Squad Leader Archive

Hi everyone,
Seems everyone, including myself, is really into the whole faction perk / faction power / faction pet ideas, and I'd like to see some elaboration on it for a detailed composite for the next submission. Or if you think Squad Leaders and faction should have no colaboration, let us know about that also! Happy discussions!

Perks - Specialized Training

Someone with full access to all the benefits of a Galactic Empire (and to the resources of the government that Empire unseated) is also going to have access to specialized training. Perhaps an extra skill box on each tree; Empire Officer Training, Rebel Officer Training. Gives a passive bonus and an extra command that is unique to that faction. Also, raising your rank in either faction should give passive bonueses to Squad Leader skill mods.

Powers - Undecided

Ithink of perks and powers as the same thing. If you want special powers, the only thing I can recommend is being able to recruit faction NPCs if your rankis higher than thiers, but only for a short time, andtheycant use any meansof fast travel, like shuttle or starship. It would be triple useful if I could run around Bestine dragging Stormtroopersbehind me to fend off a rebel invasion.

Pets -Permadeath

Permadeath onALL faction pets. Period. I don't want to see anyone whip out 3 AT-ATs, get beaten back after an hour, then come back 5 minutes later with the same AT-ATs. Squad Leaders should have a higer limit on how many faction pets they can have at one time. Squad Leader bonuses should affect pets.

Uhm...this isnt really a suggestion, but, can stormtroopers use the specials that the squadleader has, like volleyfire? Could your stormtroopers volleyfire?

Okay and if not, than I would suggest faction pets be able to do stuff that a real person would be able to under the squad leader, so they could solo.

No faction perks should be designed for just squad leaders.

Perhaps designing faction perks which enables the overt GROUP leader some benefits, for example attaining rank could give you the oppurtunity to expand the size of the group (however these group expansion giving ranks would be far down along the line, with several thousands of faction points before earning the next rank that adds more group slots; and there would be a reasonable maximum number of people you can have, also requiring proper ranking subordinates for the larger squad to function). Perhaps even being able to command platoons (which are more than one squad for you non military buffs, thus a platoon leader would be able to command two or more squads) at the higher tier ranks. As someone stated earlier, this could be given in the form of "training", thus not only would you had to have spent faction points earning the rank, but even further points to get trained at the NCO/Officer ranks.

However, the above would only be possible if the entire group was overt, with the commanding officers (I say officers because it would take more than just a Colonel for the platoon system to work, he'd have to have subordinates under him with the proper rank) leading them.

Even being able to give positions such as "team leaders (multiple teams would make up the squad)", which would be nothing more than just organizing the group. It would give the members under a specific team leader the color or letter associated with their team, to showcase the division. These team leading perks should be given at NCO ranks, thus giving Sergeants and other "low-costing" ranks some leadership potential. A "team" chat would have to be in order, so that the team could communicate within itself and not clutter the group chat (however they could still respond to the group chat by using the group chat command or tab). Also, those in a team would have their name in that color (or if they are designated by letters, the letter would be next to their name), with a special icon given to team/group leaders so that you can easily see what they are saying in the chat; and enable information to be relayed and acted out quickly.

Squad leader bonuses could still apply to the whole group if he is the group leader, despite having a low rank (or even lower rank than those serving under him). Reason being is perhaps the SL is a remarkable or zealous leader and that is why he is in charge of the group other than the superior ranking officers, or this is part of the SL's training. However, it would be encouraged for squad leaders to advance in rank to give further bonuses to their squads, and to participate in the platoon system (you could even expand this toa company system given the proper rank, training and subordinates).

These features would enable GREAT tactical flexibility! Although the battlefields in their current state would have to be expanded to allow more players to fight so that the above perks could be used in the fullest potential, it would allow players to participate large scale, organized warfare.

All of these additions would create a sense of actual orgnization within the Rebel Alliance and the Empire, and rank would actually posses some leadership value.

I think the only faction perk that Squad Leaders should receive is a reduced cost to purschase faction pets. This ties into the idea the SLs should have improved access to NPC pets in general.A faction-wide messaging channel may also be interesting, but I can foresee that being easily abused by spammers, and we all hate spammers.

A discount would be really nice, but I think we would need even more than that to differentiate ourselves from the Smuggler.

I'd like to see some SL only equipment. Like, if you're empire, and have the storm trooper armor, you'll get that orange shoulder-pad thingy.. and do something similar for the rebels.

I think all Squad Leader skills should work with faction pets (and SL's get xp when they're in the group, just like droids or creatures) if the situation presents itself. Possibly a squad leader, since they're a leader, can have 1 more faction pet out than the rest (would that be 4 instead of 3?)

