Forward Operating Base

The Forward Operating Base (or "FOB") is the area around a radio that enables a team to place spawn bunkers, ammo crates, repair stations, defensive structures, weapon emplacements, and other deployables. FOBs allow players to establish a presence on the battlefield and reinforce a position.

## Creating a FOB

Creating a FOB requires placing a radio. You must be a Squad Leader to do this.

A Squad Leader (or "SL") with an SL kit can place a radio through the Squad Leader Radial Menu (`T` by default). Additionally, the SL needs:

* A logistics vehicle within 30m.
* An additional **team** member within 30m.
* Lead Crewman and Lead Pilots require **three** teammates nearby.

The Radio must be:

* At least 150 meters from main.
* At least 400 meters from other friendly radios.
* On smaller maps, only 300 meters are required.

When placing a radio, if one or more criteria are not met, the radio's projection appears red or orange. If the SL attempts to place an invalid radio, an error message appears, indicating which criteria are not met. Otherwise, the projection appears green. Placement is instant and does not require construction with an entrenching tool. A map's unique exclusion radius is available in the "Layer Info" tab of the map.

Radios have static and radio chatter noises that are technically audible to around 40 meters. However, that requires the game volume to be set at maximum. At normal audio settings, these sounds are audible to around 10 meters.

## Supplying and Building at a FOB

Using construction points, spawn bunkers and other deployables can be built within 150 meters of the radio. The SL can place any deployables while Fire Team Leaders can only place certain fortifications. Once placed, deployables must be constructed with an entrenching tool.

FOBs start with 0 Construction Points (or "CP") and 0 Ammo Points (or "AP"). The FOB must be supplied by a vehicle, such as the logistics vehicle used to place the radio. Supplies can be loaded or unloaded within a FOB's construction radius through the vehicle's interaction menu (`F` by default). Vehicles can get more supplies from main or from another FOB. Each FOB can hold a total of 20,000 supplies of each type (20,000 CP + 20,000 AP).

For more information on how to supply FOBs, transfer supplies between FOBs, and load and unload supplies from vehicles, see Logistic System.

## Spawning at a FOB

FOBs gain an active spawn point after a spawn bunker is built (aka a "HAB" for conventional factions or a "Hideout" for unconventional factions). While rally points may only spawn once per minute, a player may respawn at a FOB anytime.

Spawn bunkers can be disabled by damage to the radio, damage to the bunker itself, or too much enemy infantry near the bunker. Check the Spawn Bunker page for more information.

## Taking Down a FOB

The radio hub can be damaged by heavy weapons or dug down by a holding down **right-mouse-click** with the entrenching tool. Demolition charges set by a Combat Engineer and Sapper or the improvised explosive device set by a Sapper are also very effective at lowering the health of the radio hub. Damaging the radio hub to below 75% will disable any connected Spawn Bunkers.

If the radio is destroyed, it is put into bleedout. The friendly team has **75 seconds**, as of v4.4, to rebuild the radio before it is destroyed. During this time, the enemy team must defend the radio. The timer can be stopped by building the radio back up to a certain threshold, the radio does not have to be rebuilt fully. If a radio bleeds out, the team that lost the radio will lose 20 tickets.

However, if a friendly player digs down the radio with an entrenching tool, the radio is instantly destroyed instead of bleeding out and the team will lose no tickets. Notably, a radio can be dug down by friendlies during bleedout, which would result in no ticket loss.

Once destroyed by either method, all tech structures (HABs, ammo crates, vehicle repair stations) and emplacements (TOW launchers, MG bunkers) placed within a radio hub's build vicinity will be destroyed as well. Fortifications such as sandbags and HESCO blocks will remain.

## Trivia

* As with rallies, all radios make significant noise. Be sure to always be listening out for radio chatter, as it could mean you've stumbled across an enemy radio.
* In versions prior to Alpha V9, the FOB radio acted as the spawn point which was initially inactive for spawning until a time period passed or the FOB was resupplied. No CPs were consumed to activate the FOB.
* Since v10 supplies can now be transferred between FOBs with logistics vehicles.
* The 300 meter exclusion radius and 150 meter build radius of radios can be viewed on the map if the Viewing FOB Radii option is toggled on, shown as a gray circle and blue circle, respectively.

## See also

* Spawn points
* Spawning
* Deployables
* Logistic System

## References

1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 Alpha 10 : Squad – Communicate. Coordinate. Conquer.
2. ↑ Recap – October 2018 : Squad – Communicate. Coordinate. Conquer.