Thread for Proposed Player Crews Systems and Ideas

[aurickle]

I realize that there are some other threads that talk about their dislike for the NPC crews idea. The reason I'm starting a new thread is because I wanted to go a bit more in-depth on the subject and also outline some ideas. Rather than this thread being a back and forth of "NPC crews are great!" and "NPC crews suck!" I'd like this thread to become more of a springboard for ideas. That's something that's not likely to happen in the established threads.

The real magic of Star Trek has always come from the interaction among the command crews. Look at STNG, DS9, Voyager and Enterprise. In every one of these cases, the first two seasons were not terribly good and then the series got progressively better until cancellation. Why? Because it took a couple seasons for the characters and their chemistry to really become established. What is it about Classic Trek that we all love so much? It's the byplay among Kirk, Spock and McCoy -- with all the other characters thrown in for good measure.

Star Trek at its best is a very human story. Heck, Leonard Nimoy even said as much during his talk at the convention today.

This is where I see Star Trek Online falling apart in its current vision. Yes, it'll be great to go exploring the galaxy, discover new civilizations, fight the Borg, and all that. But where's the magic of the command crew interaction when everyone is tucked away in their own private ships with a bunch of NPC's? Really, your ship just ends up being elaborate (and mobile) player housing.

Now I can see one big potential problem with a shared ship: What happens when just a couple of you are online? Obviously nobody wants to stand around twiddling thumbs while his friends are at work or whatever. That would just put STO into the same dead end as DDO.

So how can you give players the fun of being a command crew while keeping the game from becoming group-centric? Here are my ideas:


At the beginning of the game, you are the commander of a very small ship with an NPC crew -- just as currently designed.
As you progress in the game, you can maintain the same playstyle that's currently outlined. You get assigned to better ships, and level up your command crew and your ship crew. If you go this route, you won't touch on much of the following. That's ok, though, because the game's giving you the option to play and thrive with either system.
Alternatively, you can choose to specialize your character. For example, Command, Helm, Tactical, Science, Engineering, Communications. If you do this, you form a command crew with several friends of your choice and are assigned to a ship.
As a specialist, you'll have certain mini-games that become available when appropriate (mainly when in combat). For example, the engineer would have a HUD that lets him manage power and damage control systems. Various skills would allow greater finesse in the performance of your task. For example, the helmsman might get movement bonuses and even special maneuvers.
Specialists would have certain advantages in planetside activities. For example, the science officer might be more adept with the tricorder and the engineer might be better able to understand or make use of alien technology.
If the command crew doesn't have a full complement online, the vacant slots are filled in with NPC's. This is exactly in keeping with the shows, where no-names would take over a station if one of the main characters got incapacitated or had to leave the bridge for some reason.
The command crew shares experience, regardless of whether the members are all online or not. This is like Vanguard's brotherhood system, and is separate from the guild/fleet system.
There could be various shipboard activities that are available as well. For example, crafting stations. Or a holodeck with mini-games and the like, etc. Not to mention personal quarters to be decorated as with traditional MMO player housing. This all provides things to do while the rest of the crew is offline.
At any time, one or more players can also take a warp-capable shuttle out. This lets them leave the ship to experience content on their own. They can take a complement of NPC's with them.
If the command crew is part of a larger fleet, then players who happen to be solo for the moment could also take out a fleet ship with an NPC crew when they need (or want) to fly solo for a bit. This allows members of command crews to also play in the currently-envisioned style. It's also not without precedent on the shows, since we have seen or read about occasions where main characters were temporarily assigned to other ships.


Basically, a system such as what's outlined above would give everyone the best of both worlds. Those players who are more solo-minded can play the game exactly as it's currently envisioned and can go an entire career without ever forming a command crew. However, those players who enjoy playing together on a regular basis can form a command crew and experience shared content. The problem of what to do when friends aren't around is resolved by providing a variety of solo or small-group activities, combined with a shared experience system that makes sure everyone stays at an equivalent level.

Does anyone care to share constructive thoughts on a system such as this? Or have ideas of their own? Again, please try to keep this thread as an ideas thread rather than a reiteration of "I love/hate the idea of NPC crews" statements. Thanks. :)

[CapRevnik]

Wow, what a great idea, i don't think you left any room for improvment here

[sixwhirled]

I'd rather cryptic didn't waste it's resources in trying to keep everyone happy. I like the idea of having your own crew. Having to share a ship with other players was the reason I wasn't at all interested in Perpetual's take on the game.

There seems to be two different camps developing on these forums. Those that want a Trek RP wonderland (Second Life with a Trek skin) and those that just want to play the game.

[Cyjack]

Star Trek is a lot of different things, to a lot of different people. Its cool if you want to share ideas, even on this dead horse, but speak for yourself, not for me.

[tango209]

Not to sound like a jerk, because it does sound good on the surface, but please describe what each player position would be doing on the ship. Unless you can show me that it would be fun, then I'd rather they go the route they've planned.

[Dericho]

Not to sound like a jerk, because it does sound good on the surface, but please describe what each player position would be doing on the ship. Unless you can show me that it would be fun, then I'd rather they go the route they've planned.

Agreed. Even in tabletop games I've played that used multi crewed ships it usually boiled down to one person rolling the dice to see if the weapons fire hit. The rules allowed for other positions to be 'useful' but it was an artificial patch tp prevent the other players being bored during ship to ship combat.

Having the helmsman and tactical officer coordinate during a fight would be insane

[Ghrenn]

Not to sound like a jerk, because it does sound good on the surface, but please describe what each player position would be doing on the ship. Unless you can show me that it would be fun, then I'd rather they go the route they've planned.

You don't sound like a jerk. You sound like someone who plays MMO's.

I agree with you completely. I said on another thread that the image of me sitting in engineering for two hours adjusting simulated knobs makes my brain bleed.

[Kristov]

Yes, what do you do for the people who aren't needed for the current mission? Do they get to sit and watch the paint dry while 1 or 2 people in the crew get to actually play the game they are all paying for? Do you want to spend 4 hours sitting at the computer watching other people play the game while you just...sit there?

[sixwhirled]

Not to sound like a jerk, because it does sound good on the surface, but please describe what each player position would be doing on the ship. Unless you can show me that it would be fun, then I'd rather they go the route they've planned.

Captain: Typing/Venting orders to crew.

First Officer: Sitting complacently staring at the view screen. Maybe talking about his favorite Trek episodes in general chat.

Helm: Staring at a LCARS panel and pushing the forward button to move the ship forward and the backward button to move the ship backward.

Ops: Playing LCARS mini-games to maintain the ships systems in inspiring graphics that would make fans of the Atari 2600 proud!

Tactical: Waiting around until there is something to shoot and then clicking the "Fire" button on the LCARS control panel that they've been staring at for 45 minutes.

Engineering: See OPS.

I'm sure you get the general idea.

What? This doesn't sound fun to you?

[aurickle]

Agreed. Even in tabletop games I've played that used multi crewed ships it usually boiled down to one person rolling the dice to see if the weapons fire hit. The rules allowed for other positions to be 'useful' but it was an artificial patch tp prevent the other players being bored during ship to ship combat.

Having the helmsman and tactical officer coordinate during a fight would be insane

As far as coordination goes, it's amazing what can be accomplished via voice chat like Ventrilo.

