TGMC:Field Commander

This page is a part of the TGMC wiki. TGMC is a project based on the CM-SS13 codebase.

This page is currently under construction! The following page is currently in the process of being created, is undergoing a major structural rework and/or is being moved. The reason for this is: "Needs a lot of content placed into it."

COMMAND

Field Commander

Access: All Access Difficulty: Very Hard Rank: Major Class: Marines Supervisors: Captain Duties: Lead your Marines on the ground to horrible and certain death. Work with the Captain to formulate and execute plans. Call in Orbital support as needed, fail to supply proper hits. Get decapitated within minutes. Guides: Guide to engineering, Guide to engineering, Guide to medicine Quote:"We need a new FC again; our FC got decapped."

Introduction

Welcome to the beginning of your career as a field officer. You are a part of the Terra Gov Marine Corps on a mission to handle distress calls of the unpleasant xenomorphs invading them. You will work with the Captain and Requisitions Officer on getting your marines down well armed and supplied, and will lead the marines groundside to establish a Forward Operating Base, and assign squads to certain roles they'll have to play on the ground. The Field Commander should often try to stay alive, but often they are either killed or bursted by xenomorphs.

Playing the Field Commander

Being Field Commander is a very demanding task on the ground as you must strategize and support the marines. An incompetent Field Commander will easily astray marines, waste resources, or lose planetside due to neglectance and ignorance; at best, they get decapitated. Such Field Commanders are forgotten in the passage of time; competent Field Commander are remembered.

You are responsible for ensuring marines are in quality status to eliminate the xenomorphs. This means you must know how to maneuver & supply the marines, how to secure & protect mining drills, how to communicate & coordinate with CIC, how to construct & maintain the FOB, how to heal & revive marines, and, the most important of them all, how to direct & control the unga. Essentially, you're the RO, CSE, SO, and CMO (but without surgery skills) with captain access that can deploy to planetside. Every bit of knowledge that can help you leverage marines to win against xenomorphs is important.

Compared to the captain and CIC, you are with the marines and their hardship. While captain or whoever is in CIC remains in shipside detached from the boots on the ground, you suffer alongside the marines.

Beginning of Operation: Shipside and Preparing

You should probably head to the Combat Information Center to set up Overwatch, or bug a Staff Officer or Captain about it. You may also brief the marines. Briefings done by you may be at the traditional Briefing Room, over the Radio, or at the Alamo Dropship. Note that briefings are strictly optional; actually trying to do one will usually instantly lose the respect of your marines, which makes your job as a leader nearly impossible.

During Operation: Planetside and Engaging

The Field Commander will often be out in the field, but it is advised that they don't go alone, as they can be easily taken out. Wrangling your marines is a hard task, and often you should gain their trust in your ability to lead them. Make sure you give clear and concise orders, don't input an essay, and don't input anything vague. Marines often love to go alone, so make sure you often tell them to partner up and give certain tasks to squads. If you can manage that, you're a better Field Commander than most.

Though you have fancy looking-equipment it's important to remember that (with the exception of pistols) you aren't any better at weapons use than any other marine, and your real skills lie in your max-power Orders (greatly increasing movement speed or increasing pain decay to 3x the normal speed is very powerful), your ability to repair and heal as well as Squad Engineers and Corpsmen, and your ability to use Tactical Binoculars much faster than anyone else (remember that you can use the Railgun even without a single person on the ship). The marines are probably better off with you in or near the FOB than with you dead in a corner somewhere, even if you take two xenos down with you. The Field Commander used to have a Smartgun, but it was removed specifically to force people to stop acting like a Squad Marine - try to take the hint. Also, if you're planning on leaving the FOB at all, wear a helmet; your beret is armored, but it doesn't prevent your head from coming off, and even the CMO can't fix that.

Equipment and Weapons

In terms of gear, you start with a pistol holster with a custom m1911 (you can't replace the magazines, but you can refill them with the standard .45 ammo) that has the odd problem of not auto-ejecting magazines. It works fine as a way to scare a Runner off, and if you're dexterous, it can be very powerful in general, downing even tier 3 xenos in two perfect magazines, but the difficulty is on par with using revolvers, and the m1911 doesn't stagger enemies. You *do* have increased skill with pistols, roughly equivalent to having a Recoil Compensator and Red Dot attached at all times; you're able to dual-wield and still hit most of your shots at a range a normal Marine wouldn't, but if you're going to try to do this you should pick a weapon with actual ergonomic features. This strategy will let you kill most xenos (any that die within 2 magazines) incredibly quickly, but leave you very vulnerable afterwards - and again, your main job is to stay alive and provide support, not get killed trying to John Woo a Praetorian.

On the even less practical side of things, you're given a sword that's more ceremonial than anything; it might be a good idea to replace this with a medical or tool belt, but it is very stylish. As mentioned earlier, you also get an armored beret that notably does not prevent decapitation, and should either be worn to show off your own skill or replaced with a helmet so you don't get permanently killed in a situation where literally anyone else would get revived a minute later.

You also have access to anything abandoned in the CIC (usually the Staff Officers' M4A3 pistols), the Squad Prep area (you can use the vendors as well), and anywhere else on the ship, as you have access to everything. You can even order equipment for yourself in Req, but doing this is a good way to get shouted at proportional to how many points you spend and how quickly you die on the ground while that 80-point rifle gets melted by acid. And you can't heal people or weld barricades while you're shooting a minigun! The most expensive *weapon* you should ever be ordering for yourself is a Mateba, if you have the skill to reload it quickly, as a way to punish xenos trying to focus you by giving them a stun and a quick death. Leave the actual frontline killing to the PFCs. Please.

Tips

• Just wear a fucking helmet or be behind marines.

TGMC Roles
	TerraGov Marines Ranks	Command	Captain, Field Commander, Staff Officer, Pilot Officer, Transport Officer, Mech Pilot
		Vehicle Crew	Assault Crewman, Transport Crewman
		Engineering and Supply	Chief Ship Engineer, Requisitions Officer, Ship Technician
		Medical	Chief Medical Officer, Medical Doctor, Researcher
		Marines	Squad Leader, Squad Smartgunner, Squad Engineer, Squad Corpsman, Squad Marine
		Civilians	Corporate Liaison
		Silicon	Combat robots, Synthetic, AI
	Xenomorphs Playtime	Tier 0	Larva, Minions
		Tier 1	Drone, Runner, Defender, Sentinel
		Tier 2	Hivelord, Carrier, Hunter, Wraith, Bull, Warrior, Puppeteer, Spitter, Pyrogen
		Tier 3	Gorger, Defiler, Widow, Ravager, Warlock, Behemoth, Crusher, Praetorian, Boiler
		Tier 4	Shrike, Queen, King, Hivemind
	Others		Zombie, Emergency Response Teams, Sons of Mars, Survivor