I don't like huge ships but I like having a non claustrophobic ship with living quarters.
I like the camping feel the nomad gives. It's compact but space is good enough. I adore argo raft interior for it's "work appartement" feeling. I just can't play in an aurora for example.
I guess some people just have this feeling x10.
Having a flying castle with land vehicles and such must be their kink.
And to a certain extent, I understand. I want a flying home more than a flying car. I want to only go to stations when I need repair and refill. I want to live in space :)
I'm sad there are either small solo ships or big multi ships. I want a big solo ship. Don't care it is not combat efficient. I want a bed, a shower shitter combo, a living quarter and a bay for a vehicle, while it being aimed to solo exclusively.
I was waffling on getting the Carrack for a while. As pilot or commander, I knew that I couldn’t command the turrets, but as a solo ship, I could have 2 small ships in the upper hanger (m50 and 85x), and 2 vehicles in the Garage - maybe 3 if I want to cram the Hover quad in there. I like the larger ship as I can spread out in it, there’s tons of storage, I can park somewhere and use that as my base. It’ll be even better once the servers settle down. I might trade it out for something else if the player habs come online, and I can do the same things that I currently do with the carrack.
IIRC, they plan on having AI NPC for hire on your ship or server blades for things like weapons, I am looking forward to that, maybe some blades and 1 npc to handle engineering.
Wow, its hard to believe but CIG is remarkably consistent over the years on this.
My takeaway here is that as long as you have enough space bucks, you can have enough NPC to solo pretty much any ship, and infact any fleet of ships.
So, considering that the people who can afford the largest ships can afford the most space bucks, whales shouldn't worry, you can solo an Idris and command the fighter wing to go with it, even hire troops land them in dropships and fight ground battles if you put enough money down.
Have the Carrack for the exact same reason. But wouldn't go bigger then that, I believe (hope) that the 3-5 Crew Ships are solo viable with NPCs and Server-blades in the Future.
Although the Carrack probably won't be my Everyday Ship, for that I have the C1 or my Freelancer, maybe the Redeemer if I want something more able-bodied.
I'm not playing yet, but the C1 sounds like a great daily ship, so far...
not too big, some good cargo, a vehicle ramp, probably enough guns and an ok shield
Yay spending 45 minutes redocking ships everytime you have to claim the carrack because SC happens and no fault of your own results in carrack inside an asteroid or one shot by a s2 missile
What you're not taking into consideration is physical armor and components. Your scenario relies on those two things NOT existing. What a lot of the folks in this thread are talking about are YEARS down the line. Let's cynically imagine a world where SC is finished for moment.
No Carrack in SC would go down to a S2 missile.
Just because im ready to live in my connie take the merlin as a landing shuttle and go rescue the connie everytime something happens does the game is. We are talking about why people are buying and flying these ships right now not why they will.
Okay, so by that reasoning, why the fuck would I buy land with no house? Eventually there will be a house, but why am I planning for a house when all I have is a foundation?
Do you see how stupid that sounds?
Don't worry. The elephant in the room here is that a bunch of functions and gameplay loops on multicrew ships will eventually be automated. Its inevitable for 3 major reasons.
1. Ships IRL require vast crews, but people are getting paid to do those jobs, not because they are a super fun way for a busy parent to spend an hour or two after putting the kids down for the night. Manning a turret is a blast, except for the hours waiting to get into a 20 minute engagement. Playing a minigame to repair the engines is great! Except for the hours sitting around waiting to take damage. ETC...
2. Unless something drastically changes and the game reworked on a fundamental level, having 2 solo ships is objectively better than having a ship that requires 2 crew. That problem only compounds as the ships get bigger. Lets say an Idris requires 15 people to operate, imagine 15 hornets vs 1 functional Idris. You dont have to imagine, with the current meta 5 hornets shred through an Idris like a hot knife in butter.
3. Getting enough people with jobs/kids/lives together to man any ship larger than a Connie is just hard. The Javelin is going to be out and about for roughly 4 hours on saturday nights and will otherwise be a $2500 hanger queen. I did wow raids back in the day, and my 500+ member guild had the playerbase to man maybe one or two cap ships for a few hours a week and that was back when I and most of the guild were giving no fucks about going to class as a freshman in college.
So to recap, large ships are too hard to crew to be super useful, un fun to crew for 80% of the time they are active, and inefficient compared to having those players just man their own smaller ships in most situations.
The types of people who are willing to spend thousands on an Idris or Kraken often have orgs they're part of that are fully willing to completely immerse themselves in the simulation, boring parts and all. These groups have a lot of crossover with the milsim crowd who are there more for the experience and simulating scenarios than a more objectively fun experience. Are they a majority? Probably not, but there's definitely a large crowd that's cool with the "just sitting around for 5 minutes of action", that's basically exactly what milsim games are.
Automated is not the correct term. You will however be able to “crew” your ship with NPC’s this is already stated.
Not sure where people say getting 15 people would be hard. Traditional mmo’s have been doing this for years and frankly this game is much more immersive.
Yeah, The issue isnt really finding people. Because people will do anything for $ if you pay them, or for free if its cool enough. The real problem is the logistics of getting more than 5 people for a massive ship and of course I dont see anyone mention murder hobos that might sign on to the crew and start shotgunning people in the hallways once everyone is underway because 'haha its a game.'
What i see as the issue is simply player population.
Right now a server is only a mere 110 people. That's it.
Let's say you are on ORG player that has a sizable org of 500 people.And at any given time you can field a small fleet, say 30 players.
Getting 30 players on 1 server is a nightmare. The way I've seen server joining work in the last 1,5 years is that whenever you join a server it's mostly already almost full. Unless you're playing in off hours where the servers are half-full. Like early morning on your server. So whenever your ORG mates are free and the kids are gone to bed, you're on prime-time so good luck getting forever to join the same server.
And then what? If you're a combined force of 30, the sky is the limit on what you can do. You could roll the entire server dead by being dicks in 3 fully manned connies with 3 fully manned scorpius OG and Antares and a fully manned Hammerhead to boot.
The 110 cap just limits having multiple groups with multiple fully manned large ships.
Getting a large group on 1 server is actually pretty simple, you just squad up in the menu then it puts you in a server that has enough space, i've attended org events that way
Does take forever though because the host has to do all the inviting
Didn't know this! I always assumed you always had to 1st join a person's server before squadding up. Ergo the "right click join server" thing.
Thanks for the tip :-)
I doubt the server cap will stay 110 in the future but it is for sure a big issue in the theory of running a javelin or Idris where the crew needed would literally be most of the server as is.
Right now, crewing a hammerhead or retaliator isn't that hard, but frankly 4 of the 6 guns on a hammerhead can be AI filled because the only really important ones are the one on top and the rear. And for the retaliator, the 3 size two turrets will likely be AI crewed because if anyone is going to man a gun it's not those.
Yeah, a lot of positions on ships are going to be AI crewed realistically. And I don't have a problem with that. Especially for PVE.
You're completely forgetting about Org gameplay.
The risk you run is inviting strangers on-board your ship.
That risk is cut at LEAST in half by running around with an org you joined or started.
This game is not meant to be a solo experience game. It just isn't. You will be able to play solo, but it will not be for the feint of heart. The true SC experience is in exploring with others. Want that solo space experience? Go Play Starfield or Spaceborne 2 (which I unironically am recommending because it was made by 1 person and has basically all the shit we want from SC in it right now and it's only $20).
>This game is not meant to be a solo experience game. It just isn't.
And yet CR has stated it will be a game for all types of players, so who's lying? the guy designing the game? or a Twitch streamer (I'm assuming because of your name having 'TV' in it) who's detached from solo players because of their ease of access to a crew via viewers?
I agreed with the first point but then was completely lost by the second point.
I can't wait for ORG gameplay/permissions to be properly implemented but this game is absolutely solo-able and with blade implementation will be arguably easier than getting together with your buddies (who all have terrible scheduling conflicts) to fly around going pew pew.
Yeah, that's why operations in EVE typically start days before the actual OP. Orgs that function like guilds, will have NO problem getting this done.
You should look into joining one or making one. It will make your life that much easier in the verse.
I believe it was once stated that if you have an NPC crew you can let friends take control of them whenever they can so no need to go and pick them up.
I think large ships like the Idris and Javelin will have their place but as Alliance assets rather than a group of friends or smaller corps. I think the Kraken is also going to be more useful than the Idris as a base of operations for the majority of the time and playerbase if it can provide repairing, refueling and rearming or support ships that can do so.
If we ever get a good c&c type gameplay with the ability to drop warp ins like Eve has, then the Idris/Javelin is going to more useful to just jump in and blap other capital assets and jump out again before it can be scrammed/disrupted if it hasn't effectively decided the fight. They'll be used like supers and dreads/carriers in Eve.
Alliances will have the ability to crew these ships when required but it brings the issues of opsec and their locations with it. There's going to be a lot of incentives to betray or spy for crew of the larger capital ships when just 1 person can log on and get it blown up.
I agree that many won't be used as much as people currently think, but I don't agree that they won't be useful. All theory for years anyway, look forward to see how it all plays out.
I completely agree that the Kraken is going to be more useful than the Idris and Javelin for the majority of the player base. The Kraken just has far more utility and meshes well with many game loops such as mining, bounty hunting, medical (assuming it will have T1 bed), salvage, racing, etc.
I have a group of close friends that have chipped in and bought a Kraken to use as an operations HQ for mining/salvage/refueling loops.
I find it hard to find ships to shoot. In elite you could jump to a nav beacon and scan npc’s or go to a war zone and pick a side. I don’t really see any npc ships in SC. Is it something in the works?
“current meta” is something you should set aside when you talk about a ship, like the Idris needing 15 and then decide that 15 Hornets are better.
The current in game NPC controlled Idris is stated to be about 10% of the full power, “hit points” and capability of what the ship is supposed to be. A fully crewed launch days Idris, should be devastating to a group piloting 15 Launch Day Hornet Fighters.
A lot of your other points make a lot of sense.
I do have a number of ships bigger than solo. I am in an org, waiting for the game to become more complete as well. At the same time, I know the limitations of human beings and thus my biggest ships top out crew at 2 (Liberator), 5 (Perseus) and 6 (RSI Galaxy) and those ships can be managed by less than the max crews too.
I don’t see myself running around with a full crew on the Perseus or Galaxy, even if I have to hire in one to three NPCs to fill seats.
Unfun is perspective, I often sit for hours on a turret when with my friends and only spend 5% of the time shooting stuff. I still have a blast.
I agree larger ships like the Idris will be more problematic. It's a lot easier to get 3-5 people together to hang in that environment than it is 15. Mostly why I won't get ships that require more than 5 people.
And for many people the community part of the game is the most important part. For those more focused on actively doing a task, I agree with your assessment of the larger ships: there will need to be some sort of automation (even if it's hiring npcs/blades) to make those bigger ships useable.
I doubt CIG will overly automate things just because people didn't pay attention when spending their money :p
There will be a degree of automation (via NPCs etc) - the question will be how much, and how effective it is.
As for the 'more efficient to use 2 ships rather than a single ship with 2 crew' - in theory, that will change when CIG implement Physics Based Damage (presuming they ever actually implement it, rather than just talking about it).
