A chain of command is NOT a democracy.

[Cassius]

A chain of command is NOT a democracy.

Last night I was gaming on one team as a CO (on Kashan responsive and mostly effective) then I got teamswitched and somebdoy else became CO. He quickly complained how none of the squads was responsive and my squadleader complained in VOIP how he is a retard and that commanding is a 2 way street and that we shouldnt follow the orders he accepted from the CO

Well it is not, you want your commander to give good orders, keep him informed. You are about to go somwhere, tell your CO, you want to set up a firebase because you found 2 crates, inform your CO.

If you have a disagreement with your orders tell your concerns to the CO. If you want to make a suggestion do so. Eventually the CO will respond to your input, eventually he has good reasons to insist on his orders based on info you the SL do not have.

Even if the commander is new to commanding and makes bad decisions, follow orders anyway. If the team cooperates and loses he might learn from his errors and be a better CO
If the team gives him a hard time he will be put off commanding again.

https://www.realitymod.com/forum/f142-c ... nding.html

[OkitaMakoto]

Agreed. Well, I have mixed feelings but generally I agree. Its a part of the game.


Though, I have had some games in the past where our commander was completely inept and tried sending us ALL over the map crossing squads paths and the like. Generally just being VERY seat of his pants. Finally, my then drunk SL just told him we were going to go on our own. The CO asked where we were going and my SL replied in a slurred manner "We're going to win the round. Thank us later" Which we did. We had a helo in our squad fly us from one CP to another and within 5 minutes we had the Chinese already struggling to defend their main base from our assault[Qwai]

The gist of what Im saying is, its a game, but its also PROJECT REALITY, so I tend to try and listen to my SL and CO at all times. However, if my CO is an ABSOLUTE tard, I will follow the orders of my SL. I will not, however, ever leave my SL and go solo. I may change squads for one that fits my style, but I will listen to the SL I am currently under. CO though, as I said, DOESNT always know whats best as through EAs voip he may be uninformed, he may be overwhelmed, or he may just be inept


But yeah, I hear ya. If you are doing a decent job and are not an ABSOLUTE f***up then your orders NEED to be followed.

[Cassius]

Yah I hope the SL told the CO why he did not follow orders at least.

[Clypp]

COs often make bad decisions and it is part of a SL's job to convince him otherwise. That said, bad decisions are sometimes better than no decisions from a CO.

[[T]waylay00]

In real life, you're correct. It's not a democracy.

However, the COs in Project Reality aren't always experienced, trained 5-star generals either. So obviously there will be some very bad, uninformed decisions given out. IMO, that's when the SL has the right to decide what's best for his squad.

You have to put into perspective. As much as we'd like PR to be as realistic as possible, you still have to keep in mind that it's a game.

[Cassius]

Of course its a game, but you should give players who want to fit the CO spot a chance. I just felt really bad for the CO (though I admit not having been SL I cant tell if he was a d+ck in VOIP or not) and at the same time frustrated that another potential occasional commander was put off commanding.
Maybe a guide for beginner commanders can be cooked up no how to approach commanding when you dont have the experience. For example beginner commanders could be encouraged to be more open to advise from the SL. With that said the final word should always be with the CO.
Also if you are a grunt always follow Squadleaders order, its the SL who has to follow commander orders, you follow squadleader orders.

[Dude388]

A commander is only as useful as the Intel he receives from his squad leaders. Without it, he's as useful as a one-legged man in a butt kicking contest.

[Rico11b]

Most COs fail or make bad choices from one of two things or both.

1. Lack of a plan.
2. Lack of GOOD intel from squad leaders.

A good CO will be formulating a plan WITH his SLs BEFORE the round starts. He will also stick with the plan and make adjustments where needed. He won't just toss out the whole plan at first contact. That just shows a lack of discipline on his part. It is said that no plan survives contact with the enemy, and that is true. But still, you MUST always have A plan in mind. Many good COs have plans from A to Z.

Commanders NEED info and current reports about how the plan is developing. Without that he doesn't know if the plan is working or not. Sitting in the UAV trailer is utterly boring especially when no one wants to communicate with you. Not to mention he is disconnected from the battle. Then when your team loses you wanna blame the CO. Well it just doesn't work that way.


ALSO, if the ENTIRE TEAM (32 players max) would just stick together and provide covering fire or each other you would see a major difference in the out come of most maps. Regardless of WHO is the best player.

I'm guilty of it myself so this is a reminder for me also

I'm a RL combat veteran so you would think I should know better, but lots of times I don't. Just goes to show that this still just a game, and it is not NEARLY as realistic as most players, and some devs seem to think it is.

