actually it should stay as it is, the regular ground tankers are supporting the water flow to the engines/pumps. the air tankers are dropping water/fire retardant either directly on the fire or just in front , they cant effectively, directly support water flow.
That's why most place have gone to referring to water trucks as Tenders to differentiate them
You might be able to create a bunch of Groups in the ARR for specific light forces. Only issues with that is you will need to manually select which one you want, and can't just have it send the nearest one.
Having 6 guys on a heavy rescue is realistic, putting 10 on an engine, never seen an engine so big that 10 men could ride in it.
I only know of 1 truck cab that can hold 10 people, Pierce Quantum cabs, but I have never seen a configuration of it that does. Having seen cabs of it that hold 8, I can only imagine that in real life 10 would only be possible if you were running it clean cab.
From what I understand, the decision to increase capacity wasn't necessarily what has been negatively reacted to - what I've heard is more along the lines that when they increased the capacity, it overrode the player-specified crewing of every affected vehicle, defaulting them all to maximum. With some players having hundreds of affected vehicles, this change seems overwhelming and frustrating. Perhaps if the devs were to re-instate the increased crewing capacity in a way which only increased the maximum capacity, rather than adding crew to every related vehicle whilst the capacity is increased, that might receive less negative feedback...
That's what I saw too. It was that people had SOME of their vehicles get changed so they had to find the exact vehicles, go into their stations and change them back. Plus I don't know anywhere that runs 10 man engines, even volley wise.
As the title states, readd the crew increases, at least for the Platform and Heavy Rescue.
PIOs are used during the scene, but again, it was more for realism.
Investigators I agree is more after the fact but there are some calls (wildfire cleanups) that are after the fact so that isn't very far fetched.
The tiller I was more going for as multi use apparatus.
Dive teams (at least in my area) are only really called in for recoveries, not usually rescues since if they were on the surface the dive team would be unnecessary.
I just threw these out here for this, discourse.
HAZMAT and Tactical ambulances have the same issue. They will get sent with HAZMAT or Patrol (respectively) ARRs, but not ALS
I was thinking for a while and came up with some ideas for new units
| Unit Name | Unit Functions | Department | Special Training | Cost | Explanation |
| Tiller | Platform, Heavy Rescue | FD | N/A | 19,000 | I don't think any departments use tillers as rescues, but storage wise they could be used with possibly a second piece as such. And even "connecting" two apparatus would be nice regardless (I am aware this is possible via ARR) |
| Tiller (Quint) | Platform, Heavy Rescue, Firetruck | FD | N/A | 28,500 | I don't think any departments use tillers as rescues, but storage wise they could be used with possibly a second piece as such. I do know that tillers can be used as quints, |
| Equipment Truck | Heavy Rescue, Mobile Air | FD | N/A | 19,000 | In my area most departments air units are also carry miscellaneous tools (except the one that has a cascade system on their rescue-bodied engine) |
| (Rescue) Engine W/ Light Boat | Firetruck, Light Boat (, Heavy Rescue) | FD | Swift Water | 19,000 (28,500) | I know some departments have "banana boats" on engines for water rescue, one nearby dept. has it on their rescue engine (not the above mentioned "engine") |
| Public Information Officer | PIO | FD | PIO | 10,000 | This is more for realism, would probably be used on larger calls. |
| Urban Search & Rescue | Heavy Rescue, USAR | FD | N/A | 19,000 | This is more specialized than a normal rescue, it would be deployed to any collapses, and can also be sent to major fires. |
| Dive Team | Dive, Water Rescue | FD, PD | Dive | 19,000 | This could be used for recoveries, or evidence recovery. |
| Chief | Patrol, Chief | PD | N/A | 7,000 | Used for larger police calls, patrol in the same way as K9 (can't transport). |
| Investigator | Patrol, Investigator | PD, FD? | Investigator | 7,000 | At least used for PD, could be needed on fire calls if FD doesn't get its own. Patrol in same way as K9. |
| Community Service Officer | CSO | PD | N/A | 3,000 | Can be used to control traffic on fire calls (would need to be added) and can also take some planned appearances. Can't transport or act as a patrol. |
| Prisoner Transport | Prisoner Transport | PD | N/A | 15,000 | Similar to the Mass Casualty Unit, it can just transport multiple prisoners. |
| Riot Control | Riot Control | PD | Riot Control | 15,000 | Would be needed for riots or non-peaceful protests. |
For most of them I used pre-existing costs (19k for most FD's since current double-role apparatus cost that much and using math that would be 28.5k for 3 roles, and PIO's 10k is the same as a Chief; 7k for PD chief/investigator is same as K9. CSO, Riot and Prisoner transport were spitballed). Can't really think of any vehicles for EMS.
Feel free to add to this list, or tell me I'm wrong.
This is the exact reason I don't use utility units. Where I would have a utility unit I currently have a heavy rescue with the utility graphic.
I wish this for the pumper-tanker as well. It still gets dispatched as an engine in the ARR, but it isn't in the tab. I can kind of see why the Type 3 isn't as it requires the Wildland expansion.
That makes sense, but I wouldn't expect the price to triple.
I don't know if I missed a message about a price increase for the fire stations, but both the small and regular fire station prices increased. The small stations used to be 50,000, and are now showing as being 150,000. Regular was 100,000 and is now 300,000. None of the other stations (regular or small EMS/PD) have changed prices.
Honestly the best approach with the whole thing rather than creating a whole new unit, especially since in lots of big cities all firefighters are required to be EMTs or paramedics as well no matter what apparatus they ride, would be to add specific training options so that they can be put on any fire vehicle but function as both a firefighter and a paramedic.
I agree with this. In the city I live, all firefighters are cross-trained paramedics. The members who hold the rank of Firefighter staff both the ambulances and the suppression apparatus (two on each ambulance, one or two on each suppression apparatus as well as an officer and engineer).