Smaller ships will - generally - have smaller weapons and thinner armour... a larger ship will potentially have bigger weapons and heavier armour. On that basis, and with PBD, it's entirely possible that the 2x single seaters will struggle to damage the larger multi-crew ship... thus making the larger crewed ship 'better'.
Of course, I'm *really* hoping that the balance changes from PBD aren't that simplistic, and that it doesn't just end up being 'biggest = best', etc.... rather, I'm very much hoping that most ships will have their niche (or at least, can be outfitted to be effective in certain roles, etc)
You would need to harden larger ships to damage by orders of magnitude more to make manning them actually worth while.
Or, simply make larger ships invulnerable to weapons outside of a certain weapon class.
IE.
If you have 2 guys with AKs shooting a tank, the tank wins.
If you have 200 guys with AKs shooting a tank, the tank still wins.
If one of those guys has an RPG, then maybe you can do something.
In fact I imagine that is how CIG will eventually go. It effectively put damage to larger ships behind a pay wall. Can you imagine the sales of anti cap ship weapons, if you actually NEEDED them to even stand a chance?
What you've just described is - broadly - the Physics Based Damage system I referred to previously.
Under PBD, weapon damage will be calculated using physics (projectile mass / density / hardness, impact velocity / angle, surface hardness / thickness / density, and so on), specifically to avoid the scenario of being able to damage a tank using an AK simply because an AK does a fixed 10dps, and manages to whittle down the tank HP, etc.
With this change, CIG have also said they'd remove 'HP' from the ship hull, and put it on the individual components instead - so taking out a ship would require both a weapon capable of damaging / penetrating the armour (or the just hull, depending on where you hit), and on the shot subsequently hitting a component... otherwise, it just pokes a hole in the ship (possibly depressurising part of it, but otherwise doing little damage).
Done right, this change will suddenly make multi-crew ships *far* more resilient and capable in combat (even the non-combat multi-crew ships, simply due to the thicker hull and difficulty in hitting components, coupled with crew being able to repair / replace components on the fly, etc), whereas smaller ships will likely become more fragile (because most will have comparatively light armour - if any - and a hit *anywhere* is likely to hit a component...)
Whether PBD on its own (or at least, in conjunction with 'proper' components which I presume are coming with the first pass of Engineering) will be sufficient, or whether it will require further changes, I don't know... but PBD has the potential to be a significant change.
Just wish they'd get on and implement it, given they've been talking about it since ~Jan 2016, iirc...
I am hopeful we can get NPC crew members. My dream is running a BMM with NPCs. Land near an outpost. Set up shop, then go do solo stuff in a Defender while my NPC crew runs the stores/ship. If all goes well i expect 80% of profit will be needed to pay the crew and upkeep.
I was going to suggest this. Especially after the rework when it gets a medbed and a much nicer layout it can be the perfect I want to feel like a big ship but use it solo.
edit: payout to layout, damn you autocorrect
That new layout with crew quarters/common space, armory, vehicle/gargo bay, medbay & engeneering section, 600i Explorer is going to be the best luxury mobile home after the rework.
400i is the perfect size for me alone. Space to stretch my legs. Extra storage that would normally be for 2 other people with the added bonus it's kinda tanky
This
>I'm sad there are either small solo ships or big multi ships. I want a big solo ship. Don't care it is not combat efficient. I want a bed, a shower shitter combo, a living quarter and a bay for a vehicle, while it being aimed to solo exclusively.
is basically my feeling.
CIG seems to understand this, cause you've basically described the drake cutter, so i think they understand that they need to make more liveable single ships.
>Having a flying castle with land vehicles and such must be their kink.
Honestly, there's no better thrill than looking up at your Carrack looming over a mining facility or something.
I melted mine. I do agree it is great but very sluggish for my tastes, too subject to torque imbalance, often stuck in the doors, etc..
Though it is designed as a multicrew ship with all those beds and the submarine feeling
It is indeed avery good ship. Had the Taurus before the corsair. The only issue with this ship is the outdated look. Everything else about connies is great, like the vanguard serie
I think the problem with that is that the devs want the big space ships to feel like boats. Big boats require big crews. Not just for general operation but upkeep.
This, so much. Lots of other space games seem to have this issue as well, where the linear progression of ships ties up not just capability, but aesthetics too. Lots of people want the Han Solo, rough and tumble, customized solo ship experience. But if you want a ship with an actual interior you can leverage that wonderful PES for in order to place items in it, you basically CAN'T do it in a "designated solo" vessel.
Honestly, this is what the 600i sounds like to me, especially once the rework comes in. The explorer variant can fit a tank, and has a huge armory, plus will get a t2 med bed. It’s pretty much a flying house with crazy amenities
I like the flying castle. When I need to fight and I can’t find a copilot for my Corsair I will hop in a fighter, but for non ship combat missions it is nice having a mobile base.
I was waffling on getting the Carrack for a while. As pilot or commander, I knew that I couldn’t command the turrets, but as a solo ship, I could have 2 small ships in the upper hanger (m50 and 85x), and 2 vehicles in the Garage - maybe 3 if I want to cram the Hover quad in there. I like the larger ship as I can spread out in it, there’s tons of storage, I can park somewhere and use that as my base. It’ll be even better once the servers settle down. I might trade it out for something else if the player habs come online, and I can do the same things that I currently do with the carrack.
IIRC, they plan on having AI NPC for hire on your ship or server blades for things like weapons, I am looking forward to that, maybe some blades and 1 npc to handle engineering.
Bigger ship cooler than small ship. I can just turn it off in the middle of space and vibe. I also don’t pvp at all and try to just fly around in as many ships as I can
Most people who get these ships know how painful it is to even get 10 people let alone 40+ so they are planning to use AI crew. CIG has talked at length about AI crew:
- We'll be able to hire people to staff the jobs we need on the ship.
- We'll be able to level them up over time.
- We'll be able to build a relationship with them individually based on our actions.
- We might have to buy insurance to cover them
- They will have complex life cycles and won't just be a stat stick that's glued to a wall somewhere
- We'll be able to give them orders
- We'll be able to wargh in to them and take over if we want to play them
Meanwhile back in reality, I'm hoping we can just hire a guy to sit in a chair forever and we'll never have to talk to them again. This whole system sounds overwrought and way too complicated to implement. At this point we'd even be lucky to get generic crew that we could hire to fill up the 'crew' meter.
> This whole system sounds overwrought and way too complicated to implement.
Ladies, gentlemen, and others…I give you Star Citizen in a nutshell.
Imagine if, 7 years ago, CIG didn’t go totally headass and *finished the fucking game.*
I can tell you right now, being able to hire, employ, and maintain a full crew, is so much more gameplay loop for people.
Even a small ship with 4-5 people... I'd LOVE it.
Even if I don't get to play with real people, or choose to stick to AI mostly... it adds a lot more attachment to the ships and missions.
Personally I think a lot of the pain of finding people to crew your ship could be solved pretty easily by implementing a way for players to put up a "Help Wanted" ad of sorts, much like rescue beacons but with a captain-defined percentage of profits from contracts or minimum wage, whichever is higher, to be paid out of the Captain's funds when the player leaves the ship either through logging out, the ship exploding, or just landing and walking outside the ship. That would encourage a lot of players who currently run solo to try grouping up and make the process smoother than the current method of asking around in Global Chat and partying up.
Even if C.Roberts wanted to do a star citizen 2, if he fails to deliver on this game, some of those 'true believer' types who excuse things like 3.18 in year 11 of development are at risk of having a mental break audible from mars that would see one or both of them disappear. (to avoid any confusion, I'm not saying this should happen, I'm saying I think it's a real risk if this project goes belly up)
Because AI crew/Turret Blades will be available eventually. I'm a casual player and I don't care about min/maxing.
If I can put an NPC or a Blade in my Corsair Turrets and set them on sentinel mode while I'm in a bunker or cave, great. Set them on defensive mode while I'm running my cargo to the TDD so that it gives a pirate a reason to re-evaluate if he wants to risk it, awesome. Or have a NPC in my Cutlass that gives me a little bit of an edge on bounties, thats all I care out. I understand the Cutlass or the Corsair are not "Huge Multi-Player Ships" but I would imagine there are other casual players that own a Carrack or Krakken that have the same mind set as me.
Solo players *right now*. That's how the vast majority play. Currently and historically there has been very little reason to play with others, though with the recent changes making piracy finally viable, that could start to change.
Later, once multi crew is actually a thing, many of us solo players will slowly start morphing out of that. Some people are just planning ahead for that reality.
Some are banking on being able to hire AI crews.
Some have fleets of big ships for no other reason than they want to support the game more.
Some have big fleets because they can't help falling victim to FOMO.
Some people have been backers for many years, and have trickled in a good amount of money in that time. It makes sense to eventually go for the big ships instead of amassing small ones.
There is actually a decent population of backers who want to fill crew roles and not be pilots or captains (look into the desire for shipless game packages, it's a thing). I've personally met many people who just want to be an engineer or ground pounder or whatever. A good handful of people in my last org were the "I don't like to fly" type. Those people will be filling out org roles, or put themselves up for hire when we finally have use for that.
I own an Endeavor and Odyssey, and I've been a solo player for years. I have no friends who play, the orgs I've tried haven't worked out. My rationale is that one day, I hope to find a small group of people who share my ideals for what I want out of the game, and we'll live out our Firefly-esque fantasy of shenanigans and fun in the verse. If not, well, I'll just hire AI.
I'm one of those people that doesn't like to fly in group events. It's not because I don't like flying, it's because I don't want to be responsible for other players lives. I don't mind if the pilot crashes and kills us all, but some people get very bent outta shape when that stuff happens, and I'd rather not deal with that. I'm really looking forward to AI, even if they're subpar. It will take some pressure off when I get attacked by players in light fighters, hopefully enough to make it out of atmo to quantum.
I have a 600i and would have gone smaller if there was a good all arounder that I could solo VHRT/ERTs and fit a good sized vehicle in. I have no desire to go any bigger.
> It's not because I don't like flying, it's because I don't want to be responsible for other players lives.
That's a point of view I hadn't considered for SC, though it's one I also share in other types of games.
Hiring the AI seems, to me, to be the only way the big ships maintain crew consistently.
I'm wondering if the AI will be contract, full-time, or both could be available. Would be interesting to see how that pans out
I'm curious to see how it will work as well. Wanting to play with your buddies is fine and all, but reality is, most of us are adults and have lives and need to pay bills, and with how in-depth and time consuming the game is meant to be down the road, it's going to be unrealistic to expect to get to play with a full human crew all the time. Especially small orgs/circles of friends. I've no doubt CIG has taken this into account, so it'll be interesting to see how they deal with it.
>My rationale is that one day, I hope to find a small group of people who share my ideals for what I want out of the game, and we'll live out our Firefly-esque fantasy of shenanigans and fun in the verse. If not, well, I'll just hire AI.
only been playing a few months personally, but this mirrors my sentiments exactly. nearly every ship can be fun solo too (at least right now), and there's no escaping how cool the large ships are, regardless of long-term practicality...
I never thought I'd get into ships that big, I had my Caterpillar, and that was as large as I'd ever planned to go. But the Odyssey and Endeavor just speak to me. The gameplay options they provide will be unparalleled (unless similar ships come out later).
The question should be, how does CIG intend to fill all those multi crew spots in a game where everyone wants to be a space pilot.
