I was thinking about how the troops should be organized on Operation Pitchfork in order to minimize chaos (during work, I admit) and I ended up looking for inspiration on the French Revolutionary Army (since it was also a mostly voluntary movement).

To improve battle performance the revolutionary army decided to create the so called demi-brigades, composed of:

• one regular (ex-Royal Army) battalion (experienced soldiers).


• two federe voluntary battalions (voluntary, inexperienced but enthusiastic soldiers)

As it turns out this structure worked quite well.

Regarding Operation Pitchfork, just replace the regular battalion with guild battalion (disciplined, organized) and the federe by random people battalion (enthusiastic, undisciplined) and you get the gist of it.

We'd need some really cool names though, demi-brigade, federe,... it just doesn't cut it. Perhaps barbecue and cheese battalions forming up the sauce brigade (because, all the bacon) ?

Have been debating about this myself, but reading a number of the large guilds that are interested in this, I think only a few will be interested in taking on new recruits that won't actually sign up as members.

We'll see, though - a lot of time between now and then.

I don't think a standard military structure is going to cut it for this, however. My current thoughts are having a tensor structure, so that things like a Task Force, Fleet, and Corps are all of similar organizational import, rather than a hierarchy.

Have been debating about this myself, but reading a number of the large guilds that are interested in this, I think only a few will be interested in taking on new recruits that won't actually sign up as members.

We'll see, though - a lot of time between now and then.

I don't think a standard military structure is going to cut it for this, however. My current thoughts are having a tensor structure, so that things like a Task Force, Fleet, and Corps are all of similar organizational import, rather than a hierarchy.

I'm of the same mind, Xeriar.  Unless a whole bunch of people get real hardcore I don't think a regimented structure is that feasible. 

I'm agreeing with Xeriar and Hike.

While there will be some coordination, what will most likely happen is the majority of people will go to Null and head straight for Orion through Caliban.

The people who wish to be part of an organised structure will more than likely follow the orders of Sailor (and his appointed high ranking officers).

I don't see the point in having a rank structure other than the following.

Sailor (Supreme Commander)
Advisors (Consultation and command)
Instance leaders (Following orders from Command)
Everyone else (Individuals in the instances)

And as I said, this will only really apply to people who *wish* to be lead by Sailor. Many guilds have stated that they want to take command (which won't be happening as it's Sailor's op). The guilds who want to take part but do their own strategies may be in contact but more than likely will not follow any direct orders.

It's not really a problem though, as long as everyone is on the same page then we should be fine.

I'm agreeing with Xeriar and Hike.

While there will be some coordination, what will most likely happen is the majority of people will go to Null and head straight for Orion through Caliban.

The people who wish to be part of an organised structure will more than likely follow the orders of Sailor (and his appointed high ranking officers).

I don't see the point in having a rank structure other than the following.

Sailor (Supreme Commander)
Advisors (Consultation and command)
Instance leaders (Following orders from Command)
Everyone else (Individuals in the instances)

And as I said, this will only really apply to people who *wish* to be lead by Sailor. Many guilds have stated that they want to take command (which won't be happening as it's Sailor's op). The guilds who want to take part but do their own strategies may be in contact but more than likely will not follow any direct orders.

It's not really a problem though, as long as everyone is on the same page then we should be fine.

I will admit that part of me is planning a mix setting for this.

But I am apart of a gamer Taskforce right now but we don't do anything hardcore... more then likely we will be very loose about what we plan to do.  (Still very early to know the play style everyone will run with)

But, we could work up a deployment plan for the individuals that don't want to run as a well oiled formation.

AS for Sailor Running the OP I was planning on that from the start ... and the other organization that plan to lead their own groups they can still have general Objectives if they are willing to accept them if not we will just have to throw in the plans to what they wish to do and move others around to better fit the effectiveness of the event.

We will always have people that will never want to work to a fine detailed plan but they would just like to be another body to throw at the Vanduul when the time comes, and they have their own plans. And I will respect that.

