Please fix Multicrew already.

[CMDR ShoutOfHellas]

To whom it may concern,

As a huge fan of "Elite" I tend to defend almost everything Frontier Developments does. Even the most broken, disappointing, or plain and simply boring features are for me just "first steps" which are about to be updated and reworked as soon as possible. I said this to myself for example when Multicrew was released and I saw how disappointing it was. I thought "don't worry, they’ll fix it". Apparently, this was in April, and there is still no improvement to it. Therefore, I feel the urgent need to whine about this on the forums, whah whah. So, let’s make this quick:

- Co-pilot should be able to start, disable, restart and repair modules like a proper co-pilot. This is useful in any kind of situation. To avoid trolls, helm should be able to disable module controls like gunner controls in functions-panel
- Allow SRV use in multicrew, either with pilot in SRV and co-pilot flying the ship or the other way around. Imagine dropping your co-pilot on a planet. He collects materials for a next jump while you as a pilot scan all the other planets in this system. Multicrew/Exploring would finally have a purpose.
- Allow the co-pilot to plot routes, like a proper co-pilot should do.
- You should be able to let your co-pilot fly the ship if you want to. He has a flippin’ HOTAS on his chair, what the heck is it for? For the fighters? At least give those fighter pilots a proper VR headset for Randomious’ sake. The Helm should be able to take a gunner seat or a fighter if he wants to and trusts his co-pilot to fly his ship. Honestly, I wouldn’t let a complete stranger do that, but I would use it with close friends. I mean I let Abbigail, my Crew CMDR fly my ship, but as soon as I invite a CMDR to my ship, she is suddenly “not good enough”. Not cool FDev. Not cool.

Anyways FDev, you are still doing a good job. This is just my input on ten months of Multicrew. I hope this gives you some insight of what I think, is lacking in the game.

Have a happy new year and fly save.

 

[Skyphantom]

I absolutely agree with you. Multi crew for a long time has been lacking a lot in the activities and immersion department. All of your ideas and suggestions are great but I think there should also be some change that makes use of the voice coms as people generally just hop into a multi crew and just type to each other every once in awhile just doing there own thing. At least in my own experience.

 

[Hydrino]

I absolutely agree with you. Multi crew for a long time has been lacking a lot in the activities and immersion department. All of your ideas and suggestions are great but I think there should also be some change that makes use of the voice coms as people generally just hop into a multi crew and just type to each other every once in awhile just doing there own thing. At least in my own experience.

Agreed, but don't expect any changes to multi-crew until 2019 at earliest; and it could become an orphan feature like CQC and never see an update.

Hopefully, as part of the Beyond series of updates, FD lay the groundwork for more detailed multi-crew mechanics (if they don't simultaneously implement them). They should have a tick-box for multi-crew applicability whenever new any new feature design is discussed (can this be used for multi-player- if so how to plan for that and/or implement it as part of the design/development).

 

[Insane4un]

"If players not gonna play multicrew, we are not gonna update it"

Sandro

 

[Hydrino]

"If players not gonna play multicrew, we are not gonna update it"

Sandro

Logic that is influenced by lack of time and funding budget to develop and/or sustain a feature to a viable fun-level. And/or selling a feature too early in the overall dev cycle of the game.

But there is some upside to failing-fast and moving past sunk costs where indicated.

To me multi-crew came way too early, as the Beyond series of updates are needed to expand core game loops enough to provide more viable multi-crew options (and each feature needs a discussion tick-box as to how multi-crew and how space legs could benefit from and influence the feature [whether ever used or not]).

 

[Bortas]

There was a massive discussion in which many, many players warned FDev that if they didn't include NPCs in multicrew, it was going to fail hard.

The didn't listen. It failed.

 

[Insane4un]

Logic that is influenced by lack of time and funding budget to develop and/or sustain a feature to a viable fun-level. And/or selling a feature too early in the overall dev cycle of the game.

But there is some upside to failing-fast and moving past sunk costs where indicated.

To me multi-crew came way too early, as the Beyond series of updates are needed to expand core game loops enough to provide more viable multi-crew options (and each feature needs a discussion tick-box as to how multi-crew and how space legs could benefit from and influence the feature [whether ever used or not]).

You just over complicated this too much. While in reality it is their attitude. Or just a personal attitude of lead game designer.

 

[Musaab]

"If players not gonna play multicrew, we are not gonna update it"

Sandro

Did he actually say that?

 

[Insane4un]

Did he actually say that?

9:42 [video=youtube_share;PhsH5U7tz4A]https://youtu.be/PhsH5U7tz4A?t=9m42s[/video]

There is a damn lot of "not very true and honest speech" about "multicrew future". You'd better listen to it. And laugh at what multicrew is 1 year after.

Also a lot of "let's see how multicrew go.." and stuff like that as an excuse for don't give a s for multicrew later.

 

[CMDR ShoutOfHellas]

Thanks a lot for the comments commanders. Wow, hearing Sandro say that, actually made me feel uncomfortable. People would Multicrew more often if either the payouts were higher (which would be okay, but not the main reason why you Multicrew at all) or, and this is key, they could actually do something besides sitting around awkwardly, trying to start conversation in chat. Multicrew/explorer is no feature, it's a bug. No FDev, just NO. I was super thrilled when Multicrew was announced, and then this. Still no improvement.

