Troubling Trend in Battlefield Executions

[CaptainYankee]

Over the past couple of weeks I've noticed a sharp rise in the number of BE's handed out for very little reason. Now, I know some changes to CO rules are coming up, but the number of BE's being handed out, and the reasons for them, are starting to get out of hand. BE'ing civilians, BE'ing during briefing, BE'ing when MPs are on the scene and could easily handle the situation. Does anyone even remember the BE rules anymore? At this point you can BE someone for just about anything, and even if they go make a player report, you have pretty good chances of getting let off with a warning, if that.

Just me? Anyone else baffled by how easy it is to just remove someone from the round in a low-stress, no-threat situation?

[Renomaki]

I myself haven't witnessed a lot of these, but I wouldn't be surprised if it had to do with the fact that, as of now, COs aren't respected as much as they should be, with people often disregarding them or insulting them outright, even outright ignoring orders as a whole. And if you played CO a lot, no doubt it is bound to push you a bit over the edge, causing people to make irrational decisions due to the frustrations they have to endure for so, SO LONG.

I myself snapped at one point after delta pretty much ignored a DIRECT ORDER to not deploy on the first wave, and when I expressed my sheer disgust of their behavior (which has been very commonly shitty), they got all pissy and verbally decided that they weren't going to listen to me anymore. It was then that I snapped and decided "you know what? Fine, you don't have to listen to me, and I won't have to listen to you."

This resulted in all comms towards delta being silenced, and their overwatch being deactivated. Shortly after, delta did what delta does and rushed the xenos, expecting to trigger a tsunami of marines to come to their aid and put pressure on the xenos. Instead, nothing... They couldn't reach command, and while help was soon sent to them, they had no idea help WAS coming until it was too late, resulting in chaos and slaughter. Later on in that same round, the remaining deltas mutinied, overthrowing me with little resistance (I say little, since the XO decided it would be a smart idea to pull a pistol on them when I clearly was SURROUNDED by deltas). MPs later tried to recover my wounded body [due to a stray bullet] and went full on siege-mode on the CiC, which resulted in one delta marine deciding to execute me despite the fact that I had not given MPs orders to save me.

It was a really bad round, and I felt bad about it, unable to apologize enough for my horrible behavior. And keep in mind, I only really play CO off and on. Imagine being one of the more common "regular" COs?

[Sora9567]

I myself haven't witnessed a lot of these, but I wouldn't be surprised if it had to do with the fact that, as of now, COs aren't respected as much as they should be, with people often disregarding them or insulting them outright, even outright ignoring orders as a whole. And if you played CO a lot, no doubt it is bound to push you a bit over the edge, causing people to make irrational decisions due to the frustrations they have to endure for so, SO LONG.

I myself snapped at one point after delta pretty much ignored a DIRECT ORDER to not deploy on the first wave, and when I expressed my sheer disgust of their behavior (which has been very commonly shitty), they got all pissy and verbally decided that they weren't going to listen to me anymore. It was then that I snapped and decided "you know what? Fine, you don't have to listen to me, and I won't have to listen to you."

This resulted in all comms towards delta being silenced, and their overwatch being deactivated. Shortly after, delta did what delta does and rushed the xenos, expecting to trigger a tsunami of marines to come to their aid and put pressure on the xenos. Instead, nothing... They couldn't reach command, and while help was soon sent to them, they had no idea help WAS coming until it was too late, resulting in chaos and slaughter. Later on in that same round, the remaining deltas mutinied, overthrowing me with little resistance (I say little, since the XO decided it would be a smart idea to pull a pistol on them when I clearly was SURROUNDED by deltas). MPs later tried to recover my wounded body [due to a stray bullet] and went full on siege-mode on the CiC, which resulted in one delta marine deciding to execute me despite the fact that I had not given MPs orders to save me.

It was a really bad round, and I felt bad about it, unable to apologize enough for my horrible behavior. And keep in mind, I only really play CO off and on. Imagine being one of the more common "regular" COs?

I was Delta Smartgunner that round. I think the issue was that both sides felt their idea was best. You as the CO clearly had a tactical plan, but Delta has a concrete reputation of being first in the fight at all costs. I wish you and other COs shouldn't have to adjust your plans depending on how Delta acts, but if you do have a "Delta drops second plan", you would kind of need MPs to enforce that plan.

As for the Mutiny side, our plan was for no bloodshed period. But then you know, the XO did their thing, and the CMP decided to make everything worse.

