Reinforcements

Reinforcements are players re-entering combat (usually after being killed) and rejoining their Side. Most missions do not feature Reinforcements of any kind.

In ShackTac, death is typically permanent, with dead players being removed from the mission until its end. Nevertheless, there are several situations where players may be allowed to return to a mission in progress. The reasons for allowing this are varied, as are the methods by which players return to combat.

Players typically do not rejoin the same Element they were part of when killed, with few exceptions. Furthermore, Reinforcements never occur in Adversarial missions.

Reasons
There are several reasons why a player would be allowed to rejoin combat after being killed. In all cases, the underlying reason for Reinforcing is to maintain the enjoyment of both the players who've been removed from the game as well as those left behind in the mission.


 * If a player was killed very early in the mission, they will likely be allowed to rejoin combat shortly afterwards (typically by REJIP, but not always).
 * If a player was killed by a bug in ArmA, rather than by enemy action, they will typically be allowed to REJIP immediately into the same role they occupied before death.
 * If a substantial number of players have been killed during the early or middle section of the mission - with plenty of time before the mission ends - a large-scale Reinforcement may be arranged to return all willing players to combat. In this case they will likely be formed into an entirely new unit, or more rarely as smaller Elements to be reattached to existing ones. In large-scale Reinforcements such as these, players are much less likely to be teleported into combat, instead being transported in by Transport Helicopter or some other organic method.
 * Players arriving late to the game may be allowed to join despite not being present at the start of the mission (a "JIP"). This is very rare, and may or may not be a privilege reserved for veteran Shackers. It may be more permissible when plenty of "dead" players are also waiting to Rejoin, in which case the newly-arriving player will be lumped in with them.
 * Players in key roles who cannot easily be replaced, such as Pilots or high-level Command roles, are likely to be allowed to return directly into their previous roles when killed regardless of how much time is left on the mission. This prevents the mission from becoming hopeless for those still playing.

Methods
There are two methods of returning players to the battlefield: By teleportation, or by organic Reinforcement. While the end-result is similar (the player is back in action at least until killed again), these two methods differ in the time it takes players to return to the battle as well as the amount of extra work required by the Game Master to organize their return.

Teleportation
In the first method, players are teleported instantly and directly to the location of friendly forces, nearby to the unit they are joining or re-joining. This method is very simple for the Game Master to arrange, and is typically only used when the "dead" player was killed very early on or by a bug in ArmA.

When teleporting, the player will likely rejoin the same unit they were part of when killed, essentially undoing their death without too much hassle.

It is exceptionally rare (if it happens at all) that a large number of players will be teleported back into action.

Organic Reinforcements
In the second method, all "dead" players who wish to return to the mission are organized together at a safe location, loaded into transport vehicles, and then transported back to the combat area where their will rejoin their Side.

For the most part, players rejoining this way will be organized into completely new Elements to replace ones that have been wiped out (or merged with existing elements after losing most of their players). New Callsigns may be given to the new units, or recycled from those lost entirely.

At other times, the dead players are not organized into units at all, instead being transported to the battlefield and then joining whichever units require reinforcements. This reduces the workload from the Game Master, shifting it instead to leaders on the ground. When using this method, it is not uncommon to see players rejoining the same Elements they belonged to when they died.

The most commonly-used vehicles for this type of Reinforcement are Transport Helicopters and Transport Planes, which will drop the players at a location close to existing friendly units on the ground. In the case of Planes, Parachutes will be used for the landing.

Pilots and Co-Pilots do not need to be transported to the battlefield at all; They will be placed at the friendly airbase and return to the battlefield themselves using a newly-spawned Aircraft. Ground Vehicle Crews may do the same.

Organization
Depending on the reasons for the Reinforcements and the method used, the rejoining player(s) may or may not be returned to the Elements they belonged to previously. In many cases, especially when a large group of players is sent as Reinforcements, it is more common to see them organized into completely new units, with each player having a new role that may or may not be the same as one they had previously.

