Commando Archive

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MariketheWookiee wrote:
master marksman is too much, that means we have higher requirements then other classes (all classes now require 2 lines to get the elite) personaly, i say pistols should be pre req along with ranged support (cause we use launcher pistol first, and some pistols is handy with it)

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That would work too, although if I may point out,master marksman would require only 5 more skill points than the current prereqs (and commando isn't supposed to be an elite prof). I'm not pushing for master marksman, though, I'm just dead against the unarmed requirement... Hell, why don't they make it scout and ranged support like Bounty Hunter; I'm sure we could use theincreased terrain negotiation given the weapon loads we're always carrying about.

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djkav wrote:

I think the new pre-reqs are fine.

Commandos should be able to fight unarmed. I don't think commandos should be bothered about rifles, pistols are carbines. They have there heavy weapons.

Unarmed is like a secondary skill for commandos, they prefer to use heavy weapons, but can fall back to unarmed should they need to

Commandos do usually operate like a crack unit.

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This may be an accurate statement on the live servers but it is WAY off the mark on the TC server.

Right now commando is nothing more than an armor/weapon certification tree. You get no specials at all from this tree. This means that if you want to fire these weapons with anything other than novice marksman specials, you need a second tree of combat, like pistols carbines, or rifles.

Sure you could dabble lightly in ranged skills and then pickup TKM for your so called "fall back" but this would make you neither good in ranged attacking nor good in melee. I think templates that involve master commando will require a pure ranged template. For example the template: Master Commando, Master Pistoleer, Smuggler 4440 would provide lots of nice specials to use with the plasma flame thrower.

This means the age old template of Master Commando/TKM is no longer viable. Or if you take it, you will be spending what few points you have left in a skills tree like carbines or whatever. I think the the requirements of commando need to reflect its ranged disposition and be changed to

• Marksman: Pistols 4, or Carbines 4, or Rifles 4


• Marksman: Ranged Support 4

This would give them a few more points to spend on skills like healing, or more ranged skill. As it stands I highly doubt that any commando will take a template involving TKM and be very competitive vs. one that doesn't.

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IdrisTycho wrote:

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djkav wrote:

I think the new pre-reqs are fine.

Commandos should be able to fight unarmed. I don't think commandos should be bothered about rifles, pistols are carbines. They have there heavy weapons.

Unarmed is like a secondary skill for commandos, they prefer to use heavy weapons, but can fall back to unarmed should they need to

Commandos do usually operate like a crack unit.

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This may be an accurate statement on the live servers but it is WAY off the mark on the TC server.

Right now commando is nothing more than an armor/weapon certification tree. You get no specials at all from this tree. This means that if you want to fire these weapons with anything other than novice marksman specials, you need a second tree of combat, like pistols carbines, or rifles.

Sure you could dabble lightly in ranged skills and then pickup TKM for your so called "fall back" but this would make you neither good in ranged attacking nor good in melee. I think templates that involve master commando will require a pure ranged template. For example the template: Master Commando, Master Pistoleer, Smuggler 4440 would provide lots of nice specials to use with the plasma flame thrower.

This means the age old template of Master Commando/TKM is no longer viable. Or if you take it, you will be spending what few points you have left in a skills tree like carbines or whatever. I think the the requirements of commando need to reflect its ranged disposition and be changed to

• Marksman: Pistols 4, or Carbines 4, or Rifles 4


• Marksman: Ranged Support 4

This would give them a few more points to spend on skills like healing, or more ranged skill. As it stands I highly doubt that any commando will take a template involving TKM and be very competitive vs. one that doesn't.

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The key thing about Commando is you have to remember that Pre and Post CU we are about "HEAVY DAMAGE"...Post CU we will be expanding on that idea to be more about "Heavy Damage in both Melee and Ranged areas"...We are not about fancy specials or slick weapons (although we got some)...

We are about Power and Damage capability...Post CU, even using what we get from ourRanged Supportor Unarmed Pre-Req, we will be capable of "Heavy Damage" in both AOE and non-AOE attacks. We have weapons that can convert any ranged attack into an AOE attack and add status effects or a DoT...We have at least 1 or more weapons that do the same but with out an AOE effect...And we have our Grenades which don't require any special attached to them.

We are meant to be Heavy Damage dealers...we accomplish that with even just using our pre-reqs with our weapons...We don't NEED to dabble for more specials, but we'd be stupid not too...Even Mastering Commando/TK, we'll still have at least 30 points to dabble elsewhere which will get us a number of ranged specials that we will again, convert intoCommando specials.