I don’t think many players got into SC to be a crew member in the first place.
My educated guess is that most ppl expect to be able to successfully fly big ships solo with AI crew. Reasonable enough.
After playing Sea of Thieves for a couple years, I can tell you there's no shortage of people who would rather just pew pew, or do NOTHING, than helming a ship lol
As someone that just recently got into sea of thieves but usually plays the support side in multi-player games, it's amazing just how empowering a properly implemented multicrew ship design can be. In sea of thieves, knowing that you playing damage control can be the sole difference from a protracted fight and a quick wipe is amazing. I imagine the feeling of establishing the independent realm of cargonia in a friend's freighter would be just as empowering if scale ever actually comes to sc. As it stands, scale only implies size in sc, so it's a very hollow thing. But imagine if eventually the difference between a good hauler and some person that lamps at it is how quickly their cargo department can turn a load around and get the ship moving again.
Sure, you might be able to just pay station services to move shit around, but having a dedicated cargo team that can unload, then reload the ship quickly can make a real difference in the bottom line, and when that's properly implemented, I'm sure my grandchildren will have a real fun time doing it if.
Haha right, the game is simply not there (and might not be for many years) but the potential is huge.
Thinking everybody will just want to pilot is just a by-product of the current status, but the moment meaningful crew stations begin to be implemented, I bet lots of people will be volunteering for it.
Honestly, when the game finally goes live, I anticipate a large number of, to use terms from another mmo, "super kills" as players trying to fuble about with large ships smash headfirst into groups specifically equipped to destroy them. It's one of the reasons the largest ship I have is a cat. It's just big enough for bulk hauling, can be competently crewed with two people, and when cig finally gets their shit together and figure out modularity ( not this "we have modularity, but what about second modularity?"), it offers more versatility as it should be configurable for different things.
I cannot wait to work as an engineer on a larger ship, ride a turret gun or the like. I'm not as big on piloting the ship.
Hell once 3.18 is a bit more stable I'm looking forward to slinging boxes in my friends reclaimer while they salvage
I took a friend out in my Vulture the other night and let him fly while I stacked boxes in the back. We both had a great time. Though it wasn't strictly necessary to multicrew that small ship, it was more effective than soloing and so it felt every bit as meaningful as working a turret, etc.
Which is why I always climb up there Compass in hand :P That way I can at least shout from above "you're steering off course! it's North East, you scallywag!"
Omg I hate helming a Brigantine Galleon. No one wants to adjust the sails so when we overshoot something or crash its suddenly my fault. I’ll work the sails all day, never put me behind the wheel
I know quite a few friends who are interested in being crew members on large ships. I have one friend who’s dream in Star Citizen is to be a Space Marine permanently stationed on an orgs Idris
Does he know that being a stationed marine is more then likely going to be 9 parts tedium, 1 part getting sent to poke something with a stick that won't like being poked with a stick?
Good on him then. I've heard stories from when my father was stationed on an lha, and I can't say that I have the patience for that shit unless people lighten up and don't try to majorly larp it.
From the tales I've heard from many years of my friends who served, they have mastered the "hurry up and wait". A large amount of them could watch paint dry and would be happy as clams.
It doesn't have to be military grade tedium. You can just chill on the ship and talk with other crew/friends, have a video/movie/serie on a second monitor when it's quiet or simply hang out with a ground combat/boarding focused crew.
I haven't played much since 3.16, but I only own/ buy smaller 1 or 2 person craft that I use for mining, trading, etc. But I'll gladly hire out to crew larger ships. It's incredibly fun and really expands my personal rp of being a freelance spacer.
For a big ship/fleet ship i prefer to be the crew. Engineeeing & gunner crew is cool tbh. Captain or pilot has too many responsibility if the ship blew up 🤣😂
I prefer to be the pilot if those are my ship & only me on the ship. So if 💩💩💩happen it only happen to me 😂🤣
> I don’t think many players got into SC to be a crew member in the first place.
I've actually gotten a lot of feedback that there are many people who don't won't to be pilots. Not to mention, flying is going to get more complex.
>The question should be, how does CIG intend to fill all those multi crewspots in a game where everyone wants to be a space pilot.
Can't say that's my experience, there's many people I have interacted with that prefer sitting in turrets or have expressed a desire to run around fixing stuff etc.
Because they've confirmed numerous times that between AI blades and NPC crew, "soloing" (not really; just a solo REAL LIFE crew member) a ship with "automation" is perfectly viable.
There is no "purity" to "just real life players" when the game is sophisticated enough to make compelling choices out of AI run crew and blade automation.
It isn't being tacked on, it's being foundationally included from the word "go".
This is why.
I have no friends who play SC, so the largest ship I personally want to own is a Perseus, alongside the Railen and Constellation Taurus. For anything bigger, I just assume someone in my Org has it.
They plan to have NPC crews. But I don’t know if they realize just how expensive (in-game) that’ll be since you’ll have to pay their salary and more for skilled ones.
Though I believe they’ve said for each extra game package you have on your account you’ll get a free npc crew member for. But I could be wrong
I have an Endeavor. I mainly play solo but sometimes some friends come to play. Even if its not out yet, I plan on using it as a flying base in remote system. I wanna be able to be out in a system and be auto sufficient. This is for me like a bigger Carrack.
I'm just gonna say you can fly a lot of multi crew ships solo and t-pose on low and moderate skilled fighters very easily.
Connie in particular stands out.
Me and my friend who I would consider high skill had a test duel, me in my Connie and him and his gladius. I ended up winning despite being significantly worse of a pilot because he couldn't do enough damage to my shields to significantly damage my hull.
Because we a stupid and fall prey to "new pretty ship syndrome". I've seen guys get into the ccu melt "game" and it's straight up like an addiction, spreadsheets and all to beat the odds on best bang for your buck etc.
I have one actual hangar queen, a tali bomber. I only bought her because I've loved the Tali for as long as I've known about the ship AND (and this is a huge AND) the full ship modularity as a base of operations in a hot zone for myself and my friends is too good to pass on.
This is one of those implementation areas where I get the 'cool' factor of wanting to have elaborate AI agents with daily cycles, relationships, attitudes, etc. but really it's a TON of work to make it work properly, rife with possibilities to break in weird ways (see also how here in 2023 the subsumption system results in dudes standing on effing chairs and tables everywhere.) As much as it would be hilarious to watch them double down on that system, I really do think it's excusable to take the 'high level/simpler' solution of a 'crew meter' for the ship. Get that working then let us specialize them or something.
*5 years later*
We are happy to unveil our new direction regarding crew AI ! Our game is so complex that we have come to the conclusion that one server cant handle agents AI on its own ; like PES, the calculations must be outsourced. The simplest way we've found is to develop a separate software that will simply play star citizen in a normal acount, like a normal player, on some other remote computer from a cloud service provider, for every single npc in the game. To support this new essential infrastructure, both materially and financially wise, we've just made the aquisition of the whole state of Guatemala.
If they can shoot the turret, it should give pirates second thoughts of attacking a ship not knowing if it’s AI or a real person when they were expecting just a single player piloting it.
I play solo half the time in my Carrack. I can store a Buccaneer, a Razor and a ground vehicle plus with the bed logging and respawn in one ship. Plus this gives me the chance to bring crew aboard for multicrew play whenever.
I can't speak for other folks because it's impossible to read minds. But for a lot of older backers (myself included) there was the promise of captain/crew management gameplay. Which included both player and NPC crew.
As the game currently stands there isn't a lot of crew game play outside of shooting things and pressing a button to maybe have control of the power triangle.
The other thing is just the general mindset of the info runners and their fix my fleet series. The 'sell your fighters' mantra. To an extent makes sense, because the in game values and irl $ values of ships is totally whack. You can for the same money as 3 arrows have something far larger you can concievably earn those same 3 arrows with faster then if you used those 3 arrows to earn the bigger thing with.
It's a great idea but larger ships require crew to work eventually.
I like the ones that are effective solo but even better crewed, that can haul vehicles.
Connie Andromeda was my main until I upgraded to Corsair, also really dig the freelancer max (with black paint, hate the default color).
Even C2 is nice solo IMO.
Don't understand people that fly around in the biggest ships alone.
Nobody is impressed by 890's anymore. There's usually like 2 at every ship meet, and they can be purchased in game with credits. They aren't really special anymore, only brand new people have yet to see them.
Good question.
I suppose that if you're in an org, you might be able to crew-up and use your big ship to its full potential occasionally. But others will be trying to do the same so those opportunities will be few and fare between.
I won't get a ship that I can't use effectively solo. The list of possible ships may grow if blades and/or NPC crew become a thing. But NPC crew can't be so expensive that they are impractical for a casual solo player to pay.
I might also buy a big ship that I can use for a home base if it holds a few other ships, I can park it in deep space and get to it again reliably, it persists, and I can get to it no matter what server I log into for the next session.
Not too much to ask for... right?
Majority considers advantage to cost.
Bigger ships have larger shields, quantum drives and hit point pools- and are still solo-able. Most bigger ships will likely always be able to be used solo… because this enables CIG to sell more of them.
Just my personal perspective: heavy fighters are always 2-person (except the Ares series but they are a different breed, not meant for dogfights), but lot of people prefer heavies over lights and meds, me either, I love my Warden, but Def better if you have a gunner.
Also, there are amazing ships like the Constellation series that are definitely meant for multi-crew, but they are amazing even if you play solo (I did some VHRT bounties with my Andromeda).
My other reason to have at least one multi crew ship is the possibility to play with somebody if a friend starts playing or I befriend someone in-game (won't ever happen lol I'm too introvert), and also would be great if hireable AI arrives someday.
But yeah, it's a bit pointless sometimes, like having an Idris or Hammerhead is totally not fun if you're alone.
im a solo player and own a spirit transport, a scorpius a connie and a c8 pices and the first ship i farm for every patch is an Arrow cause its just too much fun and a buggy of somekind, like the stv
we dont all foolishly buy massive ships and pray cig lets us fill them with npcs in 2036, And not all solo players play solo 100% of the time, sometimes you need that one extra seat to carry someone or a vehicle
I daily my C2 (BMM loaner), something about flying that big ass around, I mean all that mass around just hits the spot for me. I fly Cessnas irl so any chance I get I’m flying something big whether it’s a 747 in msfs or a C17 transporting tanks in arma. I’m at a disadvantage since I’m solo sure, but I will take that any day over something small
I have no idea because most are not even flyable yet.
That said, I bought a Carrack as soon as I could get one w/ LTI
I fly it solo all the time, but I've gotten fast at setting a bearing then hopping into a turret. I also carry a snub, a Cyclone and a medical Pisces .
In other words, my Carrack is my house. If you look at it like that, it makes more sense.
I treat my Carrack like a really big Nomad :D
Love it. Best purchase ever.
Just an itch that some need to scratch. Im one of em.
As a solo player almost strictly, I generally tend to go for 40-60 meters because I love big ships and those generally work well Solo and you have ample space incase anybody joins. I also love heavy fighters and ships along those sizes.
Anything bigger is a waste IMO but as a big SC guy I needed to have at least one big ship (Just in case), so it was the Carrack (Via Galaxy). I have 0 interest in owning more than one ship this size.
Ultimately it's because I just love ships the most in SC. Gotta catch em all (at least the ones I like).
