Consider changing the starting ship, scoutship

[grävling]

Now that I don't have to reserve one of the top slots for 'Ship' if I eventually want a big ship to fly about in, I have been flying in a lot of Scoutships.

It's really, really fun. Your people level so much faster!

But one thing isn't so much fun.

This is on Basic. Just starting out. I made 'Experience' my C choice, and Ship my E choice.



Ow! What a terrible problem with understaffing it looks like you have there!

Now, if you are experienced, you know what to do. Buy a bigger barracks! Hire more crew! (Assuming you got created on a place that has a decent selection of crew to hire, and a starport that can handle upgrades. It's really not fun when that doesn't happen and people die as you make your first trip in the quest for a decent starport.)

Then it looks like this:


So the problem wasn't as bad as it appeared at first glance.

But I think it would be good if we could give newbies the suggestion 'If you don't want to make Experience priority A or B, start with a small ship or face understaffing problems.' I don't think that 'C' is a particularly low priority, and I think it should work with a scoutship 'out of the box' ... i.e. we don't have to tell the newbies 'If you don't want to make Experience priority A or B, start with a small ship, and if it is a scoutship, immediately grow your barracks, or face understaffing problems'.

You could achieve this by starting the scoutship with the bigger barracks. If you do this, you might add some more starter crew, as well. Or you could make the scoutship somewhat easier to fly, so the crew of 12 were closer to accomplishing the job. 1 fewer point in Pilot and Navigation difficulty, for instance, would get both of these just over being understaffed.

[grävling]

This is the start for the Juror with Experience as C, by the way.

So the Juror is easier to fly, at least by the 'how understaffed are you' tally. Promote an officer, hire 2 people and you are good to go.

[fallen]

Thanks for the feedback!

We'll keep working to improve.

Definitely, choosing lower Experience can cause you to be understaffed on a lot of ship choices.

[grävling]

I would really like it if you didn't think of 'C' as low, since it really is 'middle'.

[grävling]

Moving to EXP B, basic level in the scoutship doesn't help.




Still understaffed in everything.

[grävling]

Moving to EXP A still doesn't mean you won't start off understaffed.

[Alex Fury]

I usually make Experience E... What I've usually done for those ships, is take out some of the weapon systems, and then with promotions, open up slots to hire for the skills I need.

Generally when I'm running a Juror, or a Scout ship, I'm usually going more as a messenger/blockade runner type. Avoid combat, haul small but valuable stuff. I knock out the in-close weapons first for other things. More often than not, at the first planet-landing (unless there's just no one to hire, or the starport his horrendous) I can start off with fully staffed (or close) skills across the board.

[grävling]

My problem isn't -- I don't know how to get around understaffing problems but rather, I think that newcomers who decide to start with a scoutship
should not have horrendous understaffing problems NO MATTER HOW MUCH EXPERIENCE THEY ASK FOR.

[fallen]

Thanks for the feedback. We'll keep working to improve.

[MintDragon]

Jun 23, 2017 12:24:32 GMT -5 grävling said:

I would really like it if you didn't think of 'C' as low, since it really is 'middle'.

There are some easy options at launch.  A tutorial (built-in or on-line) can help, but setting default choices (ship, talents, exp, profession, etc...) catering to a newbie might be a way to go.  The above posts are all valid (lord knows it took me over a year of coming back to ST and ST4X after being frustrated by not knowing what to do), balancing for the starter difficulty bonuses, default settings will be something I'll be making a huge push for...