MickeyFinn
05-06-2008, 03:56 PM
When approaching a disaster beyond the capabilities of one or even a few trained individuals (such as Oklahoma City or even a WalMart fully engulfed in flames), firefighters are still expected to be able to perform their job flawlessly.
What may seem like a simple task to a civilian becomes a nightmare very quickly. Massive amounts of personnel may be required, and with it comes hundreds of questions without answers. Whose job is what? Who does everyone report to? In becomes apparent very quickly that a strong structure needs to be created before there are hundreds of firefighters are doing whatever they think is needed.
In comes IMS, the Incident Management System. There are rules and structure to handle a problem of any size, and I see this being an absolute necessity in the siege battle gaming that will be taking place in AoC or WAR. I think it applies rather well, actually.
There are a few rules in IMS that can never be broken:
1) The incident commander is in charge, and will only relinquish that duty if they so choose. Even if a basic firefighter has a department Chief approach him, command may not be passed without the firefighter making that choice. That Chief may be the better candidate due to experience though, and this is something a responsible firefighter will recognize.
2) Utilize a proven management form called Span of Control. In a labor intensive situation, any single person can manage only between 3 and 7 people. 5 is optimal. Moving beyond the limit of 7 will always always always prove to be a bad plan. This rule applies to everyone from the Incident Commander down to a company's Captain.
3) Utilize another form of organization called Unity of Command. Each firefighter reports to one person. That means the incident commander will never give orders to someone outside of his span of control, and a subordinate will never listen to them. Confusion always exists in a real-time situation, but this principle helps very much.
I will adapt the structure for the purposes of PVP:
Attacking a 4 wall keep
Incident Command (Run by Incident Commander)
|
|
Operations (Run by Operations Chief)
|
|--> West Wall Operations Company (Run by West Wall Captain)
|--> East Wall Operations Company (Run by East Wall Captain)
|--> North Wall Operations Company (Run by North Wall Captain)
|--> South Wall Operations (Run by South Wall Captain)
|------->South Wall Company 1 (Responsible for using the ram)
|------->South Wall Company 2 (Responsible for close range suppression efforts)
|------->South Wall Company 3 (Responsible for long range suppression such as a trebuchet)
|
|
Logistics & Planning (Run by Logistics Chief). This branch ensures available resources for the siege
|
|--> Wood Management & Planning (Run by a Captain)
|--> Ammo Management & Planning (Run by a Captain)
|--> Food Management & Planning (Run by a Captain)
|--> Reinforcement Planning (Run by a Captain)
In this example, The Incident Commander will never address South Wall Operations, or the Food Management team. Those are the jobs of their respective chiefs, and Unity of Command prevents him from interfering. His job is simply to tell the Operations chief that he wants a company on each wall, and lets the Chief do it in the best way he knows how.
This form of organization is critical for the huge battles that will surely commence. It reduces radio traffic to the absolute minimum (TeamSpeak/Ventrilo for us, but same thing) and creates maximum efficiency. The system can be expanded or contracted based on the incident. Resource management might not be necessary, so the Incident Commander may very well choose to double the size of the Operations division instead. Either way, I think we could utilize this structure to our benefit.
What may seem like a simple task to a civilian becomes a nightmare very quickly. Massive amounts of personnel may be required, and with it comes hundreds of questions without answers. Whose job is what? Who does everyone report to? In becomes apparent very quickly that a strong structure needs to be created before there are hundreds of firefighters are doing whatever they think is needed.
In comes IMS, the Incident Management System. There are rules and structure to handle a problem of any size, and I see this being an absolute necessity in the siege battle gaming that will be taking place in AoC or WAR. I think it applies rather well, actually.
There are a few rules in IMS that can never be broken:
1) The incident commander is in charge, and will only relinquish that duty if they so choose. Even if a basic firefighter has a department Chief approach him, command may not be passed without the firefighter making that choice. That Chief may be the better candidate due to experience though, and this is something a responsible firefighter will recognize.
2) Utilize a proven management form called Span of Control. In a labor intensive situation, any single person can manage only between 3 and 7 people. 5 is optimal. Moving beyond the limit of 7 will always always always prove to be a bad plan. This rule applies to everyone from the Incident Commander down to a company's Captain.
3) Utilize another form of organization called Unity of Command. Each firefighter reports to one person. That means the incident commander will never give orders to someone outside of his span of control, and a subordinate will never listen to them. Confusion always exists in a real-time situation, but this principle helps very much.
I will adapt the structure for the purposes of PVP:
Attacking a 4 wall keep
Incident Command (Run by Incident Commander)
|
|
Operations (Run by Operations Chief)
|
|--> West Wall Operations Company (Run by West Wall Captain)
|--> East Wall Operations Company (Run by East Wall Captain)
|--> North Wall Operations Company (Run by North Wall Captain)
|--> South Wall Operations (Run by South Wall Captain)
|------->South Wall Company 1 (Responsible for using the ram)
|------->South Wall Company 2 (Responsible for close range suppression efforts)
|------->South Wall Company 3 (Responsible for long range suppression such as a trebuchet)
|
|
Logistics & Planning (Run by Logistics Chief). This branch ensures available resources for the siege
|
|--> Wood Management & Planning (Run by a Captain)
|--> Ammo Management & Planning (Run by a Captain)
|--> Food Management & Planning (Run by a Captain)
|--> Reinforcement Planning (Run by a Captain)
In this example, The Incident Commander will never address South Wall Operations, or the Food Management team. Those are the jobs of their respective chiefs, and Unity of Command prevents him from interfering. His job is simply to tell the Operations chief that he wants a company on each wall, and lets the Chief do it in the best way he knows how.
This form of organization is critical for the huge battles that will surely commence. It reduces radio traffic to the absolute minimum (TeamSpeak/Ventrilo for us, but same thing) and creates maximum efficiency. The system can be expanded or contracted based on the incident. Resource management might not be necessary, so the Incident Commander may very well choose to double the size of the Operations division instead. Either way, I think we could utilize this structure to our benefit.