Player Features and Ideas Discussion

I was thinking...we all know ships have crews. We all know they get vaporized when your ships goes kablamo. My suggestion is that there is more realism with ship crews. They should cost isk, they should have bonuses. Taking it a little further, they should have a chance to try and escape with you, when you die.

Maybe if you are a jerk, and kill people a lot, and die a lot, ship crews are more reluctant to help.

Eve is the exact opposite of the old saying "A captain goes down with the ship." In Eve, it's "A captain is the first to get to the only escape pod and GTFO."

I'm not sure what crews add that isn't already taken care of with what we already have.

We already have to fit highs, lows, mids, rigs, and drones. Is adding what amounts to even more slots really a good idea?

This sounds cool, I worry we already have a lot of customization options, it's already difficult to make sure you have the right set of implants, drugs, rigs, ammo to come out on top of a fight, I worrying adding more elements would cloud that even more. To many, it would be nice to have more options, to others, it's already too much. Let the debate begin.

But it would add some realism to the game. We now have a feeling of life on planets with Dust, it would be nice to know I'm not piloting a giant battleship alone.

Perhaps crews can be used to make ship functions perform more efficiently (ex: an engineering crew increases cap recharge or shield capacity etc). These crews get better over time to give you that little edge we need in battle

This would be the best option IMO. Adding yet another system that has to be balanced relative to other systems and/or for the sake of adding it always rubs me wrong.

The only evidence of ship crews I'd like to see is escape pods leaving ships when they explode. I want to destroy wealth, not lives.

Considering how guns and shields and major functions are all computerized and automated or otherwise delegated to the pod pilot the crew is there to do what manual work is required for things to function, not to improve upon them.

According to lore, little to no effect on frigs, huge effects on caps. It scales with size. Also more effects on Minmatar, less on Gallante.

Not that we should go that way. Lore makes for bad game mechanics.

"A captain is the first to get to the only escape pod and GTFO."

Hahahaha :D

This idea keeps coming up and will always keep coming up.

Firstly they would be an interesting PI production commodity.

The could be introduced with no real game mechanics change by making them a base material requirement in the construction of ships/starbases this at least gets them in the game.

I do not like the idea of ship crews as rig/module type options that provide further bonuses. It potentially game balance and adds further cost to PVP.

If they were to have a game impact I could perhaps see them as a skill gap closer.

Instead of adding a generic bonus they could improve a skill level by one or perhaps more levels.

Example

Engineering crew could increase energy grid upgrades, energy management, energy systems operation and engineering by one level.

Gallente Frigate Crew could improve That skill by one level, perhaps even include small hybrid turret.

This allows newer players to supplement their skills closing the gap to vets at a cost while providing no advantage to all level 5 skill players therefore not affecting game balance.

To ensure the requirement to still Train skills these would provide the bonus only and not be a substitute for the requirement of module usage or ship usage.

No crews for advanced skill specialisations or T2 ship skills either.