K's Fleet Comms Guidelines

The nice thing about being FC is that you get to set whatever rules you want, and as long as they get good results (and aren't unnecessarily antagonistic), you are more or less good to go.
Knowing this, I've come up with a simple set of rules that I FC by. It's a bit of a wall-o-text, but trust me, it's well worth the read. These are the rules that I run every fleet that I FC by, but your FC may run things a bit differently. Hopefully, as a fleet member, this gives you an idea of the things your FC might like or not like, and even moreso, as a potential FC in the future, I hope it gives you an idea of what to tell your fleet as far as ground rules.
Just be sure to set them up front; trying to change expectations in the middle of a fleet is insanely hard.

This is based on a very simple principle: Murphy's Law - anything that can go wrong, will.

LESSONS LEARNED IN TWISTED METAL
Always have an FC.
Always have a #2, as the FC will die.
In any fleet that is split, either for camping reasons, DPS reasons, at least one person charged with a leadership role should be with each group.
A person appointed a scout should act as their own FC, subject to orders by the FC.
Never say "I", use your character's name instead.

Requests made by the FC should be filled as quickly and efficiently as possible. When the FC asks for a volunteer, one should be present and selected within 5 seconds. If two people step up to volunteer, they should work out who will be the volunteer in a quick and orderly manner. A good way to do this is to actively step off of volunteering. (IE if K'endro and Jimmy both speak up to volunteer, K'endro would do well to say "Jimmy will do it")

Information should be relayed in a quick, efficient manner, taking as little time as possible to relay the pertinent information. This becomes more important as more information needs to be delivered (IE things are happening faster, or an engagement is taking place).
To relay information efficiently, say the following, in this order.
<Your name>
<Your Current System>
<Your Current Location in System>
<The intel you wanted to provide>
IE: "K'endro, Kor-Azor, Amarr Gate; we have 2 manticores on scan"
If, after a reasonable period of waiting you have not received a response from your FC (5 seconds or so should do), and if your intel is sufficiently important, consider three courses of action: Repeat your intel, put it in fleet chat, or recommend a course of action. DO NOT issue a command or something that sounds like a command unless you are an FC or otherwise in the command structure.
IE: "K'endro; FC, I recommend we bug out".
In K-space, the intel that you should provide upon jumping into a new system should very likely go in this order:
Number of People in Local
Ships on Grid
Ships on Scan
Other information

To avoid confusion, certain words and lingo should be avoided, and others should be standardized.
"Jump" is a protected word, to be used by the FC only.
"Scramble" can either mean the fleet should scramble to planets, or that you have warp scrambled the enemy. Clarification is advised.
Classifications of other pilots are as follows (color coded by their usual color on your overview).
Corpie
Neutral
Neg-Sec (0 or lower security standing)
Outlaw (-5 or lower security standing)
GCC'd (Global Criminal Flagged)
Neg-Ten(Negative standing to the corp, denoted by the red "-" flag in the overview)

The words "Red" and "Flashy" do not convey information that is standardized, as people have their overviews set up differently. Some people have war targets set up as red flashies, while some have them as a static teal. Some people have neutrals set up to flash, some don't. Be very specific.

Three levels of voice-communication restrictions exist (at least):
Casual Comms- "Normal, casual conversation, light coordination, may be social in nature". Usually carried out in the Social channel, but might be carried out in the combat channel while gearing up. You, as the FC, should make it clear if this is allowed, or not.
Fleet Comms- "Seriousness appreciated. Matters not pertaining to the current operation should be directed to text chat" Usual operational status.
Battle Comms- "No speaking unless delivering intel or issuing orders" During combat, or near-combat situations.
Which state the fleet is in should be clarified by the FC periodically.

When calling targets, an FC should try to provide as much of the following as possible:
Primary Target Full Name
Primary Target Ship Type
Primary Target First Three Letters
Secondary Target Full Name, Shiptype
EWAR targets, in general or specific (Call as a primary, or call "EWAR on Logistics")
Point targets, in general or specific (Call as a primary, or call "Spread Points", or "Point Battleships").

Other words that an FC might use to describe combat tactics:
Hydra - Spread the action out to targets as the individual members of the fleet see fit. AKA "spread".
Alphabetical - Do the action to someone in the opposing fleet whose name begins with a letter like yours. IE K'endro would tackle Kryptonite as opposed to Saint George.
Closest - Do the action to the closest target, or one suitably in range.

