Commando Archive
Thread: What to do with our Brawler *Unarmed* Tree?
I understand the feelings about this issue, but there are things that are giving me a little trouble...
First off, I noticed nobody seemed to address the actual definition of a prerequisite that I gave earlier (almost theexact definition in Webster's). It just means it's required that you learn Unarmed 4 before you can become Commando. It doesn't mean you have to use (or will even WANT to use) unarmed moves once you reach Commando, you just need the skills before you are allowed access to the Commando profession. Now as to WHY it's a prerequisite... you'd have to ask the DEVs on that one. I'm assuming they've seen the various films, books, etc. that the rest of us have. You know, the ones where a "commando" is backed up against a wall without a single weapon on him, he reaches out and *SNAP* breaks the enemy's neck. This is what I'm going to assume anyway, because I think that imagining the DEVs actually looked into the history of either the term "commando" (or the roots of actual real-life commando teams) and found that most of them had unarmed training is probably giving them too much credit. 
Also on the subject of Unarmed, if they WERE to put some unarmed moves on the Commando tree, I can pretty much guarantee that:
1) TKA's would be crying to high heaven (but like you said, who cares?)
2) this part of the Commando tree WOULD MOST ASSUREDLY require MUCHO unarmed combat exp.
and 3) the moves would STILL pale in comparison to the TKA moves (and that's BEFORE they nerfed them to hell and back because of the crying of the afforementioned TKA's 
) and be pretty much useless to us anyway.
BTW... just toalert those of you that don't already know... I have 2 accounts. 1 is a Smuggler/Commando, and the other is a BH (thus trying to explain why most of the examples you see me pull out of my @$$ are BH examples). I try to keep the two separate, but we talk about what we know... I know Smuggler, Commando, BH, Marksman, and Scout (and of course the current skill of contention: Unarmed). I guess having a BH as my other character gives me a unique outlook on the 19 point "skill-sink" as some Commandos see it..... be glad it's only 19 points and not more. 
Anyway, back to the subject at hand... Alot (but not all) of the people proposing changes here seem to be in favor of some kind of KDor KD/Dizzy move (whether it be added to Commando or placed in the Unarmed tree). Geeeeee... that wouldn't have anything to do with the humanoid NPC's inability to get back up after this combo is successfully applied, would it?
Of all the ideas I've seen on this thread, my favorite would be the old "rifle-butt to the head" that someone mentioned (with maybe a stun effect at level 1 Field Tactics, and a KD at level 3). But then again, I also agree with the person that said "What's that got to do with unarmed?" Like I said in my first post, I'm kinda torn on this issue, but I think that the requirement shouldn't be removed,and I ALSO think we shouldn't try to encroach on another profession's "niche" (as I'm sure we'd be going w...t...f...??? if they started a new "Heavy Weapons Specialist" profession).
First problem in this discussion is that we are not commandos. We are heavy weapons specialists, an argument could be made for special weapons experts. But not commandos. Commando operations typically involve a good deal of stealth. The heaviest weapons your likely to see on most such operations will be grenades, a sniper rifle, and the occasional explosive charge. Rocket launchers, flamethrowers, and chemical weapons are a bit large and extreme for most things that an actual commando would be involved with. (Admittedly there will be occasional exceptions, but they are exceptions). If you wanted to go by realistic commandos, you'd keep unarmed at least to level 2 or 3, add in one handed weapons, exploration up to 2, survival to 2 (for deep insertion, extended operations missions), novice artisan for simple repair and juryrigging, as well as a fundamental understanding of engineering so you know the best place to set your charges, and novice medic for some field first aid. Then you'd require them to choose a faction, be covert at all times but have the ability to attack others anyhow, provide all the gear they wanted/needed for free at the start, and drop them off in a hostile city. I don't think this is what most people have in mind when they think of the SWG commando (could be fun though).
