most metal efficient.

[Arbs]

Simply because xenos will attack from the north.