Suggestion to cap out miner performance at a lower skill level.

[Imperial Good]

To reward pilot and crew skill, miners currently gain increased mining speed based on their combined skill. For mining resources like silicon the difference from skill is huge. However, to reward more difficult activities like combat, mining as an activity caps out levelling up crew around, usually just before, 3 stars. This results in the silly situation where a fighter pilot and service crew who made a few lucky kills to get to 4 or 5 star can be transferred into a mining ship and instantly start to mine silicon a lot better than crew who have literal hundreds of hours of experience mining silicon. As such my suggest would be to add a cap to miner performance from skill at roughly the skill level that miners can obtain naturally by mining.

Setting this cap at 3 stars, this would mean a 3 star miner would perform the same as a 5 star miner. As mining can level crew to roughly 3 stars, this means that letting your miners level up by mining will eventually result in them turning into very good miners automatically, drastically lowering the micro management required to get good silicon miners. This also makes sense from a logic perspective since someone who has been mining for hundreds of hours is probably going to be about as good as they get when it comes to mining, and will not get massively out done by some ace pilot and crew who has never mined an asteroid before.

Implementing the cap would involve a range compression so the mining performance with respect to level. The values between level 0 (0 star) and level 15 (5 star) would be compressed to occur between level 0 and level 9 (3 star). A limit would then used to force levels 10 and above to act like level 9 as far as the performance calculations go. If this results in miners becoming too effective due to the increase in number near the level 9 cap, then a reduction in the best case performance of 20% to 30% could be used.

The result of this change, as experienced by a player, should be that freshly hired miners are still very slow at mining ores and silicon but after many hours they improve significantly by themselves, without requiring player micro management. Existing saves with long playtime should notice an overall increase in mining speed for ore and silicon due to their miners all being close to the new skill crap. Resources like gasses and ice are unlikely to be affected much as crew skill did not show much impact to mining performance of such resources when I tested it.

[dtpsprt]

I don't think that caping the miners is a good idea... Caping, in general, is a bad thing both in game(s) and real life because it takes out the insentive.

A good idea to implement what you want to achieve and way closer to real life situations, even though I do not know the difficulty in programming such a thing, would be to drop performance (stars) by 30% or even 50% when changing ship category, both in pilots and crew, even from S to M to L to XL of the same "kind" like fighters or miners. After that they start progressing in their new role.

It makes sense in many ways. First of all everybody needs some time to acclimatise in new situations. Then a fighter pilot would start treating his miner as fighter(!!!) untill bitter experience makes them understand the differences and think differently. The same goes the other way, a miner pilot for example can not utilise the nimbleness of a fighter. Air Forces around the world realise this thing, so they keep fighter pilots as fighter pilots and rarely transfer them to bombers or, even worse, cargo.

[LandogarX4]

To reward pilot and crew skill, miners currently gain increased mining speed based on their combined skill. For mining resources like silicon the difference from skill is huge. However, to reward more difficult activities like combat, mining as an activity caps out levelling up crew around, usually just before, 3 stars. This results in the silly situation where a fighter pilot and service crew who made a few lucky kills to get to 4 or 5 star can be transferred into a mining ship and instantly start to mine silicon a lot better than crew who have literal hundreds of hours of experience mining silicon. As such my suggest would be to add a cap to miner performance from skill at roughly the skill level that miners can obtain naturally by mining.

Setting this cap at 3 stars, this would mean a 3 star miner would perform the same as a 5 star miner. As mining can level crew to roughly 3 stars, this means that letting your miners level up by mining will eventually result in them turning into very good miners automatically, drastically lowering the micro management required to get good silicon miners. This also makes sense from a logic perspective since someone who has been mining for hundreds of hours is probably going to be about as good as they get when it comes to mining, and will not get massively out done by some ace pilot and crew who has never mined an asteroid before.

Implementing the cap would involve a range compression so the mining performance with respect to level. The values between level 0 (0 star) and level 15 (5 star) would be compressed to occur between level 0 and level 9 (3 star). A limit would then used to force levels 10 and above to act like level 9 as far as the performance calculations go. If this results in miners becoming too effective due to the increase in number near the level 9 cap, then a reduction in the best case performance of 20% to 30% could be used.

