Ship Modules and Crew Capacity

[Unicornzombie]

I'm really happy to see the new ships in game, the designs are pretty cool and I like the different roles the ships can play. At this point the only thing I hope changes is how ship module installation is handled.

As it stands right now you either pick a crew member or a module which can for a lot of travel back and forth if you want to delve into some of the crew members backstories.

Is there any plans in the future to make modules use entirely separate slots from the crew slots? Right now I'm envisioning my Captain Steele telling crew members they're getting ditched for a repair module or shield booster.

 

[criticAlls]

My biggest gripe with the current system is that weapons, which take up ship hardpoints, require that you sacrifice a crew/upgrade slot. That's silly. It's a hardpoint, a point on the outside of the ship specifically designed with all the room required for the weapon and its proper functioning. It shouldn't take up any room required for upgrades or crew. At this point the hardpoints are just upgrade/crew slots that also have the ability to hold weapons and that just seems silly considering we're already so restricted on the number of upgrades/crew we have. That means even the ships that are currently out which have 6 module/crew slots will be even further restricted if you chose not to buy a ship with any "fixed equipment."

As it stands there's no real point in differentiating crew/upgrade/weapon hardpoint slots. They all just take up the same slot. If this is the route that's wanted then there's absolutely zero point in buying a ship that doesn't come with weapons and then trying to arm it, it's better to just have a ship that comes with "fixed equipment" weapons, because they take up no slots, so you can use the rest of the space for the people/upgrades you want.

I also agree with the OP, however. The module/crew slot thing, I'm not a fan of that, either, yet I kind of get it. Modules like that would, theoretically, take up areas inside the ship and the ship only has so much internal space so it's either a crew room or a module room. Makes me think a bit of the game FTL where some ships start out with empty rooms but you can buy certain "modules," for example a stealth module, and suddenly that room will have a console in it and be dedicated to the new module.

Having to balance energy during battle makes sense and makes things different to ground combat and, in such, a bit more interesting; even having to choose between automated upgrades and number of crew is reasonable, I don't really like it, but it's certainly reasonable. Having to essentially take up a whole room in order to accommodate a weapon, which already has a specially designed hardpoint for it, doesn't make any sense to me. If nothing else that is the thing I'd very much like to see changed, just allow hardpoints to be hardpoints and once you're out, that's it, no more weapons. If that means that ships with "fixed equipment" weapons have more weapons and upgrades/crew than others, then so be it. It'd even be reasonable to reduce the amount of hardpoints by, say, half, as long as they no longer take up upgrade/crew slots.

That's my two cents, anyway. I found the combat fun, I think it's going in a good direction, and, so far, I'm happy over all as I have no other issues with the ships currently on offer, the combat, or any other system currently integrated in terms of space-stuff.

 

[Rocven09]

I feel the same. Love having my ship feel more personal, but I feel like I'm in the chicken or the egg situation. Need a better ship so I can travel with easier ship combat to visit the crew I HAD to kick out when I updated, which means I have kick more crew to improve my ship. I kinda want my clowncar ship back. Best brothel in space lol.

 

[Athena]

I don't have a backer build, so I need to ask: Do any of the ships have a minumum number of rooms separate from the crew modules? You'd think crew modules would be there to epand a ship's capacity beyond its normal limit.

 

[Theron]

While having this dropped into an ongoing playthrough is annoying, having to make a choice is kind of the point. More Crew/Module space is supposed to be a reason to keep upgrading our ship.

From the perspective of a new playthrough, you're choosing between a new Crew member or a Module on an individual basis over time, rather than all at once.

There are also delays for some Crew members, giving you time to get a bigger ship. Shekka needs at least 2-3 weeks and 35K credits, Paige needs 1 week and 500K credits. Amber can't be recruited until you've been to Zheng Shi.

Keep in mind, the ships currently available are not the sum total of all ships that will be available as we progress through the story. I can only assume the Sidewinder will be an upgrade to any ship you have at that point.