The other thing that people NEED to remember is Post-CU, template building is partly about SACRIFICE to make it more strategic...if you go one route, you have to know what you are gaining and losing...To become a TKM with Commando (something I will be), you gain the avoidance ability which, inturn, will allow you to go armorless, which inturn, will remove many of the hinderances, which inturn, will make you a more powerful Commando...BUT...You are also sacrificing the ability to gain a ton more ranged abilities...so while you gain much in the way of defense and increase the effectiveness of our offense, you sacrifice having a much wider range of offensive abilities...the same can be said of a Commando who dabbles all Ranged abilities...They'll gain a ton of offensive abilities, but they'll sacrifice in the way of defense and they'll HAVE TO wear armor which means they'll HAVE TO deal with the hinderances that are associated with that...

It's all a trade off post-CU...you want this, you give up that...

The other key is that we are MEANT to be made up of Melee and Ranged...this is NOT going to change...They already have all ranged professions and all melee professions...We are meant to be an avenue for both Melee and Ranged template builders...we are the middle ground when it comes to template building...This works for non-Commandos as much as it works for us...Not all of us want to build a full ranged Commando (which is what we'd be pretty much forced to be if we had all Ranged pre-reqs)...The Fact that the unarmed tree is shared by pretty much all Melee professions opens the door for us to Dabble Melee professions should we decide to...and while some think dabbling Melee is a bad idea, other's love that idea...the Unarmed Pre-Req isn't just an avenue to TK...It's one half of all of the other Melee pre-reqs for the other Melee professions...it also opens us up to Smuggler (which is a hint on where to spend those remaining pts after mastering Commando/TK).

The Devs have told us throughout the CU discussion period that we should be more then capable using the specials we get from Marksman if we decide to fill our template with Melee boxes...This is where we need to put some focus in regarding testing...we need to hold the devs accountable for telling us that...But we also need to be aware of the give and take that the CU is all about...If we had all Ranged pre-reqs, we'd be able to get a ton of ranged abilities and likely become even more the "uber" profession that many non-Commandos (and some Commandos) are already predicting...we'd have the door open to us to become the uber-elite of ranged professions...so in a way, having that Melee Pre-Req is a way of curbing our access from ranged special over-kill...

So we need to be sensitive that not all Commandos feel (me included) that we will have to dabble all ranged to be competative (that we could spend our remaining 30 or so pts into Ranged professions and still compete quite well)...And we need to understand that the Devs gave us the unarmed pre-req for a reason, not only to make us unique, but in an attempted to (1) give us some type of balance & (2) make us play the "give and take" game...

Just my thoughts...Whether we like it or not, I'm fairly confident in saying that our Unarmed Pre-req isn't going anywhere...we are MEANT to have a Meleepre-req...We might be able to push for it to be changed to some other Melee pre-req, but why would we want to when Unarmed is shared by all other Melee professions as a pre-req...Every profession has some sort of "down-side" to keep them "balanced"...In a way, you can see the Melee pre-req as one of ours...but think about it this way...other Ranged professions have a much tougher time dabbling ANY melee because they don't have the Door that we do...100% of their pre-reqs are ranged, where as only 50% of ours is (and that Melee is shared by all other Melee professions)...that's what makes having this type of set up cool in my mind.

Besides...The unarmed pre-req gives Novice Commandos abilities to use with the Massassi Knucklers (which should grant Heavy Weapon XP...waiting to hear if this is going to be "fixed") instead of relying solely on the Launcher Pistol...

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IdrisTycho wrote:

How exactly is our plasma flame thrower going to benefit a melee stacker compared to a ranged stacker?

Having melee skills, even just what we get from the unarmed tree, will be an advantage mainly to Novice Commandos who DO NOT have the plasma FT or any FT for that matter (not every Commando will start out at Master or just below...we have to think about future Commandos grinding their way up)...Beyond that, it is an advantage to those Commandos who want a Ranged/Melee template build...TK gives Avoidance and Meditation...Pikeman gives Crowd Control...Fencer gives bleeds...Smuggler gives us Mezzing...and so on and so on...and all of them share the Unarmed pre-req...Thats where our benefit comes from...Post-CU we also need to stop associating Commando with just the FT...we have pretty much the most weapons in game, and I truely hope that we have uses for each and every one (especially with the FT only working up to 25m)...

I just see all these ranged weapons in Commando and naturally come to the conclusion that it is a ranged profession. Now if I saw unarmed mods and/or a fewknuckler weapons, etc., then I could start to see it from your point of view. But one knuckler weapon does make the tree worthwhile to a TKM. There needs to be a better balance of unarmed gear/mods and ranged gear/mods if we are to expect this to be a real hybrid.