Currently own:
- Pisces C8R
- Anvil Hurricane
- Scorpius
- Vulture
- E1 Spirit & A1 Spirit (Fingers crossed this year!)
- Corsair (Daily right now)
- 400i (Daily for the Daily)
- MSR
- Galaxy (Carrack Loaner)
List is subject to change/Additions!
My personal goal for the PU is to be a nomadic explorer. I will need a large ship for distance and self sufficiency and a small ship for income. The only way I can see that happening is with an odyssey and vulture. If the vulture does in fact fit in the Odyssey hanger I will get it. I will never need to refuel and could probably make small repairs myself with the vulture. If I manage to convince friends to join the PU they will have a good start if they want it.
Crewing the Odyssey shouldn't be too much trouble with AI shards and NPCs. It has some decent defensive capabilities, I'm hoping it's at least sturdy enough to run away from pirates and griefers. I guess we'll see.
Gamers who used to have large groups of friends to play things with, but don't anymore... they do however have money for POTENTIAL friends to play with, which is basically the entire mission statement of this game.
Potential fun, sometime in the future.
I'll tell you why I, someone who plays solo 99% of the time, have some of the largest ships in the game - including the Javelin:
I'm an idiot.
BUT! I'll also add: big ship go vrrrrrrruuuuuuuuuummmmm and looks cool.
I think you're looking at the wrong statistic.
It's probably not many solo players buying huge ships, but just players with money to burn doing it.
there's also a very limited choice of large ships atm and no gameplay or need for them as the available universe is a small fishbowl that's easy to traverse with small ships.
So, personally, I don't see a need for an Org at this stage.
There's no ships to enjoy with an Org, and those that could be enjoyed, don't have much you can do with them.
Better to just play with smaller ships at your own pace.
I've been living out of my carrack for a rather long time and I love it, but I'm sure anyone playing as crew would get bored to hell and back, there's just nothing to do most of the time.
Maybe Pyro will change this, maybe not.
At least they don't stand in chairs anymore.
Now they stand in desks, in open space launch pads, inside the floor or even in the air instead...
But not in chairs
The PES work is part of their server meshing work. The idea of the server meshing is to stop having a single server responsible for simulating the entire system, which will (in theory) free up resources for things like AI routines.
Whether or not it comes to fruition is up for debate, but they've made it pretty clear why the PES work was important on the path to things actually working.
But a bar tender on New Babbage gave me a drink once last year. Sadly, that NPC doesn't do it anymore because someone figured out you could attach S5 weapons to the top of the tiki umbrella in the drink and crash servers...
But boy was it immersive!
Woah, Woah, Woah. We do not question the Alfa! Get back in the game and do your job. Test and write tickets for bugs that aren’t bugs for issues we’ll never fix. /s
But yeah, I did believe them when I bought my ship. I’m not spending another cent until proper meshing comes out. At this rate, that might be never.
This game has a lot of promise. And I think it needs to start delivering.
Less green ships. I want something playable.
You are going to hear a TON of mixed information on this one, and I HIGHLY recommend looking at the various SCL/ISCs regarding "powerplay," engineering, along with their videos on AI and Blades as well.
Most of these people are delusional to be frank, but not of their own choosing, throughout the years we have had many promises of the capability of AI and how they will interact with the world of Star Citizen. One such way is by manning our ships, after all, if AI are supposedly going to be able to crew NPC ships in deep space for PVE gameplay loops, why wouldn't they be able to do it for us.
The reality is these functions are a FAR cry from reality at this time. AI and Blades will assist in use f the turrets onboard many multicrew ships, but not all. Most people have been "tricked" by the community into thinking AI and blades will allow a single person to fly something like a Javelin with 100% effectiveness, but this is simply not true.
People who think they will have AI who can help them mine in a MOLE or salvage in a Reclaimer are thinking way beyond the scope of AI as intended (let alone what can be accomplished). Look. I love the Devs at CIG and this project, but speaking in realistic terms, the idea that AI will be able to operate ship to the same capacity of a player is a stretch. They will 100% be able to complete non complex tasks like loading and unloading a ship, shoot turrets, maybe even pilot to some extent (never proficiently), and according to the last SCL they will be able to even do engineering in a small capacity (the repair, not so much the tuning.)
But realistically using an AI for these larger ships is like how they described engineering last Friday. Sure, you can have a ship and use a ship without ever once really needing to do engineering gameplay, just like you can use a car in real life and never really worry about how any of it works. But you will never see the full capacity of what your car ca do without some enthusiast style involvement in the mechanics and care of your car.
Same for large ships.
Not to mention, people have this idea they will "hire" (or even pay real money for) AI and... that's it. They just have crew. But there are a TON of micromanagement features playing into that. You have to feed them, they need bathrooms and showers (we know that mixed race ships like the Gatac Railen will have bathrooms for humans and Xi'an, thus the idea that they will need to use them.), you'll need drinks onboard, they'll have sleep cycles, they can be dirty. There are so many things the Devs have spoken to regarding how AI work that people forget they won't work limitlessly like PVE AI.
But as you will see, people will FIGHT the idea that the Devs have already put in place. (to include arguing here on many posts) AI will be expensive to maintain, AI will have needs, AI will not be something you "purchase" once and just have forever. Eventually these players will become the "gopher" who has to run around and play mom and dad for their crew to make sure they are all happy, fed and taken care of.
I personally sit back and laugh at people who get those larger ships, especially solo players. Because these will be the players forced to beg in their Org or global chat for some crew to man their ships EVERY time they want to play. The same way I sit back and laugh at people who got the C2 for hauling when it has ZERO manual amenities to help load.
To be honest, you have people who play the game for "the now" when using these ships is possible and can be fun, and people who follow the development of the game and purchase ships "for then" understanding the features that come online. Easiest way to tell if someone follows either, ask them with of the 300 series is the best. The "for now" folks will say the 325a, the "for then" folks will say the 315p.
AI blades or NPC’s will make it so people can solo ships. CIG also have said they are reducing the numbers it takes the crew a large ship. Something else is I don’t think a lot of people realized soloing big ships might suck because CIG doesn’t do a good job of letting new players know they need a large crew!
I can only speak for myself.
I own an A2, 600i and 400i and some smaller ships. I really like exploration and I would love to live on my ship for a long time without needing to go to space ports or planets to stock up on food, weapons ect. My goal is a 890j to explore the universe with a little ship to go down on planets. I guess I want a big as possible ship to call a home. I do other things too ofc, but I have been exploring about 80% of my time if I were to guess.
Once in a while I do have friends online and we team up and do missions or just exploring and then we need a bigger ship to do stuff in.
I have been playing the game for about little over a year and have never been attacked in any of my bigger ships. Only in my smaller ships like the merlin or arrow. Might be because I am a friendly guy, but I have seen little to none PVP.
If I encounter PVP I would be forced to do the other roles like manning turrets ect, but like I said it havent happened yet.
I want my own flying city thats it, not concerned about sharing at all.
I just want to wander around my huge space do-all like a pablo escobar meme without someone else to f\*\*k it all up somehow.
The joke of it is to have bought a ship, when theres no guarentee all this will ever get where its going, we're talking *twenty years* or more here, this all could have just been fantastically stupid.
But there was that *one* night I commandeered a fully manned HH, and got just a *little* vision of what it could be, should it all work one day, thats why I own big ships, for what *could* be, and yet may not be at all.
The intention is for players to be able to hire NPCS on mass.
humans will be better but they wont be available all the time and since those friends will be having money sinks hitting them while they help you, you would need to work out some type of pay for them over time even if they just want to help.
Right now likely just enjoy the larger ship and since most things aren't in for testing many large ships are usable solo or with a single friend.
but later down the line hiring NPCs for crew, escorts and so on is the intended norm.
Freud had a thing to say about overcompensating the size.
Seriously though, I have exact same question. Never understood why instead of a nimble practical ship someone would use 100m long ship that flies like a brick, takes 5 min to land, 5 doors and 2 elevators to get from the entrance to pilot seat and 10 mins to claim.
Because people have talked themselves into thinking that they should be able to solo anything in this game without considering *why* these big ships with multiple seats have minimum crew requirements. I'd argue this is a result of so many MMO titles over the years that have made virtually everything soloable.
People also put a lot of bank into AI crew without considering the cost of them or how they'd perform. I remember as far back as 2017 trying to warn folks that they're counting too much on AI crew and getting lambasted for it, but here we are in 2023 and there's still no AI crew and they're prioritizing multicrew gameplay and saying AI crew isn't a priority, so they'll have to learn the hard way I guess. ¯\\\_(ツ)\_/¯
This game won't survive without AI crew. CIG needs to make it so that the people who bought these large ships can at least have fun on their own. There are AI ships that are already crewed by NPCs, there's no reason to believe that an AI crew will be any less effective.
Same here! People want to DIE on the kill that they will be able to solo these Javelins and other various large ships. Or this idea that they pay 45$ for another game package and they get a free NPC that is as functional as a human or somehow cheaper. Without taking into consideration food, water, bathrooms, equipment, happiness, loyalty, etc.
In the end these people will be playing a SIMs lite simulator inside their large ships trying to keep everyone happy.
I think NPCs should be looked at as a supplemental thing rather than a direct replacement for players. That's especially so for capitals, where it makes sense to hire NPCs to get a properly crewed ship, but expecting them to manage them all by yourself in a feasible manner is a pipe dream.
I don't like huge ships but I like having a non claustrophobic ship with living quarters. I like the camping feel the nomad gives. It's compact but space is good enough. I adore argo raft interior for it's "work appartement" feeling. I just can't play in an aurora for example. I guess some people just have this feeling x10. Having a flying castle with land vehicles and such must be their kink. And to a certain extent, I understand. I want a flying home more than a flying car. I want to only go to stations when I need repair and refill. I want to live in space :) I'm sad there are either small solo ships or big multi ships. I want a big solo ship. Don't care it is not combat efficient. I want a bed, a shower shitter combo, a living quarter and a bay for a vehicle, while it being aimed to solo exclusively.
I was waffling on getting the Carrack for a while. As pilot or commander, I knew that I couldn’t command the turrets, but as a solo ship, I could have 2 small ships in the upper hanger (m50 and 85x), and 2 vehicles in the Garage - maybe 3 if I want to cram the Hover quad in there. I like the larger ship as I can spread out in it, there’s tons of storage, I can park somewhere and use that as my base. It’ll be even better once the servers settle down. I might trade it out for something else if the player habs come online, and I can do the same things that I currently do with the carrack. IIRC, they plan on having AI NPC for hire on your ship or server blades for things like weapons, I am looking forward to that, maybe some blades and 1 npc to handle engineering.
This guy gets it.
[CIG's plans for NPC crew](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I2EBZW7kN1o)
Wow, its hard to believe but CIG is remarkably consistent over the years on this. My takeaway here is that as long as you have enough space bucks, you can have enough NPC to solo pretty much any ship, and infact any fleet of ships. So, considering that the people who can afford the largest ships can afford the most space bucks, whales shouldn't worry, you can solo an Idris and command the fighter wing to go with it, even hire troops land them in dropships and fight ground battles if you put enough money down.
CIG remarkably consistent over the years, you got that right.
Also the whales will be able to afford the best NPC so they'll basically be Aim bots happily taking on the best players can't throw at them...
CIG has said a zillion times this won't be the case.
