Squad Leader Archive
Thread: Concept Thread Squad Leader Profession in Post-CU SWG.
Page 2 of 2
Sylow
Tue Jun 14, 2005 10:42 am
#14
Ifelt that in light of the Fan Fest report a lot of people seemed to have given up on the possibility of a revamp, judging my the sudden fall off of threads of this ilk.
Quite true... but what would you expect? The forum is full of threads with good suggestions and ideas, and all we get from Fan Fest is: "The Devs have no idea what to do with us."
That way a massive punch in the face for everybody wanting to improve the profession and bringing up great ideas.
KyeAshke
Tue Jun 14, 2005 11:54 am
#15
Sylow wrote:
4) Scout Pre-Reqs - Yeah, Exploration tree would be more realistic - we need to be able to run all over the battlefield directing our troops. But I also see that being able to deploy a forward position is also beneficial.
True... give me anything but camping... even hunting would be more beneficial, while not more logical. The reason why they did it like that probably are BHs, they already have the Exploration branch as requirements. If SLs would have the same, MBH/MSL would be extremely cheap in skillpoints.
6) Reinforcements, Militia Leader, - Nice, but again should be part of the GCW, not SL. (It reminds me alot of BomberStrike, the imperial pilot skill).
True forreinforcements, but the leader thing makes sense. If you're not factioned, you'll simply not be able to use the Militia Leader part... doesn't hurt, you still have it as option if you decide to jointhe GCW.
1) Squad Leader Vehicle - Even if it comes in the shape of a hum-vee, with no defensive bonuses, no turret, but can hold an entire group I say we should have it.
Aye.
2) Overhead Map - This could easily be adapted from the current building placement code, and would be greatly beneficial. The only problem I see is how to represent things like group members, enemies, targets, health on targets/groupmates.
Complete Aye.
2) Something I really think should be added is melee mods to go along where ranged mods currently exists. This opens up Melee SLs as a more viable profession. And because of this, remove the Ranged Support as a pre-req, and change it to Exploration. That way both melee and ranged SLs have the same reqs and mods.
Hmm... if you insist... but generally this change would bepainful for all present SLs,they'd have to invest more skillpoints inthis concept. (Very careful withwhat you wish... this suggestion makes us gotowards the way of the ranger. I oppose that idea.)
3) We should have more bonuses for the medic professions. We currently provide mainly passive defensive, with active aggressive skills, but nothing to help medics in the group. I actually find it easier at present to heal my groupmates whilst sitting at the back directing the battle (CM4xxx FTW) even though we have a TKM/Master Doctor with us - it is usually more beneficial for him to attack than heal (especially with aggro as it currently is).
Indeed, while reading this text, i came to wonder if we could have a "group healing efficiency" modifier? And, are there other combat-related professions which we perhaps forgot to support yet?
Leader thing - ok, I can see a combined skill working for that.
For the pre-reqs - maybe. If they want to open up the profession, I would change it to what I suggested. If they want it a purely ranged hybrid, then it might be beneficial to increase our ranged mods slightly.
BadChef
Tue Jun 14, 2005 3:26 pm
#16
A reasonable outline for squad leader, which, I for once think should be taken seriously. It's not the usual rant and request to nerf other professions to make ours the best, and it's not going overboard with the ideas. This presentation needs to be kept visible and added to, especialy with that respec comming up, I'm trying to control my temptation to respec to somthing els. These ideas that Short Timer and others have polished and presented might not be agreable to the selfish part of me, but they are realistic and workable. I think the attitude and feedback from the squad leader player base ought to be a welcome relief for the devs and if ever they asked for inpute from players, this is the oppertunity to take.
BladestormTheOne
Wed Jun 15, 2005 9:46 am
#18
Nice done!
I'm currently looking into the Squade Leader profession andI have some ideas of my own. Here are some new skills that maybe could be interesting:
Tactics I: Volley Fire*
Tactics II: Cover!
Tactics III: Adv. Volley Fire
Tactics IV: Full Cover!
Strategy I: (Close Formation!)
Strategy II: Hold the Line!
Strategy III: Ralley
Strategy IV: Adv. Hold the Line
Vehicle Operation I: Squad Leader Vehicle Certification
Vehicle Operation II: Mount!
Vehicle Operation III: Combat Droid Control
Vehicle Operation IV: Fire at Will!'' / Defend!''
Morale I: Form Up!
Morale II: Charge!
Morale III: Retreat!
Morale IV: Rush!
Volley Fire: This command would change the target for the entire group to the target of the Squad Leader. It should be functional in space too!
Cover: Everyone in the group performs a dive and gets into prone position. All group members get concealment boni for a short time.
