Your Comming Style

[rad4Christ]

I have a basic commanding structure with two starts...

Good Marine team Start: IP's, Armory, Arms Lab, mines (one pack)

Unknown (Bad) Marine Team: IP's, Armory, TF, Elec

Rest of Game:

Find hive and head in opposite direction. Use two groups of marines. One group captures nodes (I don't elec unless really crappy marines, if OK marines, elec high alien traffic nodes, good team, I elec nothing but hive RT's). The other group go toward hive and kills all nodes. This keeps aliens on defensive while marines inhibit their res flow and increase our own.

As soon as Arms Lab is up I upgrade ARMOR 1, allows my men to stay in the filed longer b/c they take more damage. Then Obs, then phase, Armory upgrade, lvl 1 Weapons... etc. From there I go by how we're doing. If we're dominating, I push on hive and upgrade quickly. If we're being pushed, but stable, I lock down key areas, and have marines scout for nodes and defend nodes. If we're being overwhelmed, try to lock down one hive and 2 nodes, keeping aliens contained as much as I can.

I do have abad habit of giving up if an expensive attack fails, i.e. siege rush that is destroyed. I'm working on having backups, but I'm still learning how not to put everyhting into one attack. One of the best comm's I know is The_Spectre on CoFR. Somehow he always manages to have 100+ res most of the time and upgrades going. I guess I spam health too much....

[BobTheJanitor]

Hey rad4Christ, I've worked for you a couple times, you're a pretty good comm if'n I do say so. Glad to see that you registered for the board. That's a cool two pronged attack strategy you have there, I plan to steal it and claim it for my own the next time I comm. Also your sig gets the Bob stamp of approval, as C.S. Lewis is da man.

Sadly I have no real comm strategy of my own to post as it really depends on the team. It seems like I only jump in the chair when everyone is staring at everyone else and spamming the 'need orders' communication while 'No Commander' flashes at the top. And in most of those situations, the team tends to be of the less than experienced variety, and I'm just no good at teaching people which end of the gun points away from their face while trying to take down the Kharaa menace at the same time.

On the rare occasions that I have good 'rines I like to go for the quick start: build IP, armory, elec Tfac, make a node run, then Arms Lab and Obs, then defend nodes/tech up. When given the option I like to go for JP/SG hive kills instead of HA, because HA to me usually spells turtling. And I once saw a good marine with nothing but JP/SG and medspam take down 2 of 3 hives. He was on top of the third when the CC went down and there was no more medspam : (

[rad4Christ]

I just played three games last night and I must say, "I LOVE GOOD MARINES!!!". We played Mineshaft, Tanith, and caged, and I won as comm. Now, the aliens weren't pushovers, and the marines worked their butt off, but I must say the satisfaction of not having to electrify a SINGLE node except PG hive locations was WONDERFUL!!! I'm telling you guys, you get a team that is constantly patrolling for you, you can have map denial without the waste of Elec, and tech up much faster!!!

[Paranoia-2MB]

Hmmm

I think i'm a quick com.  It's good, but it has one major drawback.  It requires teamwork.  If you do have teamwork, you can take control of the map very quickly.

I usually drop 2 Ips..always 2.
TF and an Armory.

Sometimes I like being a sneaky com though.  Like I was 2 days ago.  Was on some server that use WB bots and my buddy and I went Marine.  We noticed something odd when we pressed tab.

We saw:
Marines:
Paranoia-2MB
Cj
Aliens:
too many names to remember, but there where 8 of them.

I tell my buddy to run off and since we are lanning, it's much easier to communicate.  He runs off and we try to find their hive.  We found out that it was biodome.  My friend gets inside one of the vents, I build a CC + IP + Armory, drop mines for security, drop 2 shotguns.  Go to the hive and we take it out. buhahah.  Needless to say, some of the people on the alien team where shouting "bull" and "wtf"
:lol:  B)

[Niteowl]

just to revive a near dead thread

this is my observation of some of the more regular comms on LM

Holy Devil: types only.  upgrades quickly, no elect. wins quickly and efficiently. ebil as a rines, aliens, or comm. truly truly EEBIL!.

crack: types only. doesn't trust a marine farther than he can throw him in a full heavy kit. elects every rt and uses tfarms well. upgrades late. likes to steamify his desktop when he gets in the cc as of late.

Seth: really good at using and locking down areas effectively. rarely has to back track and kill hives he's already taken down. haven't seen him comm for a good long time.

CWAG: actually has a mic !! great for clan type esque games. uses multiple squads. likes the hive lockdown. haven't seen him in a chaotic pub tho

Me: commrage like crazy. erratic, crazy style. prefers throwing rines thorugh a PG into a skulk infested hive than pretty much anyother option. uses brute, large groups rather than subtle techniques and interesting siege locations.

