There's three reasons why people don't follow the commander, 1) there's no downside if you don't follow orders and 2) they don't follow because they wanna play their own way. The third problem requires a story first:
The Story:
I was in a Crimson Straight Conquest game where one person who talked loudly demanded that everyone blob up and go around in a circle and cap each point as they go. So from Sigma to Kappa. get Gamma, wrap around to epsilon.
While they totally abandoned kappa after capping and moved at molassas pace, I stayed behind and actually watched what was happening with the other team. I said INC Kappa, need help.
He said "dude stay with the group!"
I said "we need to defend.."
colourful language ensued by him, calling me names, swearing, etc,
So after ev being cast out as an incompetent fool who knows nothing, I abandoned kappa and decided to follow the blob (in an Atlas by the way, so I’m real slow and lagging behind). Watching the coast line I see a bunch of mechs headed towards kappa from epsilon and theta. I hoof it to try and catch up to the tail of the blob. I gave countless warnings about the mechs creeping up behind us, their location, qty, and even notified them of a possible flank if they don’t turn around and cover their butts. Mr Leader demands that they then go for Kappa after taking Epsilon. By this time they encounter resistance instead and blob up with tunnel vision towards kappa. I die inevitably in the tunnel after holding my ground and legging two mechs to slow them down, and a wave of mechs pour over my corpse and get behind our team and wipe us out due to a chaotic unorganized mess on our side. 12-3 loss for us. The leader even disconnected before his mech died. There was just no way to save the team.
The Point:
The point I’m getting at is that you don’t know who to trust, or who actually knows what they’re talking about. It’s very much based off who sounds most convincing or majority rules (blob). You can’t be sure who is a good commander or a bad one. Everyone is currently ranked the same as a commander.
The Solution:
So while XP helps motivate players follow orders, a public commander rating would help team mates feel comfortable with following certain players who take command. Whether it’s based on win rate when command is used, the amount of orders followed, successful something or another. I’m not sure how it can be rated, but if there was a system in place that could be used to gauge the effectiveness as a commander it would help greatly. Even if it’s clicking a simple “Did you like this person as a commander?”. I’m not sure… but it would be nice to know who to trust as a commander.
Edit: got rid of the quote, sry mis understood what you were saying, Joseph.
Edited by MoonUnitBeta, 21 February 2014 - 05:21 PM.