Theoretically, when a trooper is placed in Drill they are classified as a regular stormtrooper, with VERY basic skills. Once they get out of Drill, they're placed in a squad. At this time, troopers are expected to contact their Specialty Coordinator for help on selecting a Specialty, or obtaining a Specialty Sheet/Roster if they already have one selected.
In order to properly fulfill your role as a stormtrooper, you need to choose an area of specialization. This allows you to interact with your squad and assist and support as best as you can. If your interests lie in saving lives, become a combat medic. Want to become a slicer? Start out as a communications tech and move up to the slicer advanced level. Want to lay waste to New Republic forces? Become a heavy weapons specialist. The trooper specialization program is a way of not only adapting the new troopers to the writing style of the Vast Empire, but it allows all troopers to develop good, solid characters. Specialties provide an opprutunity to establish your character with chances to do some character building that would otherwise not be allowed in the normal squad Run-ons due to focus on the mission.
On the specialty roster (
on the wiki) you'll note there are now specialty levels to be gained. There are a different number of levels for each specialty, but they all work the same. When you enter whatever specialty field, you start off with basic skills. This means you can do stuff, but you're not all that great at doing it. As you go through, you'll gain proficiency in your skills, and as indicated on the sheet: gain specific skills. Some skills can also be upgraded to another skill once you reach the proper levels.
NOTE: Regaurdless of specialty, you all will be required to handle a blaster as needed. The specialty skills are for things other than blaster fire that will help your squads in the stories.To give you an example of skills. On level 2 of the Combat Engineer roster, you gain the skill to create hasty barricades and blast shelters. This will come in handy for your squads when you would like to seal off your base or some other area on the platnet. You won't be able to do this with the greatest of ease, and they won't be that strong: but it'll be better than nothing. When you get to level 4, on top of any skills that you've gained for completing the level, your barricade skill gets upgraded so that they are stronger. You still have the ability to create the weak ones if the resources aren't available, but if possible: you are able to create stronger ones. That is just one example of the many skills you can gain throughout the specialties.
When going to write the actual stories, they are generally to be a bare minimum of two pages in Microsoft Word (or any other Word Processor). If a trooper would like to go over that, it is encouraged; going under is forbidden. Most stories that are exactly two pages long never make it through the first time and need to be fixed. As a general guideline, 1250 words is a suggested target, although some specialty levels may lack the content to fill so many words. If you are unsure, ask your specialty coordinator, generally your Platoon Leader.
When a story is completed, the trooper will go to the Stormtrooper Corps Specialty Storynet and find (or make) their topic. For example, if they were named "Riqimo" and doing a medic spec, they would find the topic called "Riqimo Medic" and post their story on there.
As a reminder: writing specialty stories are not like writing in the squad run-on. Each story must have a beginning and an end; there is no need to read all the posts that are not yours unless you'd like to get some ideas. Once the story is posted, the trooper may private message their Specialty Coordinator to inform them of the story if they'd like (this is not necessary, as the topics are checked) because
the next story cannot be started until the current one is checked over and passed.When a story is pased, the trooper will be awarded equipment out of the Specialty account. It will be transferred to their personal possessions list, and may be used in any of their stories if they wish. The first story will result in a useful item, but not something tremendous: and will increase in value and usefulness as the stories progress. When the entire program is completed, the trooper will recieve a promotion for their hard work on top of your equipment and any other rewards their Squad Leader, Platoon Commander, or higher feel are necessary. This does not remove them from being promoted during your program, it just means that there's something to look forward to. At this point they are to select a new specialty and begin that program. It is possible to be specialized in all fields, but that isn't exactly a common thing (it's highly encouraged though ) Some fields can be upgraded, to an advanced specialties. Like Combat Engineer can upgrade to Scout or Sharpshooter.
NOTE: Pay close attention to the requirements of Advanced Specialties. Some require you to be in a special squad or complete a previous specialty to accept that specialty. 