SLF crew skill question.

Flavourless

Flavourless
Hired a Harmless crew member a while back, but tried her out for the first time this evening. (as it were)

How quickly do they improve as they rank up?
I had to change to gimballed weapons because mine couldn't hit a barn door with fixed ones (well not a stationary T7 whose PP I had sniped anyway).
She is now Novice, but doesn't give the impression of having improved much, just costs me more.

Those that have ranked crew up - when do they start to be effective?
 

IndigoWyrd

IndigoWyrd
Dunno.. mine was pretty good out of the box. Of course, she use to be a fighter pilot during some war, in some system... or so she says.
 

shadragon

shadragon
Took a noob NPC crew member into a NAV beacon last night and shoved her into a fighter. Lost one fighter and make 660K in bounties. She went up 32% between Harmless and Mostly Harmless.
 

goemon

goemon
pretty much at competent level. that's when they get their railgun from me. at expert level they can even handle two railguns (heatwise).

fastest way to rank them is comp nav beacon - enough small high ranked pirates.
 

Flavourless

Flavourless
goemon said:
pretty much at competent level. that's when they get their railgun from me. at expert level they can even handle two railguns (heatwise).

fastest way to rank them is comp nav beacon - enough small high ranked pirates.
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Yes. That's where I was. One that's not an anarchy, which is nice.
Ship size is no issue, but have to avoid wings for now.
To be honest, she is already a bit better, and not got competent yet.

Railguns? So yours is flying the mothership? Mine can't even manage the pips there.

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shadragon said:
Took a noob NPC crew member into a NAV beacon last night and shoved her into a fighter. Lost one fighter and make 660K in bounties. She went up 32% between Harmless and Mostly Harmless.
Click to expand...

Thanks for the reply. But doesn't address the question. ;)
 
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GilliganTX

GilliganTX
She is now ranked "Dangerous" and her survivability is up considerably. Much more effective over a prolonged period. I used to run out of fighters before ammo. Now I'm surprised if I lose 2 fighters before needing to re-arm.
 

h347h

h347h
Flavourless said:
Hired a Harmless crew member a while back, but tried her out for the first time this evening. (as it were)

How quickly do they improve as they rank up?
I had to change to gimballed weapons because mine couldn't hit a barn door with fixed ones (well not a stationary T7 whose PP I had sniped anyway).
She is now Novice, but doesn't give the impression of having improved much, just costs me more.

Those that have ranked crew up - when do they start to be effective?
Click to expand...

Get them to dangerous and above and they are worth the credits for sure. Stick it out for the long haul and you will be pleased.
 

CMDR-AD

CMDR-AD
Related to this topic, I have a question regarding NPC crew skill:

If I go out mining with an NPC crew flying a SLF for protection, and my NPC crew scores a kill defending me. The NPC fights the hostile ship all alone, I don't engage in the mothership. Do *I* get any combat rank increase for this? Or does the credit/rank all go to the NPC crew?
 
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Furinkazan

F
h347h said:
Get them to dangerous and above and they are worth the credits for sure. Stick it out for the long haul and you will be pleased.
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My guy is Dangerous and he was still getting slaughtered in 17 Draconis's CZ. This is in a Taipan and Condor. Still don't trust him to take the stick on my Conda.
 

goemon

goemon
Flavourless said:
Yes. That's where I was. One that's not an anarchy, which is nice.
Ship size is no issue, but have to avoid wings for now.
To be honest, she is already a bit better, and not got competent yet.

Railguns? So yours is flying the mothership? Mine can't even manage the pips there.
Click to expand...

pips come with competent level, too.

yes, my crew is flying the mothership. up to novice level they get a keelback, and in the beginning that even with 2 medium longrange weapons (because they tend to shoot from 2-3 km distance sometimes). keelback also helps with them pulling not too much aggro - you can still take the enemies on you...

after that gunship. at expert level 2 railguns with plasma slug with the usual MC/pulse mix around. at that point they deal much more damage than me in the fighter.
 

h347h

h347h
Furinkazan said:
My guy is Dangerous and he was still getting slaughtered in 17 Draconis's CZ. This is in a Taipan and Condor. Still don't trust him to take the stick on my Conda.
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Are you using them tactically or are you just letting them do w/e they want?
 

Furinkazan

F
h347h said:
Are you using them tactically or are you just letting them do w/e they want?
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Telling them to attack and defend appropriately, yes. I use them to distract big ships before i unload on them, and occasionally i'll send him on his own against low/mid ranked Cobras and Viper III's when i'm getting hammered with rails while attacking big ships.
 

Windscreen Smudge

W
Furinkazan said:
Telling them to attack and defend appropriately, yes. I use them to distract big ships before i unload on them, and occasionally i'll send him on his own against low/mid ranked Cobras and Viper III's when i'm getting hammered with rails while attacking big ships.
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From comments that have been garnered I'm guessing the Imp fighter is the trick. I've had mine in a Condor so far and they regularly get caught dead in the water and blasted.

Testing this tonight.
 

Von Shadow

Von Shadow
Definitely worth training up from noob level .... but it takes time.... until they hit master they're just purely a distractor for other ships ... they tend to die a lot .... master they start doing very rudimentary power management.... mines finally back at Dangerous (lost my 1st dangerous pilot) and they're stepping up .... a friend has deadly and they're more effective.... but mine has much better survivability

In CZ's you need taipan really cos imp fighter on noob pilots get 1-shotted too often
 

Bod

Bod
In the last bounty CG I hired a harmless pilot with gimballed weapons. When she hit expert I changed to fixed.
Now elite, she's amazing. Used strategically she lasted 5 hours in a haz res without dying.
Got me into top 5 commanders at the CG, and got her 32 million+ in wages...
 
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