The result of this change, as experienced by a player, should be that freshly hired miners are still very slow at mining ores and silicon but after many hours they improve significantly by themselves, without requiring player micro management. Existing saves with long playtime should notice an overall increase in mining speed for ore and silicon due to their miners all being close to the new skill crap. Resources like gasses and ice are unlikely to be affected much as crew skill did not show much impact to mining performance of such resources when I tested it.

I fully agree with you. It is absurd that transferring a 5 star combat pilot into a mining ship would increase its performance by a huge percentage. It also contributes to M miners being unusable in the late game. You simply cannot afford to transfer a 5 star pilot to an M ship and risk losing it to some Khaak. But 3-star M miners can in no way compete with 5-star L miners.

[Imperial Good]

would be to drop performance (stars) by 30% or even 50% when changing ship category, both in pilots and crew, even from S to M to L to XL of the same "kind" like fighters or miners. After that they start progressing in their new role.

This would result in the situation where you transfer combat crew via a miner, using it as a sort of "people storage", just to have them lose a ton of skill in the progress even though they never did any mining and were only there for a few minutes or even just a few seconds.

[dtpsprt]

would be to drop performance (stars) by 30% or even 50% when changing ship category, both in pilots and crew, even from S to M to L to XL of the same "kind" like fighters or miners. After that they start progressing in their new role.

This would result in the situation where you transfer combat crew via a miner, using it as a sort of "people storage", just to have them lose a ton of skill in the progress even though they never did any mining and were only there for a few minutes or even just a few seconds.

I think this is a thing of the past... now crews and even captains switching ships is done.

If you are talking about people using Incarcatua's for troop transports these are mostly "raw meat" Marines, just bought off the self of the nearest Equipment Dock to be used in mass in flybyboardings. Cutting a 2/5* marine in half, resulting in a 1/5 Marine is nothing.

If someone has gone as far as Terraforming 1st I don't see the reason for so many 5* Marines and 2nd when people reach that stage, they can surely afford a nice Rattlesnake, Syn or Asgard to "stow" them.

Besides, supposing this will not be another "well hidden" Egosoft mechanic, the players will know and act accordingly anyway.

[GCU Grey Area]

If you are talking about people using Incarcatua's for troop transports these are mostly "raw meat" Marines, just bought off the self of the nearest Equipment Dock to be used in mass in flybyboardings. Cutting a 2/5* marine in half, resulting in a 1/5 Marine is nothing.

Not always. I use high crew capacity ships such as Incarcatura as barracks. They're never used used for boarding operations (too slow for boarding in a hostile environment - prefer fast M warships for that). They're just a place to keep a few hundred HQ trained 4* & 5* marines & pilots until I'm ready to assign them to a ship. Would greatly diminish the value of HQ training if 1/2 of their abilities were lost immediately after leaving HQ.

As for the main point of the thread, how would it distinguish between a reassigned fighter pilot & one who has received formal training? If I go to all the trouble of moving my HQ & building training facilities on a planet I expect pilots (& marines) who have been through such training courses to perform better than their counterparts who have just been learning on the job.

[Raptor34]

If you are talking about people using Incarcatua's for troop transports these are mostly "raw meat" Marines, just bought off the self of the nearest Equipment Dock to be used in mass in flybyboardings. Cutting a 2/5* marine in half, resulting in a 1/5 Marine is nothing.

Not always. I use high crew capacity ships such as Incarcatura as barracks. They're never used used for boarding operations (too slow for boarding in a hostile environment - prefer fast M warships for that). They're just a place to keep a few hundred HQ trained 4* & 5* marines & pilots until I'm ready to assign them to a ship. Would greatly diminish the value of HQ training if 1/2 of their abilities were lost immediately after leaving HQ.

I too keep a bunch of 5/5/5s around on these mobile barracks to later distribute to my personal ships.
Seriously, losing skills is a dumb idea, maybe in X6 if they have a more full blown RPG system, in which case they'll just separate out the pilot skills anyway.

[jlehtone]

... separate out the pilot skills anyway.

Zillion specialized skills on each individual. Elaborate tables on which/how skills are "transferable".