For the other part of your argument (which I understand completely), have you ever played the Star Trek Starship Tactical Combat Simulator? It had two methods of play. With one method, each ship had its own captain. With the other method, several people would form a command crew and each had his own control panel/play sheet. It was actually a heck of a lot of fun, and everyone contributed in a meaningful way.

So it IS possible.

As I explained in my initial post, I'm not trying to force anyone to play a certain way. What I am trying to do is offer choices so that people have an option for how to play. People are very quickly polarizing into two camps. A system like what I propose would make both camps happy. That's something that the current system can't accomplish.

[jayce]

To the OP, I like what you have started and I do not want to see this turned into something completely opposite. Please report all posts that are clearly off topic or viewed as trolling for moderation. From what I read, I understand this to be a thread for discussing the ideas and details of having player crewed ships and nothing else (not why player crewed ships will not work, not I don't want player crewed ships, etc). I will post my own idea later, but for now, I just want to see material related specificly to the discussion that you have started.

[aurickle]

Captain: Typing/Venting orders to crew.

First Officer: Sitting complacently staring at the view screen. Maybe talking about his favorite Trek episodes in general chat.

Helm: Staring at a LCARS panel and pushing the forward button to move the ship forward and the backward button to move the ship backward.

Ops: Playing LCARS mini-games to maintain the ships systems in inspiring graphics that would make fans of the Atari 2600 proud!

Tactical: Waiting around until there is something to shoot and then clicking the "Fire" button on the LCARS control panel that they've been staring at for 45 minutes.

Engineering: See OPS.

I'm sure you get the general idea.

What? This doesn't sound fun to you?

Umm... When did I say that you'd be stuck doing anything like that through the whole play session? Here's more like how it would play out:

Everyone travels to their destination at warp -- with just exactly the same amount of time and effort as if they were all in private ships. When they get to their destination, they beam down to the planet and do whatever the mission calls for down there. If certain people have skills that create an advantage in the mission, they use those skills. If a phaser fight breaks out, I can guarantee that the science officer won't be standing there waving his tricorder at the enemy and trying to be useful. He'll be shooting just like everyone else.

Now imagine that your ship is orbiting a planet and people are enjoying a little free time to do whatever. One person might be decorating his quarters. Another might be crafting. A couple others might be in the holodeck. Then red alert sounds and everyone rushes to their stations for combat. What follows is some frantic action that everyone participates in according to their characters' specialties. This is the ONLY time that the players are stuck at their stations. They are most certainly NOT doing what you describe above -- not during combat, and not during the rest of the time either.

Just because Geordi was stuck behind the helm for 8 hours a day doesn't mean that players have to be. Just because in "real life" it took them a week or two to reach a destination doesn't mean that the game will do the same. The game is going to skip to the good stuff. I'm simply stating that the good stuff doesn't have to be as solo player as what we've seen described so far, and providing ideas for systems that would allow that.

AND if you don't like those systems, you don't have to play them! Good grief. I specifically stated that if you like the current system it's still fully available to you and your friends. My proposal is for an alternate system to be enjoyed by the many people who are looking for that sort of thing.

[Ghrenn]

Now imagine that your ship is orbiting a planet and people are enjoying a little free time to do whatever. One person might be decorating his quarters. Another might be crafting. A couple others might be in the holodeck. Then red alert sounds and everyone rushes to their stations for combat. What follows is some frantic action that everyone participates in according to their characters' specialties. This is the ONLY time that the players are stuck at their stations. They are most certainly NOT doing what you describe above -- not during combat, and not during the rest of the time either.

...But how would you account for the differing bit rates? Not everyone will have the same latency. Would the ship be able to keep up with everyone? (Am I making sense here?)

[sixwhirled]

Umm... When did I say that you'd be stuck doing anything like that through the whole play session? Here's more like how it would play out:

Everyone travels to their destination at warp -- with just exactly the same amount of time and effort as if they were all in private ships. When they get to their destination, they beam down to the planet and do whatever the mission calls for down there. If certain people have skills that create an advantage in the mission, they use those skills. If a phaser fight breaks out, I can guarantee that the science officer won't be standing there waving his tricorder at the enemy and trying to be useful. He'll be shooting just like everyone else.

Now imagine that your ship is orbiting a planet and people are enjoying a little free time to do whatever. One person might be decorating his quarters. Another might be crafting. A couple others might be in the holodeck. Then red alert sounds and everyone rushes to their stations for combat. What follows is some frantic action that everyone participates in according to their characters' specialties. This is the ONLY time that the players are stuck at their stations. They are most certainly NOT doing what you describe above -- not during combat, and not during the rest of the time either.

I apologize if I mischaracterized your position. I wouldn't mind a hybrid system if the time/resources of the developer allows. Honestly, to each their own. I've just played MMOs with other players and it can be a miserable experience when you're in a raid group and the raid leader is *ahem* a rather unfriendly person. But maybe Trek will attract a better class of player.

[Brenelael]

In order to make this a viable info thread for Cryptic to use you would have to give detailed information about the following aspects of multi-crew game play.

1) Give in-depth explanations of each ship system that could be player controlled and how it would be set up to be both efficient and usable for your average player (Notice I didn't say Star Trek fan here).

2) Give an in-depth explanation of what every crewman will be doing during the following play modes: Standard flight, orbiting a planet or space anomaly, during combat, at "yellow alert" and everything in between. Every crewman would need engaging and fun activities during all of these game modes to be viable.

Here's your shot all of you that want player crews. Just solve these few little problems for Cryptic and I'm sure they would be happy to add the feature. Simple huh?

Bren

[aurickle]

I apologize if I mischaracterized your position. I wouldn't mind a hybrid system if the time/resources of the developer allows. Honestly, to each their own. I've just played MMOs with other players and it can be a miserable experience when you're in a raid group and the raid leader is *ahem* a rather unfriendly person. But maybe Trek will attract a better class of player.

LOL I hear you. But my proposal is for a small group of people who play together a lot. It's not at all like a raid where you are trying to get 24 or 40 people together. That's what the whole fleet system is. The command crew would only ever be people you LIKE to play with. And like with any other MMO, if you don't like the people you're teamed with, you find another team. It doesn't take long in any MMO to find 4 or 5 people that you play with regularly.

[Recluse]

The FASA board game idea is unlikely to make it as a computer game. The common mistake I see about an actual person as part of the crew is that it is a VERY static role. You are the chief engineer of a starship. So, you push buttons to maintain the engines while you are logged on? Sounds very dynamic to me.
D&D Online had many of these complaints as well...where is all the community creativity of a Dugeon Master...it is all a scripted game...what the heck? Well, a real RPG has the fun of creating a fantasy world for those who play...but if you have ever played a RPG before you know that it takes a long time to get almost nothing done. Imagine how that would be with all the "dynamic" type of player based crew game if for a ship to work to its potential everyone has to be clicking their buttons at the right time to make the ship do something.

That's one of the problems with WoW. You are doing an encounter and the "Main Tank" has all of a sudden explosive poop and must run to the restroom. What happens? 24 other people are now "dead" and you have to start the encounter all over. That is frustration.

I like the way Cryptic is going cause you can control you NPCs to do the things for you that a person who would be running to the bathroom, or being told to go to bed by their parents, or having their wife yell at them about playing too much, these are things that you won't have to worry about to have the game work.

