How much is an NPC slot really worth?

[Brictoria]

While looking at my fleet, and considering future additions, I'm starting to wonder how much an NPC slot is worth when deciding what to keep and what to melt - For reference, I tend to play solo, so I'll likely use them to help crew my larger ship(s) both due to playing solo, as well as the ease with making sure I have crew when needed rather than hoping others will be online and willing to crew my ship instead of their own, but not knowing how effective they will be makes calculating their value difficult.

At present I have a Concierge game pack (No Squadron 42, though - Missed that by 2 days), plus:
A ship (120 month insurance), skin, gamepack and Squadron42 package that cost $19 more than the ship's standalone "value" (cheaper than the $20 "add-on" Squadron 42 with a starter pack).
A ship (120 month insurance), skin, and gamepack that cost the same as the standalone ship's "value".
A ship (6 months insurance) with gamepack that cost less than the ship's "value".
A ship (6 months insurance) with skin and gamepack that cost a little more than the ship and skin's "value" (Skin isn't available seperately, though).

I'll also be receiving (from past referrals):
A ship (24 months) and gamepack which cost more than the ship and will be melted.
A ship (LTI), paint, and gamepack that cost $2 more than the Warbond "value" of the ship and paint on it's own (Or the same price as the non Warbond version of the ship).

My current problem is deciding whether another NPC slot is really worth the extra $2 over the cost of the paint and a Warbond LTI Cutter, or whether it would be better to pass on the additional NPC slot and simply buy the ship on its own.

How much do people value the extra NPC slots at, or don't they worry about them?

 

[FZD]

Hmm, think this about sums it:
"The difference between a Game Character slot converted into a NPC crew member and a regular NPC crew member is that you can customize the Game Character NPC’s look, name and backstory. There is an additional bonus of being able to specify one of your Game Character NPC crewmembers as your successor in the event of your main characters death (See Death of a Spaceman), at which point the Game Character NPC will become playable again, with the assets of your deceased old character conveying. "

I'd say NPC slots are probably worth a little bit of extra investment, I'm thinking of getting 1-2 myself (well, I assume Concierge game package counts as 1 already, so I'm thinking of maybe getting a 2nd). But based on what we know about them so far, I don't think there'd be a real reason to really start collecting them. Well, that's a system they've basically not considered at all yet, so everything is subject to change.

 

[Brictoria]

I'm still not convinced that the multi-crew ships (particularly the larger ones) are going to be viable with more than 1 or 2 players with the rest of the crew being NPC's.

When the limit on respawns kicks in, heading out on someone else's multi-crew ship is going to require either a short voyage (however long your group plans to play for the session), or a commitment to stay on board for the duration of the trip\mission even if it requires many days before reaching another location where you can disembark (and then possibly have to travel back to where your own fleet is located or wait for part\all of it to be ferried to your new location (claiming insurance likely won't be possible if the original ship is intact and stored somewhere), or sacrificing one of your limited respawns in order to be able to "escape" the ship.

By signing on to someone else's ship, you are both giving up the ability to switch to a different activity (should you wish to do something different) for an unspecified duration, as well as committing to assist the running of their ship (or leaving it undermanned if you are not there when needed), which is likely to take a lot of the interest in multi-crewing away from people, particularly in terms of long-range travel\exploration, or for people with large fleets of their own.

 

[Bambooza]

Hmm, think this about sums it:
"The difference between a Game Character slot converted into a NPC crew member and a regular NPC crew member is that you can customize the Game Character NPC’s look, name and backstory. There is an additional bonus of being able to specify one of your Game Character NPC crewmembers as your successor in the event of your main characters death (See Death of a Spaceman), at which point the Game Character NPC will become playable again, with the assets of your deceased old character conveying. "

I'd say NPC slots are probably worth a little bit of extra investment, I'm thinking of getting 1-2 myself (well, I assume Concierge game package counts as 1 already, so I'm thinking of maybe getting a 2nd). But based on what we know about them so far, I don't think there'd be a real reason to really start collecting them. Well, that's a system they've basically not considered at all yet, so everything is subject to change.

