Red Shirt's Game Plan, version 1
One volunteer (perhaps our most-lagged-player) will be a full-time scout bomber. Run around deep in enemy space, bomb the undefended planets, and try not to die. Don't get waylaid by other missions; even if the captain calls a base og, you should often continue bombing anyway (your option). Other players will occasionally go up to help bomb when the enemy has lots of scattered armies.
We will have a starbase fighting at or just behind the front. It will not hold many armies; its primary purpose is to provide space control. The starbase should feel free to move up or back or wherever it likes; if it retreats, please do not retreat with it; stay up and fight at the front instead. It's not a big loss if the starbase dies, but it should be an asset to us, and we'll want a new one 30 minutes later.
Two designated players will alternate army-guard duty; i.e., they will protect the homeworld army pile, and shuttle more armies to it. When you're on army-guard duty, feel free to roam around (e.g., to kill bombers, pick up stray armies, or rescue teammates who are limping home); you just have to be able to get back to the homeworld in time to protect it (track all enemy ships in our space on the galactic, and note their ship types). If you screw up and get crippled out of position, distress. If you're at the homeworld and they're going to try to bomb under you, orbit the planet so you can fire all you want without running out of fuel. I prefer to use a scout for army-guard duty, because that lets me roam the farthest, but cruisers and destroyers are acceptable. When you get two or three kills, switch off and let the other guy guard armies while you take (or fake) planets. If you're NOT on army-guard duty, don't waste time and confuse the guards by doing it! (Krishna says "Prefer to die doing your own duty: the duty of another will bring you into great spiritual danger.")
The other five or six players (including the off-duty army guard, and the base player during construction) don't have roles; just play good solid netrek. Take planets when you can, bomb when you can, clear planets for our takers, ogg potential carriers opportunistically (don't fixate), phaser nearby enemies as if you were a borg, lob torps at enemies that come toward you, dodge or det all enemy torpedos, and watch the galactic. When in doubt, just hustle to the front and blow up some enemy ships. Feel free to specialize, i.e. volunteer to concentrate on one aspect of the game or one region of space. Most of these ships should probably be cruisers, because phasers are so important, but scouts have advantages too, and I don't object to other ship classes.
A few general things for everybody:
Read and heed the rare messages from the captain.
Don't clutter the team board with a lot of other messages, and especially don't write criticisms. You can send suggestions via personal message to the captain, but primarily concentrate on playing your ship the best you can.
Distress (once) the moment you beam up armies. Call a destination if you want, but mainly we'll be looking at the galactic and guessing where you want to go (drop on the open planet please).
Try to synchronize attacks (e.g. base ogs or planet-crashing), i.e. wait for stragglers and then attack at the same time (but from different directions).
Follow the game plan even when we're not doing well. I may have to alter the plan for the next game, and I may be full of shit altogether, but unless we actually follow the plan, we won't know.
In overtime, the game plan stays exactly the same.
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