If you want to log on to control the warp core, or sit around and wait for injured to pour into sick bay, then that is a very static life you might be going for. A hybrid of this as discussed by the orginal post would be interesting (if I want to take 20 minutes out of my day to serve on a ship that needs someone to monitor shield and engine output), but it would be very difficult to institute into a computer game. Imagine the searches for people who would be doing that...the incontinuity you would have by constantly changing crews (shifis). Star Trek the series and movies work as a well developed crew that works together over a long time that we grow to love and enjoy the dynamic interactions between all of them.

It is a very good idea, and I'd love to go over to a friend's house with other friends and play a game like that, but hopping onto cyberspace to play a game I'd rather have that as something I can do at any time and get the full potential out of the game. Working as a fleet would take community and coordination, and if I don't have my fleet I sufer in what the fleets could do. However, just to have my ship work, waiting for someone who said they would come online, but doesn't, or can't (ISP down for them) is not my idea of a good time.

Doing the 4-5 people thing to work as a crew of a ship would be great, but what if you best buddy doesn't want to be the ships engineer anymore, he now wants to be a tactical officer (clicking fire button instead of fix engine button). Maybe everyone could rotate roles? Your same idea could easily work with the concept that Cryptic has gone toward. The 4-5 of your best friends make up your fleet of a diplomatic ship, an engineering ship, a medical ship, a science vessel, and a military tactical ship. However, missions that you do together will not require (as in WoW) for you to have this cookie cutter of a varying display of ships. You could have 3 engineer ships and 2 science vessels do the same job that the other ships were going to do, maybe not as well, maybe the one group would be able to do the mission with less skills than the other one, but content can be achieved by any group make up.

If Cryptic makes each ship have strong enough capabilities I'd play just about any ship type. However, I don't want to be pigeon holed into a single role (i.e. ships engineer, or fleet healer). I'm hoping with the system and gameplay that Cryptic is going for they can easily allow anyone to do anything, however certain "ships" do it better and quicker than others.

[Ecoi]

Cool. Yep. Also, I want to ask, should players be better than the npcs? That would be another thing. You'd have a more efficient crew (hopefully the AI of the npcs isn't better than humans lol) if you had a player crew. Might make it interesting. :D

[sixwhirled]

Maybe the solution would be to have starbases be controlled by Player crews. You can always hop on a Runabout or shuttle and head to a planet for an away mission.

[FOUR_lights]

Maybe the starbases they mentioned that apparently can be built by fleets will have some sort of playable functions. What if these stations can be attacked by other players or enemies, maybe there could be defenses and damages to be controlled. I mean, I know its not as good as having a player controlled ship, but maybe it'll provide for group play in some way.

[mirkrim]

I like the current system, but I think players should start out as Ensigns on "hub" ships and do missions via terminal or combadge, until reaching the rank of Lieutenant JG. THEN they are presented with the option to join an existing player ship, or become commander of their own. Regardless of initial choice, the player should have the ability to switch between "modes" whenever they want.

[jiveturkey126]

In my opinion they should just allow you to have the option to bring up to 4 other people aboard your ship, to do whatever.

just so it doesnt get lonely.

But I like the system they have right now.

[Kudos17]

In my opinion they should just allow you to have the option to bring up to 4 other people aboard your ship, to do whatever.

just so it doesnt get lonely.

But I like the system they have right now.

It looks great, Im excited. I think that Cryptic would implement PC crews if they figured out a good way to do so. Also this game is still early in development, anything can happen. I dont think they should change the direction they are going, but PC crews could be an adition to an already good game. An option for people who want to play the game in that capacity.

Who knows, in any case lets support the game for what it is, and what it can be

[Zizi]

Now imagine that your ship is orbiting a planet and people are enjoying a little free time to do whatever. One person might be decorating his quarters. Another might be crafting. A couple others might be in the holodeck. Then red alert sounds and everyone rushes to their stations for combat. What follows is some frantic action that everyone participates in according to their characters' specialties. This is the ONLY time that the players are stuck at their stations. They are most certainly NOT doing what you describe above -- not during combat, and not during the rest of the time either.


But what ARE they doing exactly, while this is going on? Tactical and Helm are obvious, but what's Medical doing during combat? What's Science doing? What's the Captain doing?

What about if we're off on a survey mission? What's the Medical officer doing? Tactical? Science and Helm, again, are obvious. Captain?

These are where the problems lie, because this is where people potentially sit around waiting for things to happen for extended periods.

[Brenelael]

But what ARE they doing exactly, while this is going on? Tactical and Helm are obvious, but what's Medical doing during combat? What's Science doing? What's the Captain doing?

What about if we're off on a survey mission? What's the Medical officer doing? Tactical? Science and Helm, again, are obvious. Captain?

These are where the problems lie, because this is where people potentially sit around waiting for things to happen for extended periods.

This is exactly the point. People who scream for player crews don't realize that 90% of the time this play mode would be about as engaging as watching paint dry and that is why Cryptic looked at the idea and ultimately decided not to do it. A game has to be fun first and foremost or people just won't play it and certainly won't pay money to play it. If you tell someone that in order to advance their science skill they need to stare at a LCARS display for 6 hours that person isn't going to be a subscriber for too much longer. People need to wake up and realize that in a MMO you need to give people something to do 24/7 and not just when the ship might run into combat somewhere. If you want to help Cryptic improve this method of play see my previous post in this thread and solve those problems I outlined. Until those are solved you will never see multi-crew ability in this game.

Bren

[Zizi]

This is exactly the point. People who scream for player crews don't realize that 90% of the time this play mode would be about as engaging as watching paint dry and that is why Cryptic looked at the idea and ultimately decided not to do it. A game has to be fun first and foremost or people just won't play it and certainly won't pay money to play it. If you tell someone that in order to advance their science skill they need to stare at a LCARS display for 6 hours that person isn't going to be a subscriber for too much longer. People need to wake up and realize that in a MMO you need to give people something to do 24/7 and not just when the ship might run into combat somewhere. If you want to help Cryptic improve this method of play see my previous post in this thread and solve those problems I outlined. Until those are solved you will never see multi-crew ability in this game.

Bren

Thank you. It's the basic set of principles and questions I've been trying to get people to wrap their heads around for two days now.

That and this: I am not against player crews. I want the idea to succeed. But in order for it to succeed, there are specific hurdles that need to be crossed, and the largest, overriding hurdle is the game has to be fun at the end for most of the people playing in whatever fashion they are playing, AND in such a way that the systems you're proposing aren't made pointless(which would beg the question why you bothered developing them).

[sixwhirled]

This is exactly the point. People who scream for player crews don't realize that 90% of the time this play mode would be about as engaging as watching paint dry and that is why Cryptic looked at the idea and ultimately decided not to do it. A game has to be fun first and foremost or people just won't play it and certainly won't pay money to play it. If you tell someone that in order to advance their science skill they need to stare at a LCARS display for 6 hours that person isn't going to be a subscriber for too much longer. People need to wake up and realize that in a MMO you need to give people something to do 24/7 and not just when the ship might run into combat somewhere. If you want to help Cryptic improve this method of play see my previous post in this thread and solve those problems I outlined. Until those are solved you will never see multi-crew ability in this game.

Bren

I hope your right, Bren. When Perpetual had the license it seemed like they were pursuing the player crew path. Maybe that's why they gave it up. It wasn't feasible.