Actually, the Massassi Knucklers won't be likely useful to TK's...even their novice weapon is better then our Massassi Knucklers as far as I can see (DPS-wise)...Our Massassi Knucklers will be more use to us for Novice Grinding or close quarter combat when we have no other Melee skills beyond our Pre-Req...I fully expect a Commando who goes beyond Novice of any elite melee profession to stop using the Massassi Knucklers and use the best DPS weapon UNLESS they are still grinding Commando and need the Heavy Weapon XP...

Even smuggler has unarmed mods.

Yep...and we get some from the Unarmed Tree as well as I believe we have some melee enhancements in one of our trees post-CU (can't remember if it's still there or not)...depending on how testing goes, we can probably get that raised if we show a need...The key thing we don't have that I was hoping for, was some sort of "hand2hand" attack of our own OR some type of status effect addition via the Knucklers much like our FT does...But to say our Unarmed Pre-req is useless isn't a true statement...It's only useless to a Master Commando who has no wishes to pursue any Melee skills...and while some might say that accounts for a lot of Commandos, it doesn't account for everyone...

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garvin wrote:

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IdrisTycho wrote:

How exactly is our plasma flame thrower going to benefit a melee stacker compared to a ranged stacker?

Having melee skills, even just what we get from the unarmed tree, will be an advantage mainly to Novice Commandos who DO NOT have the plasma FT or any FT for that matter (not every Commando will start out at Master or just below...we have to think about future Commandos grinding their way up)...Beyond that, it is an advantage to those Commandos who want a Ranged/Melee template build...TK gives Avoidance and Meditation...Pikeman gives Crowd Control...Fencer gives bleeds...Smuggler gives us Mezzing...and so on and so on...and all of them share the Unarmed pre-req...Thats where our benefit comes from...Post-CU we also need to stop associating Commando with just the FT...we have pretty much the most weapons in game, and I truely hope that we have uses for each and every one (especially with the FT only working up to 25m)...

I just see all these ranged weapons in Commando and naturally come to the conclusion that it is a ranged profession. Now if I saw unarmed mods and/or a fewknuckler weapons, etc., then I could start to see it from your point of view. But one knuckler weapon does make the tree worthwhile to a TKM. There needs to be a better balance of unarmed gear/mods and ranged gear/mods if we are to expect this to be a real hybrid.

Actually, the Massassi Knucklers won't be likely useful to TK's...even their novice weapon is better then our Massassi Knucklers as far as I can see (DPS-wise)...Our Massassi Knucklers will be more use to us for Novice Grinding or close quarter combat when we have no other Melee skills beyond our Pre-Req...I fully expect a Commando who goes beyond Novice of any elite melee profession to stop using the Massassi Knucklers and use the best DPS weapon UNLESS they are still grinding Commando and need the Heavy Weapon XP...

Even smuggler has unarmed mods.

Yep...and we get some from the Unarmed Tree as well as I believe we have some melee enhancements in one of our trees post-CU (can't remember if it's still there or not)...depending on how testing goes, we can probably get that raised if we show a need...The key thing we don't have that I was hoping for, was some sort of "hand2hand" attack of our own OR some type of status effect addition via the Knucklers much like our FT does...But to say our Unarmed Pre-req is useless isn't a true statement...It's only useless to a Master Commando who has no wishes to pursue any Melee skills...and while some might say that accounts for a lot of Commandos, it doesn't account for everyone...

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You totally didnt answer the first question. It was not "How does commando benefit from unarmed?" But, "how does melee benefit from commando?" Currently it is clear that ranged does. Show me how melee does. Until melee really benefits in a melee-like way from taking commando, it is simply a ranged profession that has a melee requirement.

And, so far I see no mods to melee from taking commando. What I am suggesting is this:

• Column 1: Grenades beneficial to both ranged and melee. Actually, currently they are beneficial to no one.


• Column 2: Ranged weapons and modifiers, beneficial to ranged people.


• Column 3: Melee weapons and modifiers, beneficial to melee people.


• Column 4: Possibly armor certifications and other defense type modifiers that would be beneficial to ranged and melee.

You could mix up the trees a bit so it wasn't so easy to get exactly what you want out of it without investing more points, but the point I am making is that a commando tree like that would have real use to both ranged and melee.

As it is now, it looks like this:

• Column 1: Grenades beneficial to both ranged and melee.


• Column 2: particle beam weapons: beneficial to ranged only.


• Column 3: Inciendary weapons: beneficial to ranged only.


• Column 4: Acid weapons: beneficial to ranged only.

You see what I am saying? There is nothing about the commando tree that would make a melee person think: Ooh I could be a better melee tank if I took a bit of commando and at the same time get a little ranged skill. And there is certainly nothing about commando that would make a ranged person think that they could grab a bit of melee skill while enhancing their ranged attacks.

It's not a hybrid. It currently stands a ranged enhancer tree with a melee requirement, like always. Add some real reasons for a melee person to take it and you will have a hybrid.