Adv. Volley Fire: Like normal volley fire, except for a damage & speed bonus at the target. Doesn't works in space.
Full Cover: Like cover, but the group gets invisible on the radar and a higher concealment bonus.
Close Formation: Space only skill. All group members set a formation around the Squad Leader and have theire autopilote available. The Squad Leader leads his group and cannot fly faster than the slowest ship in the group.
Hold the Line: Everyone makes a roll und gets into kneeling position.
Ralley: As the normal ralley skill.
Adv. Hold the Line: As hold the line, except the group gains an additionalbonus to ranged defense for a short time.
Squad Leader Vehicle Certification: The squad leader gains a vehicle that only he can drive, something like a troop carrier for 8 persons. This vehicle should be faster than the current 7 people "bus".
Mount: The Squad Leader sends /offerride to all of his groupmembers within range when he is driving a vehicle.
Combat Droid Control: The Squad Leader gains control of some (or one) combat droid(s), like the ones seen in the new movies, maybewith themaster a droideka. They should be a little bit better than the combat droids currently in play, but not too good.
Fire at Will: orders a combat droid to automatically search targets within range and attack them, till the Squad Leader orders to stop or no enemies are left within range.
Defend: Orders a combat droid to defend a target und attack everyone who attacks the target.
Form Up: The normal Form Up command.
Charge: This offers a burst run to everyone who has a melee profession. It is a quick way to get melee professions into combat range, maybe with a little short damage bonus.
Retreat: The normal retreat command.
Rush: Advanced form of charge. All melee professions get a accuracy anddamage bonus at their first attacks after this command is used.
Ok, this are my ideas, how the Squad Leader could be made something very interisting. More "space commands" should be added. Maybe, something interisting for you?
KyeAshke
Wed Jun 15, 2005 11:29 am
#19
BladestormTheOne wrote:Nice done!I'm currently looking into the Squade Leader profession andI have some ideas of my own. Here are some new skills that maybe could be interesting:Tactics I: Volley Fire*Tactics II: Cover!Tactics III: Adv. Volley FireTactics IV: Full Cover!Strategy I: (Close Formation!)Strategy II: Hold the Line!Strategy III: RalleyStrategy IV: Adv. Hold the LineVehicle Operation I: Squad Leader Vehicle CertificationVehicle Operation II: Mount!Vehicle Operation III: Combat Droid ControlVehicle Operation IV: Fire at Will!'' / Defend!''Morale I: Form Up!Morale II: Charge!Morale III: Retreat!Morale IV: Rush!Volley Fire: This command would change the target for the entire group to the target of the Squad Leader. It should be functional in space too!Cover: Everyone in the group performs a dive and gets into prone position. All group members get concealment boni for a short time.Adv. Volley Fire: Like normal volley fire, except for a damage & speed bonus at the target. Doesn't works in space.Full Cover: Like cover, but the group gets invisible on the radar and a higher concealment bonus.Close Formation: Space only skill. All group members set a formation around the Squad Leader and have theire autopilote available. The Squad Leader leads his group and cannot fly faster than the slowest ship in the group.Hold the Line: Everyone makes a roll und gets into kneeling position.Ralley: As the normal ralley skill.Adv. Hold the Line: As hold the line, except the group gains an additionalbonus to ranged defense for a short time.Squad Leader Vehicle Certification: The squad leader gains a vehicle that only he can drive, something like a troop carrier for 8 persons. This vehicle should be faster than the current 7 people "bus".Mount: The Squad Leader sends /offerride to all of his groupmembers within range when he is driving a vehicle.Combat Droid Control: The Squad Leader gains control of some (or one) combat droid(s), like the ones seen in the new movies, maybewith themaster a droideka. They should be a little bit better than the combat droids currently in play, but not too good.Fire at Will: orders a combat droid to automatically search targets within range and attack them, till the Squad Leader orders to stop or no enemies are left within range.Defend: Orders a combat droid to defend a target und attack everyone who attacks the target.Form Up: The normal Form Up command.Charge: This offers a burst run to everyone who has a melee profession. It is a quick way to get melee professions into combat range, maybe with a little short damage bonus.Retreat: The normal retreat command.Rush: Advanced form of charge. All melee professions get a accuracy anddamage bonus at their first attacks after this command is used.Ok, this are my ideas, how the Squad Leader could be made something very interisting. More "space commands" should be added. Maybe, something interisting for you?
Take out the space commands, and it would be pretty damn good.
No other profession has any space specific specials, and squad leaders aren't necessarily squadron leaders (to justify it in both a balanced and role-play way). Keep space in space, and ground on the ground.
I especially like the 'mount', 'rush' and 'charge' commands, and the droid idea is...interesting, though perhaps not feasable.
