Talk:Squads/@comment-69.57.107.144-20150729040316/@comment-73.146.247.12-20160924012651

unless one of the A-rank squads contains members whose names haven't even been announced yet there are currently 27 active A-rank individuals. Operators, Tamakoma 1st, and black trigger users are not counted as A-rank. Black trigger users are S-rank, (excepting Kuga due to the deal Kido cut with Tamakoma branch, who is currently B-rank.) I believe Tamakoma 1st would be excluded due to not participating in team rank wars, which would mean that if they were included they could never be challenged for their position in A-rank. Operators I believe are counted and ranked seperately from agents, though the last two are speculation on my part. Also I believe that there are only currently eight A-rank slots allowed, i.e the only way currently to advance to A-rank is by advancing in rank wars to B-rank 001, challenging an A-rank team and defeating them, which then bumps the defeated team back down to b-rank. Or you can get demoted as a punishment as with Ninomiya and Kageura units, at which point I would presume the current B-rank 001 is promoted to fill the vacancy. Interestingly, none of the current B-rank teams are stated as having been former A-rank teams that were defeated and bumped down so either there's been a lot of retirement or the first large scale invasion occured before bail out and had massive casualties. Or I'm wrong about defeated A-rank teams getting bumped.