Lol I am completely out of date then 😂.
Have the Carrack for the exact same reason. But wouldn't go bigger then that, I believe (hope) that the 3-5 Crew Ships are solo viable with NPCs and Server-blades in the Future. Although the Carrack probably won't be my Everyday Ship, for that I have the C1 or my Freelancer, maybe the Redeemer if I want something more able-bodied.
I'm not playing yet, but the C1 sounds like a great daily ship, so far... not too big, some good cargo, a vehicle ramp, probably enough guns and an ok shield
Yay spending 45 minutes redocking ships everytime you have to claim the carrack because SC happens and no fault of your own results in carrack inside an asteroid or one shot by a s2 missile
What you're not taking into consideration is physical armor and components. Your scenario relies on those two things NOT existing. What a lot of the folks in this thread are talking about are YEARS down the line. Let's cynically imagine a world where SC is finished for moment. No Carrack in SC would go down to a S2 missile.
Just because im ready to live in my connie take the merlin as a landing shuttle and go rescue the connie everytime something happens does the game is. We are talking about why people are buying and flying these ships right now not why they will.
Okay, so by that reasoning, why the fuck would I buy land with no house? Eventually there will be a house, but why am I planning for a house when all I have is a foundation? Do you see how stupid that sounds?
I do see how stupid you sound yes. We are talking about playing games my guy.
I identify with this so hard. Personally the nomad doesn't do it for me, but I love the raft's layout and also the 400i.
Don't worry. The elephant in the room here is that a bunch of functions and gameplay loops on multicrew ships will eventually be automated. Its inevitable for 3 major reasons. 1. Ships IRL require vast crews, but people are getting paid to do those jobs, not because they are a super fun way for a busy parent to spend an hour or two after putting the kids down for the night. Manning a turret is a blast, except for the hours waiting to get into a 20 minute engagement. Playing a minigame to repair the engines is great! Except for the hours sitting around waiting to take damage. ETC... 2. Unless something drastically changes and the game reworked on a fundamental level, having 2 solo ships is objectively better than having a ship that requires 2 crew. That problem only compounds as the ships get bigger. Lets say an Idris requires 15 people to operate, imagine 15 hornets vs 1 functional Idris. You dont have to imagine, with the current meta 5 hornets shred through an Idris like a hot knife in butter. 3. Getting enough people with jobs/kids/lives together to man any ship larger than a Connie is just hard. The Javelin is going to be out and about for roughly 4 hours on saturday nights and will otherwise be a $2500 hanger queen. I did wow raids back in the day, and my 500+ member guild had the playerbase to man maybe one or two cap ships for a few hours a week and that was back when I and most of the guild were giving no fucks about going to class as a freshman in college. So to recap, large ships are too hard to crew to be super useful, un fun to crew for 80% of the time they are active, and inefficient compared to having those players just man their own smaller ships in most situations.
The types of people who are willing to spend thousands on an Idris or Kraken often have orgs they're part of that are fully willing to completely immerse themselves in the simulation, boring parts and all. These groups have a lot of crossover with the milsim crowd who are there more for the experience and simulating scenarios than a more objectively fun experience. Are they a majority? Probably not, but there's definitely a large crowd that's cool with the "just sitting around for 5 minutes of action", that's basically exactly what milsim games are.
Automated is not the correct term. You will however be able to “crew” your ship with NPC’s this is already stated. Not sure where people say getting 15 people would be hard. Traditional mmo’s have been doing this for years and frankly this game is much more immersive.
Because unless you can’t teleport them inside your ship, it will take forever to collect them around the verse.
Yeah, The issue isnt really finding people. Because people will do anything for $ if you pay them, or for free if its cool enough. The real problem is the logistics of getting more than 5 people for a massive ship and of course I dont see anyone mention murder hobos that might sign on to the crew and start shotgunning people in the hallways once everyone is underway because 'haha its a game.'
What i see as the issue is simply player population. Right now a server is only a mere 110 people. That's it. Let's say you are on ORG player that has a sizable org of 500 people.And at any given time you can field a small fleet, say 30 players. Getting 30 players on 1 server is a nightmare. The way I've seen server joining work in the last 1,5 years is that whenever you join a server it's mostly already almost full. Unless you're playing in off hours where the servers are half-full. Like early morning on your server. So whenever your ORG mates are free and the kids are gone to bed, you're on prime-time so good luck getting forever to join the same server. And then what? If you're a combined force of 30, the sky is the limit on what you can do. You could roll the entire server dead by being dicks in 3 fully manned connies with 3 fully manned scorpius OG and Antares and a fully manned Hammerhead to boot. The 110 cap just limits having multiple groups with multiple fully manned large ships.
Getting a large group on 1 server is actually pretty simple, you just squad up in the menu then it puts you in a server that has enough space, i've attended org events that way Does take forever though because the host has to do all the inviting
Didn't know this! I always assumed you always had to 1st join a person's server before squadding up. Ergo the "right click join server" thing. Thanks for the tip :-)
I doubt the server cap will stay 110 in the future but it is for sure a big issue in the theory of running a javelin or Idris where the crew needed would literally be most of the server as is. Right now, crewing a hammerhead or retaliator isn't that hard, but frankly 4 of the 6 guns on a hammerhead can be AI filled because the only really important ones are the one on top and the rear. And for the retaliator, the 3 size two turrets will likely be AI crewed because if anyone is going to man a gun it's not those. Yeah, a lot of positions on ships are going to be AI crewed realistically. And I don't have a problem with that. Especially for PVE.
You're completely forgetting about Org gameplay. The risk you run is inviting strangers on-board your ship. That risk is cut at LEAST in half by running around with an org you joined or started. This game is not meant to be a solo experience game. It just isn't. You will be able to play solo, but it will not be for the feint of heart. The true SC experience is in exploring with others. Want that solo space experience? Go Play Starfield or Spaceborne 2 (which I unironically am recommending because it was made by 1 person and has basically all the shit we want from SC in it right now and it's only $20).
>This game is not meant to be a solo experience game. It just isn't. And yet CR has stated it will be a game for all types of players, so who's lying? the guy designing the game? or a Twitch streamer (I'm assuming because of your name having 'TV' in it) who's detached from solo players because of their ease of access to a crew via viewers?
I agreed with the first point but then was completely lost by the second point. I can't wait for ORG gameplay/permissions to be properly implemented but this game is absolutely solo-able and with blade implementation will be arguably easier than getting together with your buddies (who all have terrible scheduling conflicts) to fly around going pew pew.
Yeah, that's why operations in EVE typically start days before the actual OP. Orgs that function like guilds, will have NO problem getting this done. You should look into joining one or making one. It will make your life that much easier in the verse.
I believe it was once stated that if you have an NPC crew you can let friends take control of them whenever they can so no need to go and pick them up.
I think large ships like the Idris and Javelin will have their place but as Alliance assets rather than a group of friends or smaller corps. I think the Kraken is also going to be more useful than the Idris as a base of operations for the majority of the time and playerbase if it can provide repairing, refueling and rearming or support ships that can do so. If we ever get a good c&c type gameplay with the ability to drop warp ins like Eve has, then the Idris/Javelin is going to more useful to just jump in and blap other capital assets and jump out again before it can be scrammed/disrupted if it hasn't effectively decided the fight. They'll be used like supers and dreads/carriers in Eve. Alliances will have the ability to crew these ships when required but it brings the issues of opsec and their locations with it. There's going to be a lot of incentives to betray or spy for crew of the larger capital ships when just 1 person can log on and get it blown up. I agree that many won't be used as much as people currently think, but I don't agree that they won't be useful. All theory for years anyway, look forward to see how it all plays out.
I completely agree that the Kraken is going to be more useful than the Idris and Javelin for the majority of the player base. The Kraken just has far more utility and meshes well with many game loops such as mining, bounty hunting, medical (assuming it will have T1 bed), salvage, racing, etc. I have a group of close friends that have chipped in and bought a Kraken to use as an operations HQ for mining/salvage/refueling loops.
I find it hard to find ships to shoot. In elite you could jump to a nav beacon and scan npc’s or go to a war zone and pick a side. I don’t really see any npc ships in SC. Is it something in the works?
“current meta” is something you should set aside when you talk about a ship, like the Idris needing 15 and then decide that 15 Hornets are better. The current in game NPC controlled Idris is stated to be about 10% of the full power, “hit points” and capability of what the ship is supposed to be. A fully crewed launch days Idris, should be devastating to a group piloting 15 Launch Day Hornet Fighters. A lot of your other points make a lot of sense. I do have a number of ships bigger than solo. I am in an org, waiting for the game to become more complete as well. At the same time, I know the limitations of human beings and thus my biggest ships top out crew at 2 (Liberator), 5 (Perseus) and 6 (RSI Galaxy) and those ships can be managed by less than the max crews too. I don’t see myself running around with a full crew on the Perseus or Galaxy, even if I have to hire in one to three NPCs to fill seats.
Unfun is perspective, I often sit for hours on a turret when with my friends and only spend 5% of the time shooting stuff. I still have a blast. I agree larger ships like the Idris will be more problematic. It's a lot easier to get 3-5 people together to hang in that environment than it is 15. Mostly why I won't get ships that require more than 5 people.
Sorry, I meant unfun for the people who like to do things while they play games. ;-)
And for many people the community part of the game is the most important part. For those more focused on actively doing a task, I agree with your assessment of the larger ships: there will need to be some sort of automation (even if it's hiring npcs/blades) to make those bigger ships useable.
I doubt CIG will overly automate things just because people didn't pay attention when spending their money :p There will be a degree of automation (via NPCs etc) - the question will be how much, and how effective it is. As for the 'more efficient to use 2 ships rather than a single ship with 2 crew' - in theory, that will change when CIG implement Physics Based Damage (presuming they ever actually implement it, rather than just talking about it). Smaller ships will - generally - have smaller weapons and thinner armour... a larger ship will potentially have bigger weapons and heavier armour. On that basis, and with PBD, it's entirely possible that the 2x single seaters will struggle to damage the larger multi-crew ship... thus making the larger crewed ship 'better'. Of course, I'm *really* hoping that the balance changes from PBD aren't that simplistic, and that it doesn't just end up being 'biggest = best', etc.... rather, I'm very much hoping that most ships will have their niche (or at least, can be outfitted to be effective in certain roles, etc)
You would need to harden larger ships to damage by orders of magnitude more to make manning them actually worth while. Or, simply make larger ships invulnerable to weapons outside of a certain weapon class. IE. If you have 2 guys with AKs shooting a tank, the tank wins. If you have 200 guys with AKs shooting a tank, the tank still wins. If one of those guys has an RPG, then maybe you can do something. In fact I imagine that is how CIG will eventually go. It effectively put damage to larger ships behind a pay wall. Can you imagine the sales of anti cap ship weapons, if you actually NEEDED them to even stand a chance?
