Multi crew ships how to implement?

pagroove · Post by **pagroove** » Wed Oct 29, 2008 8:16 pm

Ok new suggestion then,

As you probably know Status Quo and several other stories mention multicrews on ships such as a Python. Frontier Elite had the feature that you could hire crew members. However in Oolite there is no need for this as a commander can do it al alone. But I feel that the bigger ships need crews so post here if you have a good idea bout implementing a crew

LittleBear · Post by **LittleBear** » Wed Oct 29, 2008 9:36 pm

I suppose a JS could calculate a required crew by reference to the ship's mass value. You'd have to be carefull to pick a number that meant the Cobra Mk III would have a value of 1 or less. Eric's Salvage Drone does this so you get a phiffiling 100 C for salvaging a Sidewinder, but a rather nice 5,000C for an Anaconda. So I guess you could set a level where for every X units of mass over a certain level another Crew Member is needed.

If the JS detected that the Crew Required variable is greater than 1 it could then run a mission screen saying that you must hire X number of crew before you take off. You could generate some names and even skill scores. Eg "Candidate : Jim Ferryman, a harmless rodent from Redquate. He graduated top of his class." More experienced crew have a higher skill score but also cost more (same variable can be used to up or reduce a base-wage). If you pick a cheap and lousy crew the chance of fuel leaks or equipment failure is increased. Doable by a variable and random chance. Eg with a cheapo crew there is a 5% chance that they'll break something and a console message "Crewman Brown has attempted to clean the E.C.M. System with a bucket of soapy water. ECM System Damaged.". Set the EQ_ status to damaged. The F5 (twice) screen could store your crew status eg "You have 5 Crew members of a required 5. They are a pretty dodgy lot." The Second part of the description being set by your crews averaged skill score. Total Score of over a certain number 0% of things going wrong, but below that chances increased.

Once a week (doable with a timer) you have to pay your Crew Wages. Set a day timer to zero on launching and then on every docking check the elapsed days. If > 0 call up a mission screen: "The Crew are owed X days wages. Payment of Y Credits due." After paying you can hire and fire or keep the same Crew. Not enough cash to pay? A random number desert and the chance of something breaking is upped until you have the proper number of Crew. Launching without the correct number of Crewmen is no doubt an offence under Galactic Health and Saftey Law, so you'd also pick up an offender tag!

Like the idea.

pagroove · Post by **pagroove** » Wed Oct 29, 2008 10:15 pm

@LB>

Wow I like the all ideas you've come up with. Makes live aboard an Anaconda very interesting! I would like to see if someone could make a nice OXP out of it.

I especially like the failure chance parts.

Additions to it can be:

-Being able to hire members from different races (humans,frogs )or even Robots (more efficient)
-Chance of being hijacked. This can be done by adding a reputation to each member. The reputation counter starts when the wages are overdue

LittleBear · Post by **LittleBear** » Wed Oct 29, 2008 10:21 pm

Just added that by an edit!

. Its a really nice idea and do-able adding a lot of emersion! I don't have time to develope somthing myself ATM, but I hope someone else does!

I donno if hijacking would be doable, but disgrunteled unpaid crewman could just walk off the job taking an approprate item of equipment in leu of wages! Or they take a vote and agree to wait until the next docking, but the chance of things going wrong is upped as they're on a "work to rule" . "Not in my contract to service the engines today Captain. Says I'm entitled to 8 hours rack time and I'm taking it." Random chances of what the crew do, maybe depending on their skill levels, the amount they are owed and how long it was since the Cap last was late with the dosh!

Post by **Disembodied** » Thu Oct 30, 2008 12:35 am

There could be advantages to having a crew: they could have a chance of repairing damaged stuff for free (it's what you pay their wages for, right?). Better crew = higher chance of repair. Maybe the crew quality could affect the length of time between services, too.

Bad crewmembers might occasionally do stupid things like, say, buy a cute li'l pet from a nice feline they met in the bar... But crewmembers might be able to slow down Trumble breeding times, by squishing them when they find them (or eating them, or otherwise diposing of them).

If crewmembers had reputations ("honest", "shady", "shifty", etc.) there could be a chance of finding a hitman on your tail.

nijineko · Post by **nijineko** » Thu Oct 30, 2008 12:38 am

scum-level crewbeings could even plant a hidden transponder that would serve as a bit fat "hit me" note on the back of your cargo laden ship....

Frame · Post by **Frame** » Thu Oct 30, 2008 2:37 am

nijineko wrote:
scum-level crewbeings could even plant a hidden transponder that would serve as a bit fat "hit me" note on the back of your cargo laden ship....

which of course puts the scum like crew member in harms way too, and therefore he should eject before the ship is attacked, preferbly in the players escape capsule

Commander McLane · Post by **Commander McLane** » Thu Oct 30, 2008 6:21 am

Like the ideas.

Alternatively to doing it all on a randomly popping up mission screen I would suggest that the entry point should be on the equipment screen. Which means 'Hire a Crewman' would be scripted as an equipment item. If you buy it, you toggle the mission screen that leads you through the process (buying equipment will be an event-handler from 1.72 onwards). In the end the equipment itself is of course removed, because we don't want to flood our F5-screen, do we?

I would prefer this approach.

Captain Tylor · Post by **Captain Tylor** » Thu Oct 30, 2008 10:22 am

[quote="Disembodied"]
Bad crewmembers might occasionally do stupid things like, say, buy a cute li'l pet from a nice feline they met in the bar... But crewmembers might be able to slow down Trumble breeding times, by squishing them when they find them (or eating them, or otherwise diposing of them).quote]

Why squish them. A trip to the sun could be a great moral building exercise (BBQ Party!