As for your general CO playstyle, it's fine, you don't have a gimick but you don't need one. When it says "Commander Reno on deck", I don't go "Oh no, it's this guy." Don't beat yourself up over this. That round was mostly Delta's fault.

[Renomaki]

I was Delta Smartgunner that round. I think the issue was that both sides felt their idea was best. You as the CO clearly had a tactical plan, but Delta has a concrete reputation of being first in the fight at all costs. I wish you and other COs shouldn't have to adjust your plans depending on how Delta acts, but if you do have a "Delta drops second plan", you would kind of need MPs to enforce that plan.

That is kinda the worse quality of delta that I think a lot of COs can agree on.

They are known to be quite robust, sure, but they are also a loose cannon, a rampaging horde that is hard to tame, which often can put a lot of pressure on COs to keep them from rushing to their deaths because they HAVE to get fighting as soon as possible.

It is kinda why I do the whole "delta and [squad] drop second wave" thing, because I don't want things to escalate too quickly. The first two squads go down and set up a main HQ and a forward post, and then in about 2 minutes, the other squads deploy and THEN delta does their thing (plus when you really think about it, giving delta a few extra minutes to get stuff from cargo isn't such a bad idea). This ensures that deployment is more stable and less chaotic, which stresses me out more than you think.

Nothing sucks more than when you are already forced to go into full assault mode when you have no fallback positions, worse still when this happens and comms aren't online. Hell, delta is the reason I always have the first two squads form QRF teams, because I know they are gonna need help and very soon.

as me mum would say, I don't HATE delta, I just HATE what they do! I don't want to be totally controlling, but I'd at least appreciate it if delta was a little more cooperative with command instead of this semi-rebellious relationship they have with command.

[Enigmachine]

I was Delta Smartgunner that round. I think the issue was that both sides felt their idea was best. You as the CO clearly had a tactical plan, but Delta has a concrete reputation of being first in the fight at all costs. I wish you and other COs shouldn't have to adjust your plans depending on how Delta acts, but if you do have a "Delta drops second plan", you would kind of need MPs to enforce that plan.

The fuck is this snow-flakie bullshit?

This is the military and the CO's the big boss. Flat out defying reasonable orders is just LRP bullshit at that point. It doesn't fuckin' matter if he decided who dropped last by rolling a 4-sided die; he's the old man of the Almayer so you fucking do it.

EDIT: As for the main subject of this post; the academic in me is worried that the concerns over recent BE's are an illusion. For instance, how can we be confident that there ARE more BE's being done, as opposed to the BE's that are done are just overtly unreasonable? I'd love to hear if staff keep data on BE's.

[solidfury7]

I was Delta Smartgunner that round. I think the issue was that both sides felt their idea was best. You as the CO clearly had a tactical plan, but Delta has a concrete reputation of being first in the fight at all costs. I wish you and other COs shouldn't have to adjust your plans depending on how Delta acts, but if you do have a "Delta drops second plan", you would kind of need MPs to enforce that plan.

As for the Mutiny side, our plan was for no bloodshed period. But then you know, the XO did their thing, and the CMP decided to make everything worse.

As for your general CO playstyle, it's fine, you don't have a gimick but you don't need one. When it says "Commander Reno on deck", I don't go "Oh no, it's this guy." Don't beat yourself up over this. That round was mostly Delta's fault.

Fun fact, if you're in a high value role such as SL and you refuse to follow the COs orders at round start to follow your meta strategy ideals, you'll be job banned.

they'll have the hammer come down on them just like it did when Apache and Xur did this dumb shit.

Rightfully so.

[Enigmachine]

Who are Apache and Xur?

[Sora9567]

The fuck is this snow-flakie bullshit?

This is the military and the CO's the big boss. Flat out defying reasonable orders is just LRP bullshit at that point. It doesn't fuckin' matter if he decided who dropped last by rolling a 4-sided die; he's the old man of the Almayer so you fucking do it.

Yeah, don't I know it. I have squad preference set to none so I don't get caught in the trappings that maining a single squad can lead to, but when I was the Delta SG and SL decided to board anyway, I was conflicted: Do I stay on the Almayer and follow the CO's orders, but leave the squad without their support gunner, or remain with the squad and be part of the problem?

Hopefully it was an SL thing and not a continuous problem with Delta where they shift from "Offensive taskforce meant for hammering the enemy" to "Bloodthirsty jackasses who refuse to follow orders because 'muh unga'." But that's just my thoughts on the matter.