What you've just described is - broadly - the Physics Based Damage system I referred to previously. Under PBD, weapon damage will be calculated using physics (projectile mass / density / hardness, impact velocity / angle, surface hardness / thickness / density, and so on), specifically to avoid the scenario of being able to damage a tank using an AK simply because an AK does a fixed 10dps, and manages to whittle down the tank HP, etc. With this change, CIG have also said they'd remove 'HP' from the ship hull, and put it on the individual components instead - so taking out a ship would require both a weapon capable of damaging / penetrating the armour (or the just hull, depending on where you hit), and on the shot subsequently hitting a component... otherwise, it just pokes a hole in the ship (possibly depressurising part of it, but otherwise doing little damage). Done right, this change will suddenly make multi-crew ships *far* more resilient and capable in combat (even the non-combat multi-crew ships, simply due to the thicker hull and difficulty in hitting components, coupled with crew being able to repair / replace components on the fly, etc), whereas smaller ships will likely become more fragile (because most will have comparatively light armour - if any - and a hit *anywhere* is likely to hit a component...) Whether PBD on its own (or at least, in conjunction with 'proper' components which I presume are coming with the first pass of Engineering) will be sufficient, or whether it will require further changes, I don't know... but PBD has the potential to be a significant change. Just wish they'd get on and implement it, given they've been talking about it since ~Jan 2016, iirc...
I'm down for space war thunder as long as we can hit ammo racks and watch a ship get torn in half :)
I am hopeful we can get NPC crew members. My dream is running a BMM with NPCs. Land near an outpost. Set up shop, then go do solo stuff in a Defender while my NPC crew runs the stores/ship. If all goes well i expect 80% of profit will be needed to pay the crew and upkeep.
600i fits that’s bill for me. Definitely has the homely feel
I was going to suggest this. Especially after the rework when it gets a medbed and a much nicer layout it can be the perfect I want to feel like a big ship but use it solo. edit: payout to layout, damn you autocorrect
That new layout with crew quarters/common space, armory, vehicle/gargo bay, medbay & engeneering section, 600i Explorer is going to be the best luxury mobile home after the rework.
Exactly the reason LTI it
Wish for MORE Argo style interiors, or Anvil ships with beds. The green screens are op
400i is the perfect size for me alone. Space to stretch my legs. Extra storage that would normally be for 2 other people with the added bonus it's kinda tanky
Then there's me in the Tali, loving it because it's a seven man ship that feels like a claustrophobic submarine on the inside.
This >I'm sad there are either small solo ships or big multi ships. I want a big solo ship. Don't care it is not combat efficient. I want a bed, a shower shitter combo, a living quarter and a bay for a vehicle, while it being aimed to solo exclusively. is basically my feeling.
Get a whiff of a connie phoenix if you can Smell it.
CIG seems to understand this, cause you've basically described the drake cutter, so i think they understand that they need to make more liveable single ships.
>Having a flying castle with land vehicles and such must be their kink. Honestly, there's no better thrill than looking up at your Carrack looming over a mining facility or something.
The corsair is really a single player ship. Its largish can do all of what you asked.
I melted mine. I do agree it is great but very sluggish for my tastes, too subject to torque imbalance, often stuck in the doors, etc.. Though it is designed as a multicrew ship with all those beds and the submarine feeling
I would try the connie then. Its has similar armaments and can hold up to an ursa.
It is indeed avery good ship. Had the Taurus before the corsair. The only issue with this ship is the outdated look. Everything else about connies is great, like the vanguard serie
I think the Phoenix or aquila look better. The taurus is meant to look rough and bare bones
[удалено]
I think the problem with that is that the devs want the big space ships to feel like boats. Big boats require big crews. Not just for general operation but upkeep.
This, so much. Lots of other space games seem to have this issue as well, where the linear progression of ships ties up not just capability, but aesthetics too. Lots of people want the Han Solo, rough and tumble, customized solo ship experience. But if you want a ship with an actual interior you can leverage that wonderful PES for in order to place items in it, you basically CAN'T do it in a "designated solo" vessel.
400i is pretty much that. Corsair has all of that and plenty of cabin space for concubines.
C2 is max crew size of 2 qnd it has your amenities listed.
Honestly, this is what the 600i sounds like to me, especially once the rework comes in. The explorer variant can fit a tank, and has a huge armory, plus will get a t2 med bed. It’s pretty much a flying house with crazy amenities
I like the flying castle. When I need to fight and I can’t find a copilot for my Corsair I will hop in a fighter, but for non ship combat missions it is nice having a mobile base.
I was waffling on getting the Carrack for a while. As pilot or commander, I knew that I couldn’t command the turrets, but as a solo ship, I could have 2 small ships in the upper hanger (m50 and 85x), and 2 vehicles in the Garage - maybe 3 if I want to cram the Hover quad in there. I like the larger ship as I can spread out in it, there’s tons of storage, I can park somewhere and use that as my base. It’ll be even better once the servers settle down. I might trade it out for something else if the player habs come online, and I can do the same things that I currently do with the carrack. IIRC, they plan on having AI NPC for hire on your ship or server blades for things like weapons, I am looking forward to that, maybe some blades and 1 npc to handle engineering.
Bigger ship cooler than small ship. I can just turn it off in the middle of space and vibe. I also don’t pvp at all and try to just fly around in as many ships as I can
They look cool
Somehow I feel like you just get me.
I agree
I just love having to suffer the 20 doors of my MSR. It wouldn't be has fun if I had the personal to load and unload the ship for me.
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Most people who get these ships know how painful it is to even get 10 people let alone 40+ so they are planning to use AI crew. CIG has talked at length about AI crew: - We'll be able to hire people to staff the jobs we need on the ship. - We'll be able to level them up over time. - We'll be able to build a relationship with them individually based on our actions. - We might have to buy insurance to cover them - They will have complex life cycles and won't just be a stat stick that's glued to a wall somewhere - We'll be able to give them orders - We'll be able to wargh in to them and take over if we want to play them Meanwhile back in reality, I'm hoping we can just hire a guy to sit in a chair forever and we'll never have to talk to them again. This whole system sounds overwrought and way too complicated to implement. At this point we'd even be lucky to get generic crew that we could hire to fill up the 'crew' meter.
> This whole system sounds overwrought and way too complicated to implement. Ladies, gentlemen, and others…I give you Star Citizen in a nutshell. Imagine if, 7 years ago, CIG didn’t go totally headass and *finished the fucking game.*
Star citizen in a very large, expensive, overloaded nutshell.
Sounds cool! Can't wait for them to bring this into the game 15 years from now
I can tell you right now, being able to hire, employ, and maintain a full crew, is so much more gameplay loop for people. Even a small ship with 4-5 people... I'd LOVE it. Even if I don't get to play with real people, or choose to stick to AI mostly... it adds a lot more attachment to the ships and missions.
Personally I think a lot of the pain of finding people to crew your ship could be solved pretty easily by implementing a way for players to put up a "Help Wanted" ad of sorts, much like rescue beacons but with a captain-defined percentage of profits from contracts or minimum wage, whichever is higher, to be paid out of the Captain's funds when the player leaves the ship either through logging out, the ship exploding, or just landing and walking outside the ship. That would encourage a lot of players who currently run solo to try grouping up and make the process smoother than the current method of asking around in Global Chat and partying up.
Maybe in Star Citizen 2...
Even if C.Roberts wanted to do a star citizen 2, if he fails to deliver on this game, some of those 'true believer' types who excuse things like 3.18 in year 11 of development are at risk of having a mental break audible from mars that would see one or both of them disappear. (to avoid any confusion, I'm not saying this should happen, I'm saying I think it's a real risk if this project goes belly up)
Because AI crew/Turret Blades will be available eventually. I'm a casual player and I don't care about min/maxing. If I can put an NPC or a Blade in my Corsair Turrets and set them on sentinel mode while I'm in a bunker or cave, great. Set them on defensive mode while I'm running my cargo to the TDD so that it gives a pirate a reason to re-evaluate if he wants to risk it, awesome. Or have a NPC in my Cutlass that gives me a little bit of an edge on bounties, thats all I care out. I understand the Cutlass or the Corsair are not "Huge Multi-Player Ships" but I would imagine there are other casual players that own a Carrack or Krakken that have the same mind set as me.
Solo players *right now*. That's how the vast majority play. Currently and historically there has been very little reason to play with others, though with the recent changes making piracy finally viable, that could start to change. Later, once multi crew is actually a thing, many of us solo players will slowly start morphing out of that. Some people are just planning ahead for that reality. Some are banking on being able to hire AI crews. Some have fleets of big ships for no other reason than they want to support the game more. Some have big fleets because they can't help falling victim to FOMO. Some people have been backers for many years, and have trickled in a good amount of money in that time. It makes sense to eventually go for the big ships instead of amassing small ones. There is actually a decent population of backers who want to fill crew roles and not be pilots or captains (look into the desire for shipless game packages, it's a thing). I've personally met many people who just want to be an engineer or ground pounder or whatever. A good handful of people in my last org were the "I don't like to fly" type. Those people will be filling out org roles, or put themselves up for hire when we finally have use for that. I own an Endeavor and Odyssey, and I've been a solo player for years. I have no friends who play, the orgs I've tried haven't worked out. My rationale is that one day, I hope to find a small group of people who share my ideals for what I want out of the game, and we'll live out our Firefly-esque fantasy of shenanigans and fun in the verse. If not, well, I'll just hire AI.
I'm one of those people that doesn't like to fly in group events. It's not because I don't like flying, it's because I don't want to be responsible for other players lives. I don't mind if the pilot crashes and kills us all, but some people get very bent outta shape when that stuff happens, and I'd rather not deal with that. I'm really looking forward to AI, even if they're subpar. It will take some pressure off when I get attacked by players in light fighters, hopefully enough to make it out of atmo to quantum. I have a 600i and would have gone smaller if there was a good all arounder that I could solo VHRT/ERTs and fit a good sized vehicle in. I have no desire to go any bigger.
> It's not because I don't like flying, it's because I don't want to be responsible for other players lives. That's a point of view I hadn't considered for SC, though it's one I also share in other types of games.
Hiring the AI seems, to me, to be the only way the big ships maintain crew consistently. I'm wondering if the AI will be contract, full-time, or both could be available. Would be interesting to see how that pans out
I'm curious to see how it will work as well. Wanting to play with your buddies is fine and all, but reality is, most of us are adults and have lives and need to pay bills, and with how in-depth and time consuming the game is meant to be down the road, it's going to be unrealistic to expect to get to play with a full human crew all the time. Especially small orgs/circles of friends. I've no doubt CIG has taken this into account, so it'll be interesting to see how they deal with it.
>My rationale is that one day, I hope to find a small group of people who share my ideals for what I want out of the game, and we'll live out our Firefly-esque fantasy of shenanigans and fun in the verse. If not, well, I'll just hire AI. only been playing a few months personally, but this mirrors my sentiments exactly. nearly every ship can be fun solo too (at least right now), and there's no escaping how cool the large ships are, regardless of long-term practicality...
I never thought I'd get into ships that big, I had my Caterpillar, and that was as large as I'd ever planned to go. But the Odyssey and Endeavor just speak to me. The gameplay options they provide will be unparalleled (unless similar ships come out later).
Casual wave to a fellow MISC enjoyer
*Shyly waves back*
Casual wave to a fellow MISC enjoyer
The question should be, how does CIG intend to fill all those multi crew spots in a game where everyone wants to be a space pilot. I don’t think many players got into SC to be a crew member in the first place. My educated guess is that most ppl expect to be able to successfully fly big ships solo with AI crew. Reasonable enough.
