Squad Leader Archive

I think the other thread that lists the issues can address this sort of thing well, and should be pointed to as the source of all issues, however, for the purposes of narrowing it down to the five top ones, I feel the community very much believes these are the top 5, based on whats been said for the last few months.

I feel these are class-breaking, and something that serious impedes our ability to play Squad Leader.

1. Squad Leader XP (http://forums.station.sony.com/swg/board/message?board.id=squad_leader&message.id=974)


2. Empty Novice Skill Box: Add Group Melee Defense, or Group Terrain Negotiation, or /formup or /steady aim here.


3. Rally prevents any non-combat activities (crafting, harvesting, sitting, dancing)


4. Specials fail too often


5. The /group notify, autoloot, autoharvest functions do not work

Also, while some of these things take time to fix, there are a number of quick fixes that could help a lot in the meantime, see (http://forums.station.sony.com/swg/board/message?board.id=squad_leader&message.id=758)of course, for the full list.

ok simple and sweet.

1. Exp should be based on the groups total damg done

2. better passive skills in the tree as a whole

3. more skills

4. fix group functions

5. the mind pool drain and success rate of specials skills

by the Capt your doing a Good job.

1) reduce mind points costs or remove them all together from skills like volleyfire (leader points grunts everyone should target that creature)

2) remove failure. this is an ELITE proffession much training and practice has be put into achieving this failure is not excusable.

3) make the skills work! right now none of the skills do anything.

4) add more passive skills. the movement ones are nice but there should be more for melee and ranged defense.

5) change the way exp is earned. i can get 12k SL exp per kill in a full group because i do 75% of the dmg to every creature. whereas SL with worse weapons get next to no exp. that doesn't make them any better or worse than i and vise versa so why do they get punished?

I use squad leader to lead hunting parties, mainly. Here are my concerns.

We get7 abilities. These are Rally, Steady Aim, Form Up, Volley Fire, Retreat, System Message, and Boost Morale.

Rally: Claims to provide, according to the skill tree, a "to-hit" and "defensive" bonus. Using the skill and examining the effect, however, claims only a "to-hit" bonus. This bonus is significant, but not make-or-break. It fails VERY often. It should be cancellable for crafters/medics/campers in the group.

Steady Aim:Seems to have no effect. Doesn't even enter combat queue like a normal ability. Waste of a HAM meter, as it stands.

Form Up: Does what it says, but doesn't seem all that useful (i.e., if you have time to do a form up to cure dizzy, the battle's probably going your way already).

Volley Fire: All it does is cause everyone to /assist the group leader, from what I can tell.

Retreat: Makes everyone burst-run. Basically kills the squad leader in HAM costs.

System Message: Makes a message stand out a little more. /shrug

Boost Morale: Awesome.

Here's the problem. Volley Fire, Retreat, System Message, and Steady Aim are 100% useless if you can organize the group successfully. Every single ability can be replicated through coordination/leadership. Rally is nice, but flawed. Boost Morale is nice. Essentially, you have an elite profession that gets Rally/Boost Morale. Not worth the skill points, as it stands. The entire mobility tree is a waste, as all it does is shave a few minutes off your trip.

That's problem #1.

Given that I regularly lead large hunting parties, Getting Squad Leader XP hasn't been a noticeable issue for me. I won't comment on it.

Problem #2 is the total FUBAR of the group commands. I've seen a "tip" that says the group leaders are supposed to be able to see all the mission waypoints of their group members. (On the loading screen). The only thing you can do at the moment as a squad leader, given your lack of special abilities and bonuses, is act as the organizer. Your credibility, therefore, is shot to hell if you are unable to do something as basic as enforce a looting order, due to the fact that the harvest/loot notifys DON'T WORK. I need those. Yesterday.

Problem #3 is the inability of a Squad Leader to provide any information other than thru the acquisition of carpal tunnel syndrome. I would kill for a shortcut for "current coordinates". I would love the ability to be able to designate my target without having to either say, "Ok boys, we're attacking %TT, the one second from the left... Wait, he moved." Volley Fire accomplishes this, at the price of your entire HAM bar, factoring in failures.

Problem #4 is the lack of real, significant, passive bonuses. Strategy II is GARBAGE. A bonus to steady aim? Wasted, totally. Realistically, all you get in terms of passive bonuses (I don't count the bonus to rally, a passive bonus to an active ability is NOT a passive bonus) is +10 to melee and ranged defense. Wow. That's not a lot. Really.

Problem #5 is more a pet peeve. I don't think that grouping with a pet/faction pet/probot should give you Squad Leader XP. I'm on Bria (HellFire Mistrider) and have seen some people powergame to master squad leader on Dantooine in two days with a probot and a rancor. Some leadership ability.

