Inactive Crew Still Getting Paid?

KingTurtle · Jan 2, 2017

I saw an FD rep say they would look into it, but I still see it on the live server since it was acknowledged. Is this going to stay, or is a fix coming soon? I would like to know since I am going to fire mine if that's the case. I cannot even see them in the cockpit so it does not even help with making this simulator more immersive (if the fighters are actually drones, then they can sit in the cockpit and control it from there).

Problem:
-Currently, Elite Dangerous has inactive crew members getting paid from any profit made by the commander, this is an addition to the active crew member getting paid off the commander as well.
-I noticed that one of my inactive crew member was getting paid even higher than the higher-rank active crew member (this part doesn't even make sense).
-Commanders can fire their active crew member so they don't get paid prior to getting the profit.

Solution:
1. The initial contract should only be an investment that they will be available only to that Commander. If the contract prices have to go up, then so be it (we are buying their time after all).
2. Only active NPC pilots will share the profit with the Commander (inactive pilots already got paid with the contract).
3. Commanders will not be allowed to terminate or make inactive a crew member till all profits are submitted. This would cut down on people scamming them into risking their lives.

The captain of a fishing boat only shares his profit with crew members on board. I don't get why in Elite we are paying these people to sit in the passenger lounge (that's what the contract is for so only allow 1 pilot to be hired for now).

Please implement this ASAP Frontier, so I can keep my crew mates without feeling like I am their sugar daddy.[knocked out]

Alex Brentnall · Jan 2, 2017

I thought this was confirmed as design intent that they get paid whilst inactive? Same way you still pay an army during peacetime.

Personally I kinda agree, despite having enough credits to burn 30% of my profits I hate the idea so have been working on a hire and fire basis for a while now, just the hiring costs to pay.

trollson · Jan 2, 2017

The crew are in your employment and so get paid. Its up to you how you use them - active or inactive. Zero hours contracts were outlawed fortunately!

The crew get paid according to their rank when recruited, not their current rank which increases for active crew. So its entirely possible that an inactive crew member can draw a higher wage than an active member of higher rank - the active members rank will have increased since they were recruired.

If you release (fire) a crew member then presumably (once persistent NPCs) they would be available to be hired at rates commensurate with their improved ranks. I tend to believe that active crew have access to escape pods on ship destruction - same as pilot and passengers - but that the crew contract expires if the ship they are crewing is destroyed; so freeing them up to earn more elsewhere.

Sapyx · Jan 2, 2017

It's in the contract you sign when you hire them: they get their fair share of your profits, even if you choose not to put them to work. You're paying them so you have the right to call on them at any time and you are dragging them all over the galaxy with you. If you hire someone and then don't give them any work to do, that's your problem, not theirs; you still have to keep paying them.

I noticed that one of my inactive crew member was getting paid even higher than the higher-rank active crew member (this part doesn't even make sense).

Crew that you hire at high rank cost more than crew that you hire at low rank and train up yourself. This is supposed to motivate you to hire harmless novices and train them up, and to keep crew you've trained on-staff rather than use the hiring-firing-as-needed model.

I wold agree, however, that an inactive crew should perhaps be paid less than the active crew who actually did the helping of the earning of credits. This, however, would mean the game would have to keep track of each and every credit you earn and which crew has the right to any share of it. It is much simpler to simply do one profit division calculation per transaction.

It would perhaps be even more logical for crew to claim a regular salary, and be paid a profit-share bonus for active duty on top of that salary. But, given the nature of the game, I can see why this can't be done. You'd have players logging on after six months away, only to find their crew salaries have drained their bank balance to nothing, then the crew jumped ship when the money ran out.

Darth Ender · Jan 2, 2017

I hired two from the same place. I think it goes in order and the pay is calculated sequentially rather than simultaneously. So whoever was first gets paid correctly, then that is deducted from the profit and the second and third is calculated from the remaining profit.

fennster · Jan 2, 2017

trollson said:
The crew are in your employment and so get paid. Its up to you how you use them - active or inactive. Zero hours contracts were outlawed fortunately!

