Gunmander - Captaining from the deck

[Agent Of Change]

Ok so I am brand new to this forum and the game (only playing for about a week now) and my Clan has jumped in enmasse so we've been playing with different strategies and builds as n00bs are wont to do. Now in case this has been discussed before I did a couple quick searches to see if this had come up and didn't find anything so i apologize if I'm duplicating something.

What I wanted to ask about/comment on was what we have come to call the Gunmander postion.  I would be shocked into a heart attack if we were the first to  experiment with the pilot NOT being the captain, but as i said I didn't see it mentioned in my quick searches.

The Gunmander: A Primary Gunner who acts in all cases as the captain, directing the ship, selecting the targets and coordinating with friendly captains in addition to manning the guns.

We have discovered on smaller or more open ships (Goldfish, junker, and squid so far) Having the Gunner call the shots works very well.  It requires good communication with your pilot and a good amount of chemistry with your crew (as does pretty much any effective crew really) but it has allowed us to be quite successful in our own estimation early on and certainly no worse off than other ships with pilots as their captain.

The pitfalls we've seen have mostly been in properly relaying friendly ship communication and miscommunication/misunderstandings on deck but those are getting less and less frequent with practice.

I'm curious if other folks have experimented with this?  If you have other ships it might work/not work on?  If you have played around with other roles as captain?

[Alistair MacBain]

Hard but true thing ... No.
The one who makes the first move/decision is the pilot thus it makes most sense to have him actually deciding what to do. Its his job to watch the map and know what the enemy does. As engineer youre to busy repairing and as gunner you should also observe whats happening on your ship.
The pilot has to keep the terrain in mind and know where his ally and the enemy is and how they are positioned.
It doesnt make sense to have the gunner give the call to burn hydro to stay alive when its the pilot who will most likely observe the situation first and who should realize the hp and armor of his ship.
If the gunner is the one making the call you just prolong the decision which is pretty bad when youre fighting kill builds which can kill you in a matter of seconds.
He is also the one with the easiest communication with his allied ship. Youre fighting with 2 ships on each side. Not 1.

On your current lvl it might work out that way but as soon as people get more experienced you will suffer as the prolonged decision is all what a decent opponent needs to kill you.
It doesnt mean that you can mix things up but in the end its the pilot who does the move and not the gunner.

[HamsterIV]

It is possible to boss people about from any position on the ship. There have been times when flying with an all noob crew that I have directed the ship from the position of main engineer, telling the captain which direction to turn and what throttle setting he should be at. If the person who is flying the ship is OK with another player usurping their authority the more power to you.

By convention pubic games have the person in the Commander slot be a pilot and be in charge of the ship. If you are with your clan you can fly however you like. I remember flying with Charon and Sushi (two of the founders of the ducks) where Charon would gun and Sushi would fly. Caron would take the captain slot because he has a much more commanding presence on the mic, and direct the team and ship from the nose gun of a goldfish.

Pilot captains tend to be the norm because the pilot has more time to look around and asses the over all situation. This includes what the other ships are doing and if there are any crewmen out of place. Gunners tend to suffer tunnel vision when there is a hard to hit target, and engineers are too busy with their Parkour when things get hot. While this Gunmander is not a horrible idea I don't think you have stumbled upon the new meta.

[Agent Of Change]

I suspect that that might become a barrier.

We tried it as an experiment and were surprised at how well it did work.  It's actually been an interesting partnership between the gunner and the captain when we run that.  I suspect it might work to better or worse degrees depending on the people involved as well.

The way it's been mostly working is that the Gunmander doesn't dictate how the flying is done just what he needs for guns and the larger strategic picture, the pilot provides information, and directs the engineers where necessary.  That might create some lag, as for inter ship communication we just drop the gunner into the captain slot and let him speak to the other ships and go from there.

I can see where that might create lag or delay against 'kill builds' but it'll be interesting to see how far this can take us I suppose.

[Agent Of Change]

It is possible to boss people about from any position on the ship. There have been times when flying with an all noob crew that I have directed the ship from the position of main engineer, telling the captain which direction to turn and what throttle setting he should be at. If the person who is flying the ship is OK with another player usurping their authority the more power to you.

By convention pubic games have the person in the Commander slot be a pilot and be in charge of the ship. If you are with your clan you can fly however you like. I remember flying with Charon and Sushi (two of the founders of the ducks) where Charon would gun and Sushi would fly. Caron would take the captain slot because he has a much more commanding presence on the mic, and direct the team and ship from the nose gun of a goldfish.

Pilot captains tend to be the norm because the pilot has more time to look around and asses the over all situation. This includes what the other ships are doing and if there are any crewmen out of place. Gunners tend to suffer tunnel vision when there is a hard to hit target, and engineers are too busy with their Parkour when things get hot. While this Gunmander is not a horrible idea I don't think you have stumbled upon the new meta.