[ThesoldierLLJK]

The new guidelines are supposed to stop what you're concerned about.

Also the CO doesn't bend to Delta, you do your fucking jobs, or go play xeno.

[Clutch]

delta does what delta does

[Novus Luna]

delta does what delta does

I speak no exaggeration when I say that if every Delta-preference that exhibits the traits thusfar discussed in this thread got banned, it would improve this server tremendously for Command players on average. It's hard to make tactical decisions for a map designed for 4 squads when you only have 3 squads and a pile of insubordinate chimps. I'm getting into the habit of making Delta the FOB team and, thanks to what solidfury said above, I will be ahelping Squad Leaders and Engineers that don't adhere to that. If you play an engineer, you have a 25% expectancy of FOB, suck it up. The reason I make Delta FOB is because they're unga wildcards in the field - I should be changing tactical plans around what the enemy does, not around what the insubordinate squad does.

Here's a fun idea I just thought of exclusively for Delta. Instead of zipcuffs that no one uses, give each squad leader 2 beacon handcuffs that can interface with the evacuation wench that CAS has. Also give the MPs a small supply. Currently, if you commit insubordination in the field, you don't get punished unless you get injured enough to need medbay, especially if there isn't a big enough MP team for the CMP to station someone at the FOB. I'd also like to see the times for insubordination increased a bit, though then again I am the CMP that enforces the LRP crimes like I'm the Vatican and they're the Ten fucking Commandments.

[kastion]

I hate how delta ungas and tries to speedrun every round. I know sometimes its the COs doing it, but most of the time its just delta ignoring orders like fob duty. I had a game where I was Charlie spec and before we even landed on the planet delta and bravo I think had already smashed the aliens so we just walked around in the caves of big red for a while until I got bored and wandered off alone. Ended up in the bar with a survivor who was making drinks and I told the rest of Charlie and an entire squad ended up getting drunk with a survivor because the round was so boring. This not following orders shit literally ruins rounds for everyone else and is beyond low rp. People should be getting job bans for refusing to follow orders of the CO in my opinion. Mutiny is there for a reason, but just ignoring orders is no kosher.

[Huebone]

I was Delta Smartgunner that round. I think the issue was that both sides felt their idea was best. You as the CO clearly had a tactical plan, but Delta has a concrete reputation of being first in the fight at all costs.

You as the CO clearly had a tactical plan, but Delta has a concrete reputation of being first in the fight at all costs.

You as the CO clearly had a tactical plan, but Delta has a concrete reputation of being first in the fight at all costs.

but Delta has a concrete reputation of being first in the fight at all costs.

but Delta has a concrete reputation of being first in the fight at all costs.

but

but

The absolute state of Delta when they think that defying orders from the top dog himself is justifiable. The rules and wiki say, "if a higher up says jump, you don't even ask how high, you just do it."
Dear god, at this point the CO shouldn't even need to BE individually, they should just have the other squads capture Delta for their stupidity, even if it means some broken bones or even death. It's happened before, more often than not, lately it's been Delta that decides to go on and mutiny the CO, or die trying.
I'm not saying kill the Deltards every time they act out once, but at least try to establish SOME order every few rounds like this.
Have respect for the CO, stop throwing us deeper into a state of LRP hell.

[Valkrae]

I was BE'd for refusing to be a Commanders fetish fap material as a Civilian. He kept trying to get me to be his 'servant' and weird shit like that. I said no and I was executed for 'refusing orders'.

[kastion]

I was BE'd for refusing to be a Commanders fetish fap material as a Civilian. He kept trying to get me to be his 'servant' and weird shit like that. I said no and I was executed for 'refusing orders'.

Chen is an outlier of shitty CO. He will lose his CO when the new CO rules go into effect so you don't have to worry about him. We are talking about the average CO in this thread.

[Gnorse]

Delta absolutely deserved to be BEd for that shit, and this is coming from a delta main.
If you're a nobody PFC, feel free to flat out ignore a COs orders, but don't cry if you get tazed or BEd.
If you're literally anything but a PFC, you -will- follow the CO's orders.

