Some suggestions

[BlackenedPies]

When they start listening and understand the situation they won't deviate from instruction. The most common cause is that they're new players to this odd game. It happens mostly on goldfish because there's mainly only one gun.

[Pyrate Roberts]

Yep Carn is right, odds are higher engineers get guns over gunner. Considering most ships have 3 guns or more, and up to 5 parts to repair, its upsetting when your a gunner stuck repairing without optimal tools while the engineer is shooting on the hwacha on a goldfish. A marking system is not complicated at all. You get on the gun, click a button, or press a key, and after 1-2 minutes it's marked so you can override anyone on that gun. You can mark other guns, but your previous mark is removed, and the marking of the new gun takes 1-2 minutes. That means if I mark a side gun the engineer can now get on hwacha and I cant remove him until he gets off. The time limit of 1-2 minutes, and the ability to only mark 1 gun at a time prevents any sort of abuse from a gunner. A gunner just marking a gun he wants is not abuse and everyone still has a fair shot at guns. Not to mention engineers can still get on EVERY gun, the gunner can just kick them off a marked gun if he wants to. I really see very limited potential for abuse. In which case if abuse does exist, one can throw the same argument back, don't play with the guy next round, and report him for trolling.

[BlackenedPies]

Marking is over complicated, it's better to just let gunners have priority on guns. The problem you're discussing is a disorganized crew without good communication. It wouldn't hurt to give gunners priority but it's unnecessary. Communicate well and there won't be problems.

Fly a ship where everyone's on a gun and problem solved. Players that troll despite good communication are very rare. It's not a troll problem it's a communication problem.

[ShadedExalt]

Marking is over complicated, it's better to just let gunners have priority on guns. The problem you're discussing is a disorganized crew without good communication. It wouldn't hurt to give gunners priority but it's unnecessary. Communicate well and there won't be problems.

Fly a ship where everyone's on a gun and problem solved. Players that troll despite good communication are very rare. It's not a troll problem it's a communication problem.

There are many, MANY "lol bitch stfu i'm 1337 quikskope mlgpro" players.

[Carn]

Marking is over complicated, it's better to just let gunners have priority on guns. The problem you're discussing is a disorganized crew without good communication. It wouldn't hurt to give gunners priority but it's unnecessary. Communicate well and there won't be problems.

Fly a ship where everyone's on a gun and problem solved. Players that troll despite good communication are very rare. It's not a troll problem it's a communication problem.

There are many, MANY "lol bitch stfu i'm 1337 quikskope mlgpro" players.

agreed

[BlackenedPies]

I've played over 2200 hours with lots of good and bad communication. Yes there are such players who are young and new to this unusual game. The quantity of real trolls is low and the best way to root them out is to give recommended loadouts. If they don't accept the loadout don't fly with them or you're asking for trouble.

If you don't know your crew then don't fly a goldfish. Few players want full time repair duty and I think it's disrespectful to new crew. Of course they want to shoot so give them a gun. Don't blame them for hopping on the gun when they learn their job is 99% repairing. Be respectful or expect trouble.

With good communication and an organized ship this is a non issue. Run a tight ship or don't complain.

[BlackenedPies]

Recommend loadouts, give everyone a gun, and explain positions. Tell them when to shoot and repair. There won't be problems.

[Sarabelle Marlowe]

The issue I see is not so much communication, many of us agree that it is key to any victory. Running a tight ship is not the argument, far from it, and in this game it's top priority.

The problem is when you run into a player that refuses to listen. More then once I've been trolled simply by having someone, no matter how any of us asked through both text and voice, that the gunner needs a particular gun and they wont budge from it.

The instance I am recalling was during sales. There were three of us dags, and we were playing around having fun with a hwatcha fish. We got a crew member from MM fairly late in the lobby, a couple levels up, he accepted the load out, everything seemed alright. When we loaded in, he dashed to the front and stayed on the gun. I asked him not to, I wanted to pre-load my ammo. He wouldn't move. Alistair asked, both text and voice to no avail. We got hit by the enemy team, and the engi on the front gun kept hitting the balloons, loading the wrong ammo, refused to shoot what Alistair told him to, ect ect. We had to resort to using the flame thrower and ram kills. So after the game, we left the lobby, and what more, this guy followed us. We had to leave lobby and sit before he went away.

On some ships, this isn't so much an issue,  but there are ships with guns that benefit best with certain types of ammo. And even if that were not the case, then you have someone that refuses to listen to target priority and refuses to repair because they wanted to gun and the load time for them was faster then the gunners.

 If someone indicates and asks they wish to gun before we load in, I'll switch over, but more then a few times there was no indication and they cost us games because we were down an engineer and not doing the damage or disable we needed. For some, this is a far and few between problem, but when it does happen it's very annoying. Even on ships with many guns, some people have ignored the requests. I've seen players tell off me or my captain that they want this gun and they were not going to shoot anything else. In some cases, mild annoyance, in others, costly.