An FC will typically be talking like an auctioneer over the course of an entire battle, relaying as much pertinent information as possible. Silence is death, especially to the pilots that have yet to land on grid.
IE, an FC might call:
"Saint George is Primary, in an Onyx. SAI. Secondary is Joseph Stragg, J. ECM: hostile Logistics, spread points. Hydra TD's. If the Onyx is out of range, damage closest.
Saint George Primary, Onyx, SAI. Secondary Joseph Stragg. More ECM on those logistics. Call points on primary"
(Fleet responds "Point!" "Point Saing!""Point SG!""Point!")
FC Continues "Jimmy, maintain point on primary. Others, re-spread points. Broadcast for Reps. Saint George almost down, new primary Joseph Stragg -- scratch, new primary Snake Oil, in a buzzard, SNA. Secondary Kryptonite, Curse, KRY."
&c. &c.
HOPEFULLY from that type of communication, even though you have no idea what happened in this theoretical fleet battle that just happened in K'endro's mind, you know exactly what you would have to do if you are flying any particular kind of ship. Some things go unsaid, like "guardians, rep broadcasts", because these things are uniform across all engagements.

The letter announcement is very important; Kryptonite can be KRY, CRY, CRI, KRI. Vowels can be even worse. Uystra, for example. UYS, OIS, EUS, and AUI are all reasonably valid things for your fleet to think you are trying to call, and every second they spend sorting through the enemy list to find it is a second they aren't DPSing the target. Remember that EVE is one of those games that you are likely to be fleeting with people that have different accents than you have, and different interpretations of names than you. Thus, letters are best. If you know your phoenetic alphabet, you can even use that, if you like, though it might be slower than letters.

Fleet comms are important to be kept clear. During a combat situation, no one cares if you are taking damage, just went into structure, want to swear about something that happened, got blown up, were targeted by someone, looked at funny, or are otherwise concerned.

It doesn't matter, as far as the engagement goes. You need to relay the information that other people need to know, and only that.

This changes based on the size of the engagement, and based on the ship you are flying. Sometimes, who the single target is pointing is important. Other times, everyone is tackled by the opposing gang in a 15-a-side fight, so it just flat out doesn't matter if you are. If you are the sole logistics, it matters a lot more if you are jammed than if you are one of 20. Think first about whether the other people in the fleet need to hear what you are going to say, or if you are just saying it for your own personal gratification. If it is the latter, don't say it.

Fleet comms are limited by time. This means that in situations where you are in combat, or comms need to happen quickly, you get the info that other people need to hear the most through in the shortest amount of time. This is very important. This will turn a close fight into a victory. Not doing this will turn ships into twisted metal very quickly.

Engaging on gates in lowsec should be done very carefully, as the following concepts almost always apply.
Gangs of reasonably comparable size will generally not engage on gates for full fleet/fleet combat. GCC/Gate guns hurt, putting one side at a distinct disadvantage.
Gangs will take stragglers/single travelers, and point/pop them before scrambling to random safe locations. Thus, staying with the pack and moving as one creates safety.
Once you GCC (take hostile action on a non-outlaw), any bystanders will engage you to get on the killmail. Even if fleet A engages only fleet B, fleet C standing by will probably also engage fleet A, as they are now likely criminally flagged.

Game mechanics:
When you agress a non-outlaw, or non-GCC'd other, you have GCC'd. For 15 minutes, gate and station guns will shoot you. To avoid this, dock up, or keep bouncing between safe spots. Anyone can engage and kill you with no penalty.
Any gun that shoots you has it's own 15 minute timer. IE, if you GCC on a gate, and then warp to a station to dock up, your criminal flag will wear off, but your aggression timer on the faction of the hosting station will still be there for an additional 2-3 minutes. So if you undock after your GCC runs out, but before your yellow timer runs out, you will get shot again, and the yellow aggression timer will be reset to 15 minutes. This is a point of much confusion.
After you agress, you have a 60 second timer during which you cannot dock, nor jump through gates. This counts down from the last aggressive action you took (EWAR, shoot, drones shooting something, etc). If you are trying to deagress, deactivate all agressive modules, and recall your drones entirely. This does NOT prevent you from warping off, so if you are stuck on gate, under gate fire, you can warp off instead of waiting out your aggression timer.
If you jump into Hisec while GCC'd, you will be immediately Concordokken'd.

TL;DR:
There is none. Read it. It'll save your fleetmate's life one day.


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And now for deciding what I will write about "next time". I think it's about time that I delve a little bit into the industrial side of things, which is where I think I might lose anyone that has even read this far :-). Stick around, though! Industry is a really good source of passive income. So... I guess the next post will have to be "Industry for Non-Industrialists". I like it.
See you then.

-K'