I think that there are people on the forums that do lean toward a "Second Life" version of a Trek Online game. But that's really not appealing to me.

[sixwhirled]

Thank you. It's the basic set of principles and questions I've been trying to get people to wrap their heads around for two days now.

That and this: I am not against player crews. I want the idea to succeed. But in order for it to succeed, there are specific hurdles that need to be crossed, and the largest, overriding hurdle is the game has to be fun at the end for most of the people playing in whatever fashion they are playing, AND in such a way that the systems you're proposing aren't made pointless(which would beg the question why you bothered developing them).

Agreed. And I know I keep bring up the "Second Life" example a lot, but I truly do think that there are those people who just want to RP in a trek-based universe.

[aurickle]

Ok, this has very quickly gone the direction that I specifically asked that it NOT go. I asked that people attempt to contribute toward coming up with ideas that WOULD work. I asked that people NOT chime in with debate about why they believe player crews aren't/are a good idea. There are plenty of other threads about that. Please use them.

[Stevediaman]

Ok, this has very quickly gone the direction that I specifically asked that it NOT go. I asked that people attempt to contribute toward coming up with ideas that WOULD work. I asked that people NOT chime in with debate about why they believe player crews aren't/are a good idea. There are plenty of other threads about that. Please use them.

Why do you think all the other threads went south?

Sadly there are no moderaters on these forums.

[mirkrim]

see my post at the top of page 3.

[Indorill]

An example for those without imagination: Part one: Engineering

The engineer player looks at the warp field and notices that the warp-field geometry is bent. He scans to find that the nearby moon contains particles that bend warp fields. He goes out in a shuttle to retrieve as many of the particles as he can and returns to the ship. The player then goes through a series of minigames to classify the particle and understand it. The particles are used to create a new weapon technology. A sample is sent to Starfleet command and the rest is used to make twenty torpedoes for the ship that prevent ships from escaping at warp. This brings up a whole new mission for the enemy engineer to find a solution. If replaced with an NPC a die roll determines success.

Now the engineer finds out from the Opps Officer that one of the relays is drawing more power than necessary. He goes inside a jeffries tube to find what is possibly a bomb drawing power from the relay. He can choose Whether or not to try and disarm it there, scan it (if he's smart enough), or call someone from tactical down that may have more experience. Another possibility is finding rodents gnawing the wiring instead of a bomb. You need to track them down with your tricorder and hit them with your phaser.

I can think of a thousand more for every position and many that would work regardless of position. The point is that it's possible. If needed I can write more scenarios. Give me a challenge if you don't believe me.

[LordDave]

I didn't see this otherwise I'd had put it in here first.

First off, the key is to find a way to implement it into the system they have no rather then ripping the current system apart. We also need justification on why, later in the game, 5 captains would jump into one ship. It would also help to isolate this PC grouping from the rest of the server to make it more modular. We also need to deal with player disconnects and their consequences as well as keeping people occupied during boring parts.

How do we do this? Holodeck.
Each player docks their ship at a starbase and beams in. This will be a recreational hub. Inside is a holodeck. A party is formed via normal channels and the leader picks from a series of situations from boarding parties to scientific surveys. Each adventure has a listing of rand required (aka level) and the positions needed. Other positions are filled with NPCs because they won't do much. So an "Explore this spacial anomoly" adventure will need a science officer, but not a tactical one. This solves the "Boredom" issue by essentially cutting out the people who would be bored. The class would be chosen based on the player's choice of sub-class as was described in the webcast.

Ships can be chosen from a list based on rank and mission.
Upon entering the holodeck, each player would man their station on the bridge. Text labels would appear to designate which station is for who. I'll draw the interfaces later.

Some missions could be PVP battles in which a holodeck in a Klingon star base is linked, via subsapce, to the federation one. This will allow both parties to fight one another in an arena sort of way. Death, unexpected disconnections, or n00bs result in nothing more then a holo-loss. No XP, money, ship, ect... This solves the negative side of PC crew.

During the holo-missions, each player gains experience because only those who would do something will be allowed into that mission. However such experience will be lower.

Mini-Games for scanning will have to be developed, something I'll think about later.

Possibly add in "previous missions" as possible holo programs. Also put in option for party leader's personal ship. Party leader is captain.
If party leader is changed after any member is inside, instance won't alter.

Boarding parties would be allowed, though the mechanics would be transporter. Only security chief/tactical officer could beam over a boarding party. They can also go over themselves, but that would leave only an NPC at tactical or no one.

Small ships can be fully rendered, but a Galaxy Class is too big to do so many decks would be locked to players.

Security chief can go down through his own ship as well and also send "security details" to sensitive areas "Sickbay, Engineering, Armory, ect..." He delegates based on security compliment.

Engineer has to ensure damage control teams are going to specific areas and allocate them accordingly.
(ie. if you have 20 damage control people all together will fix one system quicker then if you split them between two systems) Engineer also does power allocation.

Medical heals crew injured through some form of mini-game. Possibly based on random injury "Burns for example require durmal regenerator around area while a piece of shrapnel requires it to be removed, then healed up with something, ect...." As the ship is damaged, more crew go to sickbay. The faster doctor works, the faster the crew go back.
So during damage, the engineering crew goes from 20 to 15. The doctor get's 5 casualties. Once doctor finishes with them, they return to damage control, adding back into the pool. Same goes for Security.

Helmsman pilotes the ship in the same manner as the single captain player does. Tactical controls operate out of the same view, but with a marker indicating shield strength and weapons arc. Think Bridge Commander.

The captain can view either the outside perspective or the bridge one. He can do nothing but chat. All captain chats appear in red highlights. Possible he can issue orders to the various departments via drop down menus which them display as big flashing messages on the other player's screen.


Now... THAT is a "How do you do it"
I'll draw up some guis when I get home from work.
It's not exactly what you want, but it is something that will fit inside the framework Crytpic is currently developing, which means it should be addable without risking the main game.

[aurickle]

An example for those without imagination: Part one: Engineering

The engineer player looks at the warp field and notices that the warp-field geometry is bent. He scans to find that the nearby moon contains particles that bend warp fields. He goes out in a shuttle to retrieve as many of the particles as he can and returns to the ship. The player then goes through a series of minigames to classify the particle and understand it. The particles are used to create a new weapon technology. A sample is sent to Starfleet command and the rest is used to make twenty torpedoes for the ship that prevent ships from escaping at warp. This brings up a whole new mission for the enemy engineer to find a solution. If replaced with an NPC a die roll determines success.

Now the engineer finds out from the Opps Officer that one of the relays is drawing more power than necessary. He goes inside a jeffries tube to find what is possibly a bomb drawing power from the relay. He can choose Whether or not to try and disarm it there, scan it (if he's smart enough), or call someone from tactical down that may have more experience. Another possibility is finding rodents gnawing the wiring instead of a bomb. You need to track them down with your tricorder and hit them with your phaser.

I can think of a thousand more for every position and many that would work regardless of position. The point is that it's possible. If needed I can write more scenarios. Give me a challenge if you don't believe me.

You've got some cool ideas. Sitting at your computer watching the warp bubble on an engineering display for hours (or even minutes) on end would be about as exciting as a root canal. But it takes very little to adjust your ideas.

