neon-sprawl/docs/game-design/gigs.md

Gigs (combat roles)

Vision-level design for combat identity: what you bring to a fight, how you progress, and how you swap roles. Vocabulary (gig, sub-gig) and the gigs ↔ skills seams (gear, crafting, consumables, rep) stay in skills.md; this doc is the gig artifact proper.

Implementation anchors: Epic 5 — PvE combat; gig XP/progression will need alignment with Epic 2 — Classless progression when data models split.

What a gig is

A gig is the combat role on an outing: which abilities you run, how the party reads you (tank, support, control, damage, etc.), and tuning expectations. It is not a non-combat profession—skills cover gather/craft (skills.md).

Fiction may say contract, loadout, or job; specs use gig.

Gig roster

First draft (v0): nine gigs—three in damage, two each in tank, heal, and util. Names and identities are placeholders until abilities and fiction pass over them.

Archetype	Gig (working name)	Draft identity (distinction within archetype)
Damage	Breach	Focused spike: burst windows, priority-target removal—“delete one problem now” (typically short-to-mid range in kit design).
Damage	Suppressor	AoE / cleave pressure: sustained stagger, packs and lanes—keeps many threats busy in close or mid space.
Damage	Reach	Ranged damage: best at distance, spacing and line-of-sight play, punishes spread or exposed targets—fills the “back line DPS” read without implying a specific weapon yet.
Tank	Bulwark	Anchor tank: stand ground, hard mitigation, bodyguard space for the group.
Tank	Skirmisher	Mobile tank: pick up strays, reposition fights, mitigation through movement and timing.
Heal	Sawbones	Direct recovery: triage spikes, raw throughput, “fix the bar now.”
Heal	Synthesist	Preventive / layered: shields, HoTs, slow cleanses—flatten damage before it spikes.
Util	Interceptor	Shutdown: debuffs, interrupts, strip or punish enemy plans—offensive support.
Util	Conductor	Enable: group buffs, resource or tempo hooks, “make the party’s next play bigger.”

LFG / niches: the four archetypes map cleanly to “need damage / tank / heal / util.” A conditional LFG tool (Party, encounters, and recruitment) can treat archetype as the coarse tag and gig (or loadout) as the fine print—open.

Still open: final display names, which weapon or gear families attach to which gig (especially Reach vs Breach / Suppressor), sub-gig pairings that feel bad, and further roster growth after launch. Cyberpunk skin (corp vs street, chrome metaphors) layers on after kits exist.

Main gig + sub-gig

Agreed: every loadout has a main gig and a sub-gig (FFXI-style). The sub adds limited cross-gig abilities without second-main power—a large creative space as the roster grows (skills.md hybrid rationale).

• Effective sub level: at main per-gig level X, sub contributes abilities up to ⌊X / 2⌋, capped by the sub-gig’s own stored level (see XP below)—exact min / rounding TBD.
• Hub-only changes to main or sub (Hub swap).

Still open:

• Combat gear: almost certainly main-gig–restricted for equip; sub feeds abilities only—confirm in content pass.
• Consumables (passive amp): Agreed — sub-gig counts. Passive gig-tagged bonuses (e.g. extra healing from a med item when you’re a medic-type gig) apply if either main or sub matches the item’s gig hook. Open: if both match, stack vs. single best vs. main wins—pick at balance pass.
• PvP: gig rules blocked until we know if and how much PvP the game includes—see PvE vs PvP.
• UI: two gig strips, sub ability styling, loadout summary for party—open.

Progression

Agreed: per-gig level/XP (and later mastery/perks on that gig). No shared combat rank that levels every gig at once. Maining every gig on one character is allowed; slow leveling makes that a long-term goal (skills.md seams).

Agreed — gig XP award timing: only the main gig earns gig XP from combat (and any other gig-level awards). The sub-gig earns no XP toward its own progression while equipped as sub—it only reads its stored level for ability unlocks. To level a gig you ran as sub, swap it to main at a hub and play with it primary. UI should make clear that gig XP (bars, flytext) applies to main only.

Open:

• Curves: same philosophy as skills (soft feel, more XP per level)—per-gig tables vs global template TBD.
• Mastery/perks on gigs vs flat level gates—open (E2.M3-style expression).