For the game, unarmed is rather ludicrous. We are heavy weapons experts. That's our job, carry the big gun to the fight, and make really big holes in everything. If someone is able to dodge the grenades, rockets, rapid fire weaponry (which we should have), and the flamethrower and get to hand to hand range with us, we should be toast. (That being possible mind you is not just our fault for not targetting them, it's also rather ludicrous of a game designer to say that its possible, though I'll let Jedi get away with it, just to stay in tune with the Star Wars genre). We don't need any skill point sinks. Besides, I thought one of the main advantages this game was supposed to have over the others out there, was that you could dabble.
Personally I love this Idea! Being a Real Life grunt I can say we're trained to use our assault rifles as melee weapons in close quarters in this very fashion. If your gonna run up to me, your gonna be kissing the butt end of my rifle.... or my bayonette. SOOO I say keep unarmed, but in field tactics tree give us melee specials. HWbutt attack as mentioned abovein the first box. Then either field tactic 3 or 4 add in a similar melee bayonette attack with more damage or add a bleed... or both lol.
tnarb wrote:
Well I don't mind having to take the unarmed tree if they give us a knockdown atField Tactics box1 ofCommando. Not a ranged knockdown but a knockdown in melee range in 16m or under. It could knockdown a single target at Novice with a 50% chance to stun,blind and dizzy. Thiscould be called Heavyweaponbutt1.Heavyweaponbutt1 could get a damage modifier of x.5(half of the weaponsdamage)and would have a time modifier of x1(the weapons speed). The special move cost could have x.5 to health, x.75 to action, x.5 to mind and have a to hit mod of +50.
Then only at master you could get an area knockdown that only works whileat 16m or under.It could be called HeavyweaponbuttArea1 and have a small cone radiusof16m. HeavyweaponbuttArea1 could have a 75% chance to stun,blind and dizzy its target with a 15% chance to do the same to the others in the cone. HeavyweaponbuttArea1 could get a damage modifier of x.75(75% of the weapons damage) and could have a time modifier of x.75(75% of the weapons speed). The special move cost could have x.75 to health, x1 to action, x.75 to mind and have a to hit mod of +75.
If they are going to make us be within melee range(16m) to use specialsfor the HAr and Flamethrowerthen by God I wantsome compensation for having to go up the unarmed tree to get to commando.
LordH:
Warcry1 and Intimidate1 will have a lower 'stick' ration because they are novice brawler abilities. I have found that they are not reliable to use as part of your combat strategy, but it can and does save one's butt from time to time.
I'll say this once again, I believe that any type of unarmed move for us is useless. a punching commando is a failed commando (the old argument of holstering your loaded shotgun and pulling out a knife when the tiger is pouncing on you).
I stick with my engineering4 requirement that gives us grenade and shoulder weapon schematics with no named material requirements. That would be insanely useful and would, for a dang change, allow us to use all our arsenals instead of being slaved to using the flamer because no weaponsmith in your server has the materials or the will to spend several hours to make a weapon that will likely be used up in less than an hour and charge a **edit** fortune for it.
and to be honest with ya, it really doesnt matter if this will affect tka/commandos (like myself), if they want to be TKA they still have the points for it. And perhaps theyll be even more happy because then they will be a rocket-equipped, napalm squirt gunning, explosive throwing, TKA.
MightySquid wrote:
Removing unarmed andadding Exploration or Survival makes good sense from a real world perspective. If brawler unarmed were to remain then some moves should be added for Commandos, or at least increase the unarmed tougness mod in the commando tree.
Yeah, this is a good idea. The world could use a few more commandos
P.S.
Also with a decent macro you can unequip your main weapon use the unarmed specials like blind and stun and then reequip the weapon. They also help alot to lower the damage you take and should be thought of as melee range tools.
For commando close range is important. So having close range attacks that lower the damage you take is a valuable resource if you use them right.
I.E. mob charges you warcry/ blind / stun / equip flamethrower burn it then when you are waiting for the special to recycle your not taking near as much damage. Mob dies
I know warcry isnt as accurate as some would like but believe me the right bio-enhanced outfit can do a world of good.
"My main question is what other skills could they have made us get to have hybrids?"
