So I was thinking about the lost blog writings at TGN and decided to see if Google still had them cached. Sure enough they have a few of them! So I decided to move these here. This was originally posted on June 10th, 2013. One day before the announcement of Commander Mode in BF4. Enjoy!
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Ah Yes! The great Commander of Battlefield. The one thing missing in BF3 that would have made it a TRUE Battlefield sequel and not some other exact copy of Call of Duty. Yes, Yes, never mind all the extra game modes and the vehicles and the air power, without Commander, Battlefield is just a CoD wannabe.
We all know that BF3 died quickly in the gaming community because of this one feature. Four months within release the game was a ghost town. You can’t even find servers anymore so DICE is quickly making BF4.
Now, back to reality; BF3 did not have commander. It was one of the features that the community LOUDLY wanted to help make BF3 better (making it BF2.5 for many) and giving those that have not experienced a true Battlefield game something to REALLY get into. Alas, it was not meant to be, but BF3 has still survived and doing well.
As many of you may know, I did not care if BF3 had commander or not. After my years in BF2 and 2142 I had my share of it and the way DICE set up BF3, it really wasn’t something needed. Recon and Support covered most the roles of commander with the artillery, supplies, MAVs, and TUGs. Squad leaders still had the ability to give orders, though for those that read my teamwork post and play Battlefield know how well that goes.
So what is the big deal about Commander? Plain and simple it’s a very fun position to play on Battlefield. One person giving orders to Squad Leaders and dropping supplies, vehicles, and death all around the battlefield. Good times with extra points! It was even a good tool for teamwork.
As you can see above, Commander had its issues. Most of them were fixed, as far as I last remember, but some just can’t be fixed because it wasn’t the position that was the issue but the people. You had fighting commanders that took the role just for the points and never did anything. You had AFK commanders. You had commanders that hated snipers and just used all the options to make their lives hard. Don’t even get me started on all the mutiny votes instantly done regardless of who was commander. Squads not following any orders. Other squads getting angry when you didn’t instantly give them something.
All the above issues brought on server rules! Horay! Harmony restored! Except those were not always enforced or became stupid rules about exactly what a commander was suppose to do and nothing more or less or you got kicked or banned from the server.
All in all, it wasn’t a bad feature to have. It was a lot of fun most the time and made the game interesting. It was like anything else. Snipers don’t move, Medics don’t revive, and commanders don’t command.
So enough about the past and all that nonsense that only matters when it’s for the advantage of others, what about the future? What about those BF4 commander rumors?
Well, here is one of my first predictions that may be wrong later; I think Commander will be back in BF4, BUT not like it was in BF2/142. I think it will probably be a gaming mode. DICE made too big of an argument about how only two people can play Commander. They also argued about how it was a complicated thing to have in a game that was supposed to be fun for everyone. Since 62 people cannot be commander in a game, that makes sense and is a valid argument. I don’t see DICE doing a 180 on this and giving full commander mode with hardcore and full destruction. Nothing would be safe and the Battlefield would be a spawn rape wasteland. Yeah, that sounds like fun to me too.
So with the leaked/doctored pictures and the other rumors coming about and no one from EA or DICE denying it, but saying you should only listen to the man behind the curtain, makes me think that it’s not that they don’t want to deny it, but that they can’t, because then they would be big fat liars with pants on fire.
So, I could be wrong and there may be no commander or maybe a full blown commander with everything, but I just don’t see it going that extreme. I also hope they fix certain aspects and issues about commander such as idle commanders, mutiny abuse, and point moochers. I also hope they add nice gadgets/tactics to take out a commander. Blowing up assets and killing the commander was nice, but maybe have some tools to jam radars or hack things. I don’t know, it’s all rumor right now anyway. I could actually see it be more of a type of squad leader role in the game instead of an individual.
Oh, and one last peeve of mine; Commander does not MAKE a Battlefield game. If it did then only BF2 and 2142 are Battlefield games. They’re the only two that had it and no one can deny how awesome the two before it was.
Crunch Time 