I would agree that this is an entire group of individuals that are willing to be apart of something, and the same would go for any one that wants to play a video game. If some one is willing to lead and others are willing to be lead then it is up to the individual's to find the person they would like to follow into combat/missions/escorts/etc. etc. etc.

I will keep this on the back burner because of the instancing that we will have to do but, personally I don't want to force commands and orders down everyone's throats to the point of Micro-managing the actions of everyone. But, more to guide in the way of a suggested course of action, if it is favored by many others.

I don't think people will join guilds only for this (myself included). What I meant is providing a couple of general directions to the guildless pepople:
- Define meeting points.
- As soon as some critical mass has gathered, give out the "order" to depart.

I'm picturing this like:

• Guilds A, B and C are gathered on meeting point A, about 20 of person on each one.


• Random people are gradually arriving into the meeting point.


• As soon as about 40 random people arrived, send them into the fray alongside guild A


• The next 40 go with guild B


• The next 40 guild C and so on.

In this example, each 20 man guild squadron would be a barbecue battalion and the 40 random people would be the cheese battalion, hence we would throw three waves of 60 people sauce brigades at the bacon.

The aim here would be to have more "balanced" instances in order to maximize the random people effectiveness.

I admit there's no way to enforce this structure, but it sounds simple enough to have an actual chance of success: just gather people at a couple of designated points and after a while send them to the front lines. As long as people don't have to wait for half an hour for a brigade to be formed, it might be doable.

Disclaimer: I'm one of the random guildless people whose optimal usage would be running operation "Human Shield"

Instances will most likely be balanced with regards to skill and numbers. For example, a newb and his 2 newb friends will not face 40 mega death PVPers or 40 ultimate skill AI.

In the same respect, a guild of 20 players will not face 400 Vanduul ships. The balancing is done in the individual instance so we don't need to worry about having less players in one instance than another.

This means that if the guild with 20 players wants to remain a close-knit team of friends then they can do so.

As I said, I'd be happy to command/lead an instance of 40 players who do not have a guild. However, if I were to do so they will be under the acknowledgement that if I ask them to do something, they do it. You can't effectively command people who don't want to be commanded.

And as I have also previously said, I have 2 years experience commanding people on World of Tanks. While it is not 40 players, it is 14 other players in a small map with an ever changing scenario that requires quick changes in tactics and knowing how to use what is there. I won't lead you to your deaths but I won't hesitate to engage either.

I don't have any experience myself running large ops, but I've been in 40+ strike fighter operations as what is described here. The leader had a simple but effective means of commanding the group without relying on unified TS and coordinating random players.

His strategy was based on "follow the leader." All fighters would group up behind a designated lead ship (or the backup leaders) flying in circles. Then everyone would just follow him around to primary targets. His wing would run gun escort while ours ran torpedoes. The unaffiliated would just add firepower against the main target or npc's.

He ran it with 4 basic commands in text chat.
T (for target) = [lines, npc, Outpost]
Rally= [destination] (for gathering or when things went bad)
TS= [Target System] (jump to this enemy system)
Scatter (evade and jump away)

Granted SC is nothing like the game I used to play, and there is the instance factor to consider. And we don't know how in-game comms will work. But it worked there during his wing's public level operations.

Just throwing this out there in case someone finds it useful. Even if its a dumb idea, maybe it will lead to good ones.

I've never used follow the leader, problem is that using that tactic on World of Tanks will most likely cause you to leave several flanks open. With that said, commanding a team of 15 tanks is nothing like organising 40 aircraft - two different games.

My other experience of commanding is that in Project Reality where I often play as squad leader. On the 1.0 release I spent a lot of time helping new players get used to the steep learning curve. This meant leading 7 players against 50 odd enemies.

