R@S, your "Magpul Masada" actually makes me think of the Remington ACR (supposed military/LE version of what was the Masada, while Bushmaster is responsible for the horrendously overpriced civilian ACR), but with "MOAR RAILZ."
I see the collapsible/side-folding stock and the side/bottom rails, and it looks like you're using the 10.5" barrel; only critique is that the 12 o'clock rail isn't full-length. So long as it's not a "redundant" gun with only aesthetic difference (I've already slotted it into the "rails-accessorized close-quarters carbine" role in my head), cool by me.
Please note that "levels of gear" are already accounted for with existing generic NPCs; just take a look at "BS_Soldier.inv" for example in the editor, where you have several different equipment sets across and within CGLs.
I should note though as a JA2 player, one rather "unbalancing" thing about v1.13 is that because your local support (and thus mine income) doesn't drop when you stall, there's no impetus or urgency in going aggressive against the Queen's holdings. Once I take Drassen's airport sector and the mine sector, I then proceed to hunker down for weeks on end to train militia and my mercs, the latter usually by importing mercs to act as trainers for high-LDR/high-WIS mercs who can then act as training cadres (both for other mercs and for militia). Eventually the outcome will outstrip my expenses, especially if I can get away with letting contracts expire on the higher-priced mercs; then take Alma (whose "gun range" sector gives a bonus to Marksmanship training to mercs training the skill there), and eventually it just grows to the point where I can afford the "luxury" of using Skyrider's $100-per-sector helicopter service as a regular ferry.
R@S, I'd still like to be able to do this in BSM, but just keep this anecdote in mind when designing the militia. (I should note that even with high LDR and the Extended Ear headset, the JA2 v1.13 militia AI was extremely inconsistent with following orders.)
I have to admit that I'm not a fan of the class system simply because of "forced specializing" but I'd be willing to try out whatever version you've got at the moment. At one point I had my Cameron carrying a suppressed SR-25, a M4 Super 90 (M1014), an M1A (or M14 "proper" variant),
and a full-auto AR, mainly using "Aimed" mode, which should tell you something about where I'm coming from on this and what my preference is. (Though I recognize that the vanilla game does "force specialization" by its point allocation method of customizing each merc, on top of their basic traits.)