I am only just starting on this path, however i do have one thing i'd like to give input on:

Allow Novice Squad Leader a second skill that takes effect when he/she becomes group leader...

Split XP
This should allow Squad Leaders to be more sought after. Meaning people will want them to lead the groups to allow for this new XP splitting.
Personally i think it would really be a great idea, not only because i am a Novice Squad leader myself, but it's tough enough on Squaddies to get the non SQL to let you take Leadership, so you can advance in your skills, as it is. This would encourage people to ensure Squad Leaders ran the show. After all, that's what they're there for isn't it? Grouping up and organising hunts, since their name implies that they're the ones in charge.


This would allow xp to be split evenly among the group, so everyone always gets a share of the spoils. As it stands right now, those tactical groups whom employ a TKA to do knockdowns and other attacks that slow the enemy down, are being shafted, since those TKA's, etc aren't doing any damage, they're just holding the creature at bay and preventing it from attacking. So once it's dead, they get no xp for it, which is unfair.
The above skill would alleviate this issue and encourage more diverse groups of players to come together for tactical play over tank play.

Stay on target!

Five issues, no more. Briefest explanations possible please

Just the one real concern for now, same as everyone else. The Squad Leader skill tree is far too empty. Not enough stuff that makes a noticeable difference (and it being noticed is important because you're leading a group and they need to see that you leading them is a very good thing), and the abilities are almost all useless. So yeah, we need our abilities improved and fixed, we need more abilities, and we need more passive bonuses.

Guys like Volt said, keep the 5 things in-line. Just 5 brief statements and elaboration is welcome on the forums. I need something simple to work from for tommorow when I look at this to compile an official list.

No one ever spells my name right

1) Special abilities don't feel like they have a decisive effect. In fact I can't even tell if it is having ANY effect at all. In contrast some of my pistoleer special abilities are very powerful. I'd like myself and the group to KNOW they are benefitting from having an SL. Not just ASSUME they are benefitting because they see new little icons. Given the ones I've tried and what I hear about the upcoming ones, it just doesn't seem like I have anything to look forward too.

2) Novice SL skill box is too worthless.

3) Special abilities fail too often. For how weak they appear to be (see #1) this doesn't seem right.

4) SL xp should be based on total group dmg.

1) Squad Leader Exp system seems to need an overhaul at the very least to include exp for non-damaging specials as well (this may be fixed ref the in development page).

2) Not enough abilities, bonuses, etc.

3) Abilities not broad enough. Would like to see SL giving improvements to faction challenges (either through point bonus, bonus to hit other faction), non combat bonus (like regen, camp healing, etc), and other such broader appeal abilities.

4) Failure rate WAY too high and cost much too high as well.

5) The only profession that can earn NO money on it's own. This could be fixed by abilities to increase group payout on group missions, perhaps more credit loot return, or so forth.

1) Squad Leader skills cost a lot of action and mind to perform, and couple this with the fact that they fail often is a very bad combination. With the current SL experience system many SL's (including myself) only use our skills in rare encounters.

2) Squad Leader benefits are relatively minimal, the argument still stands that a group with a SL is not significantly better than one without. By adding more bonuses, specifically combat ones, would help solve this problem. Perhaps by adding a SL with sufficient skill, the squad's maximum number could be increased from 20 to 25. Or when you hit Master SL you are able to command more than one Squad, ala become a Platoon leader with Squad leaders under your command.

3) Create an incentive for players to group, and a larger incentive to participate in large groups. A higher experience bonus could be enough to create such incentives.

4) Although many people may disagree, I have now come to the decision that a Novice SL only having /sysgroup is NOT a bad thing. This requires the player playing the SL to rely on his leadership abilities to further their career as a SL; and weeds out the ones not suited for such a position. I am saying that the fact that the novice SL starts off with basically nothing isnot an issue, while many others are saying it is. So, in a sense, I am making an issue that it isn't an issue.

5) Squad Leaders who are NOT grouped with other players SHOULD NOT GET SL EXPERIENCE. Squad Leaders should NEVER have the option to solo in order to gain SL experience; thus a squad consisting of pets and only the leader shouldNOT constitute as a squad.

1) skill failure rate


2) skill "lockout" (rally preventing harvest, sitting, meditation, crafting)


3) mobility line (most folks have exploration, what does a faster prone speed help us, really?) I'd like to see a regular terrain speed boost or something of the like.


4) boost moral, it should rebalance damage throughout the party, not wounds.


5) fleshing out of the skill boxes, we basically get 1 new thing/bonus per box for the amount of time and xp we put into em, we should be getting a little bit more back.