Squad Leader Archive
Thread: Command Ideas
Here are a few:
/coveringFire -- gives all Ranged players a concealment modifiers for 30-60 seconds and adds a damage modified to all Melee players for 30-60 seconds. I remembered this from all the World War 2 first-person shooters I play. In every one (Call of Duty, Medal of Honor, etc.) there was some sort of Leader telling guys to provide covering or supression fire to help groupmates achieve their goal. This command would benefit melee fighter buy allowing them to damage more and ranged players by keeping from being aggroed by surrounding targets.
/rallySetup and /rallyTo -- The "rally" command seems like a chaotic retreat. /rallySetup would work like /waypoint in that it creates a special marker that can be activated anytime by the /rallyTo command. When /rallyTo is actived the waypoint becomes visible to all group members as a location to head to.
/distributeSpoils -- This command allows one Scout to harvest meat, hide or bone and have the amount be even distributed amoung all Scouts. This would work nicely since each Scout can harvest different parts of the same corpse. It's a win-win situation.
Thoughts?
Here are some more ideas for squadleader commands. Replace the volley fire command with 9 seperate commands specific to one of the 9 military combat professions: Combat Medic, Commando, Rifleman, Carbineer, Pistoleer, Fencer, TKA, Pikeman, and Swordsman (Bounty Hunter and Smuggler are not military professions). Each ability would be tuned to complement the strengths or spirit of the profession it is intended for, and would only affect members of that profession (and only in your group, of course). This gives a squadleader with a balanced group a wide set of tools to use, while giving a squadleader with a group composed solely of one or two professions a higher proficiency at commanding those professions. Moreover, these abilities would be tuned to be mostly PvP oriented, though they would still have some PvE application.
Commando: Bombard. Causes all commandos in range of the squad leader's targetto launch a single wide radius area effect attackagainst that target using their currently equipped weapon. This command applies to any heavy weapon, including heavy support weapons. This would have a 2 minute reuse time due to its power, and would be in the upper tiers of squad leader. This counts as their combat action, resetting their attack delay, but does not change their current target.
Rifleman: Support fire. Causes any rifleman within 64m of the squad leader to fire at the squad leader's current target, as long as the squad leader's current target is ALSO within 64m of the squad leader. This means the rifleman can engage a target up to 128m away with this skill. Usable every 10 seconds, as it is a single target normal powered shot.
Carbineer: Cover Fire. Causes all carbineers within range of the squad leader's target to full auto the target's area. All enemies hit must pass a cover skill check (causing them to use the actual cover skill if they have it or dive to prone and take additional damage if they don't) or be knocked down regardless of immunity timers. This has a re-use of 30 seconds. The cover skill check is easy to pass IF you have the cover skill already, and is especially easy to pass for riflemen who have high skill in cover, but the end result is that unless you are missed you're either prone or on your back.
Pistoleer: Opportunity Shot. Causes all pistoleers within 20m of the squad leader's target to fire1 quick shot at that target without losing their current target or resetting their attack delay. Reuseable every 10 seconds
Swordsman: Frenzy. Causes the swordsman's next attack to apply to all targets within melee range. This means any special attack in the swordsman's repetoire (head hit, mind hit, 2h hit 3, etc) will be an area effect attack. Usable once per minute.
Fencer: Furious speed. The next attack hits twice without resetting the combat timer. Usable every 15 seconds.
TKA: Perfect Strike. The next attack is guaranteed to hit, hits for maximum damage, and ignores any immunity timers. Usable every 10 seconds.
Pikeman: Barricade. Immobilizes all pikemen within melee range of the squad leader, but doubles their defensive scores (including those provided by the squad leader group bonus) and turns on their collision detection against enemies. This allows them not only toblock player progress through them, but to blockline of sighton targets behind them just as a tree or rock would. Friendly line of sight, however, is unimpeded, allowing pikemen in the back ranks to attack targets who are attacking the front ranks, just as a formation of pikemen did in real life. This has a reuse time of 5 minutes, and can be turned off at any time by the pikeman or squad leader.
