Caryl's Squad Cohesion and Defensive Manuevers Guide

[Caryl]

Greetings and welcome to Squad Cohesion Guide!

Why make this guide?

Ans.: To give future SLs an idea on what to do and how to effectively utilize their squad.

Squad Cohesion:

The Teams/Sections:

Putting your squad members into teams/sections can prove effective since you can basically tell a certain group to go to a certain point, depending on what type of situation the group is specialized in, or can handle.

The Team Loadouts/Groupings:

When grouping your squaddies, it is important to know what role their team will be specializing in.

In my preferrence, I always group squaddies into teams of three to five.

For that we have the:

Combat/Fire Support Team: consists mainly of 2-4 standards and the specialist. This type of combination ensures they can be sent to the frontlines or give the enemy a serious run for their money when utilized on a defensive mission.

Engineering Team: 1-2 Engineer(s), 1-2 Standards, 1 Spec. Protecting the Engineers is vital to the mission, since they are the only means you have of establishing an outpost or a defensive line. Putting the specialist in their team likely increases their chance of survival.

Medical Team: 1-2 Medics, 1-3 Standards. This team loadout gives the medics manueverability as well as protection, they can either be used to retrieve injured/dead from the battlefield or set-up a make-shift triage in the frontlines with the standards protecting them.

Balanced Team: 1 Medic, 1 Engineer, 2-3 Standards, Toss in the spec if you wish. Can handle any situation at their optimal capacity. Suited for general operations and base defense.

Squad Manuevers/Formations:

How it works:

Ever wanted to minimize friendly fire, at the same time maintain discipline and looking astonishingly fabulous?

Marines in formation move in synchronization with their Squad Leader, single steps at a time. This is to maintain the squad's formation as a unit and to ensure no one gets lost or left behind whilst moving or advancing.

Before, I used to call my squad and put them in a squad formation training. Other times, we could pull off a few formations. But mostly, marines just rambo off and ignore their SL's orders/commands. So we always end up with less people in the formation than usual.

Then let's give you the LEGENDS:

Of course, we can't identify formations without legends, so here they are:
X - Standard
O - Squad Leader
E - Engineer
S - Specialist
M - Medic

Then up next, the formations/manuevers:

Box Formation/Manuever:

XOS__SXX___XEX__XXX
XMX__OME__XMX__EMO
XEX__XXX___SOX__XXS

Here we have an example of a squad rotating counter-clockwise.
When rotating, the respective squaddie moves clockwise or counter-clockwise, whichever is closest to their assigned spot in the formation. When turning in a 180 Degree motion, clockwise rotation is always a preferrence.

Echelon Manuever:

X
_E
__X
___S
____O
___M
__X
_E
X

Facing:
<- Inwards
-> Outwards

Note that you can use this formation to move like in the portrait Inwards(Defensive) or Outwards (Offensive).

When moving Inwards, the firing lanes are inter-crossed. FF will be likely if your squaddies don't have trigger discipline, but can be effective if utilized properly by immediately downing an unsuspecting threat that manages to get into the center of the formation.

When moving outwards, you can advance with a wide-range of firing lanes covering all flanks.

The Engineers positioned near the edges are to help the downed marines at the outermost position, in case they do get attacked. (Assuming Engineers have shotguns or M39s).

Medics are near the center of the formation, to decrease the risk of them being reached by the opposition.

Staggered Formation/Manuever:

__X_________X
______M__E
____X________X
O_______E
__S__________X
_____M___X
__X____________X

This formation ensures less chances of the squad being targeted as a whole, standards are stationed at the outer most positions of the formation and will serve as shields for the more important squaddies in the inner part of the formation. The specialist's job here is to ensure the survival of the Squad Leader since most Standards are utilized to protect the Engineers and Medics.

Phalanx/Killing Line Formation/Manuever:

_____X
_____X
_____E
_____O
_____S
_____M
_____X

True to its name, the Phalanx or Killing Line is when marines line up in a straight line, each spot protected by the marine next to him, and then empty their mags directly in front of them. This serves as an aggressive way to push inwards when facing the hive. Aliens can't dodge bullets when in an enclosed space, but you are open for artillery bombardment and crushers (unless someone jumps the gun and human-shields the entire line before the crusher gets near it).

In the words of President Thomas J. Whitmore: "Gentlemen, Let's plow the road!"

Squad Defensive Tactics:

The Basics:

When defending, it is important to know where to position yourself and your squaddies. Ensure that they don't go running off. When you are assigned to a spot, you don't budge from that spot unless your Squad Leader tells you to! I've seen numerous occassions where marines I've assigned to an area run off to another location trying to 'help' or 'assist' engaged marines. You're far more useful when you hold your spot and provide covering fire for retreating marines and maintaining a SOLID DEFENSE LINE for our injured brothers and sisters.

LEGENDS:

X - Standard
O - Squad Leader
E - Engineer
S - Specialist
M - Medic
T - Turret
= - Metal Barricade
- - Normal Table
R - Reinforced Table
F - False Wall

False Wall Pillboxes:

F=F=F=F=F
_X_P_S_X_

This set-up is a defensive formation that will ensure Friendly Fire is minimized by putting marines between two false walls and a metal barricade protecting them at the front. Fire to your heart's content marines!