Cover - a big no-no. This is the realm of riflepeople, it doesn't belong in a squad. Group conceal perhaps, but that falls under Ranger. I see no need for this in our arsenal.
I'm not sure about 'hold the line'. What about the riflepeople in the group? They'll probably be prone. You take away some of the more damaging specials doing this. (The same holds for the prone part of 'cover', but I've mentioned that already.
Sylow
Thu Jun 16, 2005 2:51 am
#20
I am sorry that i have to tear this apart, but the concept won't work... let me tell you why:
Volley Fire: This command would change the target for the entire group to the target of the Squad Leader. It should be functional in space too!
Switching another players selected target? Then we're soon back to the discussion, if other players should have to consent on commands or whatever. In the end you'd have a pop-up box where they'd confirm that they really want to switch target (probably including a second box, asking if they are really really sure...) that they want to switch. Sorry, the current functionality of volley fire is perfect, it makes the people WANT to switch the target to the marked one. (Or would be perfect if it would be visible under all graphics settings.)
Cover: Everyone in the group performs a dive and gets into prone position. All group members get concealment boni for a short time.
Full Cover: Like cover, but the group gets invisible on the radar and a higher concealment bonus.
Hold the Line: Everyone makes a roll und gets into kneeling position.
The very same... having your complete group go prone or to kneeling position? You do that once, all your melee classes will curse you, the rest will just be annoyed as they were stopped right on track. Do it a few times and the melee classes leave your team... and the rest probably too, when you annoy them too much.
The invisibilty on radar i actually like, could be a bit overpowered, but i'd love to have it. Not at the price of being hated by the team. If necessary, i would make it the other way around, when the SL applies the cover command, everybody teammember who is prone at that moment gets the bonus and invisibility. Of course, the SL then first has to inform the team on his plans, more work for the SL-player. Of course, a team of fools who doesn't know what it does won't make good use of it. But for a good team, this is no problem and the teammembers still have the freedom they want.
Adv. Hold the Line: As hold the line, except the group gains an additionalbonus to ranged defense for a short time.
Hmm... what's the difference to rally, basically? Only that players are forced to kneeling position, which will get you a lot of hate from the team. Sure, stacked with rally it could get us into incredinly high defense modifiers, but only for a few days, then it gets nerfed, so we're back to what we have now on the buff department, only with more time and action-use to activate them and other players hating us when using some of our abilities. Sorry, but i'd rather stick with rally and no second thing here.
Close Formation: Space only skill. All group members set a formation around the Squad Leader and have theire autopilote available. The Squad Leader leads his group and cannot fly faster than the slowest ship in the group.
This one i'd actually like and could be useful... in space, people PERHAPS even wouldn't mind to be guided by autopilot occasionally.
Squad Leader Vehicle Certification: The squad leader gains a vehicle that only he can drive, something like a troop carrier for 8 persons. This vehicle should be faster than the current 7 people "bus".
Mount: The Squad Leader sends /offerride to all of his groupmembers within range when he is driving a vehicle.
Those two are good. The first was already suggested many times and i love it. The second i haven't heard of yet but would be extremely helpful if the first is implemented.
Combat Droid Control: The Squad Leader gains control of some (or one) combat droid(s), like the ones seen in the new movies, maybewith themaster a droideka. They should be a little bit better than the combat droids currently in play, but not too good.
Fire at Will: orders a combat droid to automatically search targets within range and attack them, till the Squad Leader orders to stop or no enemies are left within range.
Defend: Orders a combat droid to defend a target und attack everyone who attacks the target.
Hmm, while i love to have my droid along, i am unsure on this matter. Most suggestions with NPCs were going in the "give us a squad" of NPCs, resulting us in being the new creature handlers.That was a very bad idea and the Devs some time ago clearly stated that SLs are to lead players, not NPCs. With one droid, this might just still be possible to step over the line, not sure, though. Would be very low on my priority list, anyways.
Charge: This offers a burst run to everyone who has a melee profession. It is a quick way to get melee professions into combat range, maybe with a little short damage bonus.
Retreat: The normal retreat command.
Rush: Advanced form of charge. All melee professions get a accuracy anddamage bonus at their first attacks after this command is used.
Too many burstruns for the team. I personally would like it, but we for too long had too many people giving the team perma-burstrun with some scripts. Many people discusses a long time how to nerf Retreat to make it more balanced, as a result we have the insanely high action-costs which basically disallow us to use it when it really would be needed. (Already now it's more useful when applied as your "charge" or "rush", when a battle suddenly goes bad you're low on action, anyways...)
If you now put in another two team-burstruns, and they'd even give additional boni, you'd open all doors for exploit and abuse. I already now see timed burstrun macros on the way. So i am sorry, the commands sound fine but the consequences would be bad for the profession, i vote against this.
