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

Open: final count and names. Start from a small roster with clear party niches so recruitment talk (chat or any future tool) and encounter design stay legible; grow over content seasons.

Starter archetypes to cover (working labels, not final):

Niche	Job in a fight
Mitigation / control	Hold space, reduce harm to the group
Healing / cleansing	Recover HP, strip bad states
Damage (single / cleave)	Primary threat removal
Utility / debuff	Weaken targets, enable others

Cyberpunk paint (netrunner overlay, street sam, corp tech, etc.) layers on these mechanical niches—open which niches map to launch gigs.

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 + sub balance, brackets, templates—open.
• 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.

Open — product / client:

• Recruitment channel: chat-only vs built-in LFG/matchmaking vs hybrid; scope for launch vs later.

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

Open: whether all gigs are PvP-viable on launch, templates (PvP loadout subset), or security-band restrictions (overview risk stubs). Sub-gig rules may differ by mode.

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 size & names	Small launch set; clear niches	Open
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	Chat-only vs LFG/matchmaking vs hybrid; launch scope	Open
LFG tool (if shipped)	Niche listings; gig + loadout eligibility per archetype; multi-select among qualified niches (player choice)	Agreed (conditional)
PvP gig rules	—	Open

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.