The other view is that why have separate skills at all? Just one. A 5* is good at every post ...

[dtpsprt]

........................
The other view is that why have separate skills at all? Just one. A 5* is good at every post ...

Amen to that!!! Then again it would make Egosoft's life difficult capping everything at 3*

[Eyeklops]

I don't think this would break existing savegames and don't disagree with the general idea put forth. A question tho: Would this mining skill compression affect the AI factions as well? If it only affects player owned assets I don't see an issue. However, if every miner in the universe suddenly sees a performance bump unintended side effects may occur. The AI faction economies may get overdriven and need to be adjusted.

For a completely new game (X5?) I'd rather see piloting, mining, combat, and trading as separate skills from the start. I like the current mechanics for the NPC skill system and would love to see it expanded upon. It gives each NPC more potential to be unique and that feels more immersive to me.

[Raptor34]

... separate out the pilot skills anyway.

Zillion specialized skills on each individual. Elaborate tables on which/how skills are "transferable".

The other view is that why have separate skills at all? Just one. A 5* is good at every post ...

The game already has all these skills thought up, I think it's the transfer window? It has all these things like Black Marketer and all... It was probably planned in an early iteration or something. Dunno why it's still kept in game though.

........................
The other view is that why have separate skills at all? Just one. A 5* is good at every post ...

Amen to that!!! Then again it would make Egosoft's life difficult capping everything at 3*

But you're the one who first suggested dumping their skills because they became a miner from a combat pilot...

[Nanook]

This is a terrible idea. The real problem is that miners gain little, if any, experience as pilots while mining. What the OP is suggesting would basically eliminate having high level miners capable of mining silicon at a reasonable rate. And as this is a single player game, the OP could simply not use their terraform trained 5* pilots as miners, and let those who wish to do so, do so. Citing real life in an X game that has nothing to do with Real Life?

[Raptor34]

This is a terrible idea. The real problem is that miners gain little, if any, experience as pilots while mining. What the OP is suggesting would basically eliminate having high level miners capable of mining silicon at a reasonable rate. And as this is a single player game, the OP could simply not use their terraform trained 5* pilots as miners, and let those who wish to do so, do so. Citing real life in an X game that has nothing to do with Real Life?

Reread it. What OP is suggesting is making lvl 3 miners act like lvl 5 miners.

[dtpsprt]

...................

..........

Amen to that!!! Then again it would make Egosoft's life difficult capping everything at 3*

But you're the one who first suggested dumping their skills because they became a miner from a combat pilot...

Countering an absurd, IMHO, suggestion with an equally absurd but more fact based one is what I did...

[Raevyan]

Why not overhaul and fix the leveling system instead? A miner set to local automine should at least get to the point to be able to do adv and expert autominig. I‘ve got well over 200 hours in several saves and the first thing I do is set up local automining and mining stations. I‘ve yet to see any of those miners get to combined 3 star pilots…

The existing leveling system needs a complete overhaul and not some arbitrary workarounds trying to fix the issue.

[jlehtone]

Reread it. What OP is suggesting is making lvl 3 miners act like lvl 5 miners.

If you boost future 3* miners to what current 5* are, then extrapolate how great future 5* must become ...

We have some different views:

• Learn by doing : can and will learn, doing something else is no shorter route to becoming better
• Knowing the basics is already master : adding to 3* won't make you better
• Squirrel : yes, you were elite marine, but someone called you engineer so now a green again (forgot twice on marine->eng->marine)
• Skills galore : CP (combat), TP (trader), MP (miner) -- effective miner pilot skill = max( MP, a*CP, b*TP ), where a < 1 and b < 1. Gains MP while mining

[Maebius]

The entire way the crew is assigned, transferred and managed is super cumbersome and almost like playing excel in space.

[dtpsprt]

Why not overhaul and fix the leveling system instead? A miner set to local automine should at least get to the point to be able to do adv and expert autominig. I‘ve got well over 200 hours in several saves and the first thing I do is set up local automining and mining stations. I‘ve yet to see any of those miners get to combined 3 star pilots…

The existing leveling system needs a complete overhaul and not some arbitrary workarounds trying to fix the issue.