And as a last comment, the whole thing is too big. You basically brought the concept for a complete revamp of the profession. Despite the problems i found, there are very good points in it, but it has one mayor issue: the devs won't give us a revamp, for a long time there was one promised to us, lately the revamp documents in the "in concept" forum disappeared,long-time plans of the Devs"lost" the SL-revamp part, etc... we're considered too unimportant to really do a big thing on our profession, so we probably will never get a revamp and for sure not within the next 18 months.
Thus i have to say, we currently should work on short term goals, present the Devs easy to implement things, guide them to make our profession valuable by improving one thing after another while keeping the current framework. Give them a big concept and they have to speak with management, have to make a project out of it and will blow it due to budget limitations, time limitations and conflicts on priorities of other professions.
But if we manage to provide a list of baby-steps to improve us, i think that chances are much bigger. One fixed ability or new ability a publish, and if it's just something so simple as the grenades i suggested, and we're surely getting ahead.
(The grenades would be a copy-paste job, for example. Take the Glob-Grenade from commando, change the certification to some SL-skill, reduce damage to almost zero but bring the chance to blind and the durability up a lot... voilá, you have the flashbang. Even the schematic could stay completely the same, just with a new name, so little has to be done on the weaponsmith part.)
So, i'd rather stick with the approach of Short_Timer, keep the framework of the current SL, just suggest improvements and modifications to fix the profession.
_scout_
Thu Jun 16, 2005 3:45 am
#21
Sylow wrote:
And as a last comment, the whole thing is too big. You basically brought the concept for a complete revamp of the profession. Despite the problems i found, there are very good points in it, but it has one mayor issue: the devs won't give us a revamp, for a long time there was one promised to us, lately the revamp documents in the "in concept" forum disappeared, long-time plans of the Devs "lost" the SL-revamp part, etc... we're considered too unimportant to really do a big thing on our profession, so we probably will never get a revamp and for sure not within the next 18 months.Thus i have to say, we currently should work on short term goals, present the Devs easy to implement things, guide them to make our profession valuable by improving one thing after another while keeping the current framework. Give them a big concept and they have to speak with management, have to make a project out of it and will blow it due to budget limitations, time limitations and conflicts on priorities of other professions.But if we manage to provide a list of baby-steps to improve us, i think that chances are much bigger. One fixed ability or new ability a publish, and if it's just something so simple as the grenades i suggested, and we're surely getting ahead.(The grenades would be a copy-paste job, for example. Take the Glob-Grenade from commando, change the certification to some SL-skill, reduce damage to almost zero but bring the chance to blind and the durability up a lot... voilá, you have the flashbang. Even the schematic could stay completely the same, just with a new name, so little has to be done on the weaponsmith part.)So, i'd rather stick with the approach of Short_Timer, keep the framework of the current SL, just suggest improvements and modifications to fix the profession.
Thats why I stopped reading any concept papers on SL and why i dont read the GCW forum anymore. There are enough ideas already, there is just nobody there to read them.
Read the report of the FanFest. I dont want to quote that one again.
Babysteps:
Make the thinkgs the SL do more visible : BUFF Icons for passive buffs from the SL should be our first goal, nothing is more visible than that if a SL becomes groupleader.
Next: Increase the buff for rally and steadyaim, or slightly change it so it will make a difference even for high level players. The "soft-caps" are hurting us here - or decrease the SAC costs and reduced the timer.
A big step: make boostmorale similar to form up removing stats rather then redistributing wounds (nobody has wounds except pilots anyway).
Sylow
Thu Jun 16, 2005 3:57 am
#22
Babysteps:
Make the thinkgs the SL do more visible : BUFF Icons for passive buffs from the SL should be our first goal, nothing is more visible than that if a SL becomes groupleader.
Next: Increase the buff for rally and steadyaim, or slightly change it so it will make a difference even for high level players. The "soft-caps" are hurting us here - or decrease the SAC costs and reduced the timer.
Indeed, those things are good. Especially the Icons. Also we need the fix, that our modifiers actually appear on the character sheet, we already discussed that before.
A big step: make boostmorale similar to form up removing stats rather then redistributing wounds (nobody has wounds except pilots anyway).
Another formup? Sorry, that's worthless, i rarely use formup, no need for the rest... at least not until states get more common and more important again. (I'd rather suggest that formul also does knockdown recovery to upgrade it a bit. Removing blind and bleed via formup doesn't seem logical to me.)
My suggestion on boostmorale would be quite different, make it a small "adrenal boost" buff for the complete team, so the attack speed of everybody increases a little.
Page 2 of 2