The crew get paid according to their rank when recruited, not their current rank which increases for active crew. So its entirely possible that an inactive crew member can draw a higher wage than an active member of higher rank - the active members rank will have increased since they were recruired.

If you release (fire) a crew member then presumably (once persistent NPCs) they would be available to be hired at rates commensurate with their improved ranks. I tend to believe that active crew have access to escape pods on ship destruction - same as pilot and passengers - but that the crew contract expires if the ship they are crewing is destroyed; so freeing them up to earn more elsewhere.

The amount you pay a crew member increases as they rank up, it doesn't stay the same.

The difference is you will end up laying less percentage a member who you trained from a lower rank. Can't remember exact figures, but for example a crew member who you hired at expert will get 16% @ elite, whereas a crew member who you hired at harmless will only receive 11% once they reach elite.

VR Murgle · Jan 2, 2017

trollson said:
The crew are in your employment and so get paid. Its up to you how you use them - active or inactive. Zero hours contracts were outlawed fortunately!

The crew get paid according to their rank when recruited, not their current rank which increases for active crew. So its entirely possible that an inactive crew member can draw a higher wage than an active member of higher rank - the active members rank will have increased since they were recruired.

If you release (fire) a crew member then presumably (once persistent NPCs) they would be available to be hired at rates commensurate with their improved ranks. I tend to believe that active crew have access to escape pods on ship destruction - same as pilot and passengers - but that the crew contract expires if the ship they are crewing is destroyed; so freeing them up to earn more elsewhere.

Whether it makes sense or not is irrelevant the system encourages the hiring and firing of crew on a trip by trip basis with the crews never seeing a credit beyond thier initial fee...

fennster · Jan 2, 2017

To be fair my crew member has earned enough to buy herself 3,500 tonnes of gold.

If it was me I'd be happy enough to sit it out until more work was required of me.

NascentChemist · Jan 2, 2017

There does seem to be a bug going around, where the reported income for an inactive crew member is incorrectly tallied. Either they get credited all of your crew members' income, or their income is calculated using your active crew member's rate. Ei, they either get the sum of all crew income or a novice inactive gets payed what your active Elite gets.

Kayweg · Jan 3, 2017

Potential wage calculation glitches aside, if you employ 2 crew members, you should also be able to deploy 2 crew members (aka fighters).
As it is now, you're actually just hurting your wallet by leveling them both while you only ever can use one at a time.
As far as i understand, the only benefit of having 2 is access to an instant replacement should the first one die.
Question is, does that happen frequently enough to justify the extra wage ?
And if not, isn't it better to focus on just the one and level him up that much faster ?

Spike K · Jan 3, 2017

Damn,

BANK.

\\///
oO
>
--
Spike553

vrseven · Jan 3, 2017

I really dont understand the purpose of them taking credits and taking so much. Is there something FD is going to have the NPCs do with these credits at some point in the game? I am not asking because I am annoyed, I have enough credits that their salary does not effect my income. I am curious. Whats the difference between 1% or 12% if the credits will not be used?

Bryan K · Jan 3, 2017

vrseven said:
I really dont understand the purpose of them taking credits and taking so much. Is there something FD is going to have the NPCs do with these credits at some point in the game? I am not asking because I am annoyed, I have enough credits that their salary does not effect my income. I am curious. Whats the difference between 1% or 12% if the credits will not be used?

How do you know what they do with those credits when not active on your ship? Maybe they have rent to pay.

Leo Sagan · Jan 3, 2017

Typical FD ...

1) Create new feature
2) Make sure there is no reason to use it (here, stupid costs)
3) Fix the problem way too late if ever
4) Go back to 1

CQC, PP, SLF and soon PC only MC.

Ragamuffin1979 · Jan 3, 2017

I wouldn't mind a small fee to keep them on standby, they definitely shouldn't receive a full wage to just chill.

vrseven · Jan 3, 2017

Bryan K said:
How do you know what they do with those credits when not active on your ship? Maybe they have rent to pay.

When any of my crewmembers are not active, I freeze them in a cryopod....just sayin...

Alex Brentnall · Jan 3, 2017

On the whole: What's the point of inactive crew.

