Commando Archive

Well, since i'm sac'ing my whopping 11 Commando skill points soon, I won't be applying to replace Garibaldi. Off to visit BHworld. Likely, this is my last post to this forum for a long time. I'm on Radiant, they didn't shift our resources so it's 25 days and counting, and still no Commando weapons can be made, nor T21's, Bowcasters, Vibro Axes, etc. So, there's no point in using the LP to train boxes that can be used with weapons that simply do not exist.

But, whoever takes it over, I hope you'll read this, and use it as best you can to get this profession fixed.

Inconsistencies.

The Commando is a profession built on a completely inconsistent set of concepts. It can not stand as it is currently written, no matter how many little bug fixes they try.

Inconsistency #1 The new, handy dandy Launcher Pistol.

It shoots! It uses Pistol abilities! It gives Heavy Weapon exp.

And it's the worst thing to happen to this profession. Ever.

What is going to happen is a bunch of kids are going to say, "I can get the Master Commando title with this! Alright!" And off they go. Master Commandos popping up all over the place. Have any of you thought for one second what the Devs will say when you do?

"Look, see! There they are! Master Commandos! The profession is fixed." Master Commandos existing imply the class has power that people seek. It implies people can gain something by getting there. If you are going for just the title, you are presenting the illusion there is power at the end of the road. Once there, you will find that you being there is why they are not going to consider your complaints as valid. Having NO Master Commandos is far more powerful than 100.

The absolute worst thing any of you can do is train a single box with the skill gained with this weapon. Doing so will guarantee that the fix that must come will be only further delayed. The best evidence the profession is broken is if Master Commandos do not exist. There were two known yesterday, and even that belies the difficulties faced in achieving that title.

But on to the evidence. So, you're a Novice Commando. You've got your LP. Great! Use it. Train a box. Train 6. Train 10, who cares? Guess what? At Master, you are just as good with the LP as you were as a Novice. You gain no power, but had to fight higher level NPC's for exp, without the benefit of improved accuracy, speed, or abilities. There is no "Heavy Weapon Accuracy" in the Commando tree that might apply to the LP. So you are, quite literally, training boxes that don't increase your power. It's like a Chef using Medicine to train Chef skills. At Master Chef, you're just as good a Medic as at Novice, despite having used the Medic skills oer and over to train that Chef skill.

Inconsistency 2 Heavy Weapons must be rare.

Wrong. Not true in real life, and it should not be true here. One man portable heavy weapons are called squad support weapons, and are made cheaply and for significant abuse. They aren't like a high quality sniper rifle that needs to be carefully maneuvered to maintain accuracy... they spray and rely on mass fire or area effect.

Every class has weak, common weapons that they can use with their higher level abilities. The Commando is the only class that does not have a common workday weapon that increases in power through its skill tree. Flamethrowers have 3 rare resources, and are rare. HAR's have at least 2. That's 1/2 of all our skill boxes devoted to weapons that are intended to be rare. Yes, Riflemen know that Headshot 3 works with a T21 far better than it does with a DLT20a, even if the 20a has better DPS. But at least they can use HS3 with a common weapon when their rare ones are missing.

Some Heavy weapons should be rare. I absolutely, 100% agree. But not all. There need to be common, everyday weapons, that become powerful as we advance in the class, and excel. I think the Devs are assuming that some of the rare weapons will be available at any particular time, but on Radiant, right now, two months in, tehre are only a few HAR's, and no other heavies, because there is a known Resource Shift bug. 25 days and counting.

Inconsistency 3 Heavy weapons are close range weapons.

Yep, firing a rocket launcher 1m from your target isn't suicidal. Flamethrowers at long range don't cook tanks. An M60 vs a pistol at 10m always wins. No. This is not consistent with any reality. Heavy weapons are clumsy and awkward, and they can not be shifted to respond to melee attacks. They are area effect and often that area, in close range, includes the user.