I had forgotten about this. Then again given it was written back in sep of 2013 I don't feel so bad. One thing I wish they would do would be to go back over these old design documents and update them to allow us to know if they are still relevant or not.

 

[White Lando]

Went kind of hard on the last 30% off 100i game package sale and the Cutter game package and an old Mustang Alpha package.

I have 7 game packages total

 

[Ayeteeone]

Feel like this is one of those areas of the game that you almost have to take on faith.. almost.

The AI required for NPC's to fulfill useful roles on the ship is and has very much been in development, as it is needed for SQ42. 'Companion AI' for the player was even mentioned in one of the recent shows as being in a nacent stage.

How well it will work.. who knows. IF they can stabilize to the desired 30fps (or better!) on the servers, the actual programming should function reliably. We are seeing that with the combat AI improvements. Turrets are important to anything bigger than a light fighter and have proven quite deadly when server performance is not an issue.

If medical aid, basic engineering functions, and simple ship operations like opening a hangar/approving docking are working then NPC's will be a very popular way to run the bigger ships. They are aiming well beyond this!

I'm not finding the reference right now, but recall that NPC's based on a game package were said to be 'higher quality'. In game terms we could assume that means able to reach a higher skill level. Or not....?

Like so many things in this project, we've had to make choices based on the ideas CR has expressed. For me personally, this hasn't been an issue as I can see the vast amount of progress that has been made toward those ideas. Having a few 'high quality' NPC's available seems just as reasonable as pledging for any ship in the game where they might be useful.

 

[Freak0]

I have 5 game packages + the concierge bonus package. Having a potential 6 total helps me potentially solo my largest personal ships.

I have a group of capital sized ships for organization-TEST events. I don't really count those as personal, day-to-day, use ships.

 

[Montoya]

The truth is we have no fucking clue.

The whole idea of getting an NPC slot was because people kept buying game packages before standalone ships where a thing.

So they kinda just said "Ok so that is now an NPC slot".

Who knows what it will eventually be or if its even worth it compared to just using the in-game mechanics that will probably offer the same thing.

 

[Vavrik]

I do not really trust NPC's at the moment, not till I see them working. I'm going to dock their pay if I catch them standing on the ship's fixtures and equipment instead of doing their jobs.

 

[White Lando]

The truth is we have no fucking clue.

The whole idea of getting an NPC slot was because people kept buying game packages before standalone ships where a thing.

So they kinda just said "Ok so that is now an NPC slot".

Who knows what it will eventually be or if its even worth it compared to just using the in-game mechanics that will probably offer the same thing.

It will be worth it for me immediately when I model one of my NPCs after my wife.

I'll be able to boss her around for once.

 

[Sky Captain]

I'm still not convinced that the multi-crew ships (particularly the larger ones) are going to be viable with more than 1 or 2 players with the rest of the crew being NPC's.

It would be great to see CIG address this.

My thought is that if CIG can code large, fully-NPC-driven ships to be effective in combat in SQ42, they will be able to do it for our ships with NPCs in the PU.

But what 'effective' is remains to be seen.

Meanwhile, prepare for LTI NPCs....CIG will need to sell something other than new concept ships at some point...and that will be their incentive to code our NPCs. Well, at least as concepts.

 

[Sirus7264]

The truth is we have no fucking clue.

The whole idea of getting an NPC slot was because people kept buying game packages before standalone ships where a thing.

So they kinda just said "Ok so that is now an NPC slot".

Who knows what it will eventually be or if its even worth it compared to just using the in-game mechanics that will probably offer the same thing.

Yeah i was about to say we havnt heard anything about NPC AI at all yet just kind of rumors etc. I think this is on the back o their list so dont expect to hear anything.

 

[Shadow Reaper]

This discussion comes up seasonally, yet each time no one seems to recall what CIG has said about NPCs from the start. Since before they floated the notion of having various skill levels for NPCs and charging more for higher skilled characters, they were clear that NPCs would be more skilled than blades in turrets (so long as your ship even has room for a blade), that NPCs have to be paid, and receive more pay for higher and more skills (seems player NPCs won't need to be paid), and will not be as skilled as players in roles like turret gunner. CIG is not going to allow us to utterly replace players on the multi-crew ships unless you're willing to fly with a relatively unskilled crew.