[charliegrs]

i dont seem to run into this problem much because i just flat out never see anyone commanding at all.

[Solid Knight]

A lot of people aren't good strategists in this game. You can inform the commander of every detail but he might not know any good strategies.

[cyberzomby]

Also dont forget that a squadleader has eyes on the ground. So they know where the enemy is, what the situation is. If they expect an attack soon and I as a CO order them to move elsewhere Im very happy if the SL informs if the oncoming attack.

[Solid Knight]

I've seen commanders order a retreat when their forces were winning. I was pretty angry because my squad leader actually obeyed the commander's orders even though we had overrun the enemy. He retreats to defend a flag the commander ordered him to defend. The result? The enemy, who lost all their rallies on land, got to regroup on the carrier and land somewhere else about ten minutes later. Yay, for stupidly obeying orders simply because "he's the commander". We could have, I don't know, kept capping the flag putting a halt to their attack but I guess defending a flag that isn't under attack is a better idea.

[Saobh]

I've seen commanders order a retreat when their forces were winning. I was pretty angry because my squad leader actually obeyed the commander's orders even though we had overrun the enemy. He retreats to defend a flag the commander ordered him to defend. The result? The enemy, who lost all their rallies on land, got to regroup on the carrier and land somewhere else about ten minutes later. Yay, for stupidly obeying orders simply because "he's the commander". We could have, I don't know, kept capping the flag putting a halt to their attack but I guess defending a flag that isn't under attack is a better idea.

This "Boots on the ground always know better" attitude is ridiculous.
Example: The CO could have received the info that an enemy squad was inbound to cap the flag behind you rendering your cap useless. But on the way where stopped by an other squad or any other reason, so you ended up defending against thin air. But in the end the CO's focus was not having his flags steam rolled while everybody is on the front.

The bottom line as a squad on the ground you see much but you also miss much mostly the big picture that only the CO can have. Thus the importance of following orders, and the chain of command exists however stupid it might look at the moment.

But yeah if you have an inept CO or he isn't receiving the proper intel the situation is going to be a mess. Like in real life... you just have to hope for the best and follow orders.

Or be your own boss

[@bsurd]

You are all right guys...

But since 0.8 the most times it becomes: OMG we have a commander, what a shi....

Since 0.8 i dont think we need a commander @ all. Ok, only for mark targets, but this dont even happens the most of the time.

The coordination between the sq can easy make per team chat.

And this the most time works better then with a commander. Because then you can see for example:

sq 2 you defend? Yes. Ok then we move to next flag.

So commanding is a waste of time imo. Better go for fight then sit in this stupid command box...

[cyberzomby]

hmm I can agree with you up to a certain level. But I reckon for the larger servers with 64 players it can be cumbersome. When your under fire you havent got the time to stop and type to squad 2 that theres enemys directly south of them.

Happened to a game where I was CO yesterday. Squad 3 radiod that they where sneaking up on a squad directly south of squad 2 and were starting to engage.

[@bsurd]

we have such a good SL in the Clan, its no problem for him to let us engage and he chats to the other friendlys near us what happend and were the e are.

After that he start fireing, or searches for a good place to fall back and things like that.

With a good SL a commander isnt necessary imo.

[Saobh]

we have such a good SL in the Clan, its no problem for him to let us engage and he chats to the other friendlys near us what happend and were the e are.

After that he start fireing, or searches for a good place to fall back and things like that.

With a good SL a commander isnt necessary imo.

And at any given time, on the 4-5 squads on each team how many SLs can be deemed "good" ? not that many.

That's why having even an average CO is better, as he takes that part of the workload off from the SLs shoulders.
Ultimately its not the SLs job to
The COs give them them orders/objectives then its the SLs job to achieve it the best he can.

But this thread is just going to go round and round between the "COs side" and the "SLs side" point of view. Proposed solutions to this problem would be welcome.


As it stands the CO has less power of control on his men then an SL has on his squad. He should have the power to enforce some authority over them in order to at least have part of the submission they would get in real life.
Maybe the CO could grant or block a squads ability to put down RP or have access to special kits would be a way of doing it.

But this would also need a system to get rid of a CO which abuses this system.

[cyberzomby]

Agreed. That would be some system Now theres these servers where you can report someone who does not obey orders. Wether its a squadmember or squad leader. Thats as far as it goes though.

[=]H[=TangFiend]

I've been a big advocate of giving the power back to the CO. Thats the single one change that I really think has hurt the game with .8 The CO can't really control anything since he like was said above "Has less power over SL's than they have over their members."


I'm all for some kit allocation by the CO. The amount of "Good squads" a CO gets to work with would increase to all most all of them.