Big Boss! He's sneaky, he's legendary, and sometimes he repeats words as a question for emphasis. Why wouldn't you want to be Big Boss?

But sometimes you don't want to be Big Boss. Why don't you want to be Big Boss? What do you have against Big Boss? He became disillusioned by his country and mentor yet keeps working so hard he barely has time to even shower. What else do you want out of him?

... Where was I going with this?

Oh right, please feel free to share your favorite soldier to go about fultoning guys or other MGS stuff when you aren't in a Boss sort of mood.

When I came upon my preffered soldier I was reminded of a blog post someone on this site made where they head-canoned the female soldier they were using as a third generation Asian-American. Well it kinda seems like a lot of the female soldiers you pick up look like they're from this certain hapa template. Not the soldier I'm using though; she looks awesome. She's a unicorn! It's actually her nomme de guerre, Sunny Unicorn. With a name like that and the fact that she has an S-rank in combat I don't know why I'd use anyone else.

Again, please feel free to share your favorite soldier to take to the field.

This is my main man, Rabid Hippo. He's kind of ugly, to be honest, but there is no room for judgment when all my combat unit members wear balaclavas when they're in the field. The Savage skill is my go to perk when deploying as a combat unit member (it used to be rescuer, but then fulton upgrades happened). Being able to do the bionic punch without having to actually equip the arm first? Yes please.

Any Diamond Dog with Hippo in their name is automatically one of my favourites.

Also, am I the only one that prefers the standard Diamond Dogs fatigues to anything Snake gets to wear? Maybe it's the gloves, the knee pads, the balaclava, or all of the above. Whatever the reason may be, it's my jam.

Smoking wombat

@skyrider: I like the yellow in their collars.

Flaming Buffalo for life. <3

Bastard Whale, the only one who ever mattered

Rampant Gibbon...

Oh shit put all the glasswear away Rampy G is doing the arms thing again!

@skyrider: They do have the coolest balaclava I've ever seen.

I've only ever played as Venom Snake, but I recently got this guy and I love his name...

@sgtsphynx: How are you getting 11 S-ranks in a report?!

This game needs a Cannon Fodder funeral scene. Midnight Buffalo (19XX - 1984)

@skyrider: Savage is definitely my favourite skill for most of the game did I use a guy just called Jackal, I think he was one of the wandering motherbase soldiers. Post story have I switched him out for the S+ skilled Running Bat, who also is a Savage.

Bloody Bull is a terrifying monster.

Good for everything bar open-heart surgery.

The one and only. Accept no substitutes.

I cannot understand why you would ever play as anyone but Venom Snake. People were pissed Kojima pulled rug from under them in MGS2, but all of a sudden you're fine with taking Flatulent Giraffe instead of the guy with a goddamn horn in his head and human teeth in body?

@ch3burashka: Because when Kaz says main missions are the only thing that Boss can handle I like to imagine that he wouldn't waste his time doing the side ops. Also I believe you don't gain Demon points when you go lethal with other soldiers.

There's also the fact that this is voluntary on behalf of the player and not forced upon them.

We all need a Bastard Wasp on our side...

Not mine but thought this was a nice call back.

Stubborn Cat's twitter feed is off the chain.

@ch3burashka: It'll vary from person to person, but like BaronSamedi said, I like to imagine Diamond Dogs would send combat unit members out on side-op type stuff, and leave to big stuff to Big Boss. Some of the skills are also really useful in the earlier stages of the game, before you get their equivalent arm upgrade. Other skills, like Rescuer, are still really useful up until you get the final fulton upgrade.

And like I said in my previous post, I straight up prefer their uniforms over Big Boss'.

@blackout62: my heroism is in the hundreds of thousands, maybe into the millions, I don't remember. But that is also after an hour and a half "recruiting tour." So a bunch of those are soldiers I extracted.

@mirado: I have someone like that, all S+ and one S++, I believe in R&D. My favorite is DOOM BEAR, though. Wish I had a picture but I have staff out the wazoo and by this point his stats are probably hot ass. I have him contracted because I can't part with my precious DOOM BEAR.

@blackout62 said:

Big Boss! He's sneaky, he's legendary, and sometimes he repeats words as a question for emphasis. Why wouldn't you want to be Big Boss?

But sometimes you don't want to be Big Boss. Why don't you want to be Big Boss? What do you have against Big Boss? He became disillusioned by his country and mentor yet keeps working so hard he barely has time to even shower. What else do you want out of him?

... Where was I going with this?

Oh right, please feel free to share your favorite soldier to go about fultoning guys or other MGS stuff when you aren't in a Boss sort of mood.

When I came upon my preffered soldier I was reminded of a blog post someone on this site made where they head-canoned the female soldier they were using as a third generation Asian-American. Well it kinda seems like a lot of the female soldiers you pick up look like they're from this certain hapa template. Not the soldier I'm using though; she looks awesome. She's a unicorn! It's actually her nomme de guerre, Sunny Unicorn. With a name like that and the fact that she has an S-rank in combat I don't know why I'd use anyone else.

Again, please feel free to share your favorite soldier to take to the field.

I use that exact same character, but a lesser version.
Mine has a different name and only speaks Afrikaans.

So I'm guessing that my Sunny Unicorn is out there somewhere.

@sgtsphynx: @blackout62: I'm somewhere near 400k heroism, and ended up with 16 S and 16 A++ when I redid Where the Bees Sleep in 30 or 45 minutes or so with post game toys. Missions, regardless of their sequence, seem to give a little bump to soldier ranks over free roam.

I've found my personal Big Boss:

Kaz Miller

@dave_tacitus: That's wild, I have a Spunky Platypus with identical stats. Some volunteers must be hard-coded into the game, even for late game.

Everyone outperforms him now, but I keep rescuing "Silent Basilisk" from the Waiting Room. He speaks NO languages and has the "Diplomat" trait. I love imagining this big, hairy mute who breaks up fights and calms people down just with his expressive eyebrows.

Hello, old friend. I haven't seen you since the prologue.

This one because she reminds me of one of my favorite Japanese actresses, Miki Nakatani. She even has a mole in the same place, which makes me think this wasn't a coincidence.

I guess this guy because he's got medals:

In actuality my favorites are Finger with his glorious shades:

and this chick:

So I already shared Rabid Hippo, but he was just my favourite with the Savage skill. My two all-time favourites are Spying Rooster and Lonely Orca. They're two of my longest serving combat unit members, although I largely now keep them on out of nostalgia (A+ just barely cuts now). Given I recruited them around the same time and they speak all of the same languages, I like to think of them as a brother/sister duo working for Diamond Dogs. Spying Rooster in particular has a special place in my heart, as I've easily spent more time playing as him than any other combat unit member (maybe even more than Snake, actually). I leveled my bonds with both D-Dog and Quiet mostly while playing with him as well. The rescuer perk my be useless to me at this point, but he'll always be my #1. The fact that he's probably the only guy in my combat unit with a non-repeated face doesn't hurt either.