[Swagile]

i stopped playing CO because of this

i can't do anything to squads that are insub

insub is a joke; MP's can't deal with marines that break rules, and to deal with the squads as CO, I have to go down there and BE them personally, and going down personally to BE either results in mutiny, or a successful BE but so much commanding time wasted that could have been used in OB's / relaying important information / coordinating squads that BE is a waste of time and effort

the last time i tried to put a kill order on someone (with good RP reasoning), i was ahelped almost immediately by an admin and told to fuck off

and then admins are wondering why we have nothing but meme commanders? because being a meme commander is more interesting and relaxing than having to be an actual CO, because being an actual CO requires actual tools to enforce your authority, and no, the MP's as of current are not the tools a CO has

the MP's are a joke, and BE's are a joke and only used as stress relief, not as an actual tool a CO uses in his arsenal to keep marines in line

what CO needs is the ability to extend his BE privilege to another commanding official, aka a CO can order a SL to execute one of his marines for insubordination. then marines will jump when they're told to jump, or they face being PB buckshotted by their SL under order of the CO.

don't tell me zipties work, that requires a SL to put down their fellow marines lethally, as they get no non-lethal weapons to arrest fellow marines who disobey orders

[DefinitelyAlone0309]

The way I see it, this is an age-old situation of "everyone has their own idea on how to play the game", which is an issue on literally every multiplayer game unless the game itself is so limited in the mechanic to the point that there's only one viable way of playing it. The RP crowd has one way, and the combat-focused crowd has another.

Now I'm not saying that no one is at fault here, I'm just saying that it may be a dick move to go directly against the other crowd's goal, just because you can and want to.


On the Commander side, they have a strategy. Might be a new one, might be an old one, might be an imperfect one. They want to try this strategy and see how it fares against the Xeno/opponent human force
On the Delta side, because Delta has the reputation of not getting FOB (which really needs an improvement btw, because only engineers actually get to do shit with FOB duty), most people that simply want to go on the server and shoot shit join the squad. So, if they suddenly get FOB, their entire goal for that round is dead and gone for the most part, or at the very least the majority of the round.

Now, if the Delta players get out of bound and start to be shitters (like in this situation), they should be punished, ICly and OOCly if it gets to that point.
But, if the Command staff knows what marine players (mostly Delta) want, yet actively tries to put Delta on FOB (either for fun or for the sake of ruining their day), you really can't blame the players to get bored/annoyed/angry/

BE, as a whole, is very questionable. Sure, it's a way to stop shitters from continue shitting on people's experience. But on the other hand, it's also a way for shitter COs to also ruin their victims' experience. Because of this, and the snowflake-ness of whitelists overall, most people have grown a hate for it. Is it reasonable? Who knows. Just food for thoughts

[TrollerNoob]

On the topic of Delta growing into this mindset where they won't get FOB duty -- it shouldn't be like that at all. Squads like Alpha, and especially Bravo, always get FOB duty -- to the point where it's the standard for an average operation. Yet, the members of those squads don't start throwing temper tantrums, and there are many members who grow tired of FOB. I, for one, during my Alpha days started to become upset at how frequent FOB was applied to the squad.

But suddenly, Delta gets FOB once in a blue moon, no pun intended, and the players of that squad are the victims, and are the ones having their round ruined? That argument doesn't have a lot of strength when other squads are taken into account.

[DefinitelyAlone0309]

And that is why I said that because Delta squad has the reputation of not getting FOB, people are in it for combat only, and they don't particularly like to get sucker-punched. We can change this slowly if we want, but it sure as hell isn't an immediate thing that you can just do without a care in the world.

And I also did say that, in this situation, these players should be punished heavily. We're all playing the same game here, and we should give some grounds, for both sides.

Never said I was good at giving arguments. I'm just giving my own opinion on the subject as the original thread wanted.

[Karmac]

I feel the main problem here is in-flexibility on both sides of the field. As the Commander of the operation it's up to you to get the best out of your men, and if they don't want to work with you, you'll have to work with them.

A simple solution to the age-old "which squad do I have sit at the FOB and twiddle their thumbs for up to an hour" is to just assign the engineers of three squads to handle it, as having the fourth squad handle engineering/T-Comms is almost never something they'll complain about.

It's time people made an effort to bridge the gap between Command and Marines, because everyone loses out if you don't.

Marines don't want to follow your orders? Then they should expect to receive minimal support and supplies, they're on their own, even if it is their choice. Most of the time, this is the equivalent of committing long-term suicide, so maybe try listening to some orders even if they do suck ass. Least you'll have other marines with you.

