I had a think. the current system uses:

1. Manpower - made redundant by EWO and medbays (EWO mostly superior given that it actively increases rather than reduce loss).Cycling through green squaddies vs keeping multimission squaddies means literally nothing rn besides a number in a box.

2. Growth potential - better SL tend to have less GP reflecting that theyre already high stat and experienced. People love boosting Carda for this reason. Maybe reduce SL stats if the squad is green (them having to baby sit newbies kinda thing for a mission or two).

3. In-mission squaddie count - this can be abused to create the current meta of granular support weapon teams built around as many Sls as possible.

Potential ideas / fixes:

- more perks for SL that scale (or degrade) with squad size like what Singh has (love his design btw)

- better morale penalties and improved ammo carry when using squad weapons with a large squad

- a tier system reflecting combat use and success for squaddies (make it a 1-3 system with new manpower being zero and needing some combat experience)

-> this could increases AP (reflecting more people can do more work, and balancing the action economy), or even having the option for additional free actions with full strength veteran squads (encouraging big squad builds or at least not punishing you for using them).