Given the way our current weapon set-up is, I really have no idea. We need unarmed maxed, yet our 'ranged weapons' effectiveness only truly comes out when we're in melee range. I'd say Exploration, or maybe survival would have been a good counterpart, given what commandos are supposed to do, heck the field tactics description mentions learning how to use terrain to your advantage and whatnot. In other words, we really need an overhaul.
Here's Mister_Heavy the TKA Correspondants reply to the thread.
Similarly I agree, and have posted in the past, that smugglers and commandos should be able to use any of the brawling lines to fulfill their prerequisites. If we take that first step as a given, the question then becomes what would be an appropriate skill set for some Commando melee moves.
For quite some time I've been in favor of combining the FT and HAR trees into a "liquid Weaponry" line (or whatever you want to call it), to make room for a launcher pistol tree that would have its own mods and specials completely independent of other pistols. If wer're going to allow commandos to use any of the brawler lines to qualify, then the melee skills that commandos get should not be based off of any of the weapons in that line. The FT and HAR are the "close" combat weapons. It makes sense to me that Commandos would have some melee support skills that could be used with those weapons.Skills like "bayonette", "Stock strike" (hit with the butt of the gun - Can't really call it "butt strike") and knee-bash, could all be fit into the field tactics tree. Puttingthese skillsin the field tactics tree also addresses the issue of people taking only the FT line in commando. If you have skills and mods for the FT/HAR that are outside of the FT/HAR line, you get skill interdependence - always a good thing imho.
As far as what the skills should do, I'd vote for state change effects. I don't personally envision Commandos being real brawlers. They might use some melee skills to get out of a tight spot, or set up a better shot, but they're mainly ranged guys. Perhaps stun, dizzy, and a posture change. I do not think commandos should get a melee knockdown. Niether Fencers nor Swordsmen get KD, and they're pure melee. I think that if commandos get a knockdown, it should be on the top slot of the launcher pistol tree.
From a balance point of view, I think that any melee skills commandos get should be helpful in PvE, provide limited defense against brawlers in PvE,and should give other ranged professions another good reason to keep away from commandos. If you get to the point where commandos are defeating true brawlers in melee combat, you've gone too far IMHO.
IMHO what mister_heavy said sounds just about perfect to me. A stock strike, bayonette strike and a knee bash (man that sounds cool!!:smileyvery-happy
Combine the HAR and FT into one tree (Liquid weapons, since FT would be petroleum based for stickyness) and then a entire tree dedicated to LP.
Perfect...just perfect! Lets take this and run with it!
ill say......
that if Explore 4 was made the requirement instead of brawler.... id probably go commando since it kinda falls into the req's for SL
i do thinkt hat SOMETHING in the scout tree is more appropriate to Commando's than brawler. While i can see that most RL commandos have LOTS of hand-to-hand combat training, there is literally no use for it in this game. As one guy said in one of the early post....why would anyone drop their massive-damage heavy weapon to pull out a knife and start sticking people with it. Makes no sense.
The only prob i see with moving it to scout is the Master BH/Commando dabbling, and subsequent screams by non-BH classes about the Bounty Hunters who now KD you then get close and burn you to a crisp with FT4......
but it still makes more sense to have soemhting in scout rather than unarmed. Ims ure the Dev's wanted to mix it up a bit though, since half the proffs in the game need somehting in scout (it seems liek it lol).Possibly medic too, most Commandos are also taught basic first aid.
I haven't read this whole post, but I'll state what I've stated before...Commando's are a fighting machine...They need unarmed as well as weapon style fighting...especially to be a hybrid profession...remove the unarmed and you could basically call us a Second String Bounty Hunter Class...
Instead of removing what we have, enhance what we have...we have better chances of that from the Dev's then anything else...Don't Create New Weapons...Fix our current weapons...Less programming...and Programmers like those kind of fixes...
To fix the whole unarmed issue, GIVE US A VK CERT at Commando Novice!!! Then give us a few unarmed specials (1 or 2) within the field tactics tree...
There you go, easy solution...and we still remain Fighting Machines instead of that class that just carries big weapons...