In other situations, players may be returned to the exact same role in the same unit. This is pretty much always the case for Pilots and Co-Pilots, or when a player was killed by a bug or in the opening moments of the mission. It may also occur when reinforcing a relatively-small number of players, as it requires less attention from the Game Master to return players to their original units than to create entirely new units.

Rejoining In The Same Role And Unit
When a player is killed by an ArmA bug, or is killed within the opening moments of the mission or shortly into the mission, they will typically be allowed to return to the game in the same exact role they occupied previously, within the same exact Element, and with the same equipment they had at game-start.

This is relatively rare, as deadly bugs in ArmA are not quite as common as they seem to be, and dying early on is also somewhat rare. Nevertheless, when such a situation does occur, it is deemed fair that the player should not have to wait for others to die to rejoin the game (which could take some time), and makes for a simple way to return them to combat with very little work on the part of the Game Master.

Since the player retains their equipment, they retain the same role they had within their element. If the rejoin occurred late in the mission (due to a deadly bug), the player may locate their original body (if it still exists) and switch their equipment with that on the body - thus removing any extra equipment they would otherwise have brought into the battle unfairly.

Rejoining as a Pilot
Dead Pilots and Co-Pilots are almost always allowed to REJIP in the same role and Callsign. They will typically appear back at base, and will simply spawn a new aircraft to take back into the combat zone. This is because qualified, skilled pilots are very rare, and the absence of aircraft in a mission that includes aircraft can easily tip the balance heavily in favor of the enemy.

Thus, after a short "downtime", the aircraft will resume its duties as before. This downtime is considered the penalty for losing the aircraft, so ground forces will just have to make do without air cover/transport until such time that the pilots are returned to action.

Note that Ground Vehicle Crews may also REJIP this way, and make their way from base to the combat zone on their own. This is more difficult in some missions where the vehicle may have to fight its way back towards friendly forces. In some cases, the vehicle and crew may be teleported directly to the battlefield, though this has never been observed on video.

Generalized Reinforcements
When returning a larger number of players to combat, one option is to avoid assigning them to units until they have arrived in the combat zone and have linked up with friendlies. In this scenario, the leaders on the ground will split the reinforcements up between existing units that require reinforcements. The rejoining players will then locate their assigned units and merge into them, refilling their numbers.

In this situation, players may or may not return to their original unit and/or role. In fact, it is more common to see players returning to a different element, in order to create the illusion that the reinforcements are truly "fresh". Players may or may not even be carrying the same equipment they did previously.

Reinforcing this way allows replenishing Elements that have lost some or most of their players, without changing the Force Composition or command structure. Killed leaders (FTL and upwards) may or may not reacquire their command role, especially if their equipment has already been collected by whomever inherited their leadership role.

In some cases, an element that was wiped out entirely may be replaced by reinforcements in this way.

New Units
A common way to organize large-scale reinforcements, particularly in missions already containing a large number of players (and especially during the mid-late game) is to organize the reinforcements into completely new units. New Squads and Fireteams will be organized from scratch, with players filling any available roles just as they did when first entering the mission.

This way of organizing reinforcements is work-intensive, requiring the attention of the Game Master and/or another player recruited to help them out. The players are organized into groups back at base, given new Callsigns, and then transported into battle typically by Transport Helicopter or Transport Plane.

The new units often have completely new callsigns. This is the most common occurrence of callsigns like Delta, Echo, Fox, etc. for Infantry units. Nevertheless, the new units will typically be subordinated to an existing Platoon, though occasionally (if there are enough new units) an entirely new command element may be created to lead them.

On other occasions, a new unit organized this way may receive the callsign of another unit that was completely wiped out earlier in the mission. In such cases, it will always be subordinated to an existing command structure. For example, if "Bravo 2" has been wiped out, a completely new "Bravo 2" unit may be created to replace it, possibly even containing the same players who originally constituted the wiped-out unit. "Bravo 2" will then be subordinated to Bravo SL once they link up with the squad.