Giving priority to the gunner class would have fixed at least the damage/disable part. Not much to do with an uncooperative player, but at the very least a gunner could do their job.

[Kamoba]

Oh yes, it is true that trolls that camp guns do exist...
They refuse to communicate and ruin everyone on their ships fun. I tend to refuse them arcs when I have them on my ship even if it causes a loss for the team, by refusing to give the troll a chance to even shoot tends to encourage them to communicate...

Once on a.blender fish a guy with chem ext pipe wrench camped the heavy carro, refused to comm of accept loadouts, but in the end I though, okay its not the end of the world, in match he sat on front gun and didn't let gunner shoot... So I didn't engage enemy. Kept them visible to the front side but never gave arcs to front gun until finally in crew chat.. And I quote... "wtf u fcking retard cap lemme fkin shot u cnt! Fcking retard nt usin frnt gun!" So I replied quite simply "Oh that's not your gun." He raged in voice and then after our allies third death, he agreed to sit on flamer..
Final score 4-5 loss, the guy who raged then said the game sucks and I assume he went back to CoD because he didn't log on since...

But yeah unpleasant players do exist, and this is just an emphasis on why you -should- play with friends!
Stack the ships with your friends, stack ally ships if you have enough friends.
And don't fear being labelled a.stomper, all you're doing is avoiding painful matches. Plus is everyone teamed up with friends without fear of (bullshit) labels such as stompers and stackers etc etc, then more often balanced matches would appear as there would be more stackdd teams to pit against each other...

But for some reason so many people avoid "stacking"....

[BlackenedPies]

Recommended loadouts are your first line of defense against trolls. Never play with anyone who refuses the loadout. Block people so they can't join on you. They want to shoot so give everyone a gun and don't fly a fish. It's rude not to give everyone a gun if they're new crew. Notice the pattern of examples on goldfish? Be respectful and let them shoot or you're asking for trouble.

Trolls exist but the vast majority of players cooperate if you make them a part of the ship. Follow the 3 steps and there won't be problems. Give loadouts give guns give positions.

[sparklerfish]

Goldfish is a huge snorefest if you're not the gunner.  If I have noobs I take a spire - it's not as easy to crew on as a fish, but it's the most fun to crew on as everyone is shooting most of the time.  Junker is also a good bet.  Basically anything other than a fish. 

[Kamoba]

You guys and girls need to bi-fecta more to make your fish less boring.
Heavy carronade with a mine launcher, or flamer.
Lumberfish... Now that's a bore-fest!

[Sarabelle Marlowe]

Well, I still have to stand by my support of giving priority to gunner on guns.

I gave an anecdotal story to emphasis the want of the mechanic. I'm very well aware there are trolls, and ways to avoid them, but should I not play if I don't see clan? I alone have recruited about a dozen  people, and have an active clan on top of that, but with my work schedule, I tend to have hours that people are simply not on. And having this mechanic would be beneficial when we are down a few crew. Should the the pilot be forced to change an entire ship and load out for it because there is one player he doesn't know well? Not very fair towards the rest of the crew and team.

More then that, what is the harm? If you run a a ship with willing and teamwork oriented crew, then yes, the mechanic isn't needed. But it does no harm at that point. Where as in situations as I've said before, it would have been very much wanted. There have been threads arguing about how gunner isn't useful, do they need a buff, ect ect with good points on both sides. The only consistent thing brought up is the certain guns work best with multiple ammo types. So in the situations where having an uncooperative team mate, the gunner should be allowed to have priority in their given class.  It's something in an ideal situation is forgotten, but in those rare occurrences very useful.

As far as trolls go, well, that's just something anyone that plays online has to deal with. Beyond that, I like the idea of giving gun priority to gunner, and see very little reason for it not to be. In my opinion, the benefits outweigh the negatives. I'm aware that we can't do much with a uncooperative player, but this mechanic can at least knock one more item off the list of annoyances.

[BlackenedPies]

Should the the pilot be forced to change an entire ship and load out for it because there is one player he doesn't know well?

Or let them shoot the gun. It's rude to give a new crew member repair duty. If it's necessary for whatever reason then tell them you'll give them a gun next match. If you're rude to crew then expect similar in return.

I love playing with new players and this is not a real issue. There's little harm in gunner priority but it's unnecessary.

[sparklerfish]

Powder monkeys already think they own every gun on the ship.  Gunner priority would help prevent a troll engi from taking a gun that isn't theirs, but does nothing to help a troll gunner taking a gun that isn't theirs - in fact it makes it worse because they can literally kick the engi off a gun they're already using.

As for having to change your ship/loadout for trolls... don't you have to do the exact same when someone won't accept your recommended loadout?  You can't force players to do what you want them to - you either have to deal, or report/block/leave.

If someone wants to shoot, and the main gun is spoken for already, explain, suggest they gun on a different ship, give them a gun (as Blackened said), or just LEAVE.