 

[criticAlls]

I don't have a backer build, so I need to ask: Do any of the ships have a minumum number of rooms separate from the crew modules? You'd think crew modules would be there to epand a ship's capacity beyond its normal limit.

Nope. Upgrade/crew slots are all a ship has. If you have a ship with 6 you then can have six upgrade slots and zero crew, or a mix of the two. At the moment, any weapon that doesn't come standard on your ship also consumes upgrade/crew slots. So, currently, the most slots a ship has is 6. If you get a ship without weapons you then, also, have to use the upgrade/crew slots to equip weapons, limiting you even further. Of course weapons are also limited to the amount of hardpoints your ship has, so if it has four you can only equip up to four weapons. If your ship comes with two weapons as "fixed equipment," and four hard points then you can add two weapons for a total of four but only two of those will consume upgrade/crew slots. Currently no ship comes equipped with crew modules/slots as "fixed equipment," and currently the only "fixed equipment" are weapons, these things may or may not change in the future.

Adding crew slots as "fixed equipment" would be a pretty good solution to allow you to have some crew on board that didn't take upgrade/crew/weapon slots so you could still fly with a couple of people and have your ship customized in a way you desire, instead of having to choose between crew you want, weapons, which your ship needs, and upgrades, which make your space life easier.

Edited for information correction.

 

[Athena]

I see. I had previously assumed there was a separate inventory screen for crew members, where crew modules increased the number of crew slots. Having to choose between important components and crew members seems unorthodox. I would've assumed you'd simply have weapon hard points, specialized equipment slots, and crew, all as separate components.

 

[criticAlls]

I see. I had previously assumed there was a separate inventory screen for crew members, where crew modules increased the number of crew slots. Having to choose between important components and crew members seems unorthodox. I would've assumed you'd simply have weapon hard points, specialized equipment slots, and crew, all as separate components.

That would make sense. I'd rather have ships have specific upgrade slots, then the hardpoints being the only things weapons take up, and, finally, room for crew built-in as opposed to the "universal slots" mechanic they essentially have now. Even if that means I go from being able to apply like six upgrades and no crew to two upgrades. I really do feel like there just should already be room planned for upgrades and the hardpoints should be all weapons need. If we, then, could remove crew areas to install modular weapons and upgrades, sure, I feel that'd be fine. Yet we should have as many weapons on our ship as we have hardpoints without sacrificing upgrades or crew, ships should also just come with empty upgrade slots which we can use, again, without sacrificing weapons or crew. I feel like the crew slots should either just be for crew or we could keep them as they are now - esentially "universal modular" slots to allow us to equip "modular hardpoints" and "modular upgrade slots" to install more weapons and upgrades into.

I'm just brainstorming with keeping the crew slots "univeral modular" slots, generally speaking I really just want these things to be separate. I'd be perfectly fine for only one "free" hardpoint on a ship which comes with two weapons already and only one or two upgrade slots on such a ship. Just anything to make these things their own systems instead of essentially using a PnP functionality as if they were USB items taking up universal ports.

 

[Unicornzombie]

I wonder if it's a balancing thing? If that's the case, gadgets that offer greater benefit could be made to use more than one gadget slot, while keeping the crew quarters separate.

 

[Evil]

You're balancing out the power supply, which really does come into play in Combat. If you go into a fight in a ship brimming with cannons and lasers, you're going to be losing power fast and recharging more.

But moreover, even non-combat based systems are going to require a power supply. There's only a certain amount of power that an engine can provide, and only so many systems that can be running before something goes wrong.

 

[criticAlls]

You're balancing out the power supply, which really does come into play in Combat. If you go into a fight in a ship brimming with cannons and lasers, you're going to be losing power fast and recharging more.

But moreover, even non-combat based systems are going to require a power supply. There's only a certain amount of power that an engine can provide, and only so many systems that can be running before something goes wrong.