As the ship passes the system, the game checks to see if the engineer has sufficient skill in warpfields to spot the fluctuation. If so, and the ship is crewed by NPC's then the player captain gets a message that the moon should be investigated. If the ship is player crewed, then the player engineer gets the message. Regardless of what he might be doing.

There's absolutely no reason why it can't be assumed that he at some point looked at a display and spotted the anomaly.

The only time command crew should actually NEED to be present at their stations on the bridge would be during combat, when they can use their expertise to make a difference. In this respect it's really not much different from being in a party playing <insert popular MMO name here> and fighting a boss mob. Everyone has a role to play, and skillful play allows them to win.

[aurickle]

You know, everyone keeps talking about "the boring parts." What are these "boring parts"? Is it the time spent traveling from system A to system B? If so, you're making two big assumptions there. The first is that there will be much (or even any) time spent traveling between systems. It's fully possible that Cryptic plans for you to click "Engage" and poof! You're there. So there's no "boring part". On the other hand, maybe it does take 15 minutes to get to point B. In that case, which is more boring? 15 minutes of sitting in your solo ship while you wait to get get there (like traveling in Eve), or 15 minutes of doing stuff around the ship with your friends -- such as crafting, hitting the holodeck for a quick mini-game, or whatever?

My point is that even if it does take an appreciable period of time to get from one place to another, getting 5 people there is going to take just as long whether they're all in one ship or in their own ships. There's exactly the same potential for boredom, and flying in a solo ship won't change that.

[Deadzone]

I posted this sin another thread but this one has more promise :)

First off, people who will 'group' with their friends or fleet members on the same ship will HAVE to know this going in. It will not all be fun and games and action. If the people accept this as part of the 'job' then that is fine and should be accepted and should be no problem.

The tech is there to make full player bridge crews. Use it. Just let the player beware. Boredom may occur!

Just to relate to boredom..., in EVE ( yes again with EVE)...boredom is universal. One word...MINING. Sitting in a belt in a ship mining for 3, 4, 5+ hours.....chatting with the guys in your corporation about anything and everything. There is NOTHING worse and more boring than mining. But you need to do it to manufacture so you do it. So will boredom occur here in STO. Just as in RL, you won't be 'doing' something every second nor will life be full of adventure every minute of the day.

Second- as people bring up..well, what if so and so isn't on or logged in, or this person LDs. Two things. 1) you can find another person that can fill that position either in your fleet or someone who is looking to join a crew for an hour or two. In all other MMOs they are called "pick up groups, or PUGs" . Yes, you don't know the skill of that person or how well they play with a group but hey, that part of life. Nothing is 100% certain. Who knows, you just may have found your next fleet mate.
2) If you people cant get their people-crew together they can always go back to their own ships and fly with their AI-crews. Its not do-or-die if you can't get a people-crew setup as you always have the AI to fall back on. Hell, you can have a mixed crew I suppose. AI on the science station and a friend on nav and another friend on combat.


I think this pretty much covers all the aspects you brought up.

Look folks- in ANY game you play, all the time you spend on it isn't full of action and earth-shattering combat. Most of the time, in MOST MMOs today, you spend a LOT of your time grinding either levels or grinding for resources to make your armour or potions etc etc. It gets old after awhile and its BORING!!!!!

you will get bored in ANY game and that includes STO. The big thing is, you acknowledge this when you go into the game. You know you will be bored at times. With player crews...a science officer or a combat officer...or a wizard ...you can;t always be shooting something or having just the best time of your life every minute of the game.

If you aren't doing much with your player-crew, you guys can dock up and take your personal ships or when the other folks leave, you just put in your AI crew and you are good to go. You have the best of both worlds.

One thing though I think I would like to see with the biggest of ships, that they are fleet owned. Meaning you can have only--say two Galaxy class ships that a fleet/guild/corp..whatever you want to call them, can own. That way you don't have 20 people in a fleet and 20 of the biggest ships. It keeps it somewhat balanced in all respects. And on these large ships is where you and your fleet-mates can get onto the bridge and wreck some havoc and "let loose the dogs of war!"

So....

Oh, and lets us all bathe in the knowledge that yes, stuff like this WILL take time. I would not expect this in release nor any of the other good ideas here. But what I WOULD expect is if Cryptic is "serious" about making a truely great game, they get "serious" about adding in stuff like this that will make it a truely great game.

[Stevediaman]

You know, everyone keeps talking about "the boring parts." What are these "boring parts"? Is it the time spent traveling from system A to system B? If so, you're making two big assumptions there. The first is that there will be much (or even any) time spent traveling between systems. It's fully possible that Cryptic plans for you to click "Engage" and poof! You're there. So there's no "boring part". On the other hand, maybe it does take 15 minutes to get to point B. In that case, which is more boring? 15 minutes of sitting in your solo ship while you wait to get get there (like traveling in Eve), or 15 minutes of doing stuff around the ship with your friends -- such as crafting, hitting the holodeck for a quick mini-game, or whatever?

My point is that even if it does take an appreciable period of time to get from one place to another, getting 5 people there is going to take just as long whether they're all in one ship or in their own ships. There's exactly the same potential for boredom, and flying in a solo ship won't change that.

They believe that splitting the job of the captain into 5 jobs for 5 people will make each job boring.

Well my response to that is the fact that even Jack Emmert said in not so many words that the combat is going to be micro managed.

There is going to be scanning shield adjusting power distribution flying shooting and many many more things.

W/ all that will need to be done i dont see why they cant be distributed between 5 players and maybe added onto a little bit.

Also people think that we want to make this player system somehow better than the NPC system... that is wrong

Another thing is that people think they will need to group with other players to complete missions... again that is wrong.

Player crews is all about choice. The choice to have your friends crew your ship, or NPC's. NOT random people.

[Indorill]

I agree with Lord Dave on many things, the most important being previous missions in the holodeck. Think of the replay value.

The basic thing here is to make different specializations kinda like wow. Most of the missions were shared, but each class had its own niche, its own quests, and its own duty. Let everyone be a captain, but let the better leaders be better captains. If you have ten players on your ship, you must be doing something right. Give that captain a better ship! Everyone was important on the show (even that damn Wesley).

On the ship

Captain - Big Brother that can access every gui to coordinate team and take over any AI station
First Officer - Should be like Spock, a title given to someone in a different role
Science - Like a crafter class, creates new tech and is not part of battle unless scanning the battleground for ways to use the environment to the crew's advantage
Medical - Dispaches medical teams to injured and heals bridge crew. Spends peacetime doing doctor-specific missions or general missions
Engineer - Maintains the ship. It's not as easy as it sounds. Also sends repair teams similarly to the Medic
Tactical - Not only chooses when to fire weapons, but what kind. Also in charge of ship security.
Helm - Flies the ship and shuttles

Planetside

Captain - Leads away team. Makes all diplomatic decisions
First Officer - Same as before, but takes over if the captain is respawning
Science - In addition to being a crafter can disrupt enemy shielding like in Mass Effect
Medical - Heals crew in battle and should decrease spawn time
Engineer - Opposite of science. Repairs personal shielding and can set up turrets, etc.
Tactical - Has main buffs for combat, but no support skills. One Tactical can probably beat one of the others, but a diverse team should be better than a team of Tactical
Helm - Drives any land vehicles ala Nemesis

Note: All would carry a phaser.

