What I want from 2.3 : Automation

[Goose4291]

So because 15% don't care for NPC crew it should not be included? I am fine with introducing multiplayer crew first, as long as they implement NPCs later.



It's the other way around. With NPC crew a trader could buff his ship when he is attacked by a wing of multi crew pirates. The same is true for NPC wings. It would make combat less asymmetric.

At the moment a lot of Traders seem to have difficulty paying a one off fixed cost to carry a shield generator, I somehow doubt that's how it will be. It'll be 'FDev, these NPC crew are hurting my cr/hr ratio. Plz reduce or eliminate any cost incurred'

 

[Martian Successor]

It's very intriguing. I don't see how they're going to make it work in an interesting and balanced way with or without NPC crew.

Star Citizen makes it interesting but that's because you can walk around; tour ships, sit in command chairs and mess halls aboard the bigger ships, disable ships in space and perform boarding actions, storm corridors, have firefights inside ships and even steal ships.

Having a player only multicrew before we can walk around is pointless. It's too early for this feature. Handwavium black transition screens in between being rooted to a chair and only able to look left, right, up, down. Oh yeah... that's sexy...

With NPC crew you can at least fill that chair next to you and have some nice immersive moments and Han & Chewie wish fulfilment.

 

[Siranui]

At the moment a lot of Traders seem to have difficulty paying a one off fixed cost to carry a shield generator, I somehow doubt that's how it will be. It'll be 'FDev, these NPC crew are hurting my cr/hr ratio. Plz reduce or eliminate any cost incurred'

Pretty much. Although it'll be a rod they made for their own back.

I suspect people haven't considered the possibility of NPCs having NPC crew, too. And thus 'big three' ships being 4x more dangerous.

Another death knell for smaller vessels really, as the larger ones all get a 200-400% boost in effectiveness. I don't think people are actually considering repercussions, and instead just seeing '400% better'.

 

[Martian Successor]

Pretty much. Although it'll be a rod they made for their own back.

I suspect people haven't considered the possibility of NPCs having NPC crew, too. And thus 'big three' ships being 4x more dangerous.

Another death knell for smaller vessels really, as the larger ones all get a 200-400% boost in effectiveness. I don't think people are actually considering repercussions, and instead just seeing '400% better'.

Who's to say that NPC crew should bring a buff? Leave that to player crewed ships if there really must be some kind of artificial magic handwavium buff merely for filling a seat with a player character model. This ill thought mechanic by the way will turn the big 3 into a true god mode in high end PvP. That'll be lovely......

But I digress; SLF crew don't bring any sort of buff, heck you don't even need them to carry and use an SLF. It's primarily for fun and to be able to fight with both ship & SLF simultaneously. Let NPC crew be just for fun, what would be the problem with that?

 

[777Driver]

Having a player only multicrew before we can walk around is pointless...

Speak for yourself mate, I know quite a few people that have been waiting for multi crew before buying elite dangerous. Quite a few of my mates are buying VR headsets because of ED and multi crew. Being able to crew a ship with my friends is something I have been patiently waiting for since I joined in Alpha.

I appreciate the bulk of this forum is filled with anti social Cmdrs that believe they are the majority of ED's player base, fortunately the devs understand that a lot of players out there do want multi crew with other humans, not just some scripted NPC.

 

[Shar]

At best if and thats a big if we get NPC multicrew they will have to have minimal impact in solo

1. Gunner 10 efficiancy gain on your turrets or fire gimbles within there arc like turrets.
2. Engeneer auto operate something on the ship maybe AMFU or SCB.
3. Maybe as simple as having your current SLF pilot in the cockpit with you.
4. Make it compusory to have an NPC pilot to handle your ship when your out in the SRV.

Maybe a voice in your ship and an avatar to sit in a seat all at the expence of a % of your credits, This is just a ballpark surgestion but it will have to be this simplistic to not upset the game balance.

If it happens at all. As for auto-pilot forget it. the NPC should not allow the player to go AFK in any way shape or form.

 

[PavelKCZ]

I suspect people haven't considered the possibility of NPCs having NPC crew, too. And thus 'big three' ships being 4x more dangerous.