It was like you said before V3.00. The bad thing about it was that the shipyard could put 3, even 4* Captains on the ships it sold to the player. Some people were taking advantage of it buying 20 ships to get some 2-5 Captains like that, then sell the ships back to the shipyard...

At that time the Shipyard would just destroy the bought ships, instead of "recycling" them retrieving some of their components, so this player behaviour was actally bringing the faction's economy down as you can understand.

Instead of "introducing" retrieval of resources from the bought ships, Egosoft decided to put a cap on the 3rd star of Captains, making it quite difficult to gain more exp, except with fighting (and surviving).

Now, all the "old hands", me excepted, will tell you: "No use for something like that, just go into Terraforming so you can have a school for Captains and Marines doing it. It will take only about 2-3 days in game time to reach that point..."

Of course they don't say the amount it will cost to reach that point, or the amount of managing/micromanaging to do so, ignoring all the not managerial minded players (like myself) and that they prefer to stay in the cockpit of their personal ship flying around and blowing stuff apart or doing missions and storylines instead of building an empire. The only thing these people need (pilot/adventure/exploration/fight oriented) is a steady income that 3-4 Miners and 1/2 Autotraders can bring so they can enjoy what they want and have enough money for their repairs and upgrades...

Sadly Egosoft is following the "managerial way" IMHO.

The only "solution" is the Custom Editor, where you can give yourself 2-3 Miners and 1-2 Autominers and go on your merry way around the X Universe paying no attention to anything else...

[Raptor34]

Reread it. What OP is suggesting is making lvl 3 miners act like lvl 5 miners.

If you boost future 3* miners to what current 5* are, then extrapolate how great future 5* must become ...

We have some different views:

• Learn by doing : can and will learn, doing something else is no shorter route to becoming better
• Knowing the basics is already master : adding to 3* won't make you better
• Squirrel : yes, you were elite marine, but someone called you engineer so now a green again (forgot twice on marine->eng->marine)
• Skills galore : CP (combat), TP (trader), MP (miner) -- effective miner pilot skill = max( MP, a*CP, b*TP ), where a < 1 and b < 1. Gains MP while mining

Well, the OP was suggesting the 2nd option on your list... But I had a thought about it. Why not just make future 5 stars even greater then? You won't normally hit 5 stars anyway, you need to make external effort to train and then transfer pilots, so why not have a reward for it?
Personally I like No. 4, but on the condition that stats just... work better, so to speak, we all know how current AI is less than optimal. Oh, and without all these transferable skill sets, in my suggestion, effective miner skill would just be MP. Effective trader just TP and effective combat CP so on and so forth. Of course if Egosoft ever sorts out the AI to work fine, I would also like all these suggestions where you have crew with like turret skill, engine skill and all that crap. Not X4 though, maybe in X5. Hopefully in X6.

[GCU Grey Area]

Now, all the "old hands", me excepted, will tell you: "No use for something like that, just go into Terraforming so you can have a school for Captains and Marines doing it. It will take only about 2-3 days in game time to reach that point..."

Of course they don't say the amount it will cost to reach that point, or the amount of managing/micromanaging to do so, ignoring all the not managerial minded players (like myself) and that they prefer to stay in the cockpit of their personal ship flying around and blowing stuff apart or doing missions and storylines instead of building an empire. The only thing these people need (pilot/adventure/exploration/fight oriented) is a steady income that 3-4 Miners and 1/2 Autotraders can bring so they can enjoy what they want and have enough money for their repairs and upgrades...

Not necessarily. Takes me a couple of days to get to that point precisely because I don't play a managerial type game. I fly around doing generic & guild missions for the most part. The proceeds from those missions are spent on building up my HQ, first to get it mobile, & then to build a bubble city & the pilot/marine training facilities on an appropriate planet. Suspect it could well be a fair bit quicker to use an auto-miner/trader approach to raise the cash, I'd imagine having a passive income is quite nice. However bit too much management of assets required for that. Don't like to field freighters or miners until I've got a station for them to work at (so I can delegate the management role) & have an inexhaustible source of well-trained pilots to fly them, particularly important for efficient use of miners.