@DarkMatterGenerator: I would agree on that but to be honest, from a pure development standpoint, it shouldn't be that difficult to implement this stuff. It's not like you have to reinvent the wheel. You have to enable already implemented features in Multicrew. I mean out of sheer coincidence, a bug took controls over my ship once and gave them to my Co-Pilot. Full story here: https://forums.frontier.co.uk/showt...-your-mission-while-you-are-in-Multi-Crew-now
Don't tell me now, that it is not possible to add a button to this bug in the role panel, or to enable SRVs.

@Bortas: Yeah I really gon't get why they noped that...

 

[Knot2clever]

"If players not gonna play multicrew, we are not gonna update it"

Sandro

Trump logic.

 

[Nitross]

• Co-pilot should be able to start, disable, restart and repair modules like a proper co-pilot. This is useful in any kind of situation. To avoid trolls, helm should be able to disable module controls like gunner controls in functions-panel
• Allow SRV use in multicrew, either with pilot in SRV and co-pilot flying the ship or the other way around. Imagine dropping your co-pilot on a planet. He collects materials for a next jump while you as a pilot scan all the other planets in this system. Multicrew/Exploring would finally have a purpose.
• Allow the co-pilot to plot routes, like a proper co-pilot should do.
• You should be able to let your co-pilot fly the ship if you want to. He has a flippin’ HOTAS on his chair, what the heck is it for? For the fighters? At least give those fighter pilots a proper VR headset for Randomious’ sake. The Helm should be able to take a gunner seat or a fighter if he wants to and trusts his co-pilot to fly his ship. Honestly, I wouldn’t let a complete stranger do that, but I would use it with close friends. I mean I let Abbigail, my Crew CMDR fly my ship, but as soon as I invite a CMDR to my ship, she is suddenly “not good enough”. Not cool FDev. Not cool.

I would add:

• Make it possible to combine Wings an Multicrew (still up to 4 players max). IE: 2 ships of 2 players in a Wing.
• Make it possible to earn the same rewards Solo, in Wing or in Multicrew. If a group of player complete a mission together, they should all benefit equally. It might be more realistic to have "Trade dividends" or split rewards, but it's not as fun. Before we get "Wing missions" in 2018's "Beyond", we need to be able to do normal missions in Wings or Multicrew.

 

[CMDR ShoutOfHellas]

I would add:

• Make it possible to combine Wings an Multicrew (still up to 4 players max). IE: 2 ships of 2 players in a Wing.

How the ef did I miss dis... It was one of the main reasons why I wanted to post this. Thank you so much for adding that.

 

[Insane4un]

I call it now. Our last and only hope for multicrew is Wing Missions in Q1 Beyond.

There is a chance that Wing Missions will be possible to take in Multicrew.

Chances are low, but it all what we have.

 

[DaMorgs]

I was one of the many people who thought that MC was going to bring this game to life, really open it up. It could've encouraged those players who have never been exploring to actually go out and do it. OP you pretty much described what I thought it was going to be.

I still play ED, but it just feels 'empty' now. If only I could hire NPCs to fill the void as well as the empty seats in my ships....

I'm praying Squadrons at the end of next year revives multicrew. Alas, I don't think it will

 

[SushiCW]

To whom it may concern,

As a huge fan of "Elite" I tend to defend almost everything Frontier Developments does. Even the most broken, disappointing, or plain and simply boring features are for me just "first steps" which are about to be updated and reworked as soon as possible. I said this to myself for example when Multicrew was released and I saw how disappointing it was. I thought "don't worry, they’ll fix it". Apparently, this was in April, and there is still no improvement to it. Therefore, I feel the urgent need to whine about this on the forums, whah whah. So, let’s make this quick:

- Co-pilot should be able to start, disable, restart and repair modules like a proper co-pilot. This is useful in any kind of situation. To avoid trolls, helm should be able to disable module controls like gunner controls in functions-panel
- Allow SRV use in multicrew, either with pilot in SRV and co-pilot flying the ship or the other way around. Imagine dropping your co-pilot on a planet. He collects materials for a next jump while you as a pilot scan all the other planets in this system. Multicrew/Exploring would finally have a purpose.
- Allow the co-pilot to plot routes, like a proper co-pilot should do.
- You should be able to let your co-pilot fly the ship if you want to. He has a flippin’ HOTAS on his chair, what the heck is it for? For the fighters? At least give those fighter pilots a proper VR headset for Randomious’ sake. The Helm should be able to take a gunner seat or a fighter if he wants to and trusts his co-pilot to fly his ship. Honestly, I wouldn’t let a complete stranger do that, but I would use it with close friends. I mean I let Abbigail, my Crew CMDR fly my ship, but as soon as I invite a CMDR to my ship, she is suddenly “not good enough”. Not cool FDev. Not cool.

Anyways FDev, you are still doing a good job. This is just my input on ten months of Multicrew. I hope this gives you some insight of what I think, is lacking in the game.

Have a happy new year and fly save.

I can get behind each and every one of these suggestions.

Unfortunately it's going to require a lot of work from Frontier to refactor their SLF / SRV / Wings / Multicrew / etc so that it all actually works cohesively and consistently and allows the sort of stuff you describe. Not to mention fixing the omnipresent bugs in the existing implementation.

 

[Skyphantom]

"If players not gonna play multicrew, we are not gonna update it"

Sandro

Did they not think: hey maybe the don't play multicrew because it sucks and we don't update it?