[Black Mage]

BM: gambit, goes for the early shotgun rush with one ip and an armory, all res goes to med/ammo spam.
(assuming i'm actually playing seriously, for fun i listen to the marines)
note: has won very few games, none after attempting this tactic

[rad4Christ]

Just to give you an idea on the imbalance of 3.0, I commed 3 games on 2 new maps I had never played (actually one I played in end game, but never saw any more of the map than one hive), and won 2 of the 3. I didn't elec nodes, instead upgrading quickly. The marines were good and decent in the games I won (first game good, second game decent), but we won because of the sheer ease fo marines to win. Even on the game we lost, we took down a good many upgraded aliens with low level weapons.

If you can keep your marines out of base, and always actively pressuring aliens, you will come out on top almost every time. I think what really hurts commanders is when an alien team focus rushes a certain area, overtakes it, and the commander then avoids that area (like Central Processing on Caged). Instead, always KEEP PRESSURE on aliens. If they are focused on the 2 marines that continue to suicide rush Central, they won't bother the 5 marines capping nodes in Generator and Sewer. Then it's 5vs3 and the alien team is screwed. If skulks hit a node, go back to it. Remember, you can cap a node 2 more times with the res it costs to electrify that one node. Your marines should not "set it and forget it". They should be walking the map again and again to check for chokepoint WoL, alien res, or lone gorges going to their next node/hive. If the aliens think you're everwhere, they freak out, and spread themselves thin...

What do you think?

[Niteowl]

ok, we've diverged from personal comm styles to 'things comms should do'. which is fine, since i always need to learn more.

but yes, this is the right ideas. esp about the redropping rts. it gets tiring chomping down the same rt 3 times :S

[lolfighter]

My dilemma when playing marines, and the reason why I've always like aliens more (even back in 1.04 when we got our cute little Gorge hineys wupped), is related to the supreme weak spot of the marines: You're utterly dependent on the commander. As a matter of fact, without the help of the commander, you can't really do much: You can rambo off in hopes of killing the alien nodes, and that's pretty much it. Aliens are pretty much self-sufficient in that respect. You'll always have something to do: Protecting vital chokepoints, protecting the hive, running around to save nodes that are under attack, chomping down marine rts. And even when there's "nothing to do", you can still go marine hunting for rfk, getting to that higher lifeform faster.
But a marine can easily lapse into passivity if he's not being ordered around: No hivesight means that he doesn't know where the aliens are attacking, the inability to place structures or get himself equipment means that there's not much to do for him besides rambo off somewhere, which is where many of the rambos come from. At least that's always been MY problem. A comm that had specific plans for each single marine was a godsend: I didn't have to worry about tactical or strategical considerations for which I was ill-equipped, I could leave that to the commander, who had the much more overview.
Turns out that I've been wrong. There's ALWAYS something to do. If the comm isn't actively bossing you around, you're on patrol duty. Go check up on those nodes. Remember the turretfarm we placed in one of the hives in the beginning of the game? Go check up on it! Maybe the commander will place a PG there when you arrive, who knows? Maybe you'll discover that it's been taken down and a hive is going up?
A good marine will do all this on his own. I know that I'm not the only one who's had this problem, and I know that many still have it. A short reminder from time to time to the idle marines to simply go and patrol your turf might work well, and ease the workload of you commanders some.

[crack]

crack: types only. doesn't trust a marine farther than he can throw him in a full heavy kit. elects every rt and uses tfarms well. upgrades late. likes to steamify his desktop when he gets in the cc as of late.

HEY!  
Well I still get wins most of the time, i think i only lost about 3 and counting. The reason i get ups late is to get more rts and eletricify them. Which is more res for us. I have started to get ups at around 6 mins now which is alot more sooner then 10 mins. If my marines are bad which most of the time they arnt i will start earlier. If i have 3 rts ill start ups at 10 mins. 5+ ill start at 6mins just depends if i have enough to spend on MT and upgraded armory which always come at 5mins at least.

[Niteowl]

crack: types only. doesn't trust a marine farther than he can throw him in a full heavy kit. elects every rt and uses tfarms well. upgrades late. likes to steamify his desktop when he gets in the cc as of late.

HEY!  
Well I still get wins most of the time, i think i only lost about 3 and counting. The reason i get ups late is to get more rts and eletricify them. Which is more res for us. I have started to get ups at around 6 mins now which is alot more sooner then 10 mins. If my marines are bad which most of the time they arnt i will start earlier. If i have 3 rts ill start ups at 10 mins. 5+ ill start at 6mins just depends if i have enough to spend on MT and upgraded armory which always come at 5mins at least.

i'm not saying its bad crack.