[Deadzone]

The spice must....wait, wrong universe..:o

Keep the ideas and feedback commnig..for those who want the crews.

[ressikan_flute]

If Cryptic actually does read the forums with an open mind, I'd love to see them post a request for possibilities for PC crews, with some specific details. The only thing keeping me away from getting more into the specifics of this and digging deeper is my doubt that Cryptic even cares. If they were to extend a hand to this portion of the community and say they're interested but that they need to be convinced that it's viable, then I think people would dig in deep and work along with what they need in order to satisfy both practical demands and the opportunity for co-op crew play.

I don't think anyone here is asking for perfection, or a forced sim that would bore the tears out of anyone not familiar with the NCC-1701D technical manual, we're simply looking for an "in".

Has Cryptic even posted on the forums or interacted with us in any way?

[Unassailable]

Here's a quote from my Fun Crew-Based Gameplay Thread.

Its not hard to add gameplay to these departments other than point-click-shoot. It's all been done before:


Tactical
Will be the most popular, as it offers constant fighting for those who are so-minded. The Chief will be playing something surprisingly like a traditional MMO during ship combat. They'll be queuing attacks and toggling different shield types/frequencies and targetting specific things on the enemy. May be a bit deeper than the traditional MMO since that's all they do. These skills transfer into better targetting for more damage on ground combat, though all classes take place in the same basic ground combat. In exploration, Tactical is still in charge of shooting stuff at various anomalies. Like other jobs, the Tactical is free to go take care of downtime activities on the ship during travel time. Non-Chiefs may take up secondary "gunner" positions on huge ships or work a secondary position, typically security.

Engineering
More for miners than crafters, as it involves maintenance as opposed to building new things. The Chief will be in charge of maintaing the limited "simulation," which is basically a puzzle, varying with ship class, that involves an interconnected set of colored labelled pipes ("systems") with nodes of various meaning to the routing (and re-routing) puzzle. By manipulating this puzzle, modifications, temporary or permanent depending on avatar skill, can be made to various aspects of the ship, more power to this, more power to that, etc. Damage to these systems must be repaired as well. In this way, Engineering function as the 'healers' and 'buffers' of ship combat, and exploration as well. On the ground, the Engineers are mainly useful for completing secondary objectives that turn the battle, or diplomacy, in your favor. Non-Chiefs may run around the ship as though it were an obstacle course, making necessary on-spot repairs.

Science
These are the "crafters" - and they are constantly working. A Science Officer is constantly putting together different energy types and material types (and organism types) to get a desired result. This is also "simulation." By doing this and crafting these 'effects' the crafter also is a bit of a "mage." They can find an effect that may knock out Cardassian Shields or cure Banavarian disease or deduce the organism causing the hallucinations. They are the equalizers in ship combat, as they work to deliver a masterful crippling blow. In exploration, and on the ground, they are basically gathering 'supplies' and 'resources' from sensors. Chiefs may organize Non-Chiefs to create sub-effects to create a massive effect.

Medical
Pretty standard healer class, they just require supplies. They are crucial to command because command skills do not heal 'pets,' which, redshirt effect aside, are not self-replacing. This happens during all combat, but in exploration, the doctor (and nurses) are responsible for maintaining the crew, and quickly addressing diseases before they become full outbreaks among the NPCs, and eventually the PCs. Keep in mind Medical Officers are Science Officers as well, even if they may focus more on organism types than energy and materials.

Security
One place I would break cannon is the frequency of intruders and boarding parties. They'd be a constant part of combat. The ship would turn into a battleground for fighting enemies... a familiar multiplayer map, if you will. Chiefs would be in charge of taking the fight to the enemy in boarding parties, trying to cripple the enemy from the inside. Fallout and precursors to missions could easily bring about violent stow aways and delusional crew members that require security work during exploration phases. Of course, Security also has more damage on ground combat. Non-Chiefs get to fight too.

Command
The one everyone wants to be? Well, give it to them. Everyone has some level of command. Everyone can get a ship commissioned to them. Everyone can get NPC pets assigned to their command. Everyone can give a command that buffs the actions of another. Everyone has a limited view of what their team is doing/dealing with. An Ensign can get commissioned a shuttle/fighter, and take missions and go wherever. As they become a Lt. Jg, they can get a runabout and have three Ensign NPCs assigned to them they can train and order and etc. A Captain, on the other hand, can be commissioned a Soverign Class Vessel. They can have 1000s of NPCs onboard, acquired over their entire career... like Pokemon or something. They can buff actions taken by others or even temporarily open up actions that they haven't levelled to yet. They get mini-versions of everyone else's Hud. Of course, by the time you get to Commander, and especially Captain, the advancement game has changed. Its no longer about your skill points, but about your connections with the universe around you that allows you to get ahead... but that's endgame stuff. Their game remains relatively the same whether during exploration, ship combat or ground combat. They're making decisions, and doing a lot of talking, coordinating PCs and commanding and increasingly large number of pets. They may split their duties any number of ways with 1st and 2nd Officers.

Helm
The hardest of the 'main' duties to make fun. Obviously, during combat you have the dogfigting and queueing special maneuvers which can be a great deal of fun. There is the note of the lack of viscerality in maneuverability... it becomes, basically, a support class, since you're not actually doing the hitting. After that is accepted, you have a navigational mode where the player is manually navigating, slingshotting off of gravitational forces and dodging obstacles in warp... kind of like a racing game, actually. On the ground of course, Helmers have the added bonus of the ocasional ground vehicle. Yikes! Non-Chiefs in this area are also difficult to compensate for... perhaps they use the runabout? Perhaps they take turns? Most likely, they'll opt to have their own ships.

[Recluse]

Ok, so from the understanding that i have of player crews, if you want to achieve as much as you can achieve it is solely based on your ability to get a team together and work consistently with them. Otherwise you are the engineer on an NPC ship that can't reach its full potential until other PCs join your craft.

Someone made the argument about the boring part being you in your ship alone doing nothing instead of you in your ship with 4 others crafting and doing things on the holodeck. Ok, well why can't this be the same thing while in a solo ship? You control and reroute all systems with npc pets, you can link to other people's holodeck programs while in travel just as much as you can in a ship all together.

So, I'm gonna get the bold face back at me probably, but everything I've seen so far with what people want out of a PC crew you can get out of the system they have in dev right now with single captain crews, you just aren't thinking out of the box enough I guess.

SCENARIO 1 - PC crew system - FSS Xyz PC captain gets a message from PC science officer that a nearby moon should be checked out for a rare anomoly they have not seen. Once engaged, PC engineer notices that the anomoly is messing with the warpcore, he messages the captain, captain goes to yellow alert to deal with anomoly. All of a sudden aliens beam into ship and the security officer lets the captain know that we have intruders on board. Some crew injured so PC captain and security notify medic and crew are taken to the sickbay where PC doctor begins medical work.

SCENARIO 2 - NPC crew system - FSS's Xyx, abc, def, and ghi are on a mission together (each ship is a different type of class based ship). FSS abc a science vessel messages to FSS Xyz (a tactical command vessel) that a moon outside of everyone else's sensor capabilities should be examined for an anomoly. FSS ghi notifies the other ships that the anomoly is affecting their warpcore in a way that this ship (an engineering ship) can detect and fix. FSS def notices a beam in of aliens on a few of the ships he notifies the other captains and then begins sending teams of marines onto the invaded ships. FSS abc which also serves as a medical vessel begins coordinating injured.