You can disable or enable any or all of your weapons during combat. You don't have to use them all. For example, during that first fight I did two strikes with the laser cannon then just machine gunned him to death, doing damage each and every turn as the ship generates 25 energy and the machine gun consumes it each turn. Having more weapons isn't just for more dakka, it's also situational. Different weapons work in different ways and are effective against different things. Maybe you want your EMP cannon to take out the shields then you have some armor piercing weapon to finish him up afterwards. Single weapons don't tax energy levels nearly as much as multiple active ones do.

Presumably, as for the non-combat based upgrades, each slot is pre-assigned a certain amount of energy and as long as they're online the engines passively produce all of the energy needed for these passive systems regardless of whether anything's plugged into them or not. Where as the energy for combat seems to go into a capacitor specifically designed for combat functions, what charge the engine can safely give is calculated by the manufacturer/dealer/mechanic/whatever and is then drawn from the engines once the capacitor reads as below full and is then put into the capacitor's pool of power which the combat upgrades and weapons then draw from.

That seems to be why you don't have to worry about energy concerns on non-combat upgrades but you do on combat upgrades. Anything that requires bursts of energy seem to draw from the "combat capacitor" where as things like crew quarters, life support, upgrades, and other passive/necessary systems are pre-planned into the engine's power output which is why you can't adjust the combat power draw even if you have no upgrades and no crew as that power draw isn't meant to be accessible.

 

[Unicornzombie]

You're balancing out the power supply, which really does come into play in Combat. If you go into a fight in a ship brimming with cannons and lasers, you're going to be losing power fast and recharging more.

But moreover, even non-combat based systems are going to require a power supply. There's only a certain amount of power that an engine can provide, and only so many systems that can be running before something goes wrong.

Crew quarters would be under life support. Given the importance of life support wouldn't it make sense to have that on it's own grid (or at least taken account for in the design of the ship and it's power system)? in the interests of sound and safe ship design I think it would make sense that life support wouldn't be in a position to tax ship systems or vice versa.

 

[Evil]

Doesn't matter, because any grid would still need a source of power. You'd also need to consider the size of a ship and the space available - ideally you would have a separate engine for non-combat functions and another for powering the ship's offensive and defensive capabilities. You might have enough space on something like a battle cruiser where you could fit multiple engines. You're not going to have it on a crappy 3 person ship.

 

[null_blank]

Still need a way to kick out Ben/Bess so I can fit a 4th weapon.

We also should be able to turn off lifesupport to non-essential parts of the ship for more power for dakka.

 

[Jacques00]

Still need a way to kick out Ben/Bess so I can fit a 4th weapon.

There is a way: under the "Discuss" menu, There should be a "Dismiss"/"Break Up" option depending on whether or not Bess/Ben is a lover. The choice to break up will disable them from interaction forever, but dismissal will send them back to Tavros Station.

 

[null_blank]

There is a way: under the "Discuss" menu, There should be a "Dismiss"/"Break Up" option depending on whether or not Bess/Ben is a lover. The choice to break up will disable them from interaction forever, but dismissal will send them back to Tavros Station.

Well, it's a good thing I didn't kick out Bess yet. This turret thing actual gives me a reason to keep people around

I appreciate the info though.

 

[Athena]

I knew Turrets were on their way, but for some reason I thought that turrets were the ones that attacked automatically, and the regular weapons were the ones that needed crew. I'm not a backer, mind you, and I realize that this has been quite a lot to keep up with. Hopefully it's easier to understand once I get my hands on it. Good to see that crew modules seem to be next o the agenda. Hopefully that'll alleviate some of the issues people have had regarding crew size.

 

[criticAlls]

Still need a way to kick out Ben/Bess so I can fit a 4th weapon.

We also should be able to turn off lifesupport to non-essential parts of the ship for more power for dakka.

My biggest issue was getting rid of the goo armor girl. Didn't realize you had to freakin' drop her from your inventory to "dismiss" her. I tell ya, that felt real awkward. Just like take her out of your bag, toss her on the ground "Welp, you're on your own now, toodles!"