Personally I saw the crew screen and thought. Hmmm, looks like it's been made to be easily more expandable both on the inactive and active side. Whilst we've been confirmed that 2 fighters isn't something thats happening due to the whole "Wing of 4 turning into a wing of 16", I am hopeful for NPC wingmen and NPC multi-crew sometime towards the end of 2017, worst case maybe early 2018. At which point it may be very, very valuable to have 3 pilots at high rank all trained up from novice.

Imagine if the NPC fighter pilots you hire can go out with their earnings and buy a combat ship to use in your wing.... How epic would that be for progression! And it'd balance it so you can't just give them an uber engineered ship right from novice rank.

Anyway I've just about done everything I wanted to in the game now. Few minor bits on my list I still want but effectively tick a few boxes with triple Elite and a bit of Engineering + a few events and I'll be happy.
Details here for anyone that cares:

On the to do list in chronological order:
Some more passenger missions
Trade Elite rank
Engineer FDL/Corvette
Combat Elite rank

Anytime:
Join some more Community Goals
Do a few more PvP tournaments
Do some PvP piracy <- Last tried in 1.3 so I really need to have a go again

CQC games & rank beyond "Mostly Helpless"

More Fuel Rat stuff <- 100+ rescues and counting

I also have my 2nd account should I ever want to get involved in demolition derbies etc. with player groups

Anyway thats, not important. What is important to the point I'm about to make is that come maybe 6 months time the only thing I'll be left doing is Combat Elite rank (the way I've planned my to-do list anyway). At this point I should have more cash than sense and a buffer built in case of any new ships (Dolphin, Panther etc).
I may as well just pick up 3 Novice Pilots and see how far I can train them whilst I do the last 16% of the Deadly Rank. What harm can it do? It's a credit sink for those with more cash than sense, unfortunately I'm not in that position just yet as I've never done any of the exploits like Robigo/Sothis/17 Draconis etc. but again, give me 6 months to build a bit of a buffer and I should be fine.

iSteel · Jan 3, 2017

vrseven said:
I really dont understand the purpose of them taking credits and taking so much. Is there something FD is going to have the NPCs do with these credits at some point in the game? I am not asking because I am annoyed, I have enough credits that their salary does not effect my income. I am curious. Whats the difference between 1% or 12% if the credits will not be used?

Maybe FD is keeping this for multi-crew. You could hire a NPC or CMDR, both of them get equal share. So it would be fair in whatever way you play. This kind of payout model would also support CMDR's to raise their combat status if they wish to be employed by other CMDR's.

I.e. maybe this behaviour and payouts is something what we will get when multi-crew comes. CMDR and NPC will have equal costs. Costs are high to get CMDRs interested in working in someone's crew.

Alex Brentnall · Jan 3, 2017

iSteel said:
Maybe FD is keeping this for multi-crew. You could hire a NPC or CMDR, both of them get equal share. So it would be fair in whatever way you play. This kind of payout model would also support CMDR's to raise their combat status if they wish to be employed by other CMDR's.

I.e. maybe this behaviour and payouts is something what we will get when multi-crew comes. CMDR and NPC will have equal costs. Costs are high to get CMDRs interested in working in someone's crew.

Just to deflate the hype balloon somewhat: Devs have indicated that 2.3 multi-crew will probably not come with NPC support and this may be added later.

Whilst this is all "probably" and "maybe" generally if the Devs are outspoken enough to tell us something newsworthy it's usually correct.

iSteel · Jan 3, 2017

Alex Brentnall said:
Just to deflate the hype balloon somewhat: Devs have indicated that 2.3 multi-crew will probably not come with NPC support and this may be added later.

Whilst this is all "probably" and "maybe" generally if the Devs are outspoken enough to tell us something newsworthy it's usually correct.

I think multi-crew will mean the possibility to hire a CMDR to be your fighter pilot instead of NPC. I.e. you would only have one active pilot with you CMDR or NPC.

I don't see FD adding any other multi crew functions for NPC/CMDR in near future. Now they already have the interface and payout model with NPC fighter pilot. They just have to implement possibility for CMDR to be listed in the crew list.