[Isamil]

Topics a bit old, but oh well.
Annoying comm story about bast.  I was comm(duh), and the game started out with truce, but that didn't matter to much.  We were doing fairly well I guess, I got the whole team with HA and HMG, but the aliens had 3 hives and onos and stuff(They died preaty fast though).  We went to feedwater and took down the hive with just HMG fire(That was good, game seemed to be going well at the momment).  Now they are heading to refinary, and here is the problem.  Onos(Just 1) comes to base.  Chews up the PG(Not that it really mattered, my only PG was in atmos).  I'm yelling at my team to "GET TO BASE, ONOS!!!", and guess what!  I manage to get ONE(Out of like 5 HA guys) to stop attacking this one RT and come back to base.  He actully killed the onos(HMG is teh win).  I'm a bit annoyed at my team.  Then another onos comes, guy dies.  Still screaming at my team to get back to base, yet again I get ONE guy to leave, and he dies in Atmos.  Rest of the team is still waiting around with this RT, and I have made it quite clear to them that I want them to get to base really bad.  They all die, base dies, we lose.  It was looking to be a preaty good game to, until my team stopped listening.

[Niteowl]

really old post. bumping for anyone wanting to get bettter or learn the Chair O' PAIN!

[rad4Christ]

Well, considering my strat was elec everything in sight back then, I don't think this is a good reference :p

[Mr.Bill]

Get Ips, Armory
Get Rts
Get arms lab + obs
Tech up
Realize relocating to a vent was not an idea
Recycle base cept ips and obs
Bacon until res is all gone
recycle ips
Relocate to hive
Find a pit
Jump in it
Win






Best. Strat. Evar.

[LowCrawler]

i looooove locking down hives.

if not an actual lockdown, electrify something, it has a psychological effect, makes things afraid of it. I like to turret farm because i usually end up with tons of res, and again, turret farming, while not always good at actually KILLING things, is a great deterrent. My main thing is to be "proactive, not reactive" locking down those hives is way more important than a few rts, and im perfectly fine with being strapped and having a 2hive lockdown. The res will come on its own.

I do have a thing about not dropping meds a whole lot... unless theyre requested, or if i like you and am  naturally paying attention. Otherwise i just forget youre even there and watch you die... but its normally not a problem.

get early phasetech

people always are afraid of early fades, but the best counter ive found is to make them move. If you attack in 3 or 4 places at once with pairs of marines, then the fade can't defend them all at once. and a live fade is just as good as a dead one when he cant really make any impact
Since im usually loaded, i like to keep stax of equipment on the ground as much as possible, i hate "comm gimme a jp" every ten seconds... it distracts me from what im doing.

I love to siege, and i love love love dropping lots and lots of siege cannons.

nothing is better than

*ping babababbabababababababababaOOOOMMMM* hive down. 18 sieges ftw.



edit: ooooops wrong button someone delete that down there.

[SwiftSpear]

My comming goes like this
1.  Ip's Armory obs and maby Tfac
2.  Motion tracking + arms lab
3.  Phase tech + upgrade armory + armor 1
4.  Shotties if fades are on the map, otherwize push weapons to as late a possible, upgrade to L3 weapons ASAP, PG bases in good spots around map stradleing elec RTs
5.  Fail at setting up siege bases and taking down hives
6.  Lose the game

[Manta]

My starting build:

1. IP, Armory
2. Second IP (if needed)/Arms Lab/Obs
3. RTs close to base

Following that:

4. Arms Lab/Obs (whichever one I didn't get)
5. One more RT
6. Upgrade Armory
7. Hopefully, Phase Tech is done, so a PG in base and a hive.
8. Proto Lab or guns, depending on the current situation

My actual strategy isn't very good, since I haven't commed lately. I don't know the inside-outs of commanding, as well as the little tricks and basic strats that good commanders use. I also tend to forget things, which is bad if I'm trying to get things built. My pace is moderate, usually as fast as my marines can move.

[2_of_8]

1. IP
2. Armoury
3. As many RTs as I can get before... approximately 2 minutes
4. Obs (for bacon - when I comm, aliens just LOVE rushing my base)
5. Phase tech
6. Arms Lab (this might be switched with obs+phasetech if my marines like to die a lot)
7. Armour 1
All the time: take down their nodes

Then it just depends on how well you're doing. You might need to recap res nodes, or make a full-on assault on a hive, or sneak a phase gate in the hive. I don't spend res on locking down any location; I put a res node and a phase gate next to it. However, most of the time, this doesn't work; I don't respond fast enough.

[LochNess]

2 olde E's + some vodka + once in a month internet = feudalistic leader with a early power strat to crush!!!

if mic is available, i fear those that have to listen