It'll be interesting to see how SC develops anyway. CR did state in a Q&A in Cologne that Air Traffic Control is possible for command. I'd personally like to be on the battlefield but sat back watching the battle progress and jumping in where needed.

It will remain to be seen if focus-firing is effective. If I were in design I'd have ship shields that could have short periods of invulnerability and somewhat longer periods of large degrees of hefty damage reduction - reducing the viability of focus-firing as a tactic.

A lot will also depend on how tightly we can assign flights.

The oceanic guilds are planning on coordinating together but due to our massive time difference with everyone else, proper command structure is going to be difficult at best.

Thus far, we're planning as best we can around the idea of running initial scouting ops and relaying info back to main command then following back through after the main attacks start and acting as a rear guard..

Anyway, the DUSCC forums is where we're coordinating specifically oceanic stuff.

You are talking about the Oceanics. But don't forget, that there is also a big time difference between US-Timezones and European-Timezones.

What's your plan for that?

We were sort of hoping that a similar thing would rise up for the EU and US guys, so that we'd end up with a central co-ordinating group for each of the three timezones.

As it is this is mainly an inter-guild thing, but for simplicity of operation we'd probably setup and enact whatever C&C procedures are generally decided on for managing the independants of Pitchfork.

Regarding the main topic, a lot of how this pans out depends on how the instancing system works. The simplest ways to implement it (just grab players according to locality, skill and PvP inclination) would probably play havoc with any fleet composition we setup. I'm also leery of choosing "instance commanders" unless there are surefire ways to delineate instances and get specific players into them.

I have a group of Oceanics who will be more than happy to convert Vanduul to space bacon, just point us in the right direction. Regarding time zones, our prime time is 19:00-01:00 (GMT+13). Assuming the main forces won't be online at those times, I see our role as recon and perhaps some salvage/SAR ops.

Regarding tactics, Follow-the-leader rarely works well in my experience (Freespace, Freespace 2 & Allegiance). We will need to find something more effective than flying a nice and easy line-astern, straight into their AAA fire.

Make a post over at http://duscc.com and introduce yourself

Depending on flight mechanics, it may be quite difficult to have organised formations. Follow the leader might work; certainly it's the most effective way for the overall Operation to function from system to system.

Thinking about it, I kind of like the idea of attaching one or two pub squadrons to a co-ordinated, "crack" squadron. It would be good experience for everyone involved, not to mention boosting punch of the org squadron while increasing the co-ordination of the public squadrons.

You are talking about the Oceanics. But don't forget, that there is also a big time difference between US-Timezones and European-Timezones.

True, but it's not as big as it is for us to EU. 13hrs (give or take) as compared to 6-7hrs if I remember right for central US?

I think naturally the attack will happen in waves where most of the timezone can get on, then capering down to the night owls/early risers of the next zone until the next zone peaks before dropping back off..

@ Ratu
Follow the leader according to what you are thinking in those games, as well as WOT wouldn't work too well. A shot missing the lead ship could still hit the one behind, and in WOT side shots=kill shots. In the one I played it did because the mechanics were totally different. I've described the process that was used. But keep in mind that I didn't describe what it looked like in practice.

So allow me to elaborate. Precise formation flying in tiny fighters was nearly impossible. What would happen was the lead fighter would fly in a circle until all were gathered flying that circle. Then he would break off and rest would follow in a tight cluster. Lesser equipped fighters (many being public ones) would lag behind the main strike ball. This limited the need for voice communication between various groups, and made possible group cohesion and operational coordination. I imagine this still took some practice, but is easy to learn rather than integrating numerous groups. That allowed the "leader" to listen to recon reports from other systems for following attacks.

So on the map, you would see a comet-shaped swarm of fighters, and they would hit their target area (the main target being a base) tsunami style. An initial wall of a wave that just kept coming until the area looked like a kicked hornet's nest. Now that I think about it, it gave lesser equipped ships a chance because the heavily geared and most survivable would take the initial response from defenders.