Maybe it is only lack of imagination on my side, but how can for example NPC Anaconda be 4x more dangerous with illusion of other NPC crew members ? There is only one AI. Also, for example turrets on NPC ships are driven by AI since beginning together with NPC ships pip management, chaffs etc.

 

[Windscreen Smudge]

Maybe it is only lack of imagination on my side, but how can for example NPC Anaconda be 4x more dangerous with illusion of other NPC crew members ? There is only one AI. Also, for example turrets on NPC ships are driven by AI since beginning together with NPC ships pip management, chaffs etc.

It'd just end up being a bullet-sponge fest, like back in the day when people were 6-stacking SCB's for unbreakable shield tank.

The AI would have to be tweaked for the 3 non-pilot roles to give them faster and faster reactions to triggers, until when you finally scale it up to an Elite Anaconda, Cutter or Corvette they've essentially got what would be perfect response time and no errors for players.

But we'd just see it as a ludicrous amount of tank, increased maneuverability and constant fire because they never run out of power for weapons.

Sound fun yet?

 

[Martian Successor]

Speak for yourself mate, I know quite a few people that have been waiting for multi crew before buying elite dangerous. Quite a few of my mates are buying VR headsets because of ED and multi crew. Being able to crew a ship with my friends is something I have been patiently waiting for since I joined in Alpha.

I appreciate the bulk of this forum is filled with anti social Cmdrs that believe they are the majority of ED's player base, fortunately the devs understand that a lot of players out there do want multi crew with other humans, not just some scripted NPC.

Likewise 777Driver, speak for yourself. It's not about anti-social or billy no friends, I don't advocate or support that argument. My main argument is that the devs don't seem to understand the beauty of choice.

Why should it be either multiplayer crew or NPC crew. Why not both? I have no problem with player crew, other than I don't think it has a pourpose yet past the initial novelty. My problem is that it looks like NPC multicrew will not be a thing - which is a terrible waste of all that groundwork that has already been laid out with the crew recruitment screen in station menus.

 

[PavelKCZ]

It'd just end up being a bullet-sponge fest, like back in the day when people were 6-stacking SCB's for unbreakable shield tank.

The AI would have to be tweaked for the 3 non-pilot roles to give them faster and faster reactions to triggers, until when you finally scale it up to an Elite Anaconda, Cutter or Corvette they've essentially got what would be perfect response time and no errors for players.

But we'd just see it as a ludicrous amount of tank, increased maneuverability and constant fire because they never run out of power for weapons.

Sound fun yet?

But in such case, it can be simply called "AI buff" (which we already saw last year). It is not necessary to call it "NPC ship + NPC crew" technobabble.

 

[Windscreen Smudge]

Sorry, but I can't really follow your argument. If I get you right you are afraid that solo players with NPC crew would have it easier than coop players with player crew?

What if without NPCs, coop players have it easier than solo players?
Why does it even matter?

For me NPC crew is mostly about not sitting next to an empty seat, not so much about the meta. The meta is the last argument that should be taken into consideration when designing game features and then balanced accordingly.

Also, it's pretty clear that we will get space legs at some point. I like the idea of walking around in my ship while my copilot flies it.

'But automatisation would mean I could just go AFK while the computer does all the "work"!'

Not if it's designed in a way that still requires your presence, for example calculating jump ranges and navigation.

'But this would mean that crew is mandatory for some ships'
Yes, why not? Didn't play the old games, but AFAIK it has always been like that.

No, that's not at all what I was getting at buddy....

It's nothing about advantage, and all about which becomes the more enjoyable way to experience the game.

Either NPC crew will be fleshed out to the point that it's fun and engaging and there is no reason to play the game any other way, which completely changes the dynamics of how ED works and makes about half of the ships completely undesirable without a full re-design, or it'll be broken beyond repair. Doesn't help that most of those ships that would be getting the shaft have already gotten it and are some of the most unpopular ships to date.

So you cut ship variety in half right off the bat or spend years retooling them. Sounds productive, right?

Or scenario B is that NPC crew are so janky and gimped that players would rather never experience it again after their first 30 minutes, in which case what was the point?

I want, so gimme? Is that the logic we're following now?

You're not going to find a middle ground. There is no way to implement NPC multicrew CORRECTLY without making it a mandatory part of the game. Your only other option, to screw it up, isn't fun, so which do you choose?

