I was thinking that since races such as the zolazin and the drannik can be unlocked through storylines, what if there was professions that could become available when completing a "certification" or something.

Although I couldn't think of what they would do, a few types came to mind: hunter, politician, techie, doctor, pirate, admiral, etc.

That makes sense. Some profesions could offer stuff similar to race bonuses. I like that idea, after all, that would make it several times more valuable to change your race/proffesion. Or using my idea for changing proffesion only.

I like the basic idea of having unlockable professions. Though I think we owe it to Dan to give professions all laid out for him to consider. Lets see who can expand this idea.

Hunter: The cream of the crop of this Galaxy's pilots, those that follow the Hunter path have a seemingly mystical ability to track enemies. Hunters gain +1 to NPC battle tab slots, and +5 to PVP battle tab slots.

Politician: Slick slimy lying bag of what? Politicians, known for their ability to exploit any crack in a populace for their own gain are able to help invasions by seeding doubt in advance of the attack. -20% Planetary defense when attacking any occupied planet.

Techie: With a knowledge of obscure hacks and modifications to todays technology, Techie's are able to get a bit more out of their equipment than others. +5% to all equipped modules. (too powerful?)

Doctor: We all know what doctors do. Immunity to Engineered Viruses, and Hull modules 10% more effective.

Pirate: Being a part of the Black Market does have its advantages along with its disadvantages. Tarriff on selling minerals removed for Pirates.

Admiral: With an impeccable grasp of large armada and formation tactics, Admirals are highly sought after when it comes to large scale battles. When guarding a planet, an Admiral grants a 10% bonus (on top of legion) to all ship bonuses to attack, defense, and cloak.
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That was a quick idea, what do yall think? It may not be balanced but its a start.

I like the Hunter as in bounty hunter and pirate options .

bounty hunter ,
to become one would have to complete a series of missions with a couple of rewards
mission 1 unlocks bounty hunter profession
mission 2 unlocks bounty tracker size 15 limit 1
mission 3 unlocks drone module size 25 limit 4

bounty tracker device allows player to open window to see posted bounty's
drone module space increased odds of ships with bounty appearing in battle tab by 20%
profession change to bounty hunter allows player to accept the bounty's posted on the tracker tab and ships with bounty's have icon showing possible reward .meaning go check for a contract on the tracker tab .
bounty's should not be a simple hunt down and disable/hack/raid it should be a # of completed disables set by the poster of the bounty so a single disable someone my post 10000k credits 5 disables 1 kurenite but to be fair the system should set a minimum price for each level with the player being able to set the payout higher depending on how badly he/she wants the job done .
should also be scaled so a player rank 250 can't take bounty's on someone rank 40 .

Pirate profession .
same a series of missions that unlock devices .
mission 1 unlocks pirate profession
mission 2 cargo scanner 10 space 15% increase to items raided limit 4
mission 3 disabler cannon 45 space reduces enemy ship defense by 40% limit 2 only equipable by pirate profession

piracy is illegal so say a person with pirate profession raids 10 ships succesfuly
system auto posts bounty for said pirate at 30% of value for raided items posted
on the bounty tracker .

just my idea feel free to flesh out or debate as you like

Or perhaps...

Researchers-Researchers well...do research, so this profesion reduces amount of research necessary to unlock modules by 5%.

Senator-Senator's have diplomatic immunity, so they have very good ways of avoiding attacks. This profesion gives a bonus to truce value.

Stellar Cartographer-This profesion gives access to large amounts of stellar data on various routes. It adds a 15% bonus to finding rarer NPC's.

Commodore-This profesion involves bossing people around, so this increases crew members by 2.

Dimensional Scientist-This profesion tells one how to make big stuff fit in small spaces...often by making your ship larger on the inside. Offers a 5% bonus to ship size, and a 2% bonus to cargo space.

Strategist-Self explanatory. Offers 5% bonus to NPC attack, and defense.

*Just a joke one* Time Traveler-You have traveled through time and space! You have seen the tech of the future, and the advanced lost tech of the past! After taking samples of both, your ship is epic. This profesion offers a 2% bonus to everything. Literally.