Of course, this was before I realized she didn't take up a slot anyway.. So, yeah. Real awkward.

 

[Jean]

What I really want to know is how much crew capacity do we need to ship all the rebel ants to Mhen´ga. I left a copy of my save before that mission and is one of the only ones I haven't completed yet

 

[null_blank]

What I really want to know is how much crew capacity do we need to ship all the rebel ants to Mhen´ga. I left a copy of my save before that mission and is one of the only ones I haven't completed yet

That requires a capital ship.

 

[criticAlls]

That requires a capital ship.

I was going to say something along the lines of it probably requiring a ship type that isn't out yet. I'd probably say something along the lines of a cargo ship/transport as opposed to a capital ship, especially considering how the capital ship was a stretch goal from offbeatr and, even then, the devs have always sort of made it seem like one of those things that may never get done anyway and, if it did, it'd be one of the last things, if not the last thing, added to the game.

At least, from what I can recall of the little bit of talk about it I've seen from them, that's the way they've made it seem over the years.

 

[null_blank]

So for those of you not running clowncar, how are you running your ships? Any favorites?

 

[Athena]

I haven't tried the Zheng Shi ship combat yet, but I've tried 3 ships + the default one vs. the Pirate ship:

The Casstech Z14 works as a baseline, it's certainly more of a tense fight when you show up in a basic ship with no eqipment other than a laser cannon and a machine gun.

The Spearhead SS is my current favorite for general use, evading most shots while only potentially needing one of the shield gadgets you can buy from Vahn. This makes it cheap and easy to maintain, and I could potentially fill the rest of the slots with crew modules to meet my pre-Zheng-Shi crew needs.

The Ova'Lek, on the otherhand...might be the best choice for those looking to avoid ship combat all together, at least at this stage. I've had no trouble simply avoiding combat with it, it's cheap enough that you can afford it immediately after completing Mhen'ga, and has enough crew space to last you until you reach Myrellion or Uveto, where you can upgrade to either a larger vessel or 6 crew modules.

The Pyrite Colt XLR exists.

The Moondast Gruss is great as a combat focused ship, provided you at least bring Shekka. While the coil cannon is a huge energy drain, and no shields sounds like a bad time, it comes with a repair module as fixed equipment, trivializing the damage you recieve as long as you outfit it with heavy armor. Additionally, it has enough energy regeneration that you can add a missile platform that's practically free if you disable the coil cannon. Alternatively, if you get a power core tuner, you can opt for a machine gun turret instead. I'm not exactly sure which one is better, but I prefer the latter since it feels like my crewmates are contributing something. Either way, all I have to do is stay on the offensive, and I only have to use the Coil Cannon once the enemy is below 1500 health.

I certainly look forward to seeing how ship combat matures. A couple more enemy types, and some win scenes to go along with it, and this should make for a nice side mode to break up the monotony and make traveling between planets more interesting.

...Seriously, there are only like, 4 or 5 other space encounters (all of which are 1-time events), after a while I started to forget you were traveling in a space ship and not just taking the metro to a different part of town. =P

EDIT:

I tried out Clydesdale K7 on another save, and I was surprised to see that it came with 12 upgrade slots, as well as two built-in crew slots. It only requires 1 crew moduke to fit every crew member, and if you outfit it with 7 crew modules, that leaves plenty of space for upgrades to make up for its shortcomings.

...because boy, are there shortcomings. I barely squeaked by the Corona Lords fight in the Casstech Z14, but even that looked easy in comparison to how the Clydesdale performed on my first outing. On the plus side, I got to read the lose scene. And I'll probably do so again, since this thing was expensive...I can't exactly afford any upgrades at the moment...

 

[Theron]

Just tried fighting my way into Zheng Shi with a stock Aegis MS-XI. Only took Shield damage, didn't need to evade or recharge, but did use the Shield Booster. Maybe it'll be harder when there are more than just the 2 Casstech Z7s and an EM Turret(s, it counts as one enemy).

