oy ya gitz!

i was thinking about what could be an interesting mechanic for the ork commanders.

greenskins are known for leading massive charges against their opponents.
however, in order to be a cohesive force, they require a strong leadership (which means, the boys need someone who can kick them in the butt harder than those that are fisting their faces).

so, here's what i thought: as long as a nob commander is alive, his squad will receive some buffs separeted from the WAAAGH effect.
once a squad's commander is killed, if there is an other squad's leader close, the leaderless squad will just loose their squad buff.
if there isn't any nob alive around, instead, the boys will panic, which means they will suffer for X seconds some debuff which will make them more vulnerable (constant suppression effect, reduced rate of fire, decreased melee damage, stuff like that).

this would require players to support at least one nob leader to keep the horde pushing effectively, otherwise they will have to reorganise and retreat until the debuff effects end or an other nob appears.
this would make the orks closer to lore, plus giving a unique aspect to this faction.

so, what's your opinion?

*NOTE: i'm supposing that nobs won't be only elite or hero units, but squad/ stryke force commanders will also have access to special nob classes.

The penalty for losing a nob should be that you lost a nob. I'm not keen on the idea that everybody's performance is dependent on one guy who you have to keep alive. Most of these types of mechanics are cool and sound like a lot of fun, but too bloodly restricting and complicated for a FPS action game.

in the end it all depends on aurea buffs. i don't think it would be that difficult to program.

you can gain a buff by sticking with a nob who's leading a mob, but then you have to pay for some drawback.
you want to play solo? then no penalties for nobs who are killed, but also no buffs for not supporting them.

it's not a way to penalise lone wolves, imo. it would be something that would make boys coordinate with their leader, when they want to play as a cohesive force.

It'd be interesting for premade groups, I'll give you that, but I don't see it working out well for casual play. Sort of like how they're testing if Flamer boys will be walking explosives that kill their friends as well, it runs the risk of putting too much "winning power" on one player (if you kill that one guy you've diminished the enemy's power by a weirdly high amount). It could work, I just think its too much to manage in what seems to be a very minimalistic approach to the MMOFPS. (if they seem to change that approach as the game develops, then this idea would be more appealing to me). (it also seems like buffing would in theory be the painboyz department, but that has yet to be seen as well)

I think that nobz should be used only to enhance Boyz and buff them or be able to take useful or enhanced weapons (ie power klaw). If the nob dies, well you lose those abilities and buffs in the squad and will be a waste of resources. Maybe if a warboss is in play he can buff many units and when he dies he has a bit of an effect on the Boyz'so performance for a few seconds. Other than that I think that there will be no killing the warboss and having the whole attack be spoiled.

I don't know, it seems that the punishment would be that the buffs the Nob had provided are lost, so therefore they are already being punished. I suppose that however the WAAGH effect plays out it would make that losing nobs impacts that, causing it to go down, but I don't think something like an AoE suppression would be a terribly good idea as that sounds like it could be a groan inducing feature.

Plus the boyz are pretty reckless creatures, the Horde may fall apart if da Big Boss dies, but if a simple Nob eats it, then they just look to the next biggest, toughest Ork to be da boss. You know, if they even notice until after the fights over.

Well, we should also remember that the devs want to create an asymmmetrical balance for this game.
This feature imo would be well suited for orks, as they rely heavely on high risk-reward actions to succed in their battles.
However, it's not like you should be penalised for every nob that is killed. The debuff should happen when your squad leader is killed and there are no other nob leaders around to temporary 'supervise" your team.

The drawback could be balanced by greater buffs or providing abilities unique to the orks.
In the end, we still not have any idea about what this buffs will actually provide.
They could also be something related to requisition income or abilities cooldown.

Moar ova, DIZ FREAD BELONGZ TO DA ORKZ! WE DONUT KARE FER DA UWWA GITZ ERE!!!