Originally Posted by
Siorai2
I think the 'concept' is actually genius. It's a fairly brave design decision to say 'let's break the mould here and make this prof act in a different manner'. Now, in terms of balance I'll leave those better educated and more experienced, but I don't think we should be burning development teams for trying to think in a non-linear manner.
It would be easy to suggest other profs should follow suit, docs using first aid and treatment, fixers using Breaking and Entry to hack those ncu's, Enfo's using Body Dev for Mongo? you really could go to town. The problem becomes IP sinks. Nano's give 6 different bars for us to balance our IP around, and in some cases that leads to some decision making. Most profs have maybe 1 or 2 skills that you could say 'define' them in some way or another, which simply isn't enough of an IP choice to replace 6 nano skills with. The Engi tradeskill decision seems to just 'fit' because there are a comparable number of skills for investment which means it can almost be shoe'd in.
Maybe the concept at heart is broader and only Engi has the right synergy right now?
I think it's actually a brave and interesting direction. But yes, I do of course agree that it shouldn't be undertaken if it seriously undermined the profession. Lamentably I don't know enough about Engy to comment on that particular point. I used to have Muhandes sat on my shoulder and since his departure I've become slack jawed where Engy is concerned :)