And it has a decent 30 storage (tied with Colt XLR, surpassed only by Clydesdale K7 at 50), and 9 module/crew capacity. Since you can get into Zheng Shi with just it's default loadout, you can fit it with a bunch of Advanced Crew Quarters.

The biggest downside to the Moondast Gruss is it's lack of storage. Only 5/category. Granted, that is mitigated by the fact we can now store 30/catetory at Tavros, but still...

 

[null_blank]

Yeah, the only times I had problems in ship combat was with the Z14 and that mostly due to a combination of rudimentary weapons and low armor/shields.

The Clydesdale, Aegis and Sledgehammer are tied for my favorite ships thus far, with the Sledgehammer best for combat, Clydesdale best at crewspace and item storage and the Aegis somewhere in between.

 

[Felaeris]

Yeah, the only times I had problems in ship combat was with the Z14 and that mostly due to a combination of rudimentary weapons and low armor/shields.

The Clydesdale, Aegis and Sledgehammer are tied for my favorite ships thus far, with the Sledgehammer best for combat, Clydesdale best at crewspace and item storage and the Aegis somewhere in between.

So I decided to make a spreadsheet. Because that seemed the sensible thing to do than staring at the page blankly for several hours (which I tried anyways.)
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/19R44zLtHXJHk8scK__6ApfvtSJeP7JH3L1BXcipv5CA/edit?usp=sharing

While I was skeptic at first, it seems they actually did a fairly good job balancing the different ships. This gets a bit funky after you factor:
Wasted Crew slots (is your crew too small?)
Hard caps (Is your crew size too big to fit the Sledge even with A.Quarters?)
Accuracy, Evasion, and Weapon Count (There's no 'module' upgrade for these)
Storage. Are you a minimalist? Or do you hoard every single drop like its a collectible?

The Aegis remains the winner unless:
Your crew requirements exceed the maximum or minimum required to optimize (14 Max on Sledge, 12 Minimum on Clyde)
---This means A.Quarters for days is fine as all boats can fit A. Quarters.
You really, really need that 50 storage space and will sacrifice combat skills.
The values for Accuracy and Evasion are weighted more heavily than we're inclined to believe (but the Aegis and Sledge still grossly outperform the Clyde)

 

[Theron]

A lot of this is skewed by the fact there's only one very weak enemy right now.

Weapon count is mostly useful for having different damage types. If you have a lot of weapons, you'll need to disable some because you won't have enough Energy to fire them, but you can use Electric vs Shields and Kinetic vs Armor.
50 Shield Defense is enough to reduce damage from the Z7's Machine Guns to single digits/shot. This is achievable by the Aegis MS-XI and Sledgehammer SS with one Tuned Emitters.
Capacitor Vampire completely drains the target's Energy and adds it to yours with no loss. This effectively denies the target a turn. And you get your normal Energy regeneration that turn.
The one downside to the Aegis is it's only default weapon is a Turret, but you've had plenty of opportunity to recruit by Myrellion.
I can't imagine needing 50 storage, especially since we have 30 on Tavros Station for those unique-but-outclassed items.

 

[null_blank]

I fire all guns, run capacitor then fire all guns until I have to start micromanaging between turning off guns and recharging. At the moment, dumping as much DPS on target seems to be working fine.

Besides that crappy stat bank the Clydesdale has, it's limited to two weapons which has a large effect on it's damage output. But at the moment, 2 weapons is fine since there's only one enemy.

 

[Theron]

I fire all guns, run capacitor then fire all guns until I have to start micromanaging between turning off guns and recharging. At the moment, dumping as much DPS on target seems to be working fine.

Which weapons do you have installed?

 

[null_blank]

On the clydesdale its limited by one fixed gun (Em turret) and I installed a Machinegun turret. On all other ships I tend to run Emturret and either all MGturrets or Missle turrets.