If the Devs choose to redefine heavy weapos (also known as support and suppression weapons) as close range weapons, then they should model damage on the other ranged close range weapon... the pistol! If you bother doing DPS calculations, you'll find Pistols have the (min+max)/(2*speed), Carbs second, then Rifles. That makes sense, if you consider that the chance of dying is relative to the effective range of the weapon. But the Commando weapons have a base DPS below the Rifleman, as if they were designed for long range DPS, not close. If HW's are close range, they need Pistol DPS at a bare minimum.

Inconsistency 4 Grenades are worth anything.

A single stack of 5 grenades is as hard to make as a pistol. That means factories for mass production.

Grenades don't currently do anything. Their damage is less than simply hitting attack with a pistol. They have no apparent special effects. And yet, 1/4 skill trees are devoted to these expendable weapons. Grenades are simple weapons. A detonator, an explosive, and a steel casing. Mass consumption expendable items must be simple to manufacture. (I'd extend this to Stimpacks as well. A Stimpack Chemist makes, for the same amount of time running a factory, 1/5th that of a Weaponsmith. Lots of balance there.)

Inconsistency 5 Flexibilityin attack is powerful.

The Commando has the broadest range of weapon types to attack with. We can shoot with acid, fire, kinetic, energy, etc.

Flexibility only counts IF targets have weaknesses and vulnerabilities. I've been to Endor, Lok, Dantooine, etc. Consistently, everywhere, I fidn the same thing. All of the special damage types are resisted in exactly the same %age. There is no difference. Flexibility is only a positive trait, if there is some weakness to exploit. The game currently does not include this, so the only difference between the heavy weapons is base DPS.

There are some NPC's with weakness to Kinetic and/or energy, but all Rnaged weapons have these options, so the Commando is not unique in being able to exploit this. It is equally powerful across all Ranged Weapon specialties.

Inconsistency 6 A Novice Commando should not hit well with a Heavy Weapon.

The justification for this is simple: they've never used the weapon, so they shouldn't use it well at Novice level. That's true, but only if you are willing to let them go back and practice against weak targets, just like a Novice Marksman or Brawler does when training a new weapon. The Commando skill tree demands 175K forAcid Rifle 1. The Marksman? 1K for any of Rifle 1, Pistol 1, and Carbine 1. The basic "lack of skill" presumption demands that the first level Commando boxes must be 1K like the Novice Marksman.

By not doing so, the playing field is not level. A Novice Rifleman can readily achieve 175K Rifle exp, using the Rifle Accuracy and Speed gained in the Marksman tree. The Commando does not have the Accuracy and Speed gains of the other classes, but are expected to kill the same level creatures.

It is inconsistent to expect the Commando to either kill high level monsters with unskilled weapons, or to expect them to not allow them full exp for gaining their L1 skill boxes.

Inconsistency #7 Who should be the most effective combatant?

Which profession should deal the most damage and gain the most exp in a group fight? A Master TKA, Rifleman, or Commando? Well, The TKA has put 92 Skill points into COmbat. So has the Master Rifleman. The TKA is most at risk, though, so yes, he should get more exp than the Rifleman. The Commando has put 169 Skill points into Combat. To me, that should mean the Commando ought to do tremendously more damage, and therefore get more exp, in combat. The damage level of Commando weapons, at some level, should exceed Rifleman by over 50%. If, in fact, the weapons are intended to be close range, then the damage dealt should be 50% more than the TKA.

The one question to answer, and one I cannot, is whether the Commando should outdamage a BH. The BH has more skill points invested, but 1/3 of them are not combat related (Scout skills). The scout skills inherently improve the BH's combat, however, through Terrain Navigation and the ability to pull a droid out of a hat anywhere they can drop a camp. BH's get their own special content (missions, though currently unbalanced). Whether the Devs consider the Scout investment to exceed the Combat value of the Commando Unarmed investment, then yes, the BH should beat the Commando. I see it as flexibility, and personally think the Commando's greater combat investment should mean the highest combat effectiveness.

I suppose I couldweaselout a few more, but that should be enough.

The Devs will eventually have to face all of these inconsistencies. The profession is simply never going to be fully functional until they do. So, since this is far too much for them to devote time to, I'm not going to wait for them to figure it all out.

Seeya.