FreeOrion

Perhaps something in that direction could be the possibilty to production special charcter und equipment for them.
EXAMPLE: You produce a general und give him somethig to boost his ability to command troops, and command mor troops.
Or
A master researcher, with same nice gadgets, who could be asigned to on specific research.
Both could gain experence and work better, but could be target be spies/assassins.

In same way, they are producable leaders, but much more inflexible in thier abilities.

a small nitpick on you purists of game genre out there, i know of atleast one instance of mixing styles, that worked great.

Natural Selection, mixes classic FPS with RTS(although that should prolly be called RTT, as in Real Time Tactics).

another, is starwolves, a rather unknown game asfar as i know, wich mixes homeworld style gameplay, with RPG/possibly alternating plot.....

what i am truly waiting for, and would like to be along for the making, is actualy a MMO-streetracing-RPG, could be very interesting, but as it is a strange idea, it will prolly not get picked up.

bottom line, mixing different styles of gameplay, into something new, is what every game maker SHOULD aim for, not what is already established, and done 10 to the n'th times before.

exactly my thoughts, discord

I played starwolves and I loved it. Why should we aim for an already establishes gameplay style, when we can create a totally new and probably more interesting one. Remember that all game styles were new ones not that long ago.

Another game I like a lot is Starfury. It mixes space combat with a touch of an rpg and it really is a lot of fun.

khar: you refering to the one based on the space empires series? yes, pretty interesting idea, dont know about he well they implemented it, as i only tried the demo.

yep, I'm referring to that one.

You should try it. As I said, I liked it a lot.