I don't see the difference too much between these two scenarios except the fact that in one you are part of one ship, and the other you are part of a fleet. In the one ship idea the ship only can do its job up to the ability of its weakest member (i.e. your performance of your duties would suffer if Captain retard can't give orders or engineer moron is a noob and can't read the display). Whereas your own performance as part of your own specialized ship type could be peak and working independtly, and you could actually take your own actions as a Captain in that speciality ship and not have to wait for someone who is in the bathroom during a Klingon attack to order the shields to go up or phasers to fire. If the medical ship in your group leaves, hey your own sickbay probably is still capable of taking on some of the injured that the medical ship would fix faster, but at least the game doesn't shut down if someone leaves their post. This is one problem between cooperative MMOs out there now. If I'm in a fight with 4 other people and our healer either "dies" or has some kind of Real Life problem or conection issue, then what the other 4 people are doing STOPS, they can't go on. With everyone having their own ship the event goes on, maybe not as well or as quickly, but it can still go on (i.e. I would hate that Cryptic builds this game in a way that we must depend on certain class ships to get something done, or certain class PC crew characters for that matter, I would hope that it would just get done better and faster if certain PC roles were filled, but not be NECESSARY).

Now granted in the second scenario captain retard and engineer moron might exist but, you command your own ship and if two people are in your party it seems more likely that you would retreat a starship as a captain than hop into an escape pod onboard a ship (much more of a court marshalable offense there).

So, considering they got Lenard Nimoy and a convention center spot in Las Vegas, Nevada to show everyone that "you are the captain" these types of threads might be better served if you say, "Hey, as captain of a engineering class star ship I want a special screen that allows me to see the warpcore and engine specs for my ship and for other ships in my party so that I can tell other captains what to do with their engines quicker than they would find out by far."

So, I would be calling for more PC information systems to the type of command you have (i.e. engineer, medical, science) to be able to supply your task force, fleet, team, group or whatever you want to call it instead of everyone working as a team onboard one ship doing their own jobs and hoping to have the ship move everyone onboard is competent enough not to mess up. Imagine the "leroy jenkins" attitude onboard a ship, do we as a community shut that person down and not allow them to play as a shipmate? Or do they get their own ship and lone wolf it? As a PC crewmate who leaves my post in the middle of an important mission and then 4 others who didn't know that my house caught on fire in the middle of a battle then decide to kick me off the ship I put so much work into? Or can I put all my work into my own ship and then while working in a fleet they kick me out of that group when my house catches on fire...hmmm, I'd take an Engineering class star ship over an escape pod any day of the week.

Imagine the level of griefing that would go on if we did have PC crews...it could actually make the game experience shut down, whereas if you have your own ship you are not out too much if your fleet (guild), task force or what have you break up.

[aurickle]

Here are some ideas fleshing out the roles of the command crew. Note: These positions apply when the ship is actually in combat. They are not meant to have players sitting in front of an LCARS display for hours at a time.

Helm - Responsible for maneuvering the ship. Specializes in tactical maneuvers, giving the ship movement bonuses.
Tactical - Handles weapons and shields. His job is to keep the shields strongest where they're needed the most, and also to target weapons.
Engineering - Manages power load balancing and repair efforts. In other words, is responsible for directing power to whatever systems are key at the moment, and for prioritizing the efforts of the repair crews.
Sciences - Scans enemy ships for weaknesses. Controls electronics countermeasures. For example, is key to detecting and tracking cloaked ships. Provides bonuses to the tactical officer's targeting systems. Can use electronics skills to try and override enemy command systems and such.
Communications - Also specializes in electronics warfare, such as jamming communications to prevent the enemy from calling for help, or even hampering the enemy's ability to direct damage control by jamming their internal communications. In a fleet, provides buffs to the fleet due to skill at coordinating your ship with the other members of the fleet. (In classic MMO terms, this character is the main buffer/debuffer of a team.)
Medical - The chief medical officer is just that: a department head. He's responsible for directing the efforts of his staff, getting limited medical personnel to key areas around the ship so that incoming damage doesn't hamper ship effectiveness. (In classic MMO terms, think of this person as a healer. His "mana" is actually the number of medical personnel available to him. Sending a team to a particular section is akin to casting a spell, depleting the mana which then regenerates as the team does its job and can focus on other patients.)

As you can see, these roles serve as archetypes within a party, much like classes do in other MMO's. Each has ways in which they can benefit the team, and each is an active job within a fight. Nobody sits around, twiddling thumbs.

If a station is not occupied by a player, it is taken over by an NPC. These second stringers are competent according to their training, but won't necessarily perform with the polish of an experienced group of players.

No player is restricted to a particular station. Every player should have at least minimal skill to be able to handle one or more other stations. This lets players step in if someone is incapacitated -- which has been seen happen many times on the shows. It also allows players to switch things up a bit if they feel like taking on different roles now and then.

One thing you may have noticed is that I didn't list captain, first officer, etc. in all of this. The reason for this is that those rules are more a formality than a gameplay matter. The science officer can certainly be the captain, or the communications officer could be the first officer.

Each of these roles is fully capable of beaming down to a planet and having things to do there according to the individual's skills. We regularly saw Scotty, Uhura, Sulu and others go to planets. Or Janeway would send certain people on away missions because they had tertiary skills that gave them a possible advantage with the mission at hand. The command crew skills should be a second line of character advancement that doesn't necessarily relate directly to their away team functions.

[CdrWolfe]

Just to expand a small part on a Science role in combat,

As mentioned previously the science officer or perhaps Ops can be used to scan the enemy target or ship to discover certain aspects about it that could lead to an advantage during combat. For example perhaps this specific spawned in instance of a ship has a defective warp coil which bleeds energy and causes the ships sheilds to reduce or fail.

The Tactical officer will no doubt be able to target key areas he would know about, weapons, bridge etc but the science officer could discover this weakness and then pass it on to the tactical offcier. His GUI would then update allowing him to target this new specific ship system.

Lets say he tactical officer fires and the effect is normal in damage and effect, later the science officer finds out that the shields drop whenever the other ship fires its weapons, i.e it's energy is drained slitghlty opening up this weakness.

Once again this can be passed on and coordinated towards the tactical officer. the helm officer can be tasked to position the ship to be within target range and angle of this sub system etc.

Now I beleive you could expand this into countless other scenarios only limited by your imagination. The hard part is making it programmable.

Regards Wolfe

[Unassailable]

Imagine the level of griefing that would go on if we did have PC crews...it could actually make the game experience shut down, whereas if you have your own ship you are not out too much if your fleet (guild), task force or what have you break up.

You should probably take the time to read a working PC-Crew plan, many are posted on these forums. As is, you've come up with a bad idea and then explained to us why its a bad idea. Anyone can come up with a sucky game, that doesn't mean that a good version of that game cannot be made.

[Recluse]

You should probably take the time to read a working PC-Crew plan, many are posted on these forums. As is, you've come up with a bad idea and then explained to us why its a bad idea. Anyone can come up with a sucky game, that doesn't mean that a good version of that game cannot be made.