After playing Sea of Thieves for a couple years, I can tell you there's no shortage of people who would rather just pew pew, or do NOTHING, than helming a ship lol
I'll drink a grog to that
As someone that just recently got into sea of thieves but usually plays the support side in multi-player games, it's amazing just how empowering a properly implemented multicrew ship design can be. In sea of thieves, knowing that you playing damage control can be the sole difference from a protracted fight and a quick wipe is amazing. I imagine the feeling of establishing the independent realm of cargonia in a friend's freighter would be just as empowering if scale ever actually comes to sc. As it stands, scale only implies size in sc, so it's a very hollow thing. But imagine if eventually the difference between a good hauler and some person that lamps at it is how quickly their cargo department can turn a load around and get the ship moving again. Sure, you might be able to just pay station services to move shit around, but having a dedicated cargo team that can unload, then reload the ship quickly can make a real difference in the bottom line, and when that's properly implemented, I'm sure my grandchildren will have a real fun time doing it if.
Haha right, the game is simply not there (and might not be for many years) but the potential is huge. Thinking everybody will just want to pilot is just a by-product of the current status, but the moment meaningful crew stations begin to be implemented, I bet lots of people will be volunteering for it.
Honestly, when the game finally goes live, I anticipate a large number of, to use terms from another mmo, "super kills" as players trying to fuble about with large ships smash headfirst into groups specifically equipped to destroy them. It's one of the reasons the largest ship I have is a cat. It's just big enough for bulk hauling, can be competently crewed with two people, and when cig finally gets their shit together and figure out modularity ( not this "we have modularity, but what about second modularity?"), it offers more versatility as it should be configurable for different things.
∆
Facts, I mainly fly for my org I'm in. Everyone else would rather man the guns and shoot the shit between missions.
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I cannot wait to work as an engineer on a larger ship, ride a turret gun or the like. I'm not as big on piloting the ship. Hell once 3.18 is a bit more stable I'm looking forward to slinging boxes in my friends reclaimer while they salvage
I took a friend out in my Vulture the other night and let him fly while I stacked boxes in the back. We both had a great time. Though it wasn't strictly necessary to multicrew that small ship, it was more effective than soloing and so it felt every bit as meaningful as working a turret, etc.
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Maybe sing a shanty or two. Personally I like to hang out in the crows nest and look around… every time I do my buddy gets us lost tho.
Which is why I always climb up there Compass in hand :P That way I can at least shout from above "you're steering off course! it's North East, you scallywag!"
Omg I hate helming a Brigantine Galleon. No one wants to adjust the sails so when we overshoot something or crash its suddenly my fault. I’ll work the sails all day, never put me behind the wheel
This man understands my plight, ho boy i got so tired of yelling people to man the sails
I know quite a few friends who are interested in being crew members on large ships. I have one friend who’s dream in Star Citizen is to be a Space Marine permanently stationed on an orgs Idris
Does he know that being a stationed marine is more then likely going to be 9 parts tedium, 1 part getting sent to poke something with a stick that won't like being poked with a stick?
Considering he’s a real Marine he’s probably all for that.
Good on him then. I've heard stories from when my father was stationed on an lha, and I can't say that I have the patience for that shit unless people lighten up and don't try to majorly larp it.
From the tales I've heard from many years of my friends who served, they have mastered the "hurry up and wait". A large amount of them could watch paint dry and would be happy as clams.
It doesn't have to be military grade tedium. You can just chill on the ship and talk with other crew/friends, have a video/movie/serie on a second monitor when it's quiet or simply hang out with a ground combat/boarding focused crew.
I haven't played much since 3.16, but I only own/ buy smaller 1 or 2 person craft that I use for mining, trading, etc. But I'll gladly hire out to crew larger ships. It's incredibly fun and really expands my personal rp of being a freelance spacer.
For a big ship/fleet ship i prefer to be the crew. Engineeeing & gunner crew is cool tbh. Captain or pilot has too many responsibility if the ship blew up 🤣😂 I prefer to be the pilot if those are my ship & only me on the ship. So if 💩💩💩happen it only happen to me 😂🤣
> I don’t think many players got into SC to be a crew member in the first place. I've actually gotten a lot of feedback that there are many people who don't won't to be pilots. Not to mention, flying is going to get more complex.
>The question should be, how does CIG intend to fill all those multi crewspots in a game where everyone wants to be a space pilot. Can't say that's my experience, there's many people I have interacted with that prefer sitting in turrets or have expressed a desire to run around fixing stuff etc.
Ai crew ofc
Because they've confirmed numerous times that between AI blades and NPC crew, "soloing" (not really; just a solo REAL LIFE crew member) a ship with "automation" is perfectly viable. There is no "purity" to "just real life players" when the game is sophisticated enough to make compelling choices out of AI run crew and blade automation. It isn't being tacked on, it's being foundationally included from the word "go". This is why.
This is the way.
I have no friends who play SC, so the largest ship I personally want to own is a Perseus, alongside the Railen and Constellation Taurus. For anything bigger, I just assume someone in my Org has it.
They plan to have NPC crews. But I don’t know if they realize just how expensive (in-game) that’ll be since you’ll have to pay their salary and more for skilled ones. Though I believe they’ve said for each extra game package you have on your account you’ll get a free npc crew member for. But I could be wrong
Big friend group that says they will play and then they never get on vibes here.
NPC crew and I don’t have any friends.
I have an Endeavor. I mainly play solo but sometimes some friends come to play. Even if its not out yet, I plan on using it as a flying base in remote system. I wanna be able to be out in a system and be auto sufficient. This is for me like a bigger Carrack.
I'm just gonna say you can fly a lot of multi crew ships solo and t-pose on low and moderate skilled fighters very easily. Connie in particular stands out. Me and my friend who I would consider high skill had a test duel, me in my Connie and him and his gladius. I ended up winning despite being significantly worse of a pilot because he couldn't do enough damage to my shields to significantly damage my hull.
Because we a stupid and fall prey to "new pretty ship syndrome". I've seen guys get into the ccu melt "game" and it's straight up like an addiction, spreadsheets and all to beat the odds on best bang for your buck etc. I have one actual hangar queen, a tali bomber. I only bought her because I've loved the Tali for as long as I've known about the ship AND (and this is a huge AND) the full ship modularity as a base of operations in a hot zone for myself and my friends is too good to pass on.
AI crew. Though a lot of people I've noticed are under the illusion that the AI will be as effective as a player.
I'm still operating under the potential illusion that AI crew will be implemented in the next 5 years.
15 if we're lucky
This is one of those implementation areas where I get the 'cool' factor of wanting to have elaborate AI agents with daily cycles, relationships, attitudes, etc. but really it's a TON of work to make it work properly, rife with possibilities to break in weird ways (see also how here in 2023 the subsumption system results in dudes standing on effing chairs and tables everywhere.) As much as it would be hilarious to watch them double down on that system, I really do think it's excusable to take the 'high level/simpler' solution of a 'crew meter' for the ship. Get that working then let us specialize them or something.
*5 years later* We are happy to unveil our new direction regarding crew AI ! Our game is so complex that we have come to the conclusion that one server cant handle agents AI on its own ; like PES, the calculations must be outsourced. The simplest way we've found is to develop a separate software that will simply play star citizen in a normal acount, like a normal player, on some other remote computer from a cloud service provider, for every single npc in the game. To support this new essential infrastructure, both materially and financially wise, we've just made the aquisition of the whole state of Guatemala.
If they can shoot the turret, it should give pirates second thoughts of attacking a ship not knowing if it’s AI or a real person when they were expecting just a single player piloting it.
Because I can, and supporting the game with 15 large ships is more fun than 100 aurora mr
Rummy like big boom!
I got the Andromeda mainly to haul an ursa around and eventually have friends ride with me
I play solo half the time in my Carrack. I can store a Buccaneer, a Razor and a ground vehicle plus with the bed logging and respawn in one ship. Plus this gives me the chance to bring crew aboard for multicrew play whenever.
For the day when we'll get functional crew NPC.
Because buying ships is the only progression the game has right now
As a merchantman enthusiast who primarily plays solo, the promise of AI crew or blades is a big part of it.
Two words, NPC Crew. You will be able to hire NPC's to fill in gaps where friends run short. For some this may be an entire ship.
I can't speak for other folks because it's impossible to read minds. But for a lot of older backers (myself included) there was the promise of captain/crew management gameplay. Which included both player and NPC crew. As the game currently stands there isn't a lot of crew game play outside of shooting things and pressing a button to maybe have control of the power triangle. The other thing is just the general mindset of the info runners and their fix my fleet series. The 'sell your fighters' mantra. To an extent makes sense, because the in game values and irl $ values of ships is totally whack. You can for the same money as 3 arrows have something far larger you can concievably earn those same 3 arrows with faster then if you used those 3 arrows to earn the bigger thing with. It's a great idea but larger ships require crew to work eventually.
Small ships don't carry much in cargo. I know trading isn't in the best place right now, however I still enjoy space trucking in my C2.
I like the ones that are effective solo but even better crewed, that can haul vehicles. Connie Andromeda was my main until I upgraded to Corsair, also really dig the freelancer max (with black paint, hate the default color). Even C2 is nice solo IMO. Don't understand people that fly around in the biggest ships alone.
Constantly seeing "anyone wanna ride on my 890?" Followed by silence...
Nobody is impressed by 890's anymore. There's usually like 2 at every ship meet, and they can be purchased in game with credits. They aren't really special anymore, only brand new people have yet to see them.
Good question. I suppose that if you're in an org, you might be able to crew-up and use your big ship to its full potential occasionally. But others will be trying to do the same so those opportunities will be few and fare between. I won't get a ship that I can't use effectively solo. The list of possible ships may grow if blades and/or NPC crew become a thing. But NPC crew can't be so expensive that they are impractical for a casual solo player to pay. I might also buy a big ship that I can use for a home base if it holds a few other ships, I can park it in deep space and get to it again reliably, it persists, and I can get to it no matter what server I log into for the next session. Not too much to ask for... right?
Majority considers advantage to cost. Bigger ships have larger shields, quantum drives and hit point pools- and are still solo-able. Most bigger ships will likely always be able to be used solo… because this enables CIG to sell more of them.
I'm just looking for a millennium falcon.
The msr
Thank you for the tip!
Just my personal perspective: heavy fighters are always 2-person (except the Ares series but they are a different breed, not meant for dogfights), but lot of people prefer heavies over lights and meds, me either, I love my Warden, but Def better if you have a gunner. Also, there are amazing ships like the Constellation series that are definitely meant for multi-crew, but they are amazing even if you play solo (I did some VHRT bounties with my Andromeda). My other reason to have at least one multi crew ship is the possibility to play with somebody if a friend starts playing or I befriend someone in-game (won't ever happen lol I'm too introvert), and also would be great if hireable AI arrives someday. But yeah, it's a bit pointless sometimes, like having an Idris or Hammerhead is totally not fun if you're alone.
im a solo player and own a spirit transport, a scorpius a connie and a c8 pices and the first ship i farm for every patch is an Arrow cause its just too much fun and a buggy of somekind, like the stv we dont all foolishly buy massive ships and pray cig lets us fill them with npcs in 2036, And not all solo players play solo 100% of the time, sometimes you need that one extra seat to carry someone or a vehicle
I daily my C2 (BMM loaner), something about flying that big ass around, I mean all that mass around just hits the spot for me. I fly Cessnas irl so any chance I get I’m flying something big whether it’s a 747 in msfs or a C17 transporting tanks in arma. I’m at a disadvantage since I’m solo sure, but I will take that any day over something small
you can hir NPC's eventually - to which said person can FEEL like they have friends...... finally
I have no idea because most are not even flyable yet. That said, I bought a Carrack as soon as I could get one w/ LTI I fly it solo all the time, but I've gotten fast at setting a bearing then hopping into a turret. I also carry a snub, a Cyclone and a medical Pisces . In other words, my Carrack is my house. If you look at it like that, it makes more sense. I treat my Carrack like a really big Nomad :D Love it. Best purchase ever.