Thanks for the suggestions on professions!

Given that the game now has 3 unlockable races (Zolazin, Drannik, and Lazuli) with a 4th soon to come, it is clear that professions are lacking behind.

One of the main limitations on new races and professions is that all of their bonuses have been passive. For balance reasons, this limits how much power those passive bonuses can be.

However, we have been working on a system that allows 'activated abilities' to be used, which will be released when Genetarr are made available. This will allow more powerful bonuses, but can only be used a certain number of times per day, or limited to certain circumstances, like artifacts. Some may even require energy to use.

Thus, many more professions will be possible that can have a variety of utility functions, especially as a group. I wanted to mention this now to indicate that your ideas for professions can even be larger and more grandiose than before

Tinker: For 5 energy you can pick a stat to improve it by 10% for 30 minutes.

Ambusher- +5% attack and defense the first round of combat
Seeker- can pay energy to refresh enemy players in the battle tab
Saboteur- can pay energy to reduce enemy attack or defense by 5%

bounty hunter (again) 90% chance to avoid traps.

The way I understand it, there is a larger chance to spring a trap on a given attack if the opponent has less hull. That is probably totally made up though. With the amount of attacks it can take to disable someone, a high percentage isn't totally ridiculous when it would only be unlockable at some certain level. higher levels almost always have a ton of traps and take yet more attacks to take down. There is essentially no way to disable someone by yourself unless they are asleep. Fighting other players for anything even approaching an actual benefit for myself has been a joke.

Another area that might be fixed is that it is always inevitable that someone gets ram-jammed in their sleep if they are notified on almost anyone's comm, though I have no idea what profession might address that.The consequences aren't actually that bad, but I'm sure the people would like the option of not being totally helpless when they aren't online.

Fleet Admiral: A person with the command of an entire fleet. Requires the reaching of rank 250 and the completion of a mission that has to do with a visit to the homeworld to be promoted.
Passive abilities: +5% Invasion attack, +10% defense, +5% Attack
Activatable abilities: Fleet Barrage(or something like that): For 15 energy rolls 4 times at once. 30 minute recharge. You have to get lucky to get a large ammount of damage from this attack.

Another suggestion: Command points. Required to do special abilities like the fleet barrage above(Remove passive abilities if this is used). Replace the 15 energy with 15 command points. 1 more max would be gained every 5 ranks and you'd start with 20 max. Replenishes 1 every 3 minutes and with political favor you can buy modules to speed this up. If this is added add more abilities for fleet admirals. Only one ability can be used at once. After a ability like bombing run or fleet barrage is used prevent other abilities for 5 minutes.
Extend Sheilds: Provides 15% extra defense for 5 minutes for 15 command points.
Bombing run: Same as barrage except on planets and costs 20 command points
Focus Fire: Provides 15% extra attack for 5 minutes for 15 command points
Patrol: Activateable trap(Lasts 12 hours only. It is more for protecting yourself while asleep). When tripped provides 1000 attack and defense for 1 hour.
I was really tired when i typed this so I am sorry if there are typos or if the idea is overpowered.

I think there should be a profession that gives bonus XP on missions. At my level, hunting NPCs gives almost twice as much XP as doing missions and it gets better loot at the same time. Since this is probably by design, at least in part, the bonus shouldn't have to approach 100% as would seem reasonable. A 30-40% bonus on mission XP would still leave NPCs much more appealing for me personally. The 2.3x XP return on missions goes to 3.2x and NPCs would still be almost 4x with better loot anyways. I see it as a serious issue, considering how high the ratio can get with the sharable NPCs and the XP buffs along with the other buffs. At my level I could be done with all of the available missions but I have only completed less than half, and the second half takes probably 50 times as much energy so I have only really completed less than 10% of the investment. I only feel the need to do the missions that give something more than a tiny boost to a stat through something that takes decks anyways. Some of the NPC loot gives decks even. As a "power gamer" there is almost no other way to go about the game than NPC hunting.

A profession that does missions could be called anything really. "mercenary" seems the most fitting for some reason, but it could be some scientific or exploratory type of name considering how different all the missions are.