These are obviously more useful than the current volley, and lets squad leaders choose to specialize in leading specific types of units in PvP, or balance their groups. All are particularly powerful as well, thus making Squad leaders a both an asset and an important target.They also make squad leader worth spending 64 skill points for a combat-only profession that does not significantly increase the squad leader's own combat skills. When checking to see if you perform one of these actions when the squad leader initiates it, your skills are checked first, then your currently equipped weapon. Commandos wielding a heavy sword, for instance, will not Bombard when the squad leader asks them to, neither will players equipping a heavy weapon whodo nothave theNovice Commando skill.
As an aspiring pikeman (Holo made me do it), I think the blocking idea would be great. Get me a group of 5-10 pikeman and barricade the entrance to our base.
But I can sure imagine the nerf calls after this went in.. A guaranteed max-damage hit for TKA? Like they need any help
128m range for Riflemen?
I didn't forget about combat medic above... I just couldn't think of anything suitable. Whatever it does it should a) Not be rendered obsolete by having more than one combat medic, but instead increase in effectiveness, b) be something that directly affects the battle, but without completely deciding it with the push of a button, and c) not cost them an excessive amount of medicines (in fact, probably no more than one). Perhaps a timered ability that allows them to use any of their heals without incurring wounds or using medicine for the next 30 seconds or so, though they would still take the associated mind damage.
Also, in reference to the two listed. They're not as powerful as they sound. The rifleman ability may be usable from up to 128m from rifleman to target but it does have several drawbacks.
1. The rifleman cannot attack from 128m on his own. He can only do so when the order is issued by the squad leader, which can only happen once every 10 seconds, which is significantly slower than their already slow fire rate.
2. The rifleman's shot is a normal shot, not a head shot, sniper shot, or other special.
3. If all the riflemen are 64m behind the squad leader... who's protecting the squad leader? The squad leader still has to be within 64m of the support fire targets, which means he'll be taking fire, and the riflemen behind him can't fire from their current position if he gets incapped.
As for the TKA thing:
1. It's only one attack.
2. The "max damage" isn't any more than that player could normally hit for with that attack. It just ensures that he hits for as much as he possibly could under normal conditions.
3. It's every 15 seconds. It's not going to make them invincible.
Each of these is powerful, but they have drawbacks, and these drawbacks are nicely related to the way that the profession they effect is designed. Carbineerscommanded tocover fire will be pretty good at setting things up for melees to rush in, but causing their opponents to go prone or cover actually decreases their accuracy. Bombard is pretty powerful, but heavy weapons generally have long delays, and a commando may have more pressing threats. Since it counts as their combat move and resets their weapon delay, a commando may end up waiting a good 10 seconds before he can go back to shooting at whatever's killing him.
If you ask me, the overpowered ones would be Pistoleer, Swordsman, and Commando. They don't really look like it at first, but a squad leader with enough of any of those three could quickly take down an enemy force. The commando bombard command is powerful simply because already powerful single-shot weapons are allowed to make powerful area effect attacks that they normally could not do. In fact, it's designed as a direct counter to the pikeman barricade ability, since barricade works best with closely packed ranks of pikemen. The swordsman Frenzy ability is also very powerful, since every swordsman hits every target in melee range. This means that with enough swordsman, you could be hitting 10 or 20 people 10 or 20 times each. And the pistoleer ability is powerful mainly because it allows the squad leader to use the weapons of his pistoleers as if they were his own. Not only can the pistoleers go about their business killing whatever they feel needs to be killed, but the squad leader can do his own killing. Imagine a target getting shot by 19 pistol shots every 10 seconds.
So these abilities aren't designed to make one of a certain profession much better. They're really designed so that the more of one profession you have, the better a squad is at filling that specific role. Specialized squads made entirely of one type of unit will be extremely powerful at a specific task witha squad leader leading them, but at the same time, balanced squads made up of 3 or 4 professions with 3 or 4 members each will have a nice array of abilities to fit any situation.