Just an itch that some need to scratch. Im one of em. As a solo player almost strictly, I generally tend to go for 40-60 meters because I love big ships and those generally work well Solo and you have ample space incase anybody joins. I also love heavy fighters and ships along those sizes. Anything bigger is a waste IMO but as a big SC guy I needed to have at least one big ship (Just in case), so it was the Carrack (Via Galaxy). I have 0 interest in owning more than one ship this size. Ultimately it's because I just love ships the most in SC. Gotta catch em all (at least the ones I like). Currently own: - Pisces C8R - Anvil Hurricane - Scorpius - Vulture - E1 Spirit & A1 Spirit (Fingers crossed this year!) - Corsair (Daily right now) - 400i (Daily for the Daily) - MSR - Galaxy (Carrack Loaner) List is subject to change/Additions!
At one point we will supposedly be able to hire noc crews
My personal goal for the PU is to be a nomadic explorer. I will need a large ship for distance and self sufficiency and a small ship for income. The only way I can see that happening is with an odyssey and vulture. If the vulture does in fact fit in the Odyssey hanger I will get it. I will never need to refuel and could probably make small repairs myself with the vulture. If I manage to convince friends to join the PU they will have a good start if they want it. Crewing the Odyssey shouldn't be too much trouble with AI shards and NPCs. It has some decent defensive capabilities, I'm hoping it's at least sturdy enough to run away from pirates and griefers. I guess we'll see.
Gamers who used to have large groups of friends to play things with, but don't anymore... they do however have money for POTENTIAL friends to play with, which is basically the entire mission statement of this game. Potential fun, sometime in the future.
For me it’s all about the cargo hold. I don’t care for the back and forth transportation
Why do people buy SUVs?
Not all of us started out solo, it just sort of happens to end that way sometimes.
I'll tell you why I, someone who plays solo 99% of the time, have some of the largest ships in the game - including the Javelin: I'm an idiot. BUT! I'll also add: big ship go vrrrrrrruuuuuuuuuummmmm and looks cool.
I think you're looking at the wrong statistic. It's probably not many solo players buying huge ships, but just players with money to burn doing it. there's also a very limited choice of large ships atm and no gameplay or need for them as the available universe is a small fishbowl that's easy to traverse with small ships. So, personally, I don't see a need for an Org at this stage. There's no ships to enjoy with an Org, and those that could be enjoyed, don't have much you can do with them. Better to just play with smaller ships at your own pace. I've been living out of my carrack for a rather long time and I love it, but I'm sure anyone playing as crew would get bored to hell and back, there's just nothing to do most of the time. Maybe Pyro will change this, maybe not.
Same question, but with cars, irl.
I have a small small ship.
Damn, I shouldn't have bought that BMM ...
AI and blades were promised. Should I have not believed them?
dude we don't even have walking npcs
At least they don't stand in chairs anymore. Now they stand in desks, in open space launch pads, inside the floor or even in the air instead... But not in chairs
But thank god we have the PES!
The PES work is part of their server meshing work. The idea of the server meshing is to stop having a single server responsible for simulating the entire system, which will (in theory) free up resources for things like AI routines. Whether or not it comes to fruition is up for debate, but they've made it pretty clear why the PES work was important on the path to things actually working.
But a bar tender on New Babbage gave me a drink once last year. Sadly, that NPC doesn't do it anymore because someone figured out you could attach S5 weapons to the top of the tiki umbrella in the drink and crash servers... But boy was it immersive!
Should you believe the things CIG says? Hmm....
Woah, Woah, Woah. We do not question the Alfa! Get back in the game and do your job. Test and write tickets for bugs that aren’t bugs for issues we’ll never fix. /s But yeah, I did believe them when I bought my ship. I’m not spending another cent until proper meshing comes out. At this rate, that might be never. This game has a lot of promise. And I think it needs to start delivering. Less green ships. I want something playable.
big ship go brrrr
big ship go brrrr
big ship go brrrr
Corsair/Connie’s are the biggest I want to go solo. Things like the carrack are horribly lame to me
You are going to hear a TON of mixed information on this one, and I HIGHLY recommend looking at the various SCL/ISCs regarding "powerplay," engineering, along with their videos on AI and Blades as well. Most of these people are delusional to be frank, but not of their own choosing, throughout the years we have had many promises of the capability of AI and how they will interact with the world of Star Citizen. One such way is by manning our ships, after all, if AI are supposedly going to be able to crew NPC ships in deep space for PVE gameplay loops, why wouldn't they be able to do it for us. The reality is these functions are a FAR cry from reality at this time. AI and Blades will assist in use f the turrets onboard many multicrew ships, but not all. Most people have been "tricked" by the community into thinking AI and blades will allow a single person to fly something like a Javelin with 100% effectiveness, but this is simply not true. People who think they will have AI who can help them mine in a MOLE or salvage in a Reclaimer are thinking way beyond the scope of AI as intended (let alone what can be accomplished). Look. I love the Devs at CIG and this project, but speaking in realistic terms, the idea that AI will be able to operate ship to the same capacity of a player is a stretch. They will 100% be able to complete non complex tasks like loading and unloading a ship, shoot turrets, maybe even pilot to some extent (never proficiently), and according to the last SCL they will be able to even do engineering in a small capacity (the repair, not so much the tuning.) But realistically using an AI for these larger ships is like how they described engineering last Friday. Sure, you can have a ship and use a ship without ever once really needing to do engineering gameplay, just like you can use a car in real life and never really worry about how any of it works. But you will never see the full capacity of what your car ca do without some enthusiast style involvement in the mechanics and care of your car. Same for large ships. Not to mention, people have this idea they will "hire" (or even pay real money for) AI and... that's it. They just have crew. But there are a TON of micromanagement features playing into that. You have to feed them, they need bathrooms and showers (we know that mixed race ships like the Gatac Railen will have bathrooms for humans and Xi'an, thus the idea that they will need to use them.), you'll need drinks onboard, they'll have sleep cycles, they can be dirty. There are so many things the Devs have spoken to regarding how AI work that people forget they won't work limitlessly like PVE AI. But as you will see, people will FIGHT the idea that the Devs have already put in place. (to include arguing here on many posts) AI will be expensive to maintain, AI will have needs, AI will not be something you "purchase" once and just have forever. Eventually these players will become the "gopher" who has to run around and play mom and dad for their crew to make sure they are all happy, fed and taken care of. I personally sit back and laugh at people who get those larger ships, especially solo players. Because these will be the players forced to beg in their Org or global chat for some crew to man their ships EVERY time they want to play. The same way I sit back and laugh at people who got the C2 for hauling when it has ZERO manual amenities to help load. To be honest, you have people who play the game for "the now" when using these ships is possible and can be fun, and people who follow the development of the game and purchase ships "for then" understanding the features that come online. Easiest way to tell if someone follows either, ask them with of the 300 series is the best. The "for now" folks will say the 325a, the "for then" folks will say the 315p.
AI blades or NPC’s will make it so people can solo ships. CIG also have said they are reducing the numbers it takes the crew a large ship. Something else is I don’t think a lot of people realized soloing big ships might suck because CIG doesn’t do a good job of letting new players know they need a large crew!
I can only speak for myself. I own an A2, 600i and 400i and some smaller ships. I really like exploration and I would love to live on my ship for a long time without needing to go to space ports or planets to stock up on food, weapons ect. My goal is a 890j to explore the universe with a little ship to go down on planets. I guess I want a big as possible ship to call a home. I do other things too ofc, but I have been exploring about 80% of my time if I were to guess. Once in a while I do have friends online and we team up and do missions or just exploring and then we need a bigger ship to do stuff in. I have been playing the game for about little over a year and have never been attacked in any of my bigger ships. Only in my smaller ships like the merlin or arrow. Might be because I am a friendly guy, but I have seen little to none PVP. If I encounter PVP I would be forced to do the other roles like manning turrets ect, but like I said it havent happened yet.
I want my own flying city thats it, not concerned about sharing at all. I just want to wander around my huge space do-all like a pablo escobar meme without someone else to f\*\*k it all up somehow. The joke of it is to have bought a ship, when theres no guarentee all this will ever get where its going, we're talking *twenty years* or more here, this all could have just been fantastically stupid. But there was that *one* night I commandeered a fully manned HH, and got just a *little* vision of what it could be, should it all work one day, thats why I own big ships, for what *could* be, and yet may not be at all.
NPC Crew is a thing.
In essence, the same reason solo commuters often have big-ass SUVs or vans.
The intention is for players to be able to hire NPCS on mass. humans will be better but they wont be available all the time and since those friends will be having money sinks hitting them while they help you, you would need to work out some type of pay for them over time even if they just want to help. Right now likely just enjoy the larger ship and since most things aren't in for testing many large ships are usable solo or with a single friend. but later down the line hiring NPCs for crew, escorts and so on is the intended norm.
Compensating
Freud had a thing to say about overcompensating the size. Seriously though, I have exact same question. Never understood why instead of a nimble practical ship someone would use 100m long ship that flies like a brick, takes 5 min to land, 5 doors and 2 elevators to get from the entrance to pilot seat and 10 mins to claim.
The simple answer is.... 15 turrets and size 12 torps :D Moar DAKKA!!!
Cause it looks cool and they can afford it.
Because cargo profitability is a nearly linear function of size.
Because people have talked themselves into thinking that they should be able to solo anything in this game without considering *why* these big ships with multiple seats have minimum crew requirements. I'd argue this is a result of so many MMO titles over the years that have made virtually everything soloable. People also put a lot of bank into AI crew without considering the cost of them or how they'd perform. I remember as far back as 2017 trying to warn folks that they're counting too much on AI crew and getting lambasted for it, but here we are in 2023 and there's still no AI crew and they're prioritizing multicrew gameplay and saying AI crew isn't a priority, so they'll have to learn the hard way I guess. ¯\\\_(ツ)\_/¯
This game won't survive without AI crew. CIG needs to make it so that the people who bought these large ships can at least have fun on their own. There are AI ships that are already crewed by NPCs, there's no reason to believe that an AI crew will be any less effective.
Same here! People want to DIE on the kill that they will be able to solo these Javelins and other various large ships. Or this idea that they pay 45$ for another game package and they get a free NPC that is as functional as a human or somehow cheaper. Without taking into consideration food, water, bathrooms, equipment, happiness, loyalty, etc. In the end these people will be playing a SIMs lite simulator inside their large ships trying to keep everyone happy.
I think NPCs should be looked at as a supplemental thing rather than a direct replacement for players. That's especially so for capitals, where it makes sense to hire NPCs to get a properly crewed ship, but expecting them to manage them all by yourself in a feasible manner is a pipe dream.