One-Man Spacing Tactic:

Ever seen lines like this?

-----------
-XOTESX-
-XX____X-
-XEMTX_-
-----------

Where one alien can just waltz in and everyone is in for an FF Slug-Fest mosh pit?

------------
-X_TO__S-
-_M_____-
-X_E_X_M-
------------

Giving spacing gives marines lee-way to shoot with a much wider firing arc, and without the need to watch their fire every time an alien gets in their defensive area since the spacing gives them a less likely probability of hitting clumped together allies.

MORE TO BE ADDED . . .

[Added 03/12/2017]

Squad Engineer Defense Layouts:

Pillbox Defense:

This layout is meant for small fire-teams to sit back and chill inside a pillbox of their own (360 degrees defense)

LEGENDS:
M - Metal Barricade
F - False Wall
C - Chair (If you wanna add it in for extra flavor

--------
-FMMF-
-MCCM-
-FMMF-
--------

I'll still be experimenting in-game and adding what I have done and experienced, to this post.

[XenonDragneel]

oooOOOOoo... +1

[Derpislav]

I'll come back to read it once I don't get epilepsy from that that blue/purple/color of magic you've used.

Seems nice though.

[Jalleo]

Definitly interesting to see might want to change the purple at least I cant barely read it properly due to dark background.

[Xurphorus]

This is solid, but we will never see something like this being used in-game unless forced, or being meta'd through communications. Good guide though.

[NescauComToddy]

Agree with Xur, making a squad do a formation Is almost Impossible without meta-comms. Still, good guide.

[Rocco Ward]

Agree with Xur, making a squad do a formation Is almost Impossible without meta-comms. Still, good guide.

Not necessarily. I've done it on a few rare occasions as SL, the result was pretty impressive when it was pulled off. Our smartgunner spec kept trying to go into the front, and the entire squad kept yelling at him to get in the back. Eventually we made contact with the enemy and our formation fell apart. Also another thing I have noticed, is that when you take your organized squad and mix them into the fighting with other squads, it's VERY DIFFICULT to have them regroup in the midst of fighting. For instance, if you want to perform a flank maneuver it's hard to pull your squadies out of the current fighting because they can't see your messages.

[Caryl]

Not necessarily. I've done it on a few rare occasions as SL, the result was pretty impressive when it was pulled off. Our smartgunner spec kept trying to go into the front, and the entire squad kept yelling at him to get in the back. Eventually we made contact with the enemy and our formation fell apart. Also another thing I have noticed, is that when you take your organized squad and mix them into the fighting with other squads, it's VERY DIFFICULT to have them regroup in the midst of fighting. For instance, if you want to perform a flank maneuver it's hard to pull your squadies out of the current fighting because they can't see your messages.

Yeah, but I did do a few formations before even while in combat. We kept it together and fell apart one by one without breaking the formation. That only happened once though.

[Jaketeaking]

other than the fact that i literally cannot read the purple bits, its a solid guide

[Caryl]

other than the fact that i literally cannot read the purple bits, its a solid guide

Updated, Will Green do? :3

[NescauComToddy]

When I said It was "impossible", I tried to mean that It Is really difficult to have your squad to cooperate with you, the SL. Yet, It Is possible to do such thing. As you said, your squad was demanding for the SGT to have some "sense" and not rush, still proves that, you had some competent man In It. But like you said, when you make contact with the enemy, the formation fall's apart, It means that It Isn't "worth" It to make a formation that won't last 10 minutes. Now, the only place I saw this working absolutely fantastically was In WO. The effect's that It will give to your defensive position Is great. Caryl, you could put this In your WO guide for the SLs, It would give a good +.

[Caryl]

When I said It was "impossible", I tried to mean that It Is really difficult to have your squad to cooperate with you, the SL. Yet, It Is possible to do such thing. As you said, your squad was demanding for the SGT to have some "sense" and not rush, still proves that, you had some competent man In It. But like you said, when you make contact with the enemy, the formation fall's apart, It means that It Isn't "worth" It to make a formation that won't last 10 minutes. Now, the only place I saw this working absolutely fantastically was In WO. The effect's that It will give to your defensive position Is great. Caryl, you could put this In your WO guide for the SLs, It would give a good +.

I don't have a Whiskey Outpost Guide... But maybe I'll start one.

[Karmac]

Marines would never follow that guide anyway Caryl.

[Karmac]

Just read over this after you tasked me with moving in a 'staggered formation' last night and I was a bit unsure of how I was meant to line up, this is all very useful information. Though my personal belief with the pillboxes is to leave out girders and their upgrades to allow a wide range of fire for marines. That's just me though.

[Mook476]

+1 This is pretty dope but sadly marines won't ever use this without metacommunication as others said or it's forced as others said again still pretty dope guide.

[XenonDragneel]

I am trying to use this tactic but marines in my squad don't like getting together...