).
Just Don`t forget BBQ Sauce Buns and Whisky.

pagroove · Post by **pagroove** » Thu Oct 30, 2008 3:04 pm

Alternatively to doing it all on a randomly popping up mission screen I would suggest that the entry point should be on the equipment screen. Which means 'Hire a Crewman' would be scripted as an equipment item. If you buy it, you toggle the mission screen that leads you through the process (buying equipment will be an event-handler from 1.72 onwards). In the end the equipment itself is of course removed, because we don't want to flood our F5-screen, do we?

Yes, thats probably the way to implement it. After hire a crew member a sub-menu is triggered with the crew options.

Also good a idea from Disembodied about having equipment repaired for free. What about to be able to select crew members with different tasks that give certain benefits. An engineer would give you free repairs, better engine performance (speed increase). A weapons officer would give you jamming of ECM-proof missiles and a load master would increase your cargo space etc.

pagroove · Post by **pagroove** » Thu Oct 30, 2008 3:42 pm

The loyalty factor of a crew member could be coupled with the political system in the planet screen. Buying crew members in an anarchy maybe cheap but not a good idea for a stable trip.

Also the quality (failure factor) could coupled to tech level. So buying crew members on a tech level 14 planet will give you a highly trained crew

Post by **Micha** » Thu Oct 30, 2008 4:28 pm

pagroove wrote:
Also good a idea from Disembodied about having equipment repaired for free. What about to be able to select crew members with different tasks that give certain benefits. An engineer would give you free repairs, better engine performance (speed increase). A weapons officer would give you jamming of ECM-proof missiles and a load master would increase your cargo space etc.

Considering under this proposal certain ships would require crews, wouldn't the cargo-space and speed etc. of a ship already be factored in to actually having a (more or less) capable crew?

Perhaps ships should have a 'minimum required crew' (below which you can't launch) and a 'maximum possible crew' size and various variables (such as service intervals) get calculated based on how many crew members you have and how good they are. Possibly if you have exceptional crew members they might be able to give your ship a small bonus over the top.
Also, what happens if during a fight some of your crew-members get killed (or eject) leaving you with less than the minimum crew? Perhaps then you need to radio for a salvage crew.. (and pay an exorbitant fee).

One thing I don't like about the concept of having crews is that they don't really 'do' their jobs. Ie, a pilot doesn't fly the ship for you, a weapons officer doesn't fight for you, a cargo-master doesn't trade etc. So imho there's an odd discontinuity between adding crews to the game which don't really do anything except affect your ship stats and random humorous interludes.
The concept of Elite was always that of the lone-trader. (Not saying Oolite has to continue that concept, just my 0.2Cr)

pagroove · Post by **pagroove** » Thu Oct 30, 2008 5:40 pm

One thing I don't like about the concept of having crews is that they don't really 'do' their jobs. Ie, a pilot doesn't fly the ship for you, a weapons officer doesn't fight for you, a cargo-master doesn't trade etc. So imho there's an odd discontinuity between adding crews to the game which don't really do anything except affect your ship stats and random humorous interludes.
The concept of Elite was always that of the lone-trader. (Not saying Oolite has to continue that concept, just my 0.2Cr)

Yes therefore I started this thread. If executed right then multicrews could really add something. Frontier Elite had multi crews so why not. On the other hand you are right that you still fly the ship by yourself. But at the time a player can buy the big ships something is needed to keep it challenging. So in fact having the need to hire crews on big ships make it more difficult but also more fun.[/code]

Frame · Post by **Frame** » Thu Oct 30, 2008 5:50 pm

Micha wrote:
......

Well there is definitely the matter of micro management, that you have to avoid..

But i think we should see this as just another optional Equipment to install... That they happen to of biological origin

.. is just the way it is... we could even rename them to be Robots, but then they would infact just be another piece of equipment...

However, this should be split up into two independant or one dependant on the first OXP

The First OXP includes the "fleshies" as standard crew for hire... with no naughty surprises... or no extravagant bonuses. Some bonuses like a better price for goods when selling should be included... (would be calculated when leaving the station)

The Second OXP, expands and adds assasins, pirate saboutuers, and execptionel skilled crew (which reflected by their price).. that mainly do damage control... some could even be so adapt as to be able to draw energy from fuel scoops and other equipment in order to draw auxiliry power to the shields and energy banks.

Expanding on that, you can hire / fire crewmates at any time, with imaginary consequenses.. a Disgruntled former crew mate could damage some of your equipment or steal some of your gold/gems/platinum. While another option could be to report the crew man for offenses that he have done in order to have him arrested, by bribeing the authorities in question... also you could legally report him, if his rap-sheet suddenly include an offense or pay a man to falsify his ID... so that he does not get arrested when docking to a high security station...

Again the possibilities are almost unlimited

Post by **Disembodied** » Thu Oct 30, 2008 6:09 pm

One issue might be, if crewmembers are treated as equipment, how will it work if they get "damaged"? Especially if some other crewmember has the ability to repair equipment... it might get a bit peculiar having your Quartermaster wounded in a firefight, only to be restored to health by your Engineer!

I think we'd need a way to make "damaged" crew roll a dice and see if they're "wounded but will recover", or "dead" – and if the latter, be removed permanently.