And this entire thread is to try and change a game development to something they have obviously not been going in the direction of. So, my pointing out the sucky parts of a game as you put stand to the idea of PC crews of a ship. There are a lot of people philosophically in support of this idea (I'm not one of them, and never was as I've played a lot of cooperative games, and have also served in a command structure very similar to a ship in real life). Others are philosophically opposed to the idea that Cryptic is now going toward because of their want for PC crews (I can understand the want for this as it would be cool to be Mr. Spock on the bridge crew, or Gordi in engineering, however the coolness of those positions are in the ROLE PLAY, not in the actual clicking of buttons in those posts).

My compromise is to take the ROLE PLAY aspect of the PC crew idea and attach it to the direction to which Cryptic is now driving in development. For example the roles that you listed up above from the fun PC crew idea can easily be attached to the ship class roles that anyone can play AND you can have hybrids (which would be very difficult to do with a PC crew).

HYBRIDS allow for a very dynamic game which is a very cool idea that fits into the Trek universe much better than "hybrid" crew ops. You can have a exploration/engineering class ship that you command which otherwise would be very hard to do a PC crew mate who is both the chief science officer and the chief engineer. Imagine the possiblities - Tactical/Science, Tactical/Medical, Medical/Science, Engineering/Medical, Science/Medical, Exploration/Tactical. You could have primary, secondary and at higher levels even tertiary hybrids. I would find this hard to do both pragmatically and in the spirit of Trek with PC crew mates unless you play multiple characters on DIFFERENT ships (which goes against some of your philosophy of the PC crew cause many of you want to create that USS Enterprise idea of shipmateness).

Now, take the good ideas of PC crewmanship and apply those to grouping aspects of fleets or task forces and there you go. There are some very good ideas here, but with a philosophy and mentality that is counter productive to the general development of the game. Give the engineering based ship the ability to take offer suggestions to the rest of the fleet or task force engineering solutions and benefits, and same with tactical, medical, and so on. Let the captains of those ships have as much say in their role as another captain as anyone else in the group (I'm sorry but in a game I don't see an accountant from New York and a farmboy 17 year old farmboy in Kansas, and a Devil Dog Marine from Camp Pendelton having the same esprit de corp on board the Starship Shangri La being able to effectively work together onboard one ship to get things done very often). The groups that PC crews would need to make would need similar training, a vast knowledge of each others ideas and values to be able to work together in a way that this game could work to its potential.

Now, as fun or as much work as that would be to have a well oiled machine of a PC crew starship I don't think the vast majority of people out there would put the effort into the game to try to create that atmosphere. So, once again my argument of working on a starship for 3 months putting in a lot of work and getting to know the crew very well, then I go on vacation for 2 weeks or my computer breaks down and I don't have the funds or ability to repair it or buy a new one for that amount of time, and when I log back on I find that instead of the rest of the crew waiting around for me to come back they have instead put me in an escape pod, dropped me off at a star base, or worst yet opened up an air lock (I don't know, maybe there is a way you have thought up how people would be able to join, leave, or booted from crews which aren't as extreme as this). Whereas if I have put the work into my own ship with engineering base, or tactical or whatever I don't lose a step from my last log in my own ship, however I might have been booted from a fleet, but my own game play and position onboard my own ship will not suffer if I go AWOL for whatever reason.

I can see all of the examples of Tactical, Engineering, Command, Security, and so forth being put into the game development direction (i.e. the puzzle parts given to Engineering ships, waypoint markers to other ships given to command/navigators, dealing with intruders on multiple ships including your own by the "security" ships), if the grouping function allows for a multitude of shared information to be dealt with either by coordination or by individual initiative then this works great. This is a bit harder to do on a single starship, because someone (especially when getting to know the crew) will feel like their feet are always getting stepped on by someone else.

Imagine I'm an engineer who wants to be on a starship in the PC crew goes through, but I don't like to take oreders, but I don't want to be a captain. Should I not buy the game? Of course I shouldn't, because all I would feel is constant frustration (the 17 year old farmboy with no military background, and the accountant from New York would fit these personality areas). I guess we could give these people the option of having a NPC captain then they only follow the orders they want to follow with no penalty?

Now, with the ship idea in development take the same idea, the question remains should I buy the game? Well if I'm set on being a engineer in the engine room then no, I shouldn't (which is what some of the people wanting PC crews are going to do), but I can get my own ship, make my own decisions, play the game, and occasionally group up with others and continue to make my own decisions while focusing on the engineering aspect of the game, and if I don't follow orders that the commander wants then I don't, but perhaps that person rarely groups up with me, however I still get to play the game.

So, once again, my advice would be to take some of these great PC crew ideas and expand them to incorporate current game design as suggestions. Give more of a hands on feeling to the commanders of ships in their specialty and the ability for them to coordinate that hands on approach to an entire fleet or task force.

[Recluse]

For example: The great idea of a PC crew working this way.

Captain (on communications): Engineering, we need warp power now to get out of this mess.

Engineering officer: Give me a second, Captain. (Solves some ingame puzzle or skill check, whatever) Captian, I need to reroute phaser power to bring the warpdrive up to full (or whatever, I'm not a tech geek or a writer, haha enter your own stuff here).

Captain: Negative, I need phasers to fight the big bad ugly aliens.

Engineering officer: Ok, (tries another puzzle or skill but fails). I'm sorry captain but our only option is to reroute the power.

Captain: Negative, again.

Engineering officer: Hey, captain stupid, reroute power.

Captain: I'm putting you up on charges of...(ship blows up).


So there is one situation in which both people wanted to do their own thing, and now they both suffered because of it.

In the ship based NPC system here is what happens.

Captain of tactical ship: We need warp power now, we can't handle this fight!

Captain of Engineering ship: Working on that captain. (Solves some puzzle or does some kind of skill role) Ok, you need to reroute power from phasers to your warp engine. [It would be cool here by the way that the Engineering Captain could send to ship or fleetwide a message to do something in a little type of textbox that each or every other Captain could click on as a yes or no to have their own ship do what the other wanted them to]

Captain of tactical ship: Negative [clicks no on textbox for example]. I need phasers.

Captain of Engineering ship: Ok, let me see what else I got (does another puzzle or skill role, but no other solutions). Its the only way, reroute power from phasers to engine [another textbox with same suggestion].

Captain of tactical ship: Negative...I need those phasers. [Clicks no again]

Captain of Engineering ship: Ok, you do that, helmsman course to nearest starbase, engage warp nine. (Flies away). See you captain in your escape pod later...

Captain of tactical ship: Oh noes...I guess I die. (ship blows up).

With the second scenario you have one of the two ships surving, the ship that made the right decision, as opposed to having the captain of one ship making a wrong decision and someone who disagrees with it pay for his mistake, you now can give suggestions which can be taken or ignored, but all in all your decision to not take a death penalty (which will probably be small anyways, but will take at least some time even if seconds to a minute to recover from) is ultimately in your own hands.

This seems to be a better way to handle disagreements between people who pay the same monthly fee, but for some reason one of them has a higher rank onboard ship (otherwise they would do a military grade fee/payment system where if you are the low ranking bridge officer you pay 10 monthly, and if you are the captain then you pay 25 monthly, because then I bet a few more people might listen to that guy).

Now disobeying orders in the NPC crew system could have some penalties doable by people getting a bad rep for always disobeling orders, or being kicked out of a fleet or task force. In extreme cases tickets to the devs might even punish the captain of a ship to even more extreme ends.