@ no one in particular-
We each have experience playing with all sorts of game mechanics and how to function in those examples. It will not take long to combine all that experience for discovering what will work in SC. Experience in Freespace I imagine will be very useful in tactical level dogfighting groups where things happen fast and changes take place in fractions of a second. World of Tanks perhaps more in the strategic sense, and in bomber/capital ship level combat where you can take more time to think about what is happening. EVE players in large scale combat and coordination. Us BSGO players? I don't know, that game was always broken. Probably in Rock/Paper/Scissors mechanics.

Everyone will have things to learn and unlearn from other games. But what we all bring to the table for SC is daunting. Combining all that? It gives me goosebumps.

I understand your point Andy_H.
I personally disagree with you on keeping close formations in fighters. If you play Allegiance, you will see squadrons of 30+ fighters working together and flying precision formations as they move towards their targets. These things are always possible (assuming game mechanics allow it), the difficulty is training the pilots so they don't crash into each other.

You are talking about the Oceanics. But don't forget, that there is also a big time difference between US-Timezones and European-Timezones.

What's your plan for that?

surely already been responded but, we should make something like a poll of the guilds from the different timezones and let them choose 1-2 "diplomats" who will be in charge of relying what have been discussed for the guilds in their own timezone, and ask people who speak multiple language to help out, I mean I speak French and English I can cover alot more people than someone with only one of those language, same thing from alot of you that im sure speak 2-3 or 4 languages to help out translate important informations.

Yes we could all just Use English for a main language, but for a Operation that will need some precise planning, etc, I think its important to have some peoples who can speak their native language to explain to their members what is actually happening and when (date/hour).

I agree with Le lys Rouge. While it makes sense for us to use one common language for planning purposes, it is also vital that there are multilingual people in the chain of command who can pass orders/instructions/plans onto members who do not speak English.
For my part, I speak a little bit of French but I am far from fluent.

A command structure requires some kind of uniformity in the troops you intend to command. We have no such thing, everyone will bring whatever they have, and while some guilds may have some reasonable wing compositions (Interceptors, CAS, Bombers, etc), I'm guessing the vast majority will come with whatever they can get their hands on (typical militia). Since we can't truly split up our forces in groups with similar characteristics (can't tell people who to play with), we'll have to make do with whatever shows up and hope the plan is laid out in a way which is clear enough for everyone to know what they should be attempting to do.

Hopefully, the few pockets of organized wings will serve as a bastion and an example to the other wings which should follow their lead and strive to emulate them.

Don't underestimate the fleets some guilds will bring to the table. I think there'll be enough to form a disciplined core for the independant Pitchforkers to rally around.

And if we constantly announce updates and fleet locations via twitter and proxy chat, much of the "militia" will hopefully be able to filter down to a squadron or fleetgroup where they can best utilise their loadout / inclinations.

Certainly some of the 'large' guilds will be HUGE by the time OPPF takes place. I can easily imagine some groups with several thousand members by that time.

By the time we make it to Orion, the cruel whip of battle will likely have weeded out the more wild elements, and driven the survivors into a more cooperative and tight-nit group. A lot of this is going to come down to how the communications of the event are organized.

surely already been responded but, we should make something like a poll of the guilds from the different timezones and let them choose 1-2 "diplomats" who will be in charge of relying what have been discussed for the guilds in their own timezone, and ask people who speak multiple language to help out, I mean I speak French and English I can cover alot more people than someone with only one of those language, same thing from alot of you that im sure speak 2-3 or 4 languages to help out translate important informations.

Yes we could all just Use English for a main language, but for a Operation that will need some precise planning, etc, I think its important to have some peoples who can speak their native language to explain to their members what is actually happening and when (date/hour).

I have built a region-specific board for such a thing in that can be found on the Joint Operations board. It is not currently being utilized by anyone. If we could get groups and people posting their issues in there, that would help with resolving those issues and sourcing info such as this for people.