@Siilk, that’s what I prefer as well so I’m not sure why did you addressed your opinion to me. Definitely don’t want to have PP copying (new) XCOM on this matter, that’s why I mentioned equpiment based skills: this is something (original) X-Com was built around and this is what I like more.
@Butcher, how it is easier than choosing your soldiers by equipment they are carrying? I.e., if you earlier in the game equipped soldier with minigun or grenade launcher you will immediately know he is strong, etc. So there will be no need to check all the stats of the soldiers before every next battle. You immediately will see he is a tank unit thanks to armor or weapons he is carrying, unless all soldiers will be automatically stripped off their current armors and weapons after mission (unlikely).
How about training skills being based off taking time rather than experience on the battlefield. So it takes so many days of training a soldier in a certain skill for them to gain it. But to stop someone training a soldier with every skill possible, have a skill number limit based off rank/willpower or something. So you can train a soldier to have a skillset that makes them really good (subjectively) at fighting a certain enemy or works well with some of your other soldiers. This would reduce the need for a specific class that is objectively good at one thing, and give more power and flexibility to the player. Also when soldiers have more battle experience, it can increase their willpower / skill number cap.
It could work. Training at the base + training in the battle. Soldiers could even enhance their basic stats while doing some things connected to them, so throwing accuracy could increase when soldiers throws things a lot, bravery - when soldier didn’t panic in recent missions, strength - when he likes to carry much, etc. It would be slow process and not so easy to predict, though. And through promotions or other means they could have more willpower, and so on.
making the whole experience very game-y. “No, your sniper has no idea how to operate an assault rifle even if his life depends on it. No, your ranger will not touch a shotty with a ten foot pole. Because classes
Snipers can use assault rifles. What are you basing this argument upon?
I don’t care much whether there are classes or not as long as the player is driven to care about their soldiers and they are not exchangeable pawns.
What I consider important for game immersion is that
soldiers must be unique skill-wise. If there are classes, then let some solders within class to be stronger, some faster, some with better aim, some just plain bad, some above average. etc. I don’t want to pick 2 units of assault and 1 unit of sniper to mission, but a cannon-foddery-tanky Frank, wimpy but promising sniper Yoshima, and fast support Bunny who tends to save the day for medical role. etc.
it must be extremely unlikely to get a perfect soldier - it cannot be purely player choice of which abilities to take or which skills to level up. If it is relatively simple to go for perfect min-maxed stats, then the player should suppress the role-play elements and by-gut-feeling without the nagging feeling of “playing badly”. Some randomness would force the player to step out of “best” combinations, try new things, value the good combos more and improve overall replayability.
So, in practices all this implies some randomness during soldier initial skill-roll and progression. Classes or not, it could be implemented well both ways.
Snipers in FiraXcom are limited to sniper rifles. This is clearly a balance choice and immersion breaking since they seemingly forget how to use an assault rifle when promoted from rookies snipers and, unlike other weapons that are more or less a straight upgrade from a rifle, sniper rifles come with significant restrictions.
LW alleviated this by offering the more versatile strike rifle to scouts and snipers, and a few very good XCOM 2 mods have opened all basic equipment/weapons to all classes (I don’t mind having specialized stuff like Gremlin drones and psi amps restricted to trained personel)
I like classes as long as they are done right … but I also like the classless system my only beef with the original X-com is that I had to mark my soldiers with an astrix after there name so I knew they had a high enough strength too handle the heavy weapons lols. it would of been cool to see each troopers stats along side the equip screen. I would love too see an updated version of that screen with rotating trooper model that updated every time you slapped a piece of equipment on.
I also loved loading out my troopers in the original X-com loading up each trooper with ammo and grenades… running out of ammo in a pitched fire fight made for intense situations. running away too a fallen comrade too Pick up his ammo made for a nail biting game . and to be honest when the new X-com came out I was very disappointed when they went with the unlimited ammo option.
The battle I remember the most from the original X-com was a Terror mission I had full skyranger of 24 troopers armed with assault rifles 2 auto gunners and one rocket launcher. and I was Fighting in a city filled with Sectoids and cyber disks… I formed an offensive line and moved my men forward too assault the enemy my troopers where making short work of the Sectoids . my troops entered buildings went through the alleys and streets . the fighting only got heavy when I ran into multiple cyber disks. I managed too take one down with my rocket launcher unit but he got cut down. my troops where being decimated, and my soldiers started too run out of ammo. so I started moving my troops in to a fighting retreat moving my troopers too gather ammo from fallen comrades. one trooper out of ammo threw his rifle at the enemy and I then moved him towards the rocket launcher . I threw smoke into the street and moved him to recover the rocket launcher, the enemy fired but missed he picked up the rocket launcher and the last rocket. I then moved him to safety behind a building where he reloaded the rocket launcher . the cyber disk came out on to the street in attempt too flank. my guy stepped out and he fires but the rocket misses and flies right into the gas station across the street. big explosion I hear the cry of a dead Sectoid; not what I wanted but good kill. The cyber disks eat a lot of lead and I lose more troopers I manage too take 3 of them down but with heavy losses… now things are looking dark. I have 1 cyber disk left and no heavy weapons left my 5 troopers that I have left barely have a clip between them. I resort to pick up weapons from my fallen comrades and throwing clips too the troopers that need them … and some how I reached in deep into the pit of Despair and pulled out a Victory! that was the most epic battle I have ever fought in X-com.
so I would like too see a option where you can play with limited ammo. where you have too buy ammo for your guns like the original or you can be sissy and play with unlimited ammo.
Ok so I just read the guide that comes with the Backer build. On classes, it says
There are three soldier classes in the game - heavy, sniper and assault. There will be many more, and many unique to different factions. A class represents a set of skills relating to a combat or support role, rather than a restrictive set of abilities. Soldiers will be able to adopt more than one class, unlocking new skill trees.
I rather liked the training centre system in XCOM2 War of the Chosen. It should have replaced the original class progression totally, IMO. I would use this system, with the major addition that a soldier can spend XP to adopt a new class (which would effectively add that classe’s tracks to the progression system).
Yes, War of the Chosen nicely expanded the overall idea of training and made it more flexible. The question is, would this system in PP allow for enhancing some stats as well? Or stats would progress automatically with soldier?
Some class tracks can allow perks which just increase basic stats - and then there would be a personal track unique to each character which would have stat increase perks and maybe others. This would be fairly randomised.
I am interested to know if you also like the random perk (or ability) pool from WotC. I personally is really fond of training roulette in XCOM and LW mod. Hopefully we will have some kind of random element other than stats on our troops to make each of them a little bit more unique.
I played WotC, but I don’t remember that I enjoyed any change in the skill acquisition mechanic introduced there in particular. They tried to mitigate the randomness, but it was nothing groundbreaking like second wave vs original progression.
