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[Dwarfslayer]

I recently took a couple of ill-advised fights against a large bounty target. I managed to walk into a few torpedoes and lost most of my fleet. However the proportion of crew I lost did not appear to be in line with the capacity of the ships I was working with.

I started the battle with a fleet of an Eagle, a Falcon, a Wolf and one Tug. I deployed the Eagle and Falcon, losing them both and subsequently announcing a retreat. I successfully disengaged with the enemy only to find my burn speed reduced to 0 (although I could still move slowly) as what appeared to be a bizarre clowns-in-car scenario arose where I had over a hundred and fifty crewmembers packed into one Wolf and a Tug.

The fleet I had just lost to then repeatedly ran me down and harassed me but wouldn't force an engagement as it thought I could escape. After a couple of minutes of repeatedly clicking through harassment dialogue my logistics of 0 eventually destroyed my last ships and I escaped the cycle, though not before the Wolf was destroyed by a critical accident leaving 99 crew (significantly more than half) still standing around on my tug alone.

I'm not sure how crew is really handled, but I would guess that when my cruisers were destroyed I lost crew close to their normal operating capacity, rather than some amount proportional to how many people I could support with my fleet. To be clear I wasn't significantly overcrewed (or at all iirc) when entering the fight either.

[Midnight Kitsune]

And since you can't space the extra crew members, you're boned until you get to a place to sell or drop them off

[dmaiski]

lol this bug is epic feature!

[Debido]

Actually...not a bug...Alex removed the feature allowing spacing of excess crew on purpose.

[OOZ662]

Still doesn't make sense to stuff more meatbags in a ship by mass than the amount of metal that makes up its structure, however.

I think combat crew calculations are all based on the skeleton crew value rather than the max level, which seems odd as I'd think a combat vessel would be fully staffed upon deployment.

[Debido]

As absurd as it is, yes, I can easily fit over 50,000 people into my little frigate...somehow...at a drain of over 5000 supplies per day

[Alex]

Right, it's basically "how it works". More crew should probably be lost (i.e. spare non-skeleton crew) from combat engagements you've lost, though. I'll see if I can work that in eventually.

As absurd as it is, yes, I can easily fit over 50,000 people into my little frigate...somehow...at a drain of over 5000 supplies per day

At that point, they're really not in the frigate. We're talking hastily-welded-together temporary "habitats" not really all that suited for providing life support. Of course, if you don't have the supplies, then it's not even that, which is reflected in how quickly you'll lose this extra crew.

(Also, moving to "suggestions", in lieu of locking.)

[dmaiski]

At that point, they're really not in the frigate. We're talking hastily-welded-together temporary "habitats" not really all that suited for providing life support. Of course, if you don't have the supplies, then it's not even that, which is reflected in how quickly you'll lose this extra crew.

probably one of my favourite features of SS

I love being able to do that, and its fairly reasonable as a method of storage in space

[Midnight Kitsune]

Supplies: The Omni Gel of the Sector!

[Wyvern]

Right, it's basically "how it works". More crew should probably be lost (i.e. spare non-skeleton crew) from combat engagements you've lost, though. I'll see if I can work that in eventually.

Only if you end up over capacity on crew, I'd think?  I mean, if I had spare non-skeleton crew, I certainly wouldn't be sending them into battle unless that was really the only place I could put them...

((Well, actually, realistically, I would send some, but that's because, realistically, taking hull damage would result in crew casualties immediately rather than deferred to the end of combat.  Although, with CR, we actually could model a ship taking crew losses during battle... but then you'd need to be able to micromanage how much extra crew you were assigning to each ship, and that'd just get messy.))

[ahrenjb]

Right, it's basically "how it works". More crew should probably be lost (i.e. spare non-skeleton crew) from combat engagements you've lost, though. I'll see if I can work that in eventually.

As absurd as it is, yes, I can easily fit over 50,000 people into my little frigate...somehow...at a drain of over 5000 supplies per day

At that point, they're really not in the frigate. We're talking hastily-welded-together temporary "habitats" not really all that suited for providing life support. Of course, if you don't have the supplies, then it's not even that, which is reflected in how quickly you'll lose this extra crew.

(Also, moving to "suggestions", in lieu of locking.)

Alex, now that a reputation system is in, what about allowing spacing of crew again? You can space crew, but you'll take a reputation hit with every faction, or every nearby faction at least. This keeps the option available, but provides a reason not to do it. Seems more "immersive" to me.

[Alex]

Right, it's basically "how it works". More crew should probably be lost (i.e. spare non-skeleton crew) from combat engagements you've lost, though. I'll see if I can work that in eventually.

Only if you end up over capacity on crew, I'd think?  I mean, if I had spare non-skeleton crew, I certainly wouldn't be sending them into battle unless that was really the only place I could put them...

Yeah, that probably makes sense.

Alex, now that a reputation system is in, what about allowing spacing of crew again? You can space crew, but you'll take a reputation hit with every faction, or every nearby faction at least. This keeps the option available, but provides a reason not to do it. Seems more "immersive" to me.

Maybe? While that sounds reasonable, it's one of those things where it's so low priority that I don't really see messing with it much, until there are more compelling reasons to do so.

[neptix]

At that point, they're really not in the frigate. We're talking hastily-welded-together temporary "habitats" not really all that suited for providing life support. Of course, if you don't have the supplies, then it's not even that, which is reflected in how quickly you'll lose this extra crew.

I'm just picturing this tug dragging several hundred people in spacesuits behind it on the tow cable, until they all run out of air.

neptix

[Punchclock]

Right, it's basically "how it works". More crew should probably be lost (i.e. spare non-skeleton crew) from combat engagements you've lost, though. I'll see if I can work that in eventually.

Only if you end up over capacity on crew, I'd think?  I mean, if I had spare non-skeleton crew, I certainly wouldn't be sending them into battle unless that was really the only place I could put them...

Yeah, that probably makes sense.

Alex, now that a reputation system is in, what about allowing spacing of crew again? You can space crew, but you'll take a reputation hit with every faction, or every nearby faction at least. This keeps the option available, but provides a reason not to do it. Seems more "immersive" to me.

Maybe? While that sounds reasonable, it's one of those things where it's so low priority that I don't really see messing with it much, until there are more compelling reasons to do so.

I think that jettisoning crew would work really well with a morale mechanic, I don't think any spaceman would appreciate having a captain telling them to chuck their friends out of the air lock.