Hub swap

Agreed: no on-the-fly swap. Changing main gig, sub-gig, or both only at a safe hub—city, home base, or other data-tagged swap site. Not in the field, not mid-combat.

Open:

• Which locations qualify (faction terminals, apartments, guild halls, etc.).
• Fees, rep gates, cooldowns, tutorial exceptions.
• Loadout UX after swap: auto-unequip invalid combat gear vs player-managed presets per gig pair.
• Party: what happens if someone swaps while grouped—open (session lock vs free swap at hub).

Party, encounters, and recruitment

Earlier drafts implied a dedicated LFG UI (tags, filters). That is not decided. Players might use chat only (zone, guild, party ads), a future matchmaking tool, or a hybrid (e.g. hub board + chat).

Design intent (UI-agnostic): gigs still give shared vocabulary—“need mitigation,” “need cleanse,” “LF damage”—whether typed in chat or, later, picked from a structured browser. Encounter and scaling design can reason about niches without assuming any specific recruitment feature ships.

Recruitment channel — deferred: whether we ship chat-only, a built-in LFG/matchmaking tool, or a hybrid is not something to lock now. Revisit once social, zone, and session vision are further along; the conditional LFG design below stays ready if we build a tool.

If we ship an LFG-style tool (common in modern MMOs)—agreed direction, conditional on building it:

• Listings and search are niche / archetype oriented (mitigation, heal, damage, control, etc.)—not raw gig names as the primary filter.
• Eligibility: the game (or data rules) decides whether your current gig + loadout (main/sub, gear, etc.—exact inputs TBD) qualifies you to advertise under each niche. If you qualify for several, you may select multiple niches for your listing—player discretion among what you’re allowed, not forced single pick.
• Open: eligibility tables per gig/loadout template, caps on how many niches one listing shows, how sub-gig factors in, and UX copy.

Open — rules / content (independent of LFG UI):

• Mandatory niches in instanced content vs open-world flex.
• Group scaling (E5.M4) vs gig composition—pass with encounters.

PvE vs PvP

PvP scope is undecided—how much player-vs-player content (if any) ships, and in what form, is still unsettled. Until that vision exists, gig-specific PvP rules (viability per gig, sub-gig in PvP, brackets, templates, security-band hooks—overview risk stubs) stay open with no deadline, not a near-term design task.

PvE gig design proceeds without assuming a particular PvP answer.

Story

Gig-scoped storylines and main-quest-style arcs live per gig on one character; faction rep stays character-wide (skills.md seams). Open: how much mandatory gig story vs optional.

Gear & consumables (summary)

• Combat gear: gig-restricted equip; after hub swap, player fixes loadout for new main gig.
• Crafting combat gear: no gig requirement—skills only; can craft for trade.
• Consumables: anyone can use; passive amp checks main or sub (see Main gig + sub-gig).

Detail: seams table in skills.md.

Decisions log (gig-focused)

Topic	Direction	Status
Sub-gig slot	FFXI-style; ~½ main effective cap; hub change	Agreed (skills.md)
Hub swap	Safe hubs only; not in field / combat	Agreed
Combat progression	Per-gig tracks	Agreed
Gig roster	9 gigs—3 damage (Breach, Suppressor, Reach), 2 each tank / heal / util; working names in roster table	Draft
Gig XP award timing	Main gig only; sub-gig earns no XP (level that gig as main to progress it)	Agreed
Sub-gig + consumable amp (passive)	Sub counts; main or sub can trigger passive amp	Agreed
Recruitment channel	Deferred—revisit with broader game/social vision; options remain chat / tool / hybrid	Deferred
LFG tool (if shipped)	Niche listings; gig + loadout eligibility per archetype; multi-select among qualified niches (player choice)	Agreed (conditional)
PvP gig rules	Blocked on overall PvP vision—open indefinitely until product direction on PvP is clear	Open (indefinite)

Next artifacts

• Abilities — gig-locked kits, sub-gig ability rules, telegraphs (Epic 5).
• Combat pillars — PvE readability, TTK, risk (overview).
• Items — equip tags per gig; crafted vs dropped.