I don't think people remember what CIG has said from day one about multi-crew ships. They're not intended to function well without multiple players. If your choice is between an NPC in a turret and an empty turret, that's better than nothing. You should not however expect the turret gunner NPC to hit anything, because we haven't been promised they will be able to. Best is hope for suppressing fire.

Probably, player engineers will benefit from multiple NPCs helping but working under her supervision. If you're aboard a big cap ship that obtains much of its advantage from advanced damage control systems, best is have a player there.

I think there is going to be a lot of anger from players when they see how limited NPCs are, and it will be their own fault because they were told and decided to believe something different--something they wanted instead of what they were told.

We're in the largest org in the game. Our unique advantage is to group up--or do we have all chiefs and no braves?

Try to think of it the other way around for a moment. Anyone can buy a ship. That makes them a Captain. It does not make them a good Captain. If using players onboard did not have significant advantages, why would anyone team up and play the way CIG has said they're hoping for?

I had this discussion yesterday in another forum. Now as then I'll say, collaboration is the key to success in this game. It is designed so. If leadership didn't require any skills, no leaders would play this game. If you want to be on a big, powerful ship you can't be a solo player. If you want to captain a big, powerful ship, you need to have the leadership skills to draw and keep a good crew.

This guy I had the conversation with yesterday is a friendly acquaintance. We get along well. He was arguing that players ought to be able to solo a Polaris just fine. Does that seem to anyone here what CIG intends?

My response of course was to invite him to TEST and give up solo play.

 

[Brictoria]

This discussion comes up seasonally, yet each time no one seems to recall what CIG has said about NPCs from the start. Since before they floated the notion of having various skill levels for NPCs and charging more for higher skilled characters, they were clear that NPCs would be more skilled than blades in turrets (so long as your ship even has room for a blade), that NPCs have to be paid, and receive more pay for higher and more skills (seems player NPCs won't need to be paid), and will not be as skilled as players in roles like turret gunner. CIG is not going to allow us to utterly replace players on the multi-crew ships unless you're willing to fly with a relatively unskilled crew.

I don't think people remember what CIG has said from day one about multi-crew ships. They're not intended to function well without multiple players. If your choice is between an NPC in a turret and an empty turret, that's better than nothing. You should not however expect the turret gunner NPC to hit anything, because we haven't been promised they will be able to. Best is hope for suppressing fire.

Probably, player engineers will benefit from multiple NPCs helping but working under her supervision. If you're aboard a big cap ship that obtains much of its advantage from advanced damage control systems, best is have a player there.

I think there is going to be a lot of anger from players when they see how limited NPCs are, and it will be their own fault because they were told and decided to believe something different--something they wanted instead of what they were told.

We're in the largest org in the game. Our unique advantage is to group up--or do we have all chiefs and no braves?

Try to think of it the other way around for a moment. Anyone can buy a ship. That makes them a Captain. It does not make them a good Captain. If using players onboard did not have significant advantages, why would anyone team up and play the way CIG has said they're hoping for?

I had this discussion yesterday in another forum. Now as then I'll say, collaboration is the key to success in this game. It is designed so. If leadership didn't require any skills, no leaders would play this game. If you want to be on a big, powerful ship you can't be a solo player. If you want to captain a big, powerful ship, you need to have the leadership skills to draw and keep a good crew.

This guy I had the conversation with yesterday is a friendly acquaintance. We get along well. He was arguing that players ought to be able to solo a Polaris just fine. Does that seem to anyone here what CIG intends?

My response of course was to invite him to TEST and give up solo play.

For short periods of time, it would be reasonable to expect fully player-crewed ships, but what about the problems that can come from longer-term missions\voyages.

Doing a short term run (one play session), you can all leave from a location, then return there at the end of it to allow the crew to disembark and either rejoin the next session, or do their own thing for a while.

