When trying to explicitly set the version of the replica set configuration the server will overwrite the version specified by the operator if the "force" flag is given.

Instead the version number will be incremented randomly by a relatively large number.

This behaviour is undesirable if one intends to build a system to automatically update the replica set configuration as in these cases it's important the external system is able to set the version to a known number. It is the job of that external system to ensure it's monotonically increasing etc.

Ideally the behaviour would be changed to not overwrite operator input and instead like the non-force path should return an error if the version number is less than the old version.

If I have missed something vital that explains why the server does this I would love to hear the rational behind this behaviour.