[awan]

I feel the main problem here is in-flexibility on both sides of the field. As the Commander of the operation it's up to you to get the best out of your men, and if they don't want to work with you, you'll have to work with them.

A simple solution to the age-old "which squad do I have sit at the FOB and twiddle their thumbs for up to an hour" is to just assign the engineers of three squads to handle it, as having the fourth squad handle engineering/T-Comms is almost never something they'll complain about.

It's time people made an effort to bridge the gap between Command and Marines, because everyone loses out if you don't.

Marines don't want to follow your orders? Then they should expect to receive minimal support and supplies, they're on their own, even if it is their choice. Most of the time, this is the equivalent of committing long-term suicide, so maybe try listening to some orders even if they do suck ass. Least you'll have other marines with you.

There are many rounds where I feel as if I dont get support from command already.
The strongest tools marines have are ob's and cas. I have no problems with getting a PO to cas. But getting command to OB seems to take for ever and to hit marines anyways.

[Build_R_]

Delta tends to act as the containment squad for rambos and ungas. If you don't want to act as a team or wait 2 minutes to fight while doing an important mission then you go delta. The reputation precedes them but I feel like this comment is going off topic from BEs.

I understand that CO is a stressful and difficult role but regardless a CO should be able to make use of MPs and Ahelps. Very few COs seem to use BEs as a last resort.

[Swagile]

There are many rounds where I feel as if I dont get support from command already.
The strongest tools marines have are ob's and cas. I have no problems with getting a PO to cas. But getting command to OB seems to take for ever and to hit marines anyways.

because OB's are annoying as fuck

by that i mean you have to enter arbitrary coords in orders to rain down the pain, and on top of that you have to pay attention to critical changes in the tactical situation, relay things to marines, and pay attention to what marines need, as well as think of what they need in the future (RO drops, gear up MT's to drop to help reinforce FOB, doctors drop due to lack of combat medics / dead combat medics, etc)

and sometimes the coords given are right on top of a marine push when marines SUDDENLY get the courage to push, and you can't take back the OB, so you FF an entire marine push because no one communicated they are pushing; but the SL's DID communicate for a OB

being a SO, XO, CO is all about communication and reliable information. we act on what we hear and see, not what will happen. and sometimes we don't see things or no one tells us shit; its why early evacs happen sometimes, because no one's telling us shit and so we call everyone back, fearing the worst.

same thing with OB's.

i just wish OB's were like CAS; you laze, and then a SO can just press a button to instantly cast on the last range finder location, which is a QoL improvement and allows SO's to focus more on relaying critical information happening to other squads, like a breach in the FOB to the south, instead of worrying about inputting coords, getting proper OB timing, while focusing on all these other issues

[awan]

because OB's are annoying as fuck

by that i mean you have to enter arbitrary coords in orders to rain down the pain, and on top of that you have to pay attention to critical changes in the tactical situation, relay things to marines, and pay attention to what marines need, as well as think of what they need in the future (RO drops, gear up MT's to drop to help reinforce FOB, doctors drop due to lack of combat medics / dead combat medics, etc)

and sometimes the coords given are right on top of a marine push when marines SUDDENLY get the courage to push, and you can't take back the OB, so you FF an entire marine push because no one communicated they are pushing; but the SL's DID communicate for a OB

being a SO, XO, CO is all about communication and reliable information. we act on what we hear and see, not what will happen. and sometimes we don't see things or no one tells us shit; its why early evacs happen sometimes, because no one's telling us shit and so we call everyone back, fearing the worst.

same thing with OB's.

i just wish OB's were like CAS; you laze, and then a SO can just press a button to instantly cast on the last range finder location, which is a QoL improvement and allows SO's to focus more on relaying critical information happening to other squads, like a breach in the FOB to the south, instead of worrying about inputting coords, getting proper OB timing, while focusing on all these other issues

I think that is more because aliens hear the OB they pull back and marines pull in even though the OB is announced.
The only reason a laser makes it better is that it has to be launched when someone announces it. You cannot wait to launch it at all.
That is not a change I like I don't want to see it forced because that is what a good and bad so differ in.

Honestly leading from CIC is hard imo. I have gone to the frontline to see stuff myself because I know what to look for and what I want to know. It is almost impossible to get the right/full picture as a CO without doing that. So yeah you need the right picture but you wont get that from SL's.

I want command to listen to the SL and to communicate better not to make it easy for them to OB. There should be a difference between good and bad command felt by the marines.