I was looking at the Muton stats today, and the fact that they have no Commander, Leader, or Medic ranks, made me wonder what happened in situation where one of those ranks was usually deployed. I decided to look at a Battleship savegame...

Standard Beginner Deployment for a Battleship:
4-8 Soldiers
1 of every other rank

So then I looked at my unitref. I had:

1 Engineer... so that was ok
1 Navigator... ok too
10 Soldiers...

I then noticed the layout of the unitref:

Soldier
Soldier
Soldier
Soldier
Soldier
Soldier
Soldier
Navigator
Soldier
Engineer
Soldier
Soldier

And it stuck out like a sore thumb -- The list is sorted by ascending rank and the missing ranks were simply filled in with Soldiers, taking my Soldier count from 7 to 10!

I'm assuming the other Alien Races would do the same thing, seeing as Snakemen are missing a Medic rank, and Ethereals are missing Engineer, Medic, and Navigator ranks.

You didn't know about that? It's old hat to me from seeing so many missions in unitref.

The soldier rank substitution only works with Mutons and Snakemen though. For Ethereals things are a bit different. Run-of-the-mill Superhuman Ethereal Base:

6 Sectopods
10 Ethereal Soldiers
9 Ethereal Leaders
1 Ethereal Commander

Why 9 Leaders? Well, it is just the addition of 2 Navigators, 2 Engineers, 1 Medic and 4 Leaders. 2+2+1+4 = 9. Not only that, but for Ethereal alien bases the number of Leaders and Commanders is a constant per difficulty level.

Beginner/Experienced: 5-9 Soldiers, 5 Leaders, 1 Commander, 1-3 Sectopods
Veteran/Genius: 6-10 Soldiers, 6 Leaders, 1 Commander, 3-5 Sectopods
Superhuman: 7-11 Soldiers, 9 Leaders, 1 Commander, 5-7 Sectopods

The same thing could be done for the Muton Base.
Beginner/Experienced: 9-13 Soldiers, 1 Nav, 1 Eng, 1-3 Terrorists
Veteran/Genius: 11-15 Soldiers, 1 Nav, 1 Eng, 3-5 Terrorists
Superhuman: 13-17 Soldiers, 2 Nav, 2 Eng, 5-7 Terrorists

Works for everything, not just bases. If you know the standard load-out, just substitute accordingly.

- Zombie

Really? So Mutons and Snakemen substitute Soldiers, and Ethereals sustitute Leaders? Wonder why that is? Hmmm...

BTW, I just added Alien Deployment charts to the relevant places in the wiki...

Why, to make it harder of course!

Though, I should probably mention that Ethereal Leaders will not be substituted on UFO's where leaders aren't normally present. For instance, the Large Scout never has an alien leader, so the Ethereal large scout mission can only have soldiers. I haven't checked all the UFO's to see what happens but it should hold.

- Zombie

Well the Scouts are the only ones without Leaders anyway, so it wouldn't make much of a difference...

Hmmm... Okay, scratch that.

Ethereal Leaders are substituted for other ranks, even if leaders aren't supposed to be present on that craft. After lots of waiting, I finally nabbed a Superhuman Ethereal Large Scout. The OSG says a load-out should be 3-8 Soldiers, 1-2 Navigators and 2-3 Engineers. I had 4 Ethereal Soldiers and 5 Ethereal Leaders (3 Eng subs + 2 Nav subs). I guess that's another reason why Ethereals are so darn tough: Leaders are more prevalent.

- Zombie

So it's possible to nab yourself a Leader if you down an Ethereal Scout - That's some good info to know

Yeah, good point Danial! Unfortunately, Ethereals are pretty rare early in the game so your best bet to nab a leader is still off the traditional Terror site at the end of the first month. (Not Muton though).

I suppose it is possible to see an Ethereal Scout early on, but come on, its tough. Still, an Ethereal Leader would be like the holy grail for people who play with psionics. As long as you researched a live alien already, the Ethereal Leader will divulge info about the Martian Solution and Psionics - all in one neat little package.

- Zombie

Sectoid Leader is much more likely, and just as good, btw.