Thanks for the feed back.  We don't really PUG at all there are enough of us that that will rarely be an issue for now but I see what you are saying.  your example is exactly the situation that led me to try this, my pilot wanted to fly but nothing else and I'm the groups founder so people tend to listen to me anyway so it made sense to see if it would work.  And on a goldfish too no less.

Your points are well taken though and definitely things to consider.  I appreciate the feedback.  I'm not looking to create a new meta, just figure out what works first... then we'll figure out the new meta.

[Omniraptor]

If everyone is on teamspeak together, i.e. the other ship can hear you, you can do perfectly well with a bossy gunner, and less well with a bossy engineer because engineers can't look around much in combat. If the other ship can't hear you (pub game) captain should always be on helm, to coordinate quickly and efficiently with ally ship. If you have a captain directing the action, you clutter up the radio channel because captain is talking to pilot, while also talking to other captains. It's one more unnecessary thread of conversation you could do better without, especially at a time when everyone is screaming for help on engines/balloon/whatever.

[GeoRmr]

Gunmander?

*mustache* o7

[Arturo Sanchez]

does it burn good?

it sounds delicious.

but yus the vet have a valid point. Whenever I face this "gumander", I notice the slow reaction and take full advantage. Especially if its a low level player who is easily panicked by multiple part breaks.

[Indreams]

Gunmander works well on Flakfish and Lumberfish.

I've faced a fair few, and I've flown on it once (as an Engineer). Gunmander on Flakfish and Lumberfish is usually a sharpshooter who are confident in his/her skills.

He/she constantly communicates with the pilot to line up perfect shots. Engineers are usually set to the side, either told to buff engine/balloon or "get off the gun b*tch".


But I think Gunmander only works on a long-range ships. In short-range combat, the pilot, who has the superior vision, needs to call the shots.

[Agent Of Change]

does it burn good?

it sounds delicious.

but yus the vet have a valid point. Whenever I face this "gumander", I notice the slow reaction and take full advantage. Especially if its a low level player who is easily panicked by multiple part breaks.

Further practice has ensued and we are seeing a little of this when we shuffle crews as folks get used to the new arrangement.  I think upon further reflection it's definitely less of a traditional setup and as everyone starts to get a little better at their roles this set up works a little better.  The Pilot is given lots of latitude and the Gunner is largely responsible for dictating desired target and range.

Gunmander works well on Flakfish and Lumberfish.

I've faced a fair few, and I've flown on it once (as an Engineer). Gunmander on Flakfish and Lumberfish is usually a sharpshooter who are confident in his/her skills.

He/she constantly communicates with the pilot to line up perfect shots. Engineers are usually set to the side, either told to buff engine/balloon or "get off the gun b*tch".


But I think Gunmander only works on a long-range ships. In short-range combat, the pilot, who has the superior vision, needs to call the shots.

I'm not familiar with the Flakfish or Lumberfish but I'm inclined to agree with you on the ranged part of it.  What has started to happen organically is we are handing off command of the ship as needed between gunner and pilot basically along the lines of whether shooting or maneuvering is more important at the time.  We are just starting to poke our heads into the public queue last night and we did pretty well 1 loss 3 wins using this setup and good coordination with our sister ship. 

I would like to take it out to range to see if that works a little better.


Further addressing those who are saying there is a problem with communication lag, you are likely right we see it a little already but I think there are lessons to be learned.  I'm going to use this thread to discuss this as we go forward and out line our successes and failures with this for the benefit of any one else who might want to try it.

[Alistair MacBain]

Dont consider Flakfishs.
They arent viable.

[Dutch Vanya]

Dont consider Flakfishs.
They arent viable.

At which point does something become 'viable'? Does it need to be able to 1v1? Does it need to be one of the strongest meta builds?

[Alistair MacBain]

Yes viable for me means that it can effectivly 1v1.
A flakfish cant do this. On long ranges you suffer armorshred so you cant kill an enemy that isnt sitting still for several minutes and doesnt repair his armor at all.
At closeranges the arming time doesnt allow the flakfish to do a reasonable amount of permahull dmg.

Why I say a ship has to 1v1?
Cause it takes no time to either disable your allow or kill him before you can react. A hwachabarrages disables a whole ship which stops your ally from supporting you. This means you are left alone where I already explained why you cant do anything there.
Or a standard gat mortar kills your ally before you can actually help him leaving you with another 1v1 where youre unable to fight back.

The whole idea on disable and kill builds is to take one enemy out of the engagement and then killing his ally. Any other goldfish builds is able to disable the enemy. Even if I agree that a lumberfish suffers a bid on closeranges.

[Replaceable]

If fun is what you want, FlakFish and double merc pyra is viable.

But in all other terms- this is not viable one bit.

[GeoRmr]

If fun is what you want, FlakFish and double merc pyra is viable.

But in all other terms- this is not viable one bit.

Its viable against double galleon.

Wait, is double galleon viable?