NS Black OP's.

Looking forward to it, will added some much needed end game content.

It's a great idea, but the implementation is really important.

I assume the loss of ability upgrades is temporary, only while flagged as an NS soldier, and are retained when resuming your main faction identity. There are a couple ideas which I think could improve on this theme.

1. EXPERIMENTAL WEAPONS
NS's interest as a manufacturer is in testing their products, or demonstrating their potentials in live combat to both winning and losing factions by fielding them in battles. This means there might be new, highly experimental weapons not yet available for release, that are tested by these NS soldiers. Access to "fourth" faction equipment alone might be particularly interesting as an incentive in recruiting test subjects into the program, ahead of inter-planetary release. If certification based skills and abilities are compromised, this might be a popular balancing point. NS implants are also an interesting approach.

2. REWARDS
Mercenaries sign up for personal benefit, and because they want to get paid. Supplementary increases to implant energy might be a currency used to compensate NS test subjects (or certs, just less thematic). Success in a battle or a campaign on behalf of the sponsoring faction might generate a further bonus. To discourage double agents intending to compromise a specific faction, energy allowances might be suspended or even charged against the soldier's account in the event of shooting the wrong faction uniform.

Auraxiuming a "test" item might unlock permission for personal use of the item outside the NS program, provided, if necessary, that compensation is made to the company (further certs or cash).

3. RANKS AND CERTIFICATIONS
If certified abilities are not transferable for access to comparable equipment at NS LABS (i.e. Terran Republic has qualified you for jet pack 5 deployment, but NS has not) then these can be acquired separately through NS campaigns (separate cert account). Alternatively, NS might view success differently than a military faction, rewarding successful weapons test (kills with NS weapons), than the military objectives themselves, and have a different cert reward program. More alternatively, every enlistment into an NS program might be viewed as a fresh contract, with no advanced equipment granted at all, and no special certs awarded at all to enable them. Subjects are fodder but wield experimental weaponry. Obviously suffering from an overall disadvantage by entering the program, subjects hired out to underpopulated factions should expect greater compensation for their risks while still providing bodies to assist their employer faction.

4. EXPERIMENTAL LOADOUTS
In the case of unlocking equipment from NS LABS using a separate certification system, traditional classes might be replaced with more experimental ones. I'm not referring to new fixed classes, but rather a loadout design similar to the PS 1 system, where they could be built from the ground up, using inventory space as the limitation. NS contractors could take a hand in developing and testing unique loadout arrangements. NS might even use a system that limits the number or quality of items to command with unfamiliar contractors, but as a soldier's capabilities for testing are demonstrated to the company, they might be entrusted with larger field allocations on every deployment. As NS experience grows, so does the amount of options to this dynamic loadout expand.

I would like to see the NS as an opportunity to do something different. I like it as a population balance tool (limited by continent), but also enrich the gameplay options in new ways. As an experimental weapons company interested both in testing and promoting upcoming technologies, there might be a different framework entirely within the company culture, and their approaches and goals in Planetside combat may be very different, both for the benefit of NS, as well as for the player who signs their contract.