And, going back tot he SL mission terminal idea from before... maybe SL only missions given by a recruiter, that are designed for a large group to do (like a huge rebel/imperial outpost) that might have multiple goals to finish to complete the mission... For instance, plant a bomb at a shield generator, kill gate guards that are up in a tower, blow open the front gates, run upstairs and assassinate the leader who's as tough as a kimo .. something like that

As a devout neutral SL, I'd like to make sure that adding perks either applies to neuts just as well as others.

--Ze'ev

Development Cycles will preclude any major changes to our class. Whilst I think the faction perk system is a good idea, there are a few compelling show stoppers in this idea.

1. Creating a new skill set will require an extreme amount of coding efforts by the development staff, a QA effort, and a balacing effort by the design / continuity team.

2. Modifying an existing skill tree will require about the same effort level as the first problem.

3. Adding factional only perks will cause every single neutral and PvE only Squad Leader to spontaneously have kittens. So far nothing in this game forces you to involve yourself in the Galactic Civil War, and nothing forces you into PvP. Making perks factional only will invalidate seemingly one third of the squad leaders that play this game (Ok, I realize a majority of the player base will in fact choose a side, but on paper it should be an even division).

All that being said, I am an avid PvP and PvE Squad Leader. I originally took this profession because I did see us as the premire grouping class, and an invaluable asset on the PvP battlefield. I was sadly mistaken. I would like to see us improved so that when people see "<Insert Squad Leader Title Here>" it inspires an "oooh" or "ahhhh" not "sorry you wasted all those skill points man".

If the developers do see fit to grant us code time, the factional perks I'd like to see would be parallel almost the smuggler Underworld line. You are granted discounts on factional costs twice, but instead of giving less factional points on being killed, I would think squad leaders are worth more factional (and lose more factional) points. I would embedd this in an exsiting skill tree so that neutrals are not excluded from an entire line. However, if given a choice between fixing our existing abilities and passive modifiers or getting new factional perks, I'd stick with fixing what we have now.

Xarche

Squad Leader and Professional Imperial Good Guy.

I think the SL should get faction bonuses. I'm die hard imperial, and I'm seriously debating on taking up the smuggler class just so I can get more out of my faction points for my groups. At anyrate, here's what I think.

Pets: SLs should as suggested many a time, get a reduced cost for faction pets or an extra faction pet etc. What also would be interesting is if they could get their own uniqe faction pet. Sort of like how the bounty hunter gets a tracking droid for missions, the Squad Leader can purchase a pet for faction members. Perahaps something like a secretary or something. Someone who helps the squad leader maintain order in the group or reduces the cost of the pool drain by acting as the middle man so to speak like in the military. The squad leader issues the orders to him, then he gives the orders to the troops. Just a thought.

Perks: Reduced cost for fanction installations and/or pets. At the moment, there seems to be no valuable purpose to the faction installaions. You can only place them in certain areasa, and they cost so many faction points that most people don't even give them a second look. Perhaps something to where the squad leaders can set up and direct battles with opposing factions from a Headquarters structure, or something to issue faction orders(which is another one of those ignored by the devs it seems issues).

These seem more like ideas for factions than for the SL particuarliy. However, I feel you could successfully get more use out of things like the installations and such.

The fear of running off every neutral person from the squad leader profession if we start throwing in faction perks is certiainly a legitimate one.

Maybe we should get our own special line of troopers? Something completely unique to us, and we get up to 4 of them (you wouldnt be able to add in a droid and 3 faction pets though). It would function sort of like the creature handler, only minimized to one skill line of the profession.

Maybe they could be "craftable" where you access a squad leader terminal, you get a bunch options like weaponry, class, armor, etc. and you "assemble" your troopers. I think that would be a lot of fun...

I'm working on Squad Leader and am a new Rebel, so if it comes down to it, you can take this with a grain of salt. But, in responce to the talk about Neut chars. getting benefits as much as Faction chars., I think that's a little odd. From what I understand, being factional (especially overt) puts a character in a LOT mroe danger than they would be otherwise and limits their access to otherwise public places. I could be wrong about that and have yet to really get around much, but that's my understanding as of now. It feels like being Neutral has its own benefit of neutrality, whereas the factions get more extreme benefits coupled with extreme faults.

Just my take on the situation. Also, as someone working on SL, I agree it would be nice if some of the abilities, especially passive ones, were a little stronger. I'm still going to take the class, as it sounds like a blast to mess with the relatively different abilities, but a bit underbalanced. Perks could wait a bit, in my opinion.