On a longer term mission\voyage, you run into the problem of crew wishing to disembark to do something else and so are either forced to make a long trip back to a planet\system where their fleet is located, or them being forced to "die" and using a respawn to return (potentially leaving a position on the ship completely empty if there is nowhere nearby to take on an NPC or player replacement). Similarly, what happens if you have a fully crewed ship like a Carrack doing a multi-day exploration run and the owner has restricted it so they are the only person able to pilot it and then they are unable to sign in (due to work\medical\other reason) for one or more nights - Will the crew be stuck in the ship, unable to do anything as a result? How about if crew members are unable to sign in (or sacrifice a respawn to disembark), does that leave the ship in a worse position than if NPC were used for crew instead?

While it would be nice to have 100% player crewed ships, there are situations where a single player and NPC crew for a ship are likely going to be a more appealing\appropriate option, particularly as new systems are released and the playerbase spreads itself out.

Having past comments from CIG about the plans for NPC's and player crew expectations is nice, but what they said years ago isn't neccesarily what they are planning\implementing now... Even stories about "skill levels" for NPC crews (if still planned) doesn't give any details on whether the NPC's we "own" from extra game packs will allow us to choose the skills\levels of those skills, or if it is entirely random... If we can chose\allocate skill levels for the individual NPC's, it would make them much more valuable as we could customise crew for specific roles (Turret gunners, miners, salvage crew, scanner operators, etc.) to ensure that we have access to the "best" possible NPC for a given role if one is required (min-maxing skills for different roles), rather than a more "generalist" type crew member (If running a Mole\Orion, for example, an NPC that is fully trained at mining roles but is a useless turret gunner would be more useful than an NPC that is 75% as good at mining, but is "reasonable" as a turret gunner or moving\loading\unloading cargo - or a player who has no idea what to do in a mining ship... And many Reclaimer owners are going to want a good box stacker in the rear of the ship).

At present, I'm generally trying to stick to soloable ships, not knowing how NPC's will work, but am also stuck with a Carrack and would like to know that should I wish to take it out somewhere, the NPC's I have collected will have more value than random NPC's, to allow me to use the ship without being committed to playing at certain times\days to ensure I don't let down other players or restrict them from changing what they want to do at any given time - Once aboard a ship and bed-logged, you are at the mercy of the ship's owner regarding what you can do in the game, and when you can do it, until you have an opportunity to disembark (much like fleet carriers and new players in Elite).

 

[Shadow Reaper]

That’s a lot to respond to. Please don’t think me rude for just taking a single issue you’ve raised.

In the case of extended duration service, be it exploration, mining on the fringe, or military incursions deep into Vanduul territory—where you can’t expect to leave easily—one hopes players who sign up for this will commit to certain hours/week and show up on those hours and additional hours as well. Probably most players who make that kind of commitment will use one of several accounts for this, not as an NPC but as a PC. Now if while they’re away doing other things they want to animate their account with NPC ‘botics that sounds fine to me, but I think you’d have to be a very foolish Captain to plan a long duration trip with an expensive vessel manned mostly by AI, because you are guaranteed to have an unskilled crew.

NPCs are not in the strictest sense intended as replacements for players.

But let me turn this around again. You realize, this line of argument you’re making is what always comes from solo players. You do get, large, complex, multi-player ships are NOT INTENDED for solo use. If you keep telling yourself you can make that work, you’re going to be disappointed. Multicrew ships are for teams, not solo players, and they offer immersive experiences that can be had no other way.

It’s not hard to understand CIG’s intentions here. They could certainly make AI NPCs that shoot as well or better than a player, but then there’s no benefit from teaming up, all the players go solo and they may as well play SQ42.

Instead of looking for a test case to violate the intentions of the game designers, why not just find a group you like? There are 20,000 players here. Can’t be all that hard.

Please allow I follow this single issue just one last step and ask, “why is it players favor solo play?” They really do. Chris recognized this from his first days designing the game.

I personally think there are two issues.

First, players don’t want to commit specific time to a game. They want to game when convenient. Who can blame them? And of course the problem here is a Captain could “enlist” ten times as many players as he has positions and hope for the best, but if you know anything about statistics you absolutely know this is doomed to failure. Captains crewing large vessels have to get commitments from players and players who routinely break their commitments will find themselves ejected. The Captains have no choice about this. There’s no other way to man a ship. Sucks, but there it is. If you can’t manage commitment, you don’t belong on extended duration service aboard the most glorious ships. Nuff said.