 

[777Driver]

Why should it be either multiplayer crew or NPC crew. Why not both?

Am sure it will eventually be both, as an ex Silent hunter guy & X3TC (With crew mods) I look forward to NPC crew eventually being implemented. All I am saying is I disagree with those same 20 people on here that think Multi crew is a waste of time purely because they have zero contact with the outside world.. Not to mention the fact those same people seem to be convinced they represent the bulk of the playerbase, all because they clicked on some stupid poll.

Personally I think NPC crew and basic shared cockpit between players should have been ingame from Gamma release. Devs decided to start with player multi crew, people need to deal with it.

 

[PavelKCZ]

On the other side, I must admitt that I do not see to much space for any additional fun for Solo player with NPC crew (if it will be implemented in future). Maybe some dialogues etc. (like it was in Mass Effect).
From what I saw on YouTube, with those fancy Voice Control programs, player can have a decent illusion of NPC multi-crew today. It should be quite simple to macro sequences of commands like "Lieutenant, ask for permission and iniciate the docking sequence" or "Full pips to shields, Scotty" even maybe "Computer, initiate evasive maneuver Pickard-Delta-Seven".

 

[Windscreen Smudge]

But in such case, it can be simply called "AI buff" (which we already saw last year). It is not necessary to call it "NPC ship + NPC crew" technobabble.

Nah, they'll still be perfectly capable of getting lost in debris fields and trying to scan stations for cargo/kill warrants. You'll just be shooting them more while they flop around like a gog-eyed landed fish.

That's fun, right?

 

[dannysquid]

My only real hope for it is that they will have reworked a lot of the scanner interface. I still find it odd that we have to spend so much time looking at lists of text. So, if scanning is a thing, maybe they'll have finally implemented the Orrery View. And perhaps we will be able to see a cutaway of our own ship and other ships for viewing the state of modules etc... I'm not bothered about multi-player, but if a side effect is to bring the interface into the 21st Century then I can't wait.

 

[Martian Successor]

Am sure it will eventually be both, as an ex Silent hunter guy & X3TC (With crew mods) I look forward to NPC crew eventually being implemented. All I am saying is I disagree with those same 20 people on here that think Multi crew is a waste of time purely because they have zero contact with the outside world.. Not to mention the fact those same people seem to be convinced they represent the bulk of the playerbase, all because they clicked on some stupid poll.

Personally I think NPC crew and basic shared cockpit between players should have been ingame from Gamma release. Devs decided to start with player multi crew, people need to deal with it.

I think we agree with each other for the most part. Without word from the devs it gets frustrating because it seems like NPC crew is off the table forever. I hope you're right and that it comes in later.

Right now we do indeed have to deal with the fact that player multicrew is the devs first choice. One thing I really don't see a worth in is the magic buffs that filling chairs imparts as that will wreak havoc with PvP balance - and we were almost out of the woods there.

 

[DCLXVI your God]

I really hope we get blessed with NPC multi crew. [yesnod]

 

[NMS]

Without NPC is DOA

 

[avow555]

To keep it simple and not bother you with a wall of text:

The four roles need to come with some kind of automation for solo players so that they can use the new gameplay.

I want to be a navigator rather than a pilot when I'm traveling long distance !

I want to be an engineer while my crew fight !

FD: if you make whole new game mechanics, please do not cut us solo players out of it !

Not unreasonable requests really.
I guess we shall see how the multicrew works before we may get NPC permanently.
As far as multicrew goes I suspect it may be another lead balloon, not long to find now.

 

[ROSS-128]

Regarding the "4x as effective" thing, I believe that having crew should not magically affect any of your base stats. Because that's just silly. Why would having a body in a chair quadruple my shields or harden my hull? The reason to have a crew should be so that they can perform active tasks, not provide passive stat buffs. For example, manually aiming turrets or locking missiles in any direction (because the crew member can aim the target painter). Or flying fighters. Or performing manual repairs.

I also doubt that you'll be able to assign an NPC to pilot and then sit on a gun while it flies, jumps, and supercruises for you because that would be autopilot, and they've repeatedly said no to that. At most you'll have a situation like with SLFs, where the NPC can only fly in normal-space. And you'll probably want to stay on the helm anyway, because NPCs are terrible pilots why would you trust them with your ship?