The second reason players favor solo play is they’re afraid their playtime will be wasted by others. If your Captain has no plan for you but to sit in a turret 8 hours/ week, fuck that. Who calls that “fun”? And yeah, there will be plenty of Captains who try this. Happily, the best will not and the cream is going to rise to the top.

I can imagine players on large ships segregating around whether they want to RP or not. Some will gather around the pool table with drinks and others may spend the time refitting the plasma conduits on deck 4. Point is, people will gravitate toward what they like. Some Captains will expect everyone to RP while serving as a bridge officer and others won’t care. Most will be somewhere between. However, the best Captains will keep their crews engaged and entertained, and some may even keep moral officers.

I posted up the vid about living aboard the Corsair because that group is working this kind of stuff out now, and we can all learn from it.

To sum up: if you want to Captain or crew one of the glory ships in game in long duration service, you have to have both commitment and creativity. I know the former is in short supply to many in some generations. If you never played team sports this will hurt you now. Call and complain to your parents. But. . .the good news is it’s only a game. While other players will run out of patience with repeat offenders, we’re really all here just to have a good time. Knowing that should help you relax.

 

[FZD]

NPCs would be more skilled than blades in turrets (so long as your ship even has room for a blade), that NPCs have to be paid, and receive more pay for higher and more skills (seems player NPCs won't need to be paid), and will not be as skilled as players in roles like turret gunner.

I got to say, I've seen some players who would make it pretty difficult for anything to be below their skill level. Like how do you do worse than accidentally opening fire on a neutral ship, turning it hostile and THEN missing every single shot you take?

CIG is not going to allow us to utterly replace players on the multi-crew ships unless you're willing to fly with a relatively unskilled crew.

Regardless of what CIGs vision might've one day been, there are now multi-crew ships where you pretty much have to fly with full NPC crew most of the time. Like take Banu Merchantman. What's the game loop here? You're going to sit next to a settlement for 45 minutes trading with locals, unloading and loading cargo. Then you spend 15 minutes flying through high or medium-high security space with very low chances of meeting pirates of any kind, and then you repeat. Maybe you can occasionally find a second player who likes to roleplay a space sales associate, but for someone who wants to be, and is actually good at being, a turret gunner that whole gameplay loop is nowhere near what they want to do. So yeah, you'll be flying with NPCs, and you'll be having a horde of NPC escort ships.

What TEST can do, and what we should do, is have a group of turret gunners and escort pilots on a discord channel ready to remote control an NPC on a really short notice. That way they can entirely avoid the gameplay loops they aren't interested in, and just jump from firefight to firefight - the part of the game they enjoy.

I don't think people remember what CIG has said from day one about multi-crew ships.

CIG says a lot of things. One thing they like to repeat often, is that everything is subject to change.

Try to think of it the other way around for a moment. Anyone can buy a ship. That makes them a Captain. It does not make them a good Captain. If using players onboard did not have significant advantages, why would anyone team up and play the way CIG has said they're hoping for?

Having actual brains is already enough of an advantage. Hireable NPCs do not need to be somehow gimped to prop up human players. Just being able to tell your turret gunner that the cockpit is on fire and it needs to be put out pronto, and you can't do it since you're piloting the ship and it'd be kinda bad to stop evading shots, just that alone makes human players superior to NPCs. CIG doesn't need to intentionally make NPCs be bad at shooting or anything like that.

 

[Shadow Reaper]

What TEST can do, and what we should do, is have a group of turret gunners and escort pilots on a discord channel ready to remote control an NPC on a really short notice. That way they can entirely avoid the gameplay loops they aren't interested in, and just jump from firefight to firefight - the part of the game they enjoy.

That’s brilliant. Let’s hope that’s on the table. I don’t recall whether they said NPCs would be assignable to others than their players. If they are, a tool that allows this to happen quickly in real time would really maximize the value of a large org.

As to CIG changing their minds about this or that, I suggest people resist the wishful thinking. CIG’s position here is quite clear and necessary to protect the integrity of the game. Otherwise players really are replaced by bots and that can’t have a happy ending. One thing that does not change is human nature, and that nature is why this issue comes up so often. Players want the benefits of large, multi-crew ships without the hassles of the crew and CIG has explained why this is not going to happen. When you see someone post “I’m unconvinced NPCs can handle my ships” that’s happening because a player is trying to convince themself they can successfully operate large multi-crew ships solo, and it just ain’t so.

Of course you can unsuccessfully operate such ships solo, but that’s a whole different issue. Yes, a troll can buy a Polaris, fly it solo with no NPCs, target and destroy other ships on their own and pretend that’s gaming. I’m sure it will happen but that’s not what we were discussing.

 

[FZD]

That’s brilliant. Let’s hope that’s on the table. I don’t recall whether they said NPCs would be assignable to others than their players. If they are, a tool that allows this to happen quickly in real time would really maximize the value of a large org.

Indeed, let's hope. And I mean, considering the distances you need to cover and time it takes to get from one end of the star citizen universe to the other, there basically has to be some sort of mechanism for remotely joining a party. They said they don't want your character to teleport around, but that remote control of NPCs is still considered.

As to CIG changing their minds about this or that, I suggest people resist the wishful thinking. CIG’s position here is quite clear and necessary to protect the integrity of the game. Otherwise players really are replaced by bots and that can’t have a happy ending.

I wouldn't say 'replaced' seen how the plan has always been that the universe is mostly NPCs. Most of the pirates you encounter are NPCs, most of the bounties you hunt are NPCs, most of the trading vessels you rob are NPCs. Was it like, 90% of everything was supposed to be NPCs? Something like that. And there is definitely plans for having large parts of your crew be NPCs as well, I mean, that's the reason they're making hireable NPCs and AI blades.

Players want the benefits of large, multi-crew ships without the hassles of the crew and CIG has explained why this is not going to happen. When you see someone post “I’m unconvinced NPCs can handle my ships” that’s happening because a player is trying to convince themself they can successfully operate large multi-crew ships solo, and it just ain’t so.

In the Polaris Q&A, they said your options are to either use AI crew, bring friends, or do both (I mean, good luck getting 6-14 friends pop in on regular basis, so anyone flying Polaris will probably have mostly if not exclusively NPC crews outside of org events / larger orgs). Of course players are more efficient, but the plan definitely is that AI crews are entirely viable even for larger ships. Especially for non-combat behemoths.

And even on Polaris, with all that crew, how many jobs really benefit that much from a player be more efficient? I mean, sure, all jobs benefit from having the player do them to some degree, but you need to always consider whether or not that player would be more efficient flying an escort fighter than being the torpedo loader or something. So even when you do have players available, you might just put them outside of the ship and hire few NPCs instead.

 

[Vavrik]

This is a lot of theorycrafting. I'm totally thinking the dependance on NPC's' is currently misplaced. We need to see them, not assume what they do. We also need to see what "Hanger pass" means. That might make a hanger available to you even far from home, so if you end up in a situation without crew, you just keep your ship parked. That's also theorycrafting.

But I'm really thinking @Shadow Reaper has it right. CIG wants us to have player groups, and learn ways around the limitations that imposes. We have been using Discord to organize that kind of interaction, and it works for the most part so far.

In Discord: We have had player groups on the go for at least a couple of years. Those events have taught us a lot.
Example, during IAE, we had a player group of over 30 players, and we got it to work - but it took a lot longer than it should have to get everyone in place. Also, you get that many players in a group, one is within 2 minutes of requiring a bathroom break, 3 need to deal with their wife or kids, and 2 need to eat before they pass out - all this right when something is happening. That's always going to happen with a group that size. Now is the time to be finding out what we can handle.

But as far as NPC's go, the proof is in the pudding, as the saying goes.

 

[Garonman]

I do not really trust NPC's at the moment, not till I see them working. I'm going to dock their pay if I catch them standing on the ship's fixtures and equipment instead of doing their jobs.

